Nuclear power is gaining a lot of hype lately as an answer to US energy needs. Proponents of nuclear power are extolling the ability of nuclear generators to produce terawatts of power without carbon emissions and that this will reduce our dependence on foreign resources and thereby improve national security.
As energy demands increase around the globe more and more nations are looking to nuclear power as an answer. After a decades old ban, nuclear supplier countries are reaching an accord with India opening the atomic reactor market worth tens of billions of dollars to companies like France’s state-controlled Areva, Westinghouse and General Electric of the U.S. to Russia’s Rosatom.
Electricity production produces approximately 40% of the world’s carbon emissions the other 60% coming from other sources. Converting all fossil fuel powered plants to nuclear energy would require an increase from 443 operating plants to 4,316 nuclear power plants by 2050 at a cost of $14.4 trillion. Here is the real kicker, according to “Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy Review”, a draft report prepared for the Australia government, using only 1,587 nuclear reactor generators would use all known uranium deposits in less than 40 years. Nuclear is not a renewable energy.
Nor would investing in nuclear power by any means reduce US dependence upon foreign resources. The US, the largest power consumer in the world using half again as much power as China, has a third the uranium reserves of Canada and one seventh those of Australia. Even a nuclear powered US would be heavily dependent upon foreign resources.
There is also the matter of carbon neutrality and nuclear power and the mining of uranium, just like coal, produces carbon emissions. During the lifetime of a nuclear power plant, roughly 40 years, the disposal of radioactive waste, decommissioning, and other continued maintenance adds both carbon emissions and cost.
The numbers quoted in the draft report above are based upon current energy demands. However, investor owned utilities and power generators do not operate on zero growth, quite the contrary they required sustained annual growth of 2, 3 or 5% to justify placing capital into an industry. Using the ‘Rule of 72’ the exponential growth to maintain a 5% annual increase means that power consumption must double every fourteen years.
Doubling means just that, instead of 4,316 nuclear power plants by 2050, the world would require twice as many plants every fourteen years! In other words, uranium supplies would be depleted even sooner and the infrastructure wasted.
There is no substitute for conservation and there is no time left to waste to convert to and improve upon existing renewable sources. Carbon emitted today will last 100 years and only then dissipate to about 37% of its original concentration. Planting trees can help but even a total cessation of carbon pollution would not clear the planet of what has already been produced.
The sun produces, each day, enough energy to run our planet through both solar and wind technologies. It just makes sense to invest our time, energy and resources into sustainable and renewable resources. The last thing we want is to fight wars over uranium.