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2007 Nuclear Issues v29 10 |
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Written by Nuclear Issues
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Monday, 01 October 2007 |
Nuclear Issues is also available as a pdf download
Who has a waste problem
Not the nuclear industry but certainly other industrial activities.
The nuclear industry took a basic decision back in the 1950s. They
decided that since there was so little nuclear waste it made sense to
concentrate and isolate it from the environment. For the past sixty
year this unique course of action has been followed. Other industrial
activities have little option but to dilute and distribute their waste
in the environment.
Some years ago Lord Flowers published a report in which he suggested that no more nuclear plant should be built until the waste problem was solved. This was taken up with glee by the green environmentalists.
They have completely ignored Lord Flowers subsequent revision of his position. He said that international efforts had demonstrated adequately the techniques of waste management and that it should no longer be used as an argument for holding up nuclear power development.
Part of the problem has been the nuclear industry which is its own worst enemy. They have wrung their hands and said ‘we should have done more.’ This is complete nonsense. They have spent vast sums of money trying to estimate what dose a person in about a million years might experience if stupid enough to drill into a waste repository. In fact after 300 years nuclear waste will have decayed to a lower level of activity than the uranium from which it was formed in the first place. We could put it back in empty uranium mines but we can do much better than that by building repositories in stable geological structures. These structure include clay across southern England, disused salt mines in Cheshire which offer huge underground cavities and granite almost anywhere in northern England and Scotland. There is also the possibility of deep ocean silts, which are best, but as Greenpeace seems to have declared itself responsible for ocean dumping they have prevented even the carrying out of non-active research into the techniques.
The industry also developed the technology for recycle of the eighty or more percent of fuel not used in its first irradiation in a nuclear reactor. This involves the use of reprocessing and recycle of plutonium in MOX fuel or much more efficiently in fast reactors.
The technology is all fully developed and waiting to be taken off the shelf and dusted. But a few years ago it was declared uneconomic unless the price of new uranium rose by four or five times. Well it has risen by ten times so these technologies are now fully competitive.
So what about other industrial activities? They produce many tens of millions of tons of waste every year. It is quite impractical to think about concentrating and isolating this so most gets pushed out of tall stacks straight into the environment. Already we are seeing the effects on climate change and this is widely anticipated to get much, much worse. So which is the most alarming? The nuclear industry which in sixty years has produced enough waste to half fill a store at Sellafield in about a ten metre cube and will take another hundred years to fill OR tens of millions of tons of waste every year which is being spewed out into the environment.
A nuclear stalking horse
Is history about to repeat itself? Just as the mythical weapons of mass destruction were used to justify the war on Iraq, is the assertion that Iran is developing nuclear weapons now being used to justify an invasion to bring about ‘regime change’ in that country? It is widely believed access to oil was the underlying reason for the Iraq invasion, but this is only partially true. America could have bought Iraq oil, on the international market, paying in dollars under normal commercial terms.
The long standing convention that oil is priced in dollars is based on an agreement between Saudi Arabia, the swing producer of OPEC, which has been of great benefit to both parties; the US would protect the House of Saudi against invasion or domestic coup while the dollar is confirmed as the sole currency for international trading in oil. Dollars can only be printed by the US Government which can then buy its oil virtually free – and 60% of US oil is now imported. Other non-oil producing countries either have to sell goods to earn dollars with which they can purchase oil or use their own currency to buy dollars, thus sustaining the value of the dollar as the world’s de facto reserve currency and propping up the American economy whose foreign debt is now equal to nearly 10% of the world GNP.
Sadaam Hussein, by breaking ranks and selling oil in euros threatened this cosy arrangement and with it the American economy. To buy Iraq oil America would first have to buy euros. (It followed that one of the first actions of the US administration in Iraq was to restore the link between oil exports and the dollar.) Regime change was the inevitable consequence to protect the dollar and the whole American economy. Regime change in Iraq was also intended to warn other oil producing countries including Iran and Venezuela against adopting the same policy.
For Venezuela the failed coup against President Chavez was a warning shot, but Iran has refused to be cowed. Earlier this year the Iranian oil Minister told an OPEC meeting that Iran will sell its oil in all currencies.
It has since been reported that talks have been started with a Japanese refiner for payment in euros or yen.
The financial sanctions against Iran now announced by the US can be seen as a direct retaliation for this presumptuous attack on the pre-eminence of the dollar.
It has been suggested that some other countries may follow Iran’s lead. Algeria, Indonesia, Libya, Malaysia – all Islamic countries – and possibly Russia have been mentioned in this respect. On the other hand Norway and the UK, the two European oil exporting countries are both outside the Eurozone; they may prefer to sell their oil in dollars to protect their own dollar holdings. Any collapse of the dollar would not only damage the American economy but drag down the rest of the world as well This is a dispute in which there can be no winners and from which the whole world economy could suffer.
An attack on Iran by the US alone, or with the support of its usual hangers on, or by proxy from Israel will inflame the other Muslim oil producers and disrupt world oil supplies leading to steep oil price rises, causing widespread chaos of economic and social life; a forced devaluation of the dollar particularly if other oil producers follow Iran’s lead would also inevitably reflect on the worlds economy probably leading to a widespread recession.
The matter can only be sensibly resolved through a caution and serious international negotiation since the outcome will affect the whole world. But to succeed the negotiations must be on the principal issue – the role of the dollar as the sole international currency for oil trading. The dispute over the Iranian nuclear programme is only a side issue which should not be allowed to confuse or muddle the discussions; it is a separate matter that should be left to the IAEA to resolve.
The pretext of preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons comes too soon after the myth of Sadaam’s weapons of mass destruction to have much credibility, and it is only some 30 years ago that the US, under an agreement signed by Henry Kissinger, was offering Iran assistance in developing uranium enrichment, reprocessing, and reactor technology. The present US/ Iran confrontation will, if not resolved sensibly, have catastrophic consequences for the whole world, something we cannot afford to allow.
Nuclear to the rescue
There now can be little doubt about the threat of peak oil – the only question is the date when the present bumpy plateau of maximum production turns into a slow but continuing decline in output. Some claim that oil supply has already reached a peak as prices rise towards $100/barrel. Against this background a strikingly optimistic outline of future world energy supply was given at the ASPO-6 conference in Cork last month by Professor Bauquis of the French Institute of Petroleum (previously head of Strategy and Planning at Total) in which he saw the 21st century as “A nuclear golden age.” He summarised the resulting changes by year 2100 as:
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2000 |
2100 |
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| World population |
6 billion |
10 billion |
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| Primary energy |
10 Gtoe |
23 Gtoe |
| fossil |
86% |
40% |
| nuclear |
7% |
50% |
| renewables |
7% |
10% |
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| Final consumption |
6 Gtoe |
17 Gtoe |
| heat |
50% |
30% |
| electricity |
17% |
47% |
| technology |
33% |
12% |
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| Nuclear |
440 reactors |
3000 reactors |
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350 GWe |
6000 GWe |
This large growth in nuclear production is driven not only by the need for an alternative to fossil fuels but by economics. The cost of electricity from the available sources in euro/MWh is given as:
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2005 |
2100 |
| |
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| |
base |
CO2 $20/te |
base |
CO2 $100/te
oil $100/barrel |
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| nuclear |
38 |
38 |
43 |
43 |
| gas |
65 |
72 |
115 |
150 |
| heavy fuel |
96 |
106 |
170 |
220 |
| coal |
48 |
63 |
75 |
150 |
| wind |
62 |
62 |
50 |
50 |
Any attempt to predict events 100 years hence is more likely to be wrong than right – it enters the realm of science fiction or a Brave New World, but it is useful in indicating a possible means of sustaining energy supply – in a world facing a decline in oil output followed by gas, and eventually towards the end of the century by coal, through a significant expansion of nuclear power and to a lesser extent of renewable energies. Although with oil prices already approaching $100/ barrel the cost figures for fossil fuels by 2100 are likely to be considerably higher than Baquis has assumed to give nuclear an even greater economic advantage, as the prices of coal and gas will tend to increase in line with increases in the price of oil; and also if carbon emissions are confirmed as the main driver of global warming his 7% increase in fossil fuels, while perhaps realistic, is contrary to all the targets which now call for drastic cuts in fossil fuel consumption. This suggests that the nuclear and renewable share may have to increase even more than expected unless there is to be a dramatic fall in energy consumption and perhaps also in world population by 2010 with the consequences that the environmentalists now hope for. The growth in nuclear output will depend on the success of, for instance, plans such as the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and other national and international programmes in developing fast reactors and recycling fuels to extend uranium resources; it is also possible that by 2100 future developments might see an increase in solar and possibly marine energies to increase the contribution from renewable sources beyond the3% assumed.
It can however be expected that this vision of future energy supply will be strongly criticised by those environmental groups who have always looked to peak oil as the means of slowing or even of drastically reducing world population and the continuation of economic growth. One contributor to the ASPO conference has described “Peak oil as a gift – forcing us to take a hard look at the social traps … “ While Tom Burke, a longstanding critic of nuclear power wrote in 1978 - “Nuclear power lies at the heart of a vision of the future committed to an expansion of the present pattern of expansion of economic and industrial development. If we wish to argue for alternative patterns … then we must succeed in stopping the development of nuclear power. (Prof Burke is now regularly called upon to take part in BBC discussions of energy polic.) The idea of small self-governing communities “living in harmony with nature” in a return to a pre-industrial “golden age” is not without attraction, but reducing world population to the pre-industrial level of under 1 billion from the 6 billion today is inconceivable without some as yet unimaginable global disaster.
Nuclear heat
While nuclear power can be expected to meet the major share of the future electricity market, dual purpose or heat only reactors should replace fossil fuels in supplying low and high temperature heat for domestic and industrial use for which Baquis puts the demand at 5 Gtoe by 2100. Applications of nuclear heat have a long history and a large expansion can now be expected.
Heat from some of the earliest reactors in Russia and Sweden was used for district heating schemes. More recent designs such as the Asea-Atom “Secure” system were intended to be built in residential areas and one of the aims of the GNEP is a modular design in which a single load fuel would last the entire life of the reactor.
There is also the example of the Beznau heating network in Switzerland, in operation since the late 1990’s, where nearly 150 000 MWh of hot cooling water from the Beznau nuclear station is supplied to some 2000 private, industrial and agricultural consumers through a 35 km main piping network. This hot water would otherwise have been discharged as waste into the nearby river Aare.
In Sweden a prominent supporter of the Social Democratic party has recently called for an expansion of the nuclear programme to meet the growing demand for both electricity and heating. And as Baquis pointed out that while the oil producing countries have hitherto considered nuclear as a threatening competitive source of energy, (Iran is, an exception; a comprehensive nuclear programme was begun, with American support, under the Shah, see article Nuclear Iran, in Nuclear Issues April 2007), Algeria, the Gulf countries and Saudi Arabia, Libya, Indonesia etc are now looking towards nuclear power for both water desalination and electricity.
Transport
Limitations in supply and higher prices of oil will have their greatest impact on the transport sector which now takes about 60 % of total oil consumption of the OECD countries. With increasing GDP, vehicle ownership in the OECD, now at just over 600 million, has been predicted to rise to 900 million by 2030, but over the same period vehicle ownership in China could increase at a much faster rate from 20 million to nearly 400 million. If the other developing countries are included the world increase could be from 800 vehicles in 2002 to 2000 vehicles by 2030. For the UK the predicted increase from 31 million to 44 million vehicles by 2030 would require some 85% of oil consumption to be taken by transport with obvious problems if world oil production begins to decline before 2015.
Speaking at the ASPO-6 conference, Lord Oxburgh, former chairman of Shell UK, said that to meet the transport problem there was an urgent need to find alternative liquid fuels as well as to move away from the internal combustion engine. Coal and natural gas could be converted into liquid fuels but the carbon emission from their production and use would add to the global warming effect. The most promising alternatives were biofuels and electricity. Biofuel production should not be in competition with food for land and water, indicating the use of farm residues, wastes and perennial grasses. As an alternative to the ICE, the adoption of electric drive with improved batteries in hybrid or plug-in cars using nuclear generated electricity and, if electricity storage can be developed at a reasonable cost, from the intermittent renewables, wind, solar etc, should be promoted. A similar view was put forward by Baquis who saw the share of energy for ground transportation in 2000 of 98% oil and gas 1% nuclear, 1% others changing by 2100 to 30% oil and gas, 60% nuclear,10% others.
A rethink of the UK road transport policy is now urgently required. The emphasis should not be on relieving traffic congestion by building new roads but on increasing the reliance on public transport. Disused railway lines shut down in the Beeching cuts could be brought back into use for light rail while urban tramway systems should be more actively promoted. The cost of travel should also be subsidised to encourage the maximum take-up of these alternatives to the private car.
Nuclear and oil
Bauquis also anticipated a growing cooperation between the nuclear and oil industries whereby a nuclear heat and electricity could be utilised to increase production from existing reserves and to upgrade heavy oils using hydrogen produced by electrolysis or nuclear heat. This will inevitably add to the cost, and as Lord Oxburgh observed the immediate problem is the shortage of cheap oil. Nuclear heat and steam could be used to enhance conventional oil recovery, by extending oil reserves and production profiles, as well as exploiting shale oil deposits. Construction of two Candu reactors by 2016/7 has been proposed for oil production from the Canadian tar sands.
A change of emphasis required
The focus of concern up to now has been on global warming from the carbon dioxide released in burning fossil fuels, with international targets being set for large reductions by 2030 or 2050, and dire forecasts of the consequences if temperatures rise as predicted.
These concerns have masked the more immediate and urgent problem that the world will face, perhaps as soon as 2010 and certainly by 2020, if oil production stagnates or even begins to fall at a time when energy and especially electricity demands are set to grow. On this shorter timescale nuclear energy is the only available large scale and secure alternative source of electricity and heat. That it will at the same time reduce carbon emissions is an added bonus.
30 years ahead
If assessments of world energy 100 years ahead are entering the realm of science fiction can more reliance be placed on forecasts of up to 2030? This is the period covered in the latest projections by the IAEA. “Energy, Electricity and Nuclear Power for the period up to 2030.” We can surely dismiss the low projection which assumes that no other capacity beyond that which is currently under construction or firmly in the development pipeline is completed; the need for an additional and reliable energy source when faced with a certain decline of world oil and perhaps gas supply by 2030, coupled with the need to reduce consumption of fossil fuels to meet climate change targets makes that totally improbable. Under the high projection, which includes reasonable projects and plans, the global nuclear capacity is estimated to rise from the present 372 GWe to 679 GWe in 2030 – an average growth rate of about 2.5%/yr.
The major area of growth is in the developing countries of Asia which have already taken the lead in nuclear power expansion. Of the world’s 29 units now under construction 15 are in Asia, as were 26 the last 36 reactors to have been connected to the grid. Future growth is even more striking. Although India now gets less than 3% of its electricity from nuclear power, onequarter of the worlds nuclear plants under construction – 7 of the world’s 29 reactors – are in India. This expansion is planned to accelerate with an 8-fold increase in nuclear production by 2022 to meet 10 percent of the electricity supply and a 75-fold increase by 2052 to reach 26 percent of the electricity supply.
This 75-fold increase works out to an average of 9.4 percent/yr, about the same as average global nuclear growth from 1970 through 2004. So it’s hardly unprecedented.
China too is experiencing huge energy growth and is trying to expand every source it can, including nuclear power. It has four reactors under construction and plans a nearly five-fold expansion by just 2020.
But because China is growing so fast this would still amount to only 4 percent of total electricity, just twice the present figure of 1.9 percent.
In other Asia countries, Japan has 55 reactors in operation, one under construction, and plans to increase nuclear power’s share of electricity from 30 percent in 2006 to more than 40 percent within the next decade, while South Korea which connected its 20th reactor just last year, has another under construction and has broken ground to start building two more. Nuclear power already supplies 39 percent of its electricity Russia with 31 operating reactors and five under construction also has ambitious expansion plans, which could lead to the country becoming a full fuel-service provider, leasing fuel, and reprocessing spent fuel for other countries, and even leasing reactors.
Experience of nuclear power in Europe is mixed, although there are now 166 reactors in operation and six under construction. Four countries Austria, Italy, Denmark and Ireland are against nuclear power.
Belgium, now 55% reliant on nuclear electricity, Germany, 32% and Sweden 50% are also committed under earlier political decisions to phase out their existing nuclear stations, but it seems increasingly unlikely that these plans will ever be put onto effect as the twin pressures of climate change, the ever higher prices of fossil fuels as well as a decreasing availability of oil and gas strike home at a time when it also becomes apparent that the renewable energies can only make a minor contribution to energy supply.
Other European countries are already proceeding with new construction or are making plans to do so, these include Bulgaria, Finland, France, and Ukraine.
The UK will almost certainly join this group, although it may already be too late to avoid the very damaging electricity shortages that are only too likely within the near future.
The US now has 103 reactors providing 19 percent of the country’s electricity. For the last few decades the main developments have been in improving capacity factors and with power increases at existing plants and license renewals. 48 reactors have already received 20- year renewals bringing their operating lifetimes up to 60 years. There is now a renewed interest in building new stations to reduce the present reliance on imported oil and increase the reliability of electricity supply.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is reviewing four Early Site Permit applications while plans for some 30 new reactors are being considered.
The IAEA high projection may well turn out to be an understatement of what will need to be achieved within the next 30 years.
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Last Updated ( Friday, 07 December 2007 )
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