By Pat Mahony

Pat Mahony is an Environmental Researcher at ANSTO and former president of the Young Scientists of Australia.

So, what does nuclear power mean to you? For many, it means green glow, Chernobyl and Homer Simpson. Throw in the words ‘dangerous’,'meltdown’, ‘cancer’ and ‘radioactive waste’ and you have a frightening picture of a technology that supplies around one-sixth of the world’s electricity.

But if nuclear power is so unsafe, then why is almost every developed country in the world including it as part of a long-term energy strategy?

Why are governments from the USA to Vietnam, from Japan to Finland planning to construct or commission new nuclear power reactors in the near future? Why did two towns in Scandinavia recently compete with each other to be chosen as the site for a radioactive waste dump?

People have many genuine concerns about nuclear power and its impact on the world, but these same people also report that they also feel uninformed about nuclear power. Part One of this post will illuminate the basic issues associated with nuclear power. Part Two will delve into the environmental and safety concerns.

Fuel assembly

What is nuclear power?

Nuclear power uses the energy contained in the nucleus of the atom to produce electricity. The forces holding together the atomic nucleus are extremely strong, and breaking these forces causes huge amounts of energy to be released, much of it in the form of heat. This heat can be harnessed to create steam, which then powers turbines to create electricity. Not all atomic nuclei are suitable to create nuclear power: current reactors use a heavy element, uranium, as their fuel.

Where does the nuclear fuel, uranium, come from?

Uranium occurs naturally and is reasonably common in the Earth’s crust, occurring naturally in soil, rocks and oceans. Like many other mineral resources, uranium is mined, and then sold as uranium oxide. Australia has approximately 40% of the world’s known uranium resources, and is the world’s third largest supplier (after Canada and Kazakhstan).

Uranium is distributed in a number of locations around the globe, and half the world’s supply comes from stable democracies with strong systems of security and safeguards. The wide distribution also means that interruption of one supplier is easily covered by another. This distribution is markedly different than that of fossil fuels, which are often concentrated in politically volatile regions.

One of nuclear power’s advantages is that fuel only forms a very part of its operating costs, and it is relatively independent of the price of its fuel: a 100% increase in the cost of uranium translates to an increase of about 15% in the cost of nuclear power, compared to 40% for coal and 75% for gas.

Is nuclear power really expensive?

It is true that to build a nuclear power plant is an expensive exercise. In a country like Australia, with no nuclear power reactors, it would be even more expensive, due to first-of-a-kind costs, and establishing the necessary safe guards. Even in countries with well-established nuclear power networks, it is far more expensive to build a nuclear power plant than a gas- or coal-fired power plant.

The situation changes once a nuclear power plant is constructed – nuclear power plants are cheap to run. Operational and maintenance costs are very low when compared to other technologies. If Australia established nuclear power, the cost would also include the cost for waste disposal and for environmental impact, the only power technology that takes this into account (i.e. the price of coal power doesn’t include the cost to the environment).

When all these factors are taken into account, nuclear power would be more expensive than current coal power, but cheaper than some technologies, such as solar photovoltaic. However, this situation would change if a ‘carbon tax’ (of the order of $25-40 per tonne carbon dioxide) was introduced as part of a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. This would make nuclear power cost competitive with fossil fuel technology, as it would not be affected.

The environmental and safety concerns will be tackled in Part Two.

For those interested, an interactive exhibition called ‘Nuclear Matters’ will be running at the Powerhouse Museum until August 30.

For those interested in the Young Scientists of Australia group – a group that promotes science to Australian youth – see its website, here.

Tags: nuclear

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