Posts Tagged China Syndrome

Nuclear Power Can Save the World- If We Let It

Tomorrow marks the anniversary of a dull and factually inaccurate movie that was released some 31 years ago depicting a meltdown at a nuclear power plant.A week and a half after that, a partial core meltdown occurred at a nuclear reactor in the eastern United States.I’m referring of course to the movie The China Syndrome and the meltdown at Three Mile Island that eerily coincided with the movie’s release.That was March 28, 1979, the day the American public decided to abandon nuclear power.Amazingly, despite some incredible advances, many left wing progressives are still stuck in this era of nuclear technology despite the fact that, as it stands right now, nuclear power is the most likely solution to achieving the 0 carbon emissions before 2050.

Obama, in his deliberative, reasoned way, has rightly concluded that nuclear power must be a cornerstone of our energy production in the future.And for this he is facing a backlash from the left.Recently in the Huffington Post, Sierra Club director Carl Pope and actor Alex Baldwin both wrote anti-nuclear pieces.A few weeks ago,Keith Olbermann did an anti-nuclear piece on his (usually excellent) show.I’m sure all have what they think are good reasons to oppose nuclear energy,but they are wrong, uninformed, and frankly stuck 30 years in the past.That wouldn’t be so dangerous if we didn’t need to move into the future- like now.

In my opinion, the new starting point in this discussion is Bill Gates’ most recent TED talk.If you haven’t seen it yet, it is a must watch.The overall thesis is “innovate to zero.”We need zero carbon emitted per energy unit produced to solve the climate crisis, period.According to all the scientific data he reviewed, no amount of cutting emissions short of cutting them all makes the problem any better.He then goes on to talk about the 4 most viable solutions he’s analyzed: carbon capturing and storage, wind, solar (photovoltaic and thermal), and nuclear.

Gates himself hopes that hundreds of companies innovate in all of these areas, and from that, one or several solutions to this problem might materialize.He doesn’t rule any of them out.But it also seems clear that, barring any unforeseen new breakthroughs, nuclear power is by far the front runner.A molecule of Uranium has about a million times the energy as a molecule of coal, making it the only carbon-free energy source that can produce the energy we need in the amounts we need it at the cost we need it to be.

Wind and solar simply require too much space.As Gates points out, it is the difference between energy production and energy farming.Vast expanses of windmills and solar panels we would have to be built, and transporting energy at that scale would be daunting.It has been suggested that we could cover the Mohave Desert in solar panels and power the nation.Of course that means transporting enough energy across the country to power say, New York City.Not a trivial issue.

Carbon storage is even worse.First of all, to actually capture and store 100% of all carbon emissions is an engineering challenge to rival that of building a nuclear plant.It isn’t cheap or easy.Plus, if you think nuclear waste is a problem, this carbon waste will be worse.No, it isn’t radioactive, but there will be much, much more of it.So we would have this huge volume of waste we would have to secure in the Earth somehow and as Bill Gates puts it “hope it stays there.”

Now look at nuclear.Expensive to build the plant, but cheap thereafter, nuclear energy has the potential to dramatically lower energy prices and provide us an abundance of carbon-emission-free energy.But what of the waste, the safety issues, and nuclear proliferation, you ask?I am now aware of 2 different approaches that address each of these concerns.One is the approach of TerraPower, Bill Gates’ nuclear startup.The other involves technology that was developed in the late 1950’s but was literally forgotten about until the year 2000: Thorium based reactors.

To understand both of these advances, the first thing to know is today 100% of all nuclear energy in the world is produced using uranium U-235.Expensive, hard to make, and it leaves behind a lot of radioactive waste.The Gates approach with TerraPower is to use U-238 instead.U-238 is, in fact, what we currently refer to as “nuclear waste.”That’s right, Gates can provide power by burning our existing stockpiles of nuclear waste.He estimates that the waste in storage at Paducah, KY is enough to power the United States for 200 years.In addition to this amazing feat, it is also much safer because each cylinder will burn for 60 years.This means a lot less swapping out of fuel, which is a safety risk.The technique produces very little waste, and even that can be recycled.No need for a Yucca mountain.

Even more exciting than this approach perhaps, are thorium based reactors.At the dawn of the nuclear age the director of the Oak Ridge National Lab, Alvin Weinberg built a small Thorium reactor and published his work in a book titled Fluid Fuel Reactors.The U.S. government in the 60’s wasn’t unaware of his work either, they deliberately choose to use Uranium based reactors because uranium fueled reactors produce plutonium, which can be used to make nuclear weapons.They wanted power and nuclear weaponry.Using uranium got them the proverbial two birds with one stone.Nowadays, we no longer want one of those birds.

Enter NASA engineer Kirk Sorensen, who found Fluid Fuel Reactors languishing on a shelf collecting dust.He was fascinated and took it home for further review.After close analysis of the text, he believed he had found the solution to our energy woes, and has slowly been persuading the government and the public of that ever since.

Thorium based reactors produce minuscule amounts of waste, effectively eliminating that problem.Also, it cannot be weaponized.This was a detriment in the Cold War era when we were in an arms race with the Soviet Union, but today is a major selling point.If Iran were building thorium based reactors, there would be no fuss about it.Finally, thorium is abundant on our planet.It takes a lot less effort and environmental destruction to mine thorium than to mine uranium.Wired magazine wrote a piece on thorium in their Jan. 2010 issue.In it, they provide this comparison:

If that isn’t a drastic improvement, I don’t know what is.Small and cheap, these plants can fit into existing cities, where traditional plants need to be built far away from population centers.And while there are design challenges to using thorium on a mass scale, the concept has already been proven- 50 years ago!Weinberg and his team performed hundreds of tests on it into the early 70’s and demonstrated the effectiveness of their approach.

Gates’ TerraPower will need a little more work in the R&D department, but computer simulations have demonstrated that their approach is doable.They key thing is that both approaches address the traditional nuclear energy problems: safety, proliferation and nuclear waste.

Opponents of nuclear energy have long used the talking point that there have not been any nuclear advances in this country for decades.This was true, as would be expected after our national consensus to give up on nuclear in the late 70’s, but is true no longer.Americans are right at the center of the R&D phase of this nuclear renaissance, but it is not clear whether we, as a country, will gain much.Both China and India are making heavy national investments in these technologies.India especially has committed to a thorium program.Both France and Japan have been using nuclear power in greater and greater amounts.In France, 75% of their power comes from nuclear sources.These are the places that will benefit first from nuclear power advances, because they use it.

So like on many other fronts, the United States is falling behind the rest of the world, and I’m afraid that ironically, it is the forward-looking progressive movement that is holding us back with their worn, dated, and now obsolete arguments against using nuclear power.It is accurate, in my opinion, for the left to claim that the modern conservative movement thrives on fear mongering, especially concerning the issues of health care reform and terrorism.For those on the left doing the same on this nuclear issue, I must call out the hypocrisy.You are speaking not from a position of knowledge, but rather regurgitating talking points conceived by Jane Fonda 30 years ago.She wasn’t even qualified to give an opinion then really, and those talking points are even more irrelevant now.If you take climate change seriously (which you should), you should take nuclear power seriously.

As a left-leaning independent, statements by Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah usually cause me great irritation and increase my blood pressure.So I was surprised as anyone to wholeheartedly agree with him when he said, “I don’t know of anything more beneficial to the country… as nuclear energy powered by thorium.”The ellipsis in there is when he makes the caveat, “as far as environmentally sound power.”I think the statement is truer without it.