Nuclear Power

Common Cure or Inexcusable poison?

Brant Bagnall
12/9/08
 Have you ever thought about the U.S. energy crisis? Have you thought of

the many solutions to the energy crisis? Of the many solutions one of the best is

Nuclear Power Plants. Unfortunately a great percentage of the population of the

United States of America associate nuclear power plants with the emission of

dangerous gases and radiation. That fear is also associated with potential for

operating accidents and terrorist attacks because the uranium used in production

is used in tools of mass destruction. In addition to these concerns there is an

ever growing fear of the effects on the environment. This is considered an

environmental price in addition to the high price of building the power plants and

producing Nuclear Energy. However, a close scrutiny of the facts will show that

Nuclear Energy is viable, safe and cost-effective.

Many people think that coal is cheaper, safer and more abundant than

uranium fuel power plants. However coal as a source of energy comes with a

dangerous cost. Coal-fired power plants emit greenhouse gases that cause a lot

of pollution. A lot of which surprisingly is radiation, one of the biggest arguments

against nuclear power plants. But in fact if your friend lived next to a nuclear

power plant and you next to a coal-fired power plant you would take in more

radiation than your friend! (ORNL, 1). That is because of coal ash which in fact

contains silicon, aluminum, iron, calcium, magnesium, titanium, sodium,

potassium, arsenic, mercury, and sulfur [oxide] and a small amount of uranium

and thorium. (ORNL, 1). Most notable of which are arsenic, mercury, and sulfur

and that small amount of uranium and thorium which are dangerous on their own.

Arsenic is poisonous, Sulfur [oxide] contributes to acid rain and mercury, uranium
and thorium are radioactive. (ORNL, 1). That ash gets in the air and spreads

everywhere. Coal doesn’t seem so nice now does it?

“And now we know that all the time, people everywhere are absorbing

radioactive materials and radiation like mad.” (Gwyneth Cravens, 66). It’s

interesting that people look at something and right away label it, like how people

immediately label radiation as some horrid death creating tool. Radiation comes

from daily objects like a cell phone, a microwave, or the sun. The definition of

radiation is energy that travels in the form of waves or high speed particles. (EPA

[2], 1). So radiation is light that is moving in a wave like fashion. There are also

multiple kinds of radiation. Some kinds affect us and others don’t. There are

Alpha Particles, Beta Particles, Gamma Rays, X-Rays, and Neutrons. Alpha and

Beta particles cant affect us but the rest can. (N.R.C.). “Because our bodies are

mostly empty space, radiation usually passes through us uneventfully.” (Gwyneth

Cravens, 66). Our bodies are well equipped to handle radiation exposure.

(Gwyneth Cravens, 26). Even though you may think that radiation will turn you

into some mutated monster our bodies easily handle sunburns. The next time

you get a sunburn and you turn into a zombie you tell me. Luckily most of the

radiation is contained inside of a nuclear power plant, unless of course the core

melts down which is probably the worst thing that can possibly happen in a

nuclear power plant. The good news is that this has only happened twice.

Chernobyl is one of the two notable instances where the core melted.

Chernobyl was a Russian nuclear power plant where one of the three reactors

had a complete meltdown. This was caused when the operators had to test some
of the non nuclear parts of the plant. The operators had to disconnect some of

the safety circuits and, additionally, had to put the reactor into a very unstable

condition. Once the test was finished they decided to bring it back to full working

power. As they tried to do this the reactor’s uranium underwent super-criticality.

Super-criticality is dangerous because the uranium absorbs too many neutrons

and sends out to much energy. This was caused when the absorbing rods where

pulled out to quickly. The job of the rods is to control how many neutrons the

uranium atom absorbs in a certain amount of time, usually it allows one neutron

at a time. Since the rods where pulled out too quickly there were billions of

fissions happing at once. There was also a large amount of energy released,

which heated the core substantially more than required. The water around the

fuel was instantly turned into steam. This caused the core to heat up and

pressurized and several pipes to burst. The burst pipes made the reactor

impossible to control. As all this was happening several of the graphite blocks

that were used to make the core caught fire. The safety regulations were not as

good as they are now so the walls of the power plant where inches thick. That

allowed several products to be blasted through the walls of the plant. This spread

radiation everywhere. (H.P.S.). Three Mile Island was the only other accident that

is notable. The Three Mile Island accident was in 1979 and it was started by

equipment failure and operator’s lack of training. There was a slow loss of

cooling fluid to the heat producing core. It led to a partial melting of the fuel rod

cladding and the actual uranium fuel. It released a very small amount of

radioactive material in the process but nothing too bad. It was later found out that
the amount of the material was too small to affect the population in a noticeable

way. No operators or citizens were hurt in the process. (H.P.S.).

Another of the other major problems the public sees with nuclear power is

the possibility of terrorist getting a hold of nuclear material from the power plant.

That is almost impossible. Yes they can try but nothing short of taking out an

entire city’s communication array or trying to invade the U.S. with a sizable army

will work. The security before 9/11 was tough but now almost all dangerous

industries have had major overhauls in security including nuclear plants. Even if

the terrorists got their hands on it they would have to enrich the nuclear

substance into at the very least 20%. Alan M. Herbst says “[Highly Enriched]

Uranium that contains the isotope uranium 235 in a concentration of 20% or

more. Naturally occurring uranium has a uranium 235 content of about 0.7%.”

(ANL). To enrich uranium you have to add the isotope U-235 so it’s a certain

percent of the uranium. The problem with the enrichment process is that it is a

very complicated and long process. Alan M. Herbst said “A sample of U-235

must be enriched to a concentration of at least 2 to 3 percent to be viable as fuel

for civilian nuclear reactors in the production of electricity; while weapons-grade

uranium [Highly Enriched Uranium] is generally composed of 90% or more of U-

235 (these greater concentrations are achieved through very complex, large-

scale uranium enrichment operations).” (Alan M. Herbst, 129). He also stated “A

Radiological dispersal device (RDD) or ‘dirty bomb’ is a conventional explosive,

such as dynamite, accompanied by radioactive material. When such a device is

detonated, the radioactive material would be spread to the surrounding area.”

(Alan M. Herbst, 160). A dirty bomb is meant to spreads radiation as a way of

frightening people psychologically it is not meant to physically hurt people. (Alan

M. Herbst, 160). It quickly dissipates and is generally not a problem aside from

the fact that it causes mass panic. Behind the background radiation, the radiation

that is spread by the dirty bomb is not even noticeable as stated earlier in this

report.

There are a lot of ways to create energy. Some are better then others, and

some are just down right disgustingly horrible, like coal. All ways to create to

create energy leave some kind of byproduct. For instance as stated before on the

second paragraph, coal emits greenhouse gases when burnt. Also stated earlier

Coal and Uranium emit radiation when used to create energy. The problem is that

depleted or used Uranium is left after the plant is done using the Uranium pellet.

The good side is we have a large amount of uranium inside this country right

now. The E.P.A. stated that “In 2003, the U.S. Uranium ore reserves were

estimated at about 890 million pounds” (E.P.A.). That is very good considering

how much uranium is used in a 2 years of power producing period. The U.S. has

very rigorous laws pertaining to the use of uranium in Nuclear Power Plants. The

E.P.A. states that “Every 18 to 24 months nuclear power plants must shut down

to remove and replace the ‘spent’ Uranium fuel” (E.P.A.). This leads us to another

problem where to put this ‘spent’ fuel. “For fifteen years the U.S. high-level waste

management program has focused almost exclusively on the proposed

repository site at yucca mountain in Nevada” (MIT, 20). That could be a very bad

thing if others got a hold of that material. But the good news is that “Dry soil and
Rock can immobilize Radio nuclides that might escape…” (Gwyneth Cravens,

314). So the storage there is safe. As stated they radiation cannot escape into

nearby areas. That brings use back to the amount of waste. Gwyneth Cravens

said “If you could go to the visitor center at Oconee, and you had time to see only

one display, it should be the one of the little metal rod less than an inch long,

identical to one I first saw in a uranium mill. It’s a pellet of uranium dioxide that

weighs about as much as three pennies and produces the energy equivalent of

nearly a ton of coal.” (Gwyneth Cravens, 314).

The price of a plant is a bit of a problem. Something that antinuclear

associations talk about is the ‘price’ tag of the power. These associations forget

to mention one thing though, they figure into the price all the insurance that is

needed to build the plant. Gwyneth Cravens said that “More than $10 billion in

liability insurance has accumulated for the use in the event of a reactor incident.”

(Gwyneth Cravens, 214). In other words the reactors are already insured in case

something bad happens. This is regulated by The Price-Anderson act and has

worked extremely well for as long as the U.S. has had it. Another Quote from

Gwyneth Cravens is “Under the Price-Anderson Act the public has paid

nothing…” (214). As surprising as it sounds it is true, not one person from the

public has paid. But think about what could happen if each person in the United

States donated a small amount of money to fund Nuclear Power plants. It could

save our country from an ever growing need for energy. The fact is that we do

have enough funds to build plants over and over again from the Price-Anderson

Act. Another unseen cost is the cost to the environment. We have and will see oil
and coal destroy our country and our lives, but what will Nuclear power do? “The

European Union has found nuclear power’s external costs regarding the

environment and public health care lower than those of coal, gas, and solar

power. In terms of avoidance of damages related to ecosystems and global

warming that cost money, nuclear power is on par with renewables.” (Gwyneth

Cravens, 214) A lot of what environmentalists complain about is the fact that it

will destroy ecosystems filled with wildlife. The fact is that every coal-fired plant

destroys many other ecosystems then it is currently situated in.

In conclusion Nuclear power is a very clean way to go about making

energy. It does not emit any greenhouse gas, and does not emit much radiation

as long as the plant is up to code and operating properly. Most of the mistakes

that led to disaster were made by untrained humans not the machines. Also

radiation is safer than many people consider, since you’re mostly empty space

and you come in contact with it every day. National security isn’t much of a

problem because of heightened security and the concentration of isotope U-235

is not high enough in power grade uranium. Nuclear Energy is cost effective the

only big cost is the cost of waiting any longer and allowing other sources of

energy to have a negative impact on our environment. As has been discussed

many of the perceived problems with Nuclear Energy comes from a lack of

education and emotion-based prejudices. Nuclear Energy is viable, safe and

cost-effective. Ignorance is the source of many of the problems people think of

when they think of Nuclear Energy. Instead they should think of all the benefits

and look past their misconceptions about Nuclear Energy.

 Works Cited

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11/30/2008

<[Link]/uranium/glossacroldsp_wordpopup.cfm?word-id=278>.

Cravens, Gwyneth. Power To Save The World. 1st. New York: Random House,

2007.

Enviromental Protection Agency. "Nuclear Energy." Enviromental Protection

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you/affect/nuclear>.

E.P.A. (2). "Radiation and Radioactivity." Enviromental Protection Agency. August

27 2008. Enviromental Protection Agency. 11/29/2008

<[Link]/radiation/understand/#whatis>.

Health Physics Society. "Nuclear Accidents." Health Physics Society. July 2

2008. Health Physics Society. 11/27/2008

<[Link]/publicinformation/ate/q1462>.

Herbst, Alan M., and Geourge W. Hopley. Nuclear Energy Now. 1st. Jhon Wiley

and Sons, 2007.

MIT. "The Future of Nuclear Power." The Future of Nuclear Power. 2003. School.

18/10/2008 <[Link]/nuclearpower/pdf/nuclearpower-full>.
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8 Dec 2008 <[Link]/about-nrc/radiation/related-info/faq>.

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34/text/colmain>.