[R-G] Outside View: Nuclear CO2 warming costs

[gregory meyerson]

hi:  I'm reading caldicott's book now.  it's really good.  and much  
more convincing than the pro nuclear books I've read--which utterly  
ignore the entire fuel cycle, bountiful and hidden subsidies to the  
industry etc., and downplay safety issues, effects of radiation on  
(indigenous) communities, etc.
On Jun 28, 2007, at 11:48 PM, Richard Menec wrote:

> (something that George Monbiot and others should stick under their  
> hats the
> next time they make a call for "clean" nuclear energy that will "buy us
> time".  Never mind the real purpose behind it all, which is of course  
> to
> still make more and better bombs.)
>
> ==================
>
> http://www.upi.com/Security_Terrorism/Analysis/2007/05/21/ 
> outside_view_nuclear_co2_warming_costs/7084/
>
> Published: May 21, 2007 at 2:23 PM
>
> Outside View: Nuclear CO2 warming costs
>
> By HELEN CALDICOTT UPI
> Outside View Commentator
>
> MELBOURNE, May 21 (UPI) -- The fact is, it takes energy to make energy  
> --
> even nuclear energy. And the true "energetic costs" of making nuclear
> energy -- the amounts of traditionally generated fuel it takes to  
> create
> "new" nuclear energy -- have not been tallied up until very recently.
>
> What exactly is nuclear power? It is a very expensive, sophisticated  
> and
> dangerous way to boil water. Uranium fuel rods are placed in water in a
> reactor core, they reach critical mass and they produce vast  
> quantities of
> heat, which boils the water. Steam is directed through pipes to turn a
> turbine, which generates electricity.
>
> The scientists who were involved in the Manhattan Project creating  
> nuclear
> weapons developed a way to harness nuclear energy to generate  
> electricity.
> Because their guilt was so great, they were determined to use their  
> ghastly
> new invention to help the human race. Nuclear fission harnessed "atoms  
> for
> peace," and the nuclear PR industry proclaimed that nuclear power would
> provide an endless supply of electricity -- referred to as "sunshine
> units" -- that would be good for the environment and "too cheap to  
> meter."
>
> They were wrong. Although a nuclear power plant itself releases no  
> carbon
> dioxide, the production of nuclear electricity depends upon a vast,  
> complex,
> and hidden industrial infrastructure that is never featured by the  
> nuclear
> industry in its propaganda, but that actually releases a large amount  
> of
> carbon dioxide as well as other global warming gases. One is led to  
> believe
> that the nuclear reactor stands alone, an autonomous creator of  
> energy. In
> fact, the vast infrastructure necessary to create nuclear energy,  
> called the
> nuclear fuel cycle, is a prodigious user of fossil fuel and coal.
>
> The production of carbon dioxide, or CO2 is one measurement that  
> indicates
> the amount of energy used in the production of the nuclear fuel cycle.  
> Most
> of the energy used to create nuclear energy -- to mine uranium ore for  
> fuel,
> to crush and mill the ore, to enrich the uranium, to create the  
> concrete and
> steel for the reactor and to store the thermally and radioactively hot
> nuclear waste -- comes from the consumption of fossil fuels, that is,  
> coal
> or oil. When these materials are burned to produce energy, they form  
> CO2,
> reflecting coal and oil's origins in ancient trees and other organic
> carboniferous material laid down under the earth's crust millions of  
> years
> ago. For each ton of carbon burned, 3.7 tons of CO2 gas are added to  
> the
> atmosphere, and this is the source of today's global warming.
>
> The total energy input of the nuclear fuel cycle -- the energetic  
> costs of
> nuclear power -- must be openly and honestly assessed if nuclear power  
> is to
> be compared fairly with other energy sources. Very few studies are yet
> available that analyze the total life cycle of nuclear power and its  
> final
> energy input versus output.
>
> One of the best is a study by Jan Willem Storm van Leeuwen and Philip  
> Smith
> titled "Nuclear Power -- the Energy Balance." To quote the final  
> conclusion
> of their lengthy analysis, "The use of nuclear power causes, at the  
> end of
> the road and under the most favorable conditions, approximately  
> one-third as
> much carbon dioxide (CO2) emission as gas (from) electricity  
> production. The
> rich uranium ores required to achieve this reduction are, however, so
> limited that if the entire present world electricity demand were to be
> provided by nuclear power, these ores would be exhausted within nine  
> years.
> Use of the remaining poorer ores in nuclear reactors would produce  
> more CO2
> emission than burning fossil fuels directly." In this instance, nuclear
> reactors are best understood as complicated, expensive and inefficient  
> gas
> burners.
>
> Setting aside the energetic costs of the whole fuel cycle, and looking  
> just
> at the nuclear industry's claim that what transpires in the nuclear  
> plants
> is "clean and green," the following conditions would have to be met for
> nuclear power actually to make the substantial contribution to reducing
> greenhouse gas emissions that the industry claims is possible. This  
> analysis
> assumes 2 percent or more growth in global electricity demand: -- All
> present-day nuclear power plants -- 441 in all -- would have to be  
> replaced
> by new ones. -- Half the electricity growth would have to be provided  
> by
> nuclear power. -- Half of all the world's coal-fired plants would have  
> to be
> replaced by nuclear power plants.
>
> This would mean the construction over the next 50 years of some 2,000  
> to
> 3,000 nuclear reactors of 1,000 megawatt size -- one per week for 50  
> years!
> Considering the eight to 10 years it takes to construct a new reactor  
> and
> the finite supply of uranium fuel, such an enterprise is simply not  
> viable.
>
> --
>
> (This piece originally appeared in Dr. Helen Caldicott's "Nuclear  
> Power Is
> Not the Answer," The New Press, 2006. This piece is published here  
> with the
> permission of The New Press. Helen Caldicott is president of the
> Washington-based Nuclear Policy Research Institute. She was a founder  
> of the
> International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, the  
> organization
> that won the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize.)
>
> =============
> Richard Ménec
> http://booksinternationale.pbwiki.com
>
>
>
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