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Neither the technology nor the fuel for nuclear plants are abundant or renewable. For example, can Iran build its own reactors? No. Can Somalia run its hypothet

Neither the technology nor the fuel for nuclear plants are abundant or renewable. For example, can Iran build its own reactors? No. Can Somalia run its hypothetical reactors? No. Can Syria import enriched uranium? No. Can we have reactors without them blowing up every 50 years? No. Do we have a solution for containing nuclear waste without leaks and without ruining the local communities? No. Enough with this joke of pitching nuclear as a viable alternative. I get it that technologists love it because it will enable them to rule over the developing countries and it will open many high paid jobs but let’s stop pretending. Nuclear is what oil was 100 years ago.

SllX 5y ago
Nuclear is essentially my canary in the coal mine for whether an American politician is taking climate change specifically seriously. If they’re not, then pretending to care is most likely cover for a whole bunch of other stupid crap. Unfortunately proliferation actually is a solid argument against nuclear fission outside of countries that are already nuclear-capable, but the major powers that are don’t really have that excuse.
- badmadrad 5y ago
  almost all politicians are using "climate change" as a fear based method of controlling the masses. nuclear would do to much damage to the narrative.
programmarchy 5y ago
Rare earth metals are currently required inputs for wind to produce magnets and solar to produce photovoltaics. It’s not exactly abundant or renewable.
- adrianN 5y ago
  Solar panels are almost exclusively sand and a little bit of copper for the wiring.
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    To expand on that a little: "Unlike the wind power and EV sectors, the solar PV industry isn’t reliant on rare earth materials. Instead, solar cells use a range of minor metals including silicon, indium, gallium, selenium, cadmium, and tellurium." https://ratedpower.com/blog/rare-metals-photovoltaic/ https://ratedpower.com/blog/rare-metals-photovoltaic/
- whatever1 5y ago
  Rare earths are not rare, you can even order online. Try that with enriched uranium.
  - programmarchy 5y ago
    Sure but wouldn’t we need to mine exponentially less uranium? How many tons of neodymium need to be mined for wind turbines to produce the equivalent output of a nuclear reactor, for example.
    - dane-pgp 5y ago
      That's an interesting question, actually, and the numbers seem difficult to come by. A master's thesis from 2011 says[0]: "data on the amount of rare earths in wind turbines vary, ranging from 0.2 to 3.3 kg of neodymium content per kW of rated capacity" For comparison, a nuclear power station generates[1]: "24,000,000 kWh from 1 kg of uranium-235" So, taking the lower estimate for the neodymium content, the wind turbine would have to produce energy for 0.2 x 24,000,000 hours to be as efficient in terms of mass. That's about 548 years. Even with recycling, that's a longer term commitment than some nuclear waste storage proposals, although with less of a proliferation risk. [0] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/153229259.pdf https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/153229259.pdf [1] https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/fuel-comparison/ https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/fuel-comparison/
      - fsh 5y ago
        235U may have an impressive energy density, but uranium ore contains very little natural uranium and natural uranium contains very little 235U. According to this back-of-the-envelope calculation [1], a typical energy density of uranium ore is only around 1400 MJ/kg, so only 60 times higher than that of coal. [1] http://www.plux.co.uk/energy-density-of-uranium/ http://www.plux.co.uk/energy-density-of-uranium/
        dane-pgp 5y ago
        To convert that into the (slightly more clumsy) units of my post above, 1400 MJ is about 390 kWh (which is a lot smaller than 24 million). Even taking the upper estimate of neodymium content then, 3.3 x 390 hours is only 54 days. I don't know how much ore needs to be dug up to extract 1 kg of neodymium, but one site boasts 7% rare earth content in the material it processes[0] so there might need to be a 14x scale factor to avoid comparing apples to ore ranges. 54 days x 14 is 2 years, which should be well under the average life time of a turbine, even before recycling is taken into account. We do have to also consider the capacity factor of wind turbines, though (not just their rated capacity), which "range from 0.26 to 0.52" according to a recent factsheet[1], so that might bump the estimate to 8 years. [0] https://mpmaterials.com/what-we-do/ https://mpmaterials.com/what-we-do/ [1] https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet
pickledolives 5y ago
Don‘t forget all the CO2 emitted a) at mining and enriching uranium and b) in storing nuclear waste for 100000 years and c) in tearing down highly radioactive retired nuclear power plants. In Germany we started tearing down the GDRs only nuclear power plant in the early 90s and we‘re still not done. 30+ years of daily ops of a highly specialised destruction company operating heavy machinery requiring insulation from radiation. And 1000s of tons more radioactive waste that needs to be shipped around the country. Well, only 20 plants more to go, now that we exited. Somehow people who claim nuclear to be green only look at the CO2 emissions when ready made enriched uranium goes in and burnt fuel comes out. We need to look at the full life cycle of both the plants and the nuclear fuel though, and then nuclear energy‘s CO2 emissions are far far away frm being green.
- mlindner 5y ago
  CO2 is only emitted during mining and refining because the grid itself isn't clean. The same thing is true of solar panels and batteries until the grid is made green. But you can't say "we can't make green tech because it would produce CO2" as it completely ignores the lifetime of things. > in storing nuclear waste for 100000 years That's a red herring. You only need to store nuclear waste for around 100 years (or less) before it can be treated as "low level nuclear waste" of which tons of it is generated as byproducts of the medical industry. It doesn't need to be sequestered away, it can be buried safely like all the rest of the low level waste. At that point it's more toxic than it is radioactive so it just needs to be buried in a way that it won't enter the water table. > In Germany we started tearing down the GDRs only nuclear power plant in the early 90s and we‘re still not done. Germany is also building tons of highly polluting (and radioactive waste pumped into the air) lignite coal power plants because they shot themselves in the foot by shutting down their very successful nuclear industry. They should look to France for an example on how one should treat nuclear power.
  - beders 5y ago
    oh yeah, the French are so confident with their nuclear power plants they built many of them on their eastern border (with mostly west winds blowing any fall out nicely into Belgium and Germany)
mlindner 5y ago
Nuclear fuel is incredibly abundant. People talk about the small amounts of nuclear fuel available but completely ignore how energy dense it is. You need very little of it. There's vastly more energy in nuclear ore in the ground than there is even coal and oil combined in the ground.
- fsh 5y ago
  Do you have a source for this? To my knowledge, uranium would run out in a decade or two if one would use it to supply 100% of the world primary energy consumption [1]. Coal is obviously way more abundant. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-will-global-uranium-deposits-last/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-will-glo...
  - mlindner 5y ago
    Pop science articles like that mistake "proven reserves" with "how much is actually in the ground". When geopolitics talks they look at proven reserves as that's how much we know is available and accessible in the short term, but it's not how much is actually available. Proven reserves expand whenever there is a shortage as effort is made to find additional amounts of the stuff. Additionally, most countries in the world don't even bother to look as they don't have nuclear technology of their own and there is so little demand for it. This is why for example we keep finding additional coal and oil as known reserves run out.
    - whatever1 5y ago
      So now we went from abundant down to potentially abundant.
      - catlikesshrimp 5y ago
        Then it makes sense to build as many plants as there is fuel to run them.
  - mlindner 5y ago

SllX 5y ago

Nuclear is essentially my canary in the coal mine for whether an American politician is taking climate change specifically seriously. If they’re not, then pretending to care is most likely cover for a whole bunch of other stupid crap. Unfortunately proliferation actually is a solid argument against nuclear fission outside of countries that are already nuclear-capable, but the major powers that are don’t really have that excuse.

badmadrad 5y ago
almost all politicians are using "climate change" as a fear based method of controlling the masses. nuclear would do to much damage to the narrative.

programmarchy 5y ago

Rare earth metals are currently required inputs for wind to produce magnets and solar to produce photovoltaics. It’s not exactly abundant or renewable.

adrianN 5y ago
Solar panels are almost exclusively sand and a little bit of copper for the wiring.
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  To expand on that a little: "Unlike the wind power and EV sectors, the solar PV industry isn’t reliant on rare earth materials. Instead, solar cells use a range of minor metals including silicon, indium, gallium, selenium, cadmium, and tellurium." https://ratedpower.com/blog/rare-metals-photovoltaic/ https://ratedpower.com/blog/rare-metals-photovoltaic/
whatever1 5y ago
Rare earths are not rare, you can even order online. Try that with enriched uranium.
- programmarchy 5y ago
  Sure but wouldn’t we need to mine exponentially less uranium? How many tons of neodymium need to be mined for wind turbines to produce the equivalent output of a nuclear reactor, for example.
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    That's an interesting question, actually, and the numbers seem difficult to come by. A master's thesis from 2011 says[0]: "data on the amount of rare earths in wind turbines vary, ranging from 0.2 to 3.3 kg of neodymium content per kW of rated capacity" For comparison, a nuclear power station generates[1]: "24,000,000 kWh from 1 kg of uranium-235" So, taking the lower estimate for the neodymium content, the wind turbine would have to produce energy for 0.2 x 24,000,000 hours to be as efficient in terms of mass. That's about 548 years. Even with recycling, that's a longer term commitment than some nuclear waste storage proposals, although with less of a proliferation risk. [0] https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/153229259.pdf https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/153229259.pdf [1] https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/fuel-comparison/ https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/fuel-comparison/
    - fsh 5y ago
      235U may have an impressive energy density, but uranium ore contains very little natural uranium and natural uranium contains very little 235U. According to this back-of-the-envelope calculation [1], a typical energy density of uranium ore is only around 1400 MJ/kg, so only 60 times higher than that of coal. [1] http://www.plux.co.uk/energy-density-of-uranium/ http://www.plux.co.uk/energy-density-of-uranium/
      - dane-pgp 5y ago
        To convert that into the (slightly more clumsy) units of my post above, 1400 MJ is about 390 kWh (which is a lot smaller than 24 million). Even taking the upper estimate of neodymium content then, 3.3 x 390 hours is only 54 days. I don't know how much ore needs to be dug up to extract 1 kg of neodymium, but one site boasts 7% rare earth content in the material it processes[0] so there might need to be a 14x scale factor to avoid comparing apples to ore ranges. 54 days x 14 is 2 years, which should be well under the average life time of a turbine, even before recycling is taken into account. We do have to also consider the capacity factor of wind turbines, though (not just their rated capacity), which "range from 0.26 to 0.52" according to a recent factsheet[1], so that might bump the estimate to 8 years. [0] https://mpmaterials.com/what-we-do/ https://mpmaterials.com/what-we-do/ [1] https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet

pickledolives 5y ago

Don‘t forget all the CO2 emitted a) at mining and enriching uranium and b) in storing nuclear waste for 100000 years and c) in tearing down highly radioactive retired nuclear power plants. In Germany we started tearing down the GDRs only nuclear power plant in the early 90s and we‘re still not done. 30+ years of daily ops of a highly specialised destruction company operating heavy machinery requiring insulation from radiation. And 1000s of tons more radioactive waste that needs to be shipped around the country. Well, only 20 plants more to go, now that we exited. Somehow people who claim nuclear to be green only look at the CO2 emissions when ready made enriched uranium goes in and burnt fuel comes out. We need to look at the full life cycle of both the plants and the nuclear fuel though, and then nuclear energy‘s CO2 emissions are far far away frm being green.

mlindner 5y ago
CO2 is only emitted during mining and refining because the grid itself isn't clean. The same thing is true of solar panels and batteries until the grid is made green. But you can't say "we can't make green tech because it would produce CO2" as it completely ignores the lifetime of things. > in storing nuclear waste for 100000 years That's a red herring. You only need to store nuclear waste for around 100 years (or less) before it can be treated as "low level nuclear waste" of which tons of it is generated as byproducts of the medical industry. It doesn't need to be sequestered away, it can be buried safely like all the rest of the low level waste. At that point it's more toxic than it is radioactive so it just needs to be buried in a way that it won't enter the water table. > In Germany we started tearing down the GDRs only nuclear power plant in the early 90s and we‘re still not done. Germany is also building tons of highly polluting (and radioactive waste pumped into the air) lignite coal power plants because they shot themselves in the foot by shutting down their very successful nuclear industry. They should look to France for an example on how one should treat nuclear power.
- beders 5y ago
  oh yeah, the French are so confident with their nuclear power plants they built many of them on their eastern border (with mostly west winds blowing any fall out nicely into Belgium and Germany)

mlindner 5y ago

Nuclear fuel is incredibly abundant. People talk about the small amounts of nuclear fuel available but completely ignore how energy dense it is. You need very little of it. There's vastly more energy in nuclear ore in the ground than there is even coal and oil combined in the ground.

fsh 5y ago
Do you have a source for this? To my knowledge, uranium would run out in a decade or two if one would use it to supply 100% of the world primary energy consumption [1]. Coal is obviously way more abundant. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-will-global-uranium-deposits-last/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-will-glo...
- mlindner 5y ago
  Pop science articles like that mistake "proven reserves" with "how much is actually in the ground". When geopolitics talks they look at proven reserves as that's how much we know is available and accessible in the short term, but it's not how much is actually available. Proven reserves expand whenever there is a shortage as effort is made to find additional amounts of the stuff. Additionally, most countries in the world don't even bother to look as they don't have nuclear technology of their own and there is so little demand for it. This is why for example we keep finding additional coal and oil as known reserves run out.
  - whatever1 5y ago
    So now we went from abundant down to potentially abundant.
    - catlikesshrimp 5y ago
      Then it makes sense to build as many plants as there is fuel to run them.
- mlindner 5y ago