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Nuclear is very sustainable. With enrichment, the world's known uranium supplies (5.5 million tons) would last about 30,000 years at present usage rates, if use
by fennecfoxen 5y ago
Nuclear is very sustainable. With enrichment, the world's known uranium supplies (5.5 million tons) would last about 30,000 years at present usage rates, if used with fast breeder reactors. The NEA estimates that's a sixth of what's out there. Obviously this doesn't go as far if you scale it up 10-100x, but in addition, there's about 4.5 billion tons dissolved in seawater.
This is just the uranium, not even touching the thorium. And once we get to this point, there is uranium on the Moon and Mars. The waste-management problem is harder in the political sense than the engineering sense.
- jhgb 5y ago> With enrichment, the world's known uranium supplies (5.5 million tons) would last about 30,000 years at present usage rates How does it matter if you enrich or you use a natural uranium reactor? The amount of fissile material is exactly the same. > if used with fast breeder reactors But that's breeding, not enrichment. > but in addition, there's about 4.5 billion tons dissolved in seawater. ...aaaand there goes your requirement for a breeder. Breeders may very well turn out not to be worth the bother.