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Dedication
Choice
for Humanity
Nuclear
Power Is Still A Bad Idea
by
Humeyra Imirzalioglu KOCAK
As the world's population continues to grow, energy demand increases
with rising living standards. There are a number
of reasons why oil traders feel that oil
supplies might be reduced. The war in
Iraq, Iran's nuclear program, and questions
about Saudi Arabia's internal stability
all could in the future lead to a drastic
fall in the supply of oil. Turkey
is one of the countries concerned with
growing energy power demand along with
increasing population. Because of insufficient
reserves of oil and natural gas, nuclear
energy is being reconsidered as its one
of the sources of energy. Turkey is depending
on other countries for energy. Recently,
the government announced that by 2015
Turkey will have 5000 MW of capacity power
plants build with the cooperation of the
US.
Image credit: http://www.uic.org
Turkey has significant hydroelectric power energy resources. In
addition it has large amounts of renewable
alternative sources of energy, such as
solar, wind and geothermal potential.
Turkey seemingly prefers nuclear power
while other countries are closing their
power plants.
For many years nuclear power was a controversial method for generating
electricity. Basically it involves using
radioactive material which releases energy.
This energy can then be captured and converted
to electricity. Being cheaper than oil
there are other reasons to use nuclear
power. It does not contribute carbon into
the atmosphere. It does not pollute the
air which will reduce the problem of global
warming.
Nuclear power comes from the fission of uranium, plutonium. Natural
uranium consists of two isotopes, U-235
and U-238. The reactors use only the U-235
for nuclear power to produce energy in
natural uranium which will be used for
hundreds of years. U-238 can be converted
to plutonium. U-235 is unstable as radioactivity
occurs when an unstable nuclei of atoms
decays and emits particles. These particles
can have disastarous effects on living
tissue. After burying, the disposal will
remain radioactive for hundreds or thousands
of years. When radiation is released into
the environment, it contaminates our soil
and water which cause cancer and other
diseases.
The question now is nuclear waste with the disposal of waste remaining
an unsolved problem. It was not considered
to be a big problem when power plants
were first build. It was assumed that
nuclear waste could be recycled or buried.
The waste consists of fission products.
When the uranium fuel of a nuclear power
plant is used to generate electricity,
the left over "spent fuel" is
contains highly radioactive substances.
Ten year later the spent fuel is only
one-sixth as radioactive when it's removed
from the reactor. In 90 years, it is one-tenth,
even after 300 years it will contain hazardous
radioactive material such as carbon-14
(half-life 5,730 years) and plutonium-239
(half-life almost 25,000 years). The
half life is the amount of time it takes
for a radioactive material to decay to
one half of its original amount. Some
materials have half-lives of more than
1,000 years.
There are no permanent storage sites for spent fuel rods. They
are extremely hot when they removed from
the reactor core and must be cooled down.
Therefore they are placed in the water
pool where they can cool down. They are
supposed to stay six months in the pool
but since there is no permanent storage
site they were kept there for years. As
pools fill and if the rods are placed
too close, a nuclear chain reaction can occur. Dry
storage containers located close to the
reactor site are used temporarily to store
the rods.
Another method of reducing the volume of waste is reprocessing
the spent fuel. There are few countries
which reprocess their spent fuel as a
solution to their waste problem. The plutonium
produced by the U-238 and uranium can
be separated in a reprocessing plant and
used as reactor fuel. The fuel rods are
reprocessed in other countries which ship
the plutonium back to their home for use
in reactors. In the USA reprocessing was
banned because the recovered PU-239 plutonium
could be used to make nuclear weapons.
During the shipment of nuclear waste to other countries for reprocessing,
possible terrorist attacks could be devastating.
If terrorists obtained 60 kilograms of
highly enriched uranium they could make
a nuclear explosive equal to the atomic
bomb used at Hiroshima. And, if the plutonium
is broken down, dust is dispersed into
the atmosphere which could spread quickly
through the environment causing hazards
to humans and environment. Besides
being highly radioactive, it has a half
life of almost 25,000 years.
Right now, nuclear waste is piling up in the USA and Europe since
there is no place to put them. Europe
has 12,000 tons of nuclear waste buried
underground and 730 tons is added each
year. It will cost EUR 30-35 million to
clean this up annually (Sabah 2/16/06).
A permanent solution has not been found yet. It seems like burying
nuclear waste underground is the most
effective method. But there are safety
concerns regarding hot spent fuel placed
underground. In the USA nuclear energy
represents one-fifth of country's electrical
power and commercial nuclear power plants
produce 3,000 tons of waste each year.
Yucca Mountain, Nevada is a site chosen
for permanent storage of nuclear waste.
Since 1987, $9 billion was spent
to investigate the feasibility of burying
reactor fuel. It is expected to cost
up to $33 billion to build and is planned
to go into operation by 2010. By the time
it's open the accumulated waste will be
88,000 tons but Yucca Mountain's capacity
to hold nuclear waste is limited. The
fate of the remaining tons of nuclear
waste is unknown. So far, the nuclear
power industry has not found acceptable
solutions to the problem of radioactive
waste.
Nuclear reactors may experience accidents with severe consequences
for humanity. In a typical accident the
reactor "melts".
If a nuclear meltdown occurs the
reactor loses its coolant. This is what
caused in the two diseasters including
Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. The explosion
at Three Mile Island was a shock to people
who thought that accident could never
happen in the USA. Turkey and Europe have
been greatly effected by the Chernobyl
explosion with radiation spreading and
contaminating food and soil for many years.
The radiation released from the accident
was 200 times more than Hiroshima and
has long-term effects on the cancer rate.
Obviously improving security is essential
for operating plants. Plant workers must
comply with government regulatory requirements
as well.
Nuclear reactors are obviously not completely safe. Bad design
and operation of the nuclear plants can
cause internal accidents or external hazards
like those in Chernobyl.
Specifically Turkey has a history of major accidents and environmental
disasters. The Tupras Oil Refinery explosion
had a major fire and the Aksa chemical
plant had toxic leaks after a terrible
earthquake hit Turkey on 17August 1999.
The Izmit Bay, and surrounding areas were
seriously polluted by oil, and fuel. The
water was contaminated and soil pollution
lead to the contamination of agricultural
products which harmed human health. In
the past the town of Akkuyu ,was chosen
to build a nuclear power plant with the
Ecemis seismic fault line only 25km (15
miles) away from the site chosen. The
risk of earthquake damage should be a
serious consideration for any proposed
nuclear site.
The use of nuclear energy for power may not be a safe alternative
to other sources of energy. In addition
to being an attractive terrorist target,
the problem of nuclear waste remains an
unsolved danger to the environment and
health. If Turkey develops nuclear power
it has to deal with the tremendous amount
of the radioactive waste. Other countries
including the USA have not found acceptable
solution to this problem. Hopefully Turkey
will develop cleaner, safer and cheaper
renewable energy sources such as solar,
wind and geothermal to meet its energy
needs.
Humeyra Imirzalioglu Kocak
New York, March 8, 2006
Referans/Sources:
- NY Times,Washington Times
- Scientific American Magazine Feb 2006
issue
- Sabah.com.tr/Nukleer Dosyasi 2/15/06
- Uranium Information Centre
- International Atomic Energy Agency
- The Nuclear Energy Institute
- Greenpeace.org
Related
links:
-
The Saga of Nuclear Power - p.1
-
The Saga of Nuclear Power - p.2
-
On "Choice for Humanity"
Special Thanks To:
-- Prof.Hayrettin Kiliç sharing
his thoughts and articles, and Mr. Frank
R.Lehmann contribution to article.
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