SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
New Jersey Spotlight reports
Three Mile Island may be the next nuclear power plant to be shuttered by its owner unless it gets financial help to keep the facility afloat.
Exelon Corp., the owner of the Pennsylvania generating station, announced yesterday it will retire the plant by or about September 30, 2019 absent any change in that state's policies dealing with nuclear power.
The announcement is the latest by an owner of a nuclear plant to threaten or close its facility unless given financial assistance to make the facility profitable, a drama that could play out soon in New Jersey with its three nuclear units operated by the Public Service Enterprise Group in South Jersey.
If Exelon follows through on its threat, it would mean the Oyster Creek plant in Lacey Township, also owned by the Chicago energy giant, could outlast TMI, the site of the nation's biggest nuclear accident when it had a partial meltdown in 1979.
Oyster Creek, the country's oldest commercial nuclear plant, agreed to shut down at the end of 2019 under a settlement worked out with the Christie administration in 2010.
[...] Environmentalists oppose extending the incentives renewable sources obtain to nuclear, because unlike solar, wind, and water, the former is not sustainable. “It’s not renewable; you have to keep buying the fuel,’’ said Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 04 2017, @11:25AM (14 children)
Not renewable and forces regular buying fuel etc. But for now it may be what's needed because it won't release CO2 and alternatives are not fully reliable and able to regulate output on demand. So until alternatives have better capabilities nuclear may have to stay. If the nuclear fuel is used as now, it may reach a fuel availability peak in 2035 when price may take of ie peak-uranium. But if breeder and accelerator reactors are used, it may last for billions of years.
Any plants shall be Gen 3 or better of course to avoid safety issues.
One question though, if the plant shuts down. Will there be enough power to go around?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday June 04 2017, @12:48PM (11 children)
I share that opinion. Nuclear probably isn't the best thing in the world, but if civilization is to continue without major disruptions, we must accept that nuclear and/or coal are going to be needed for the foreseeable future.
Most of us have been at least mildly amused at the kooks who make such a big deal of going "off-grid". It's fun to laugh at them, spending small fortunes to avoid using polluting energy. But, at least they can be respected for living by what they believe. All the rest of us vote with our wallets, each and every day.
Everyone who wants the coal plants shut down, should just disconnect from the electric grid. Just stop using coal-powered electricity, NOW! Ditto with nuclear. You know you're getting nucelar generated electricity, so just shut it off, NOW!
As I say, the kooks are mildly amusing, but they are honestly amusing. Those of you who bitch, complain, and moan about polluting power sources are almost all hypocrites, because YOU CONTINUE TO USE WHATEVER IS AVAILABLE!!
BTW - nuclear is kinda "renewable". http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/uranium-resources/uranium-and-depleted-uranium.aspx [world-nuclear.org]
Far less renewable than sunlight, but still - it doesn't have to be thrown out after use.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 04 2017, @12:54PM
I have however to say that solar panels + batteries is actually a economical realizable solution. Even if grid power for now is still cheaper. One benefit is redundancy against the grid.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @02:58PM
That may be true (people, in general, have double standards), but not really for the reason you suggest. You can "vote with your wallet" and you can actually, you know, vote. It seems that the regulatory hurdles put in place due to NIMBY as well as a lot of lawsuits has been much more effective at stopping nuclear energy than if some people just disconnected.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:03PM (7 children)
Coal isn't required for the forseeable future unless you've got an extreme lack of foresight. We've got the means necessary to shut them down in the near future. The only thing keeping them alive is subsidies. Spend those subsidies on other forms of power and the coal plants go tits up. You don't see Europeans depending on coal powered plants the way we do. They're actually moving aggressively to shut them all down.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-19/europe-s-coal-power-is-disappearing-quicker-than-anyone-thought [bloomberg.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:24PM (6 children)
"We've got the means necessary to shut them down in the near future."
Oh, really? Take another look around. https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3 [eia.gov]
Right now, today, a little less thatn 1/3 of US electricity is generated by coal. 19% is nuclear. Natural gas is another 1/3. Sorry - I'm bouncing between fractions and decimals - bad, bad, bad. Have some copy/pasta:
Natural gas = 33.8%
Coal = 30.4%
Nuclear = 19.7%
Renewables (total) = 14.9%
Hydropower = 6.5%
Wind = 5.6%
Biomass = 1.5%
Solar = 0.9%
Geothermal = 0.4%
Petroleum = 0.6%
Other gases = 0.3%
Other nonrenewable sources = 0.3%
Pumped storage hydroelectricity = -0.2%4
Now, this entire discussion concerns shutting down nuclear, because the money isn't there. The same discussion is going on regarding coal. Add those figures together - coal and nuclear energy account for 1/2 or 50% of the electricity generated in the US. Natural gas is the ONLY serious "clean" contender, and it is only 1/3 of the total right now.
Now, understand this: ALL RENEWABLE ELECTRICAL GENERATION COMBINED ONLY ACCOUNTS FOR ABOUT 20% OF AMERICA'S ELECTRICAL NEEDS!!
Do you understand that? Are you prepared to go on a ration system? You WILL reduce your electricity use by 80% if coal and nuclear plants are shut down tomorrow. And, there is no guarantee that your ration will be meaningful. Residential electricity? Think again - it's unecessary. Wear woolen longjohns to stay warm. Cook with gas, or don't cook at all. There are grocery stores everywhere - you don't need to run a refrigerator. Lights? Buy kerosene, or burn candles.
The remaining available electricity will be required by hospitals, police, military, and industry. A mere home owner won't get squat.
Would you like me to help you pull your head out? Or, are you comfortable like that?
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:59PM (1 child)
Natural gas isn't even remotely clean. The idea that it might be is complete BS put out by the natural gas industry. One only need to look at the consequences of fracking to get natural gas to know how much that claim is utter nonsense. About all you can say in its favor is that it's better than coal.
It does now. But why is it that you are assuming that proportion is set in stone? In 2000, renewables accounted for about 10% of America's electrical needs, about about 310 Twh. Since then, wind capacity went from about 6 Twh to 200 Twh. Solar power started to take off really after 2010 or so, and has gone from less than 1 Twh to about 40 Twh. What exactly is stopping us from continuing that trend and building up more renewable power capacity? And indeed, the fact that the old-school nuke plants are begging for government cash to stay afloat suggests that they are not even the cheapest way to continue providing electric capacity.
Alternately, I invest in some panels or windmills or both, and a battery system, and now my home has electrical power that doesn't rely on the grid at all, and I'm pretty darn comfortable. The idea that the only choices are "Nukes and coal forever" and "no electrical power for anybody" is a false dichotomy.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday June 04 2017, @05:26PM
Natural gas, from traditional sources, which do not include fracking, is much cleaner than coal. It's not much cleaner than any other petroleum or gas, but it's a helluva lot cleaner than coal
"set in stone"? It's where the investors are putting their money. It will change, but the poster to whom I was responding says the resources are there now. Maybe in Europe, but not in the US. I remind you that almost all of our solar panel production for years to come are already contracted to Europe. Unless we build more solar panel plants, there are no resources for appreciable growth in the US market. Eventually, yes, but not immediately.
If the coal and nuke plants are shut down tonight, you'll be competing against millions of Americans when you try to buy the very limited supply of solar panels.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday June 05 2017, @12:12AM (1 child)
30.4% + 19.7% = 50.1%
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 05 2017, @02:59AM
Yes, that was careless of me. Sorry.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 05 2017, @12:21AM
In his brave, new world, he'll need the insulation. You have to wonder at the delusion of people who think nothing of immediately getting rid of 50% or 80% of a country's energy supply, yet can't handle a differing opinion. You'd think the latter would be the easier thing to deal with.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @06:20PM
Thank you, Runaway, for that data and link.
I'm not sure if this is what you're trying to say, but my view angle is that there's a much-too-common misconception: that we consumers can possibly make a dent in the problem by "voting with our wallets". Most of us common folk / consumers only have control of our personal residential energy consumption choices. I tried (in vain) to find data on electricity consumption by sector. I can find energy consumption, but the bulk of residential energy goes into heating. Suffice it to say, residential electricity consumption is probably 5% of total electricity production, so our collective vote is moot. We can spend all week philosophizing and discussing it, but again, our voices go unheard.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday June 05 2017, @05:16PM
What about people who pay a premium for "renewable" grid energy? I mean obviously they aren't getting specific renewable electrons, but in theory at least they're buying renewable.
Kinda pissed about the options available in my area for that though...specifically because none of them include nuclear. I bought into the "100% wind" program, because while I REALLY don't think wind is an ideal solution, it's the best one available to me at the moment. The other "green" choice is a renewable mix that includes hydro (worse than wind, limited availability and requires flooding large areas) and biodigester (better than just letting the stuff rot I guess, but still never going to be a major power source, and it's not necessarily carbon free or renewable either.) The standard grid mix up here is 27% nuclear and ~50% fossil fuel. I'd like to "vote with my wallet" to support nuclear but there's no way to do that. I can support stupid methods of clean energy or I can stay at the default, mostly support fossil fuels, and send the message that I just want it cheap and dirty. And I live in an apartment so there's no possible way for me to go off grid right now either.
As for "using whatever is available" -- they don't give you many options and in many locations electric service is a legal requirement (ex: see Rhode Island Code - § 45-24.3-8 (e), any dwelling within 300 feet of a power line MUST have electric service.) So yeah, people "use whatever is available" because they aren't given any other choice.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @03:08PM
Nuclear isn't able to regulate output on demand. This is a real problem for any country that might choose to pursue nuclear for a substantial portion of their power. We consume massively more energy during the day then we do during the night. For nuclear to be used efficiently, you'd have massive excess of output that would need to be stored for during the next day at which point that 'massive excess' becomes a deficit of energy. It's a similar situation to solar, but in reverse in that in terms of optimal usage you end up overproducing at night and under producing during the day.
(Score: 3, Funny) by driverless on Sunday June 04 2017, @03:36PM
Also, it wouldn't really go completely dark, bits of it will continue to glow for quite some time.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Elledan on Sunday June 04 2017, @11:50AM (18 children)
The only drop-in replacement for coal plants is nuclear. Natural gas is too expensive, solar and wind too unreliable. Hydro destroys the environment and only works in some locations.
Furthermore, nuclear doesn't exhaust any gases (including CO2), requires exceedingly little fuel (there's a _lot_ of power in a single gram of uranium fuel) and even if we cannot cleanly reprocess fuel rods today, we can store them while we do the R&D. We could also do nifty things like adding battery backup to nuclear plants to make natural gas peaker plants obsolete.
Finally, 'non-renewable' applies just as much to solar and wind as nuclear. By the time we run out of uranium (ore, sea water, other sources), thorium and later hydrogen, 'running out of fuel' is probably the least of our worries.
But that's why environmentalists are environmentalists and not scientists.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 04 2017, @12:30PM (10 children)
We can already reprocess the fuel in breeder reactors using the PUREX process. The problems are non-technical management taking decisions they have no business to get involved in, usually in the form of shortcuts or bad priorities and thus exposing everybody else for deadly dangers. The other is enabling the making of nuclear bombs.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Elledan on Sunday June 04 2017, @12:58PM (5 children)
Fair point. PUREX is of course a fairly old process by now. I'm sure that with some R&D money we could streamline it some :)
I'm not worried about anyone extracting plutonium for bombs from spent fuel rods, though. Only reasonable way to get weapons-grade plutonium from a fuel rod in a commercial reactors is to only run it for a few weeks at most before the desired plutonium gets too polluted with other isotopes and extraction becomes a pain. The US and other nations get their plutonium from special reactors, not from commercial reactors for this reason.
And yes, there's a lot of involvement from those without the first clue about nuclear power, with a very biased agenda of their own, or both.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 04 2017, @01:13PM (4 children)
My point on management is people involved directly at the site of the plant and as corporate decision makers. Death by CEO etc.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Sunday June 04 2017, @02:13PM (3 children)
That's what I've been saying. Yes, nuclear power plants can be operated safely. Problem is, they won't be. Fukushima showed that. Management was told the walls needed to be higher, but they wanted to save a few cents and gamble that a big tsunami wouldn't happen. They reassured themselves with flawed reasoning based on a supposed lack of knowledge. Recall how they tried to say they were innocent because the tsunami was unprecedented in its size? Except, there had been tsunamis that big before. Even then, the walls being topped need not have been a disaster, had they not also skimped on design and maintenance in other areas.
Apologists like to use the number of deaths as a measure of danger, as if property damage that lasts centuries doesn't matter. By that scale, a bad bus accident could be rated a bigger disaster than a major hurricane. Lives are important, but they aren't the only thing.
Is talk of shuttering 3 Mile Isle a threat or a promise?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kaszz on Sunday June 04 2017, @02:55PM (2 children)
The Fukushima management should have designed the diesel generators and pumps to be submersible and designed the reactor with a external water cooling loop option.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @10:10PM (1 child)
I think the larger problem is that many of the nuclear power plants in current operation are VERY old.
New designs have a much stronger safety emphasis. We should retire the old reactors and build modern ones to replace them.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday June 05 2017, @12:28AM
The next question becomes why this isn't done..
I think there's talk about a plant in south-west Britain. But it seems to be stuck.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @03:17PM (1 child)
Increasing the efficiency of nuclear does not make it suddenly a renewable energy source. Breeder reactors don't break the law of conservation of energy.
You pay for that efficiency with products that not only need to be processed before usage, but can also be weaponized. Think of the implications there if nuclear ever became common. You'd have hundreds (thousands?) of potential targets that would require regular military level protection with inconceivable potential for terrorism both of the plant itself, and of its plutonium product. That's simply not realistic. Even if it did happen the costs would be through the roof. Spend less on the uranium and then spend a billion times more on security and contingencies.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 05 2017, @12:25AM
(Score: 2) by compro01 on Monday June 05 2017, @06:17AM (1 child)
Doesn't PUREX also create large amounts of very nasty waste, like at Hanford?
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday June 05 2017, @07:59AM
Dunno, better read up on that. But even if it would be so, there's still the accelerator technology.
And a lot of other technology that has not been tried fully. Polywell being one of them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @01:23PM (3 children)
No, it's polluting.
solar and wind too unreliable. Hydro destroys the environment and only works in some locations.
Hydro is limited. But it's possible to have pumped storage as ways to make wind and solar more reliable.
But yes, nuclear should be used until ALL fossil fuel sources of power are stopped. If we can shut down all that and keep lights on, then the world is in slightly better place. If we can replace nuclear with renewables too, great. But CO2 sources are the largest threat we have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @05:21PM (2 children)
NG is what lead to the demise of coal in the past few years. Fracking has slowed down so the price has gone the other way again. Cheaper is what will drive the market. Subsidies and laws pervert the market and create winners and losers every single time.
(Score: 2) by compro01 on Monday June 05 2017, @06:19AM (1 child)
What is it with you people and your obsession with what "the market" wants? What the market will do and what is actually desirable are often not the same thing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 06 2017, @12:53AM
You seem to think coal became unpopular because the laws said so?
What is it with people like you who think the market will not wash over any laws. Look at obamacare and hillarycare if you think I am 'stupid'. You can see the market reacting to the massive influx of cash with higher prices. You think you can ignore simple economics and because you 'feel' it shouldnt be so it is.
(Score: 2) by mth on Sunday June 04 2017, @01:25PM (2 children)
As far as I know natural gas is not very expensive at the moment. Its price is connected to the oil price and that's at a relatively low level.
Also, if a nuclear plant needs financial support to stay open, then nuclear isn't one of the cheaper power generation options.
I do think though that as long as there are still coal plants running, we shouldn't be closing nuclear plants, unless they're at an age where safety becomes a concern.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:06PM
The issue is that if it's not nuclear and it's not coal or gas, then what do we use for base power generation? Of the three, nuclear emits by far the least amount of pollutants during the process.
Hydro and geothermal are great if you're in an area that has them, but they both have their own consequences. Wind, solar and tidal are great, but they aren't consistent enough throughout the day and year for base power generation. Probably they will be in the future, but the storage technology isn't yet there to do it.
(Score: 1) by Elledan on Monday June 05 2017, @10:58AM
Natural gas is currently very inexpensive, yes. That wasn't the case before, however. It's very likely that prices will skyrocket again once the fracking bubble pops. It doesn't make sense to bet the farm on NG staying cheap for the next 40-50 years.
The reasons why nuclear power is 'expensive' is very much due to the political climate. In countries like South-Korea, China and India where they aren't focusing on one-off designs for practically every location, but instead coming up with a standard design that they can mass-produce it's really quite cheap to build the plant itself. Fuel costs can be ignored. Running a nuclear plant is very cheap, unless the political climate makes that it isn't.
Part of the problem is that nuclear plants are burdened with countless additional costs, lots of frivolous lawsuits and more which for example a coal plant never has to bother with. There have been countless instances where a fly ash pool's containment broke and toxic sludge contaminated the nearby river. The operators of the plant then receive a slap on the wrist for such a 'bad thing' and live continues as before, despite heavy metals and worse affecting wildlife and communities all the way down the river. And that in addition to the 'normal' pollution from these coal plants.
In short, in countries like the US, the system is stacked against nuclear power. In countries with a less hostile attitude towards nuclear power (like Canada, with Ontario being 100% hydro/nuclear-powered), this is far less of an issue, and it shows.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @01:44PM (4 children)
A bit of both
'Shuttered' is a little misleading. They are not abandoning a plant full of nuclear nasty.
The company is saying that natural gas makes cheaper electricity than Nuclear, so they want to shut down the nuclear plant.
Alternatively, they want a rate hike to subsidise the plant to their standard of profit.
That's not the same as abandoning it without security, maintenance, or cleanup.
(This might be a bluff, because the cost of properly keeping a shutdown plant may be higher than a running one?)
The bad news is this will make more CO2 and more spent fuel storage issues.
The good news is eventually less chance of another Fukushima.
Given I'm a climate change skeptic and only mildly curious about glowing in the dark, closing this plant seems more good than bad to me.
In general, I have two problems with our nuclear power systems.
First they require active cooling. Not being able to just put in the control rods and walk away is far from ideal.
Second, the spent fuel story is just plain criminal on the part of the government.
Neither of these say that nuclear power has to be a bad idea. Just that the way we seem to do it is.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @05:27PM (2 children)
The good news is eventually less chance of another Fukushima
Is 3 mile island in a known tsunami zone?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 04 2017, @11:56PM
> Is 3 mile island in a known tsunami zone?
Yes, tropical storms driven by all the hot air from MBA managers.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday June 05 2017, @12:54AM
Three Mile Island is on an island in the Susquehanna River. Whether the grandparent poster meant that the site could be flooded or just meant that a serious accident could occur, I don't know. Flooding has happened in the area:
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mile_Island_Nuclear_Generating_Station [wikipedia.org]
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susquehanna_River [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday June 05 2017, @12:38AM
> The good news is eventually less chance of another Fukushima.
The article notes that Three Mile Island itself had "a partial meltdown in 1979." Radioactive iodine and noble gases were released. There are two reactors at the site; the one that had the melt-down has been shut down ever since, and there are no plans to restart it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Nuclear_Event_Scale#Level_5:_Accident_with_wider_consequences [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mile_Island_accident [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Sunday June 04 2017, @01:50PM (7 children)
Subsidies just become corporate welfare, and later vote buying (essentially corruption). How about doing away with all "incentives", and let the various sources compete fairly. Renewable energy is mature enough to handle this.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:16PM (3 children)
As long as all those sources actually pay for their costs of externalities.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 05 2017, @12:28AM (2 children)
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday June 05 2017, @02:01AM (1 child)
I'm guessing you mean emitting carbon dioxide to the atmosphere?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 05 2017, @04:40AM
Here, in addition to CO2 emission, the relevant externalities are the various risks of nuclear power generation. There are genuine externalities to a disaster like Fukushima. But these are made worse by unreasonable demands made by the public and politicians before and after such accidents. Creating excessive liability for a disaster is one such thing that should be borne by the parties responsible for creating the excess liability rather than the nuclear power operator - for example, the absence of more modern nuclear plants to replace existing aging ones, the need to store used fuel rods on site rather than at safer storage locations like Yucca Mountain), and demanding higher standards of clean up than are warranted by safety considerations.
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Sunday June 04 2017, @06:09PM (2 children)
Renewable can't compete against Chinese, Russian and Middle Eastern oil and coal. So unless you want to drop off the WTO and ban\tariff those...
compiling...
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Monday June 05 2017, @01:55AM
That's why they are not building any solar power systems in the middle east. [wikipedia.org]
Ooops, I guess they are actually.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @04:19AM
It's also why Chinese coal use is in decline and their renewables and nuclear are getting all the love.
0 for 2, you did a great job there...
(Score: 2) by ledow on Sunday June 04 2017, @03:20PM (5 children)
So you never have to buy new solar panels, wind turbines, supporting equipment, etc.?
Or are they suggesting they can fabricate EVERYTHING needed for those industries from just the power generated alone?
I don't have a problem with not subsidising nuclear (if you can't make a profit, someone hasn't set energy prices properly), but subsidising wind and solar is the bit that seems wrong.
To suggest that wind, solar and especially water generation technology are somehow then completely renewable seems ridiculous.
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Sunday June 04 2017, @04:18PM (4 children)
You seem to be suggesting that people are claiming renewable energy is free.
Sigh.
No one claims this. Costs of renewable energy are based mostly on depreciation of the equipment, with some maintenance costs.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Sunday June 04 2017, @06:56PM (3 children)
And that maintenance and replacement is done from... non-renewable materials. Plastics, rare metals, etc.
What's the difference between that and using the THOUSANDS OF YEARS WORTH of uranium that's left?
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Sunday June 04 2017, @07:39PM
You mean materials that can be recycled?
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Sunday June 04 2017, @07:41PM
Oh, and, nuclear power generators are built entirely out of Uranium, are they?
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday June 05 2017, @01:49AM
> What's the difference between that and using the THOUSANDS OF YEARS WORTH of uranium that's left?
You seem to be disputing the characterisation of nuclear energy as "not sustainable." I assume you know that the fission process transmutes actinides such as uranium into other elements in a way that's not readily reversed. Apart from that, your comment appears to assume the use of breeder reactors and reprocessing, or perhaps you're unaware that nuclear fuel must be removed from a reactor before the actinides are fully consumed. This article is about a site in the United States. Reprocessing is not done in the United States, for civilian reactors. Furthermore, the United States has no place to store its high-level wastes from civilian reactors. The way civilian nuclear power is currently practiced there is that fuel is fabricated, used, stored in pools, then stored in casks at the site where it was used.
-- https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-storage/faqs.html [nrc.gov]
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_cask_storage [wikipedia.org]
Calling that "not sustainable" is an understatement.
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Sunday June 04 2017, @07:57PM
That definition makes a lot of things not renewable. Ban them all!