Chicken Yoghurt celebrates the return to blogging of Rochenko and especially recommends his piece on nuclear power. Which contains this:
Right. So, who’s not joining up their thinking now? Carbon emissions
being a global problem, we’re talking about global solutions here.
Replacing gas and coal is one such. Nuclear power is a non-renewable
resource, that relies on a relatively scarce raw material. Further,
uranium needs to go through a lengthy industrial process in order to be
useable. How much energy does the process of mining and refining use,
and how much carbon does it produce, in order to provide fuel for just one station?
Fortunately I’d written a piece on this very subject. Unfortunately the editor I sent it to did not wish to purchase it. So you, you lucky people, get to see it for free and get an answer to that very question.
We
all know that we’re not allowed to use nuclear power to beat global
warming, don’t we? Nasty, horrible, vicious stuff, why, it might
even allow people to keep the lights on, cook meat even, possibly,
dare we whisper it, allow capitalism to survive! Which would be quite
unsupportable given that we know the correct method of reverence for
Gaia is to be knitting our clothes out of tofu while feeding the kids
on lentils in the dark (and I really don’t want to think about that
no diaper training thing in that scenario).
Which
is why I always find it a little puzzling that those most vociferous
against the use of nuclear power have to, err, be economical with the
truth in their arguments. A couple of years ago, you may remember, we
were told that nuclear did have CO2 emissions as there was lots of
concrete used in the construction of plants. This has rather been put
to one side now that several (gleefully on my part) have pointed out
that wind turbines actually use more concrete than nuclear for the
same electricity production capacity.
An
example of this economy with the facts turns up in today’s Guardian
written by one David Lowry (who is ”nuclear issues coordinator for
Labour’s environment campaign, Sera “). The essential argument
is that the total fuel cycle uses energy (true) that some of this is
fossil fuel derived (true) and that therefore nuclear is not a
completely non-emittive technology (true). As for the conclusion?
Using
sensible assumptions, Professors Smith and Van Leeuwen determined
that nuclear generation produced about a third as much CO2 per kWh as
conventional mid-sized gas-fired electricity generation.
The
important question is thus not whether there are emissions but how
many of them there are? Most especially, how does nuclear measure up
to all of the other alternatives when we look at the whole lifetime
of the equipment and the fuel? According to our Mr Lowry:
As
several papers made clear when presented to the World Nuclear
Association’s annual symposium last month, the industry will
increasingly have to rely on poorer-quality uranium ores, and thus
CO2 emissions from the nuclear cycle will increase. Öko’s
analysis shows that nuclear CO2 emissions are up to four or five
times greater than those from renewables.
Well,
is it true? Is it so that nuclear is good but not good enough? A
truly interesting question and one that rather depends upon that
assumption that increasingly low quality ores will have to be used.
Which, according to another paper from the World Nuclear Association
(Hey, if we’re allowed to use “several papers” and leave them
unidentified then I can use one identified one from the same source,
yes?) is a misunderstanding of how mining works and is in any
case not true for any likely scenario in the next three or four
decades.
Which
rather leaves us wandering around in search of more realistic figures
on what are the CO2 emissions from nuclear power plants. We’re also
interested in how these compare to other forms of electricity
generation. We could look here for construction figures perhaps
but then that was written by those trying to justify nuclear power.
Obviously, I mean obviously, they are also being economical
with the truth. Or the NEI blog has several pieces . But then
again, the Nuclear Energy Institute, no matter what they say, cannot
be expected to be neutral on such issues now can they? So we mustn’t
pay too much attention to this from the same source.
Comparison of Life-Cycle Emissions
Source: "Life-Cycle Assessment of Electricity Generation
Systems and Applications for Climate Change Policy Analysis,"
Paul J. Meier, University of Wisconsin-Madison, August, 2002.
I
mean, really, who could ever believe that? Nuclear emits less than
solar? Than geothermal? Hah! Who would ever believe that? Not our Mr.
Lowry, of course. He closes his article with this:
Before
starting down the nuclear route promoted by Tony Blair at Labour’s
conference, ministers need a proper comparative analysis of nuclear’s
hidden carbon emissions.
Indeed
they do and I hope that young David isn’t the one providing it to
them. But all of the above is just nit-picking. It’s one boring
group of scientists shouting at another over interpretations of this
and that and yaaaawn, isn’t it all so dreary? So why don’t
we go back to a piece of the science that many would take as being a
very high estimate but one which our Guardian writer would actually
agree with.
…nuclear
generation produced about a third as much CO2 per kWh as conventional
mid-sized gas-fired electricity generation.
A
third eh? 33% of gas generation? So about 20% of coal generation
then? You know, roughly, splitting the difference and all that? And
what was it that we had to do to stop the world’s supplies of brown
rice from melting in the capitalist inspired boiling of everything
decent and good? Reduce emissions by 80% from 1990 levels wasn’t
it? So, if we stuck everyone in hydrogen powered cars , junked gas
and coal fired electricity generation and replaced it with nuclear
(as, on the generation front, France has) then we’ve cracked it,
solved the problem, eh? Why didn’t you just say so at the beginning
David? Even by your, terribly pessimistic, figures there is a
technological way out, we don’t all have to return to medieval
peasantry, spinning our food and kneading our clothes by flickering
torchlight, capitalism is saved!
Perhaps
that’s why he doesn’t like it, he’s realized that nuclear
works.
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