Say no to nuclear power and risk future energy shortages and adverse climate
By Prof. Kirthi Tennakone
Sri Lanka is planning to initiate nuclear power generation after a long delay––a prudent decision to secure future energy demand and reduce emissions. However, some parties have expressed skepticism that nuclear energy is unsuitable for Sri Lanka, saying it poses a risk of environmental radioactive contamination in reactor meltdowns and waste disposal.
It is true that Madame Curies’ laboratory in a suburb of Paris, where she meddled with truckloads of the uranium mineral pitchblende, continues to be lethally radioactive and beyond remediation. This was the first incident of radioactive seepage, which happened at the dawn of nuclear energy more than one hundred years ago. The situation is vastly different today. Since the advent of commercial reactor technology in the early 1950s, only two major mishaps have occurred; Chernobyl in 1986 and Fukushima in 2011.After these accidents, reactor designers made improvements to ensure safety.
The death rate associated with energy production, in accidents and environmental pollution stands lowest for nuclear power.
Nuclear power has also been opposed on the grounds that it leads to weapon development, war and acts of terrorism. These social ills emerge in the absence of political will to ensure democracy, fairness and equity rather than from nuclear power generation.
Nuclear energy is a clean and zero emission source and the most economical in terms of energy derived per unit weight and volume of fuel. A uranium fuel pellet about the size of a lozenge and weighing 10 grams, generates the same amount of energy as one ton of coal.
Despite the above facts, the public’s aversion to nuclear energy stems largely from unsubstantiated fear mongering and not being informed enough to realize it is a universal and natural source of energy, not something granted by the devil. Nuclear energy is fascinating. Just like solar energy, its primary origin is celestial. You will reconsider its virtue after learning what it is and how it came about.
What is nuclear energy?
One of the greatest achievements of modern science has been the revelation of the atomic structure of matter. Centuries of dedicated work by chemists and physicists disclosed matter is made out of some ninety odd elements, which cannot be broken-down further into freely existing components. And each element is constituted of atoms characteristic of it. An atom has a nucleus, where positively charged protons and neutral neutrons are glued together to form a ‘ball’ and surrounded by electrons to balance the positive charge. Sometimes, a heavy atomic nucleus containing protons in excess of a certain limit, disintegrates on its own, emitting ionising radiation – the process known as radioactivity. The radioactivity of a chemical element indicates an instability of the atomic nucleus carrying stored energy.
In December 1938, two physicists, Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch, working in Berlin, made a startling discovery changing the world forever. They bombarded uranium, the heaviest chemical element found on earth, with neutrons, thinking that would enable them to create artificial elements even heavier than uranium, but observed something else. When a neutron hits the uranium nucleus it broke into two lighter nuclei and a few neutrons, releasing an excessive quantity of energy. Physicists are extraordinarily clever and immediately realised the potential of the discovery to initiate a chain reaction using uranium and derive energy either slowly or explosively. The idea was practically implemented a few years later. Inventing nuclear reactors to save the planet and atomic bombs to destroy it. Now is the time to promote the first and ban the second.
What is the primary source of nuclear energy?
Fuels store energy in an invisible but extractable form. Firewood, coal, petroleum and uranium are fuels. Nature allows only transfers of energy from one agent to another, not the creation out of nothing. The common fuels got their energies from sunlight harvested by green plants, recently or millions of years ago. However, uranium has nothing to do with the sun.
Uranium occurs in the earth’s crust, notably as the mineral pitchblende. How was uranium so rich in energy, produced? The answer to the question bears on the general issue of the origin of chemical elements.
All the hydrogen and a good portion of the helium in the universe were produced three minutes after big bang. Later, a series of reactions occurring inside stars, starting with the fusion of hydrogen and helium nuclei, produced elements lighter than iron. A uranium nucleus has 92 protons and 146 neutrons, assembling them together requires an extremely energetic environment with an intense flux of neutrons. Such extreme conditions happen when a massive star explodes as a supernova, two neutron stars collide, or a black hole begins devouring a star. These events, not uncommon in the universe, produce very heavy elements, including uranium and gold (loved by many more than uranium) dispersing them all over the interstellar medium to be picked up by planets during their formation.
Nuclear energy is not renewable, but the world has a good supply of uranium. We say solar energy is renewable, because its availability over human scales of time is virtually unlimited.
Renewable energy versus nuclear energy
Despite strong emphasis and major advancements in power generation using renewables; solar photovoltaic, wind and hydroelectricity; around 80 percent of the world’s current energy demand comes from fossil fuels. Projections predict reductions expected via renewable usage would be of the order of 2-3 percent per year in the next decade. The deployment of renewable power generation facilities also consumed fossil fuels. Converting silica to silicon and making solar cells, panels and installation of supporting structures made out of iron require fossil fuel, which cannot be replaced by pure electricity. Similar constraints arise in the commissioning of wind and hydroelectric projects. Additionally, renewable energy supplies are intermittent and affected by climate variation. We know very well the problem of hydroelectricity during times of poor rainfall and draught.
Renewable energy generation systems have inherently low efficiencies and involve the utilisation of large land areas and huge quantities of materials. When attempts are made to meet a significant portion of the increasing energy demand using renewables, the constraints become increasingly severe.
A nuclear reactor of capacity 1000 megawatts needs a land area of about three square kilometers. Whereas a solar cell complex of the same capacity, covers at least 20 times more land and a wind farm 700 times. Offshore wind farms, though a good option, have a shorter operational time and higher maintenance costs compared to nuclear reactors. Other renewable energy generation systems also lead to similar constraints.
Nuclear energy and hydrogen
Today, the world focuses much attention on green hydrogen, the cleanest fuel able to decarbonise the transport sector and eliminate fossil fuels in manufacture of fertilisers, steel, solar cells and a host of other essential commodities. Production of green hydrogen via splitting water is energy intensive. Renewable energy exploited to its limits may not suffice for production of sufficient hydrogen. Nuclear energy is undoubtedly a viable alternative.
A real problem with renewable energy is the escalation of constraints when they expand to a level sufficient for the complete elimination of fossil fuels. It is hard to predict how the advancements in renewable energy will progress in the coming years.
Meeting the ever-increasing energy demand and phasing out fossil fuels to avert global warming is most unlikely to be achieved without supplementing of renewables with nuclear energy.
Building nuclear power plants is costly and time consuming. Nevertheless, in the light of the gravity of energy and climate crisis, no country can afford to ignore nuclear energy. Sri Lanka needs to embark on nuclear energy at least in a small way and plan for the future.Otherwise, in decades and years to come, the repercussions of saying no to nuclear energy could be the same as banning chemical fertilisers!
(The author can be reached via email: ktenna@yahoo.co.uk )
