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Clean Futures Collective Better active today than radioactive tomorrow! |
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NUCLEAR POWER IS NO SOLUTION TO CLIMATE CHANGE Over the past year Australians have been repeatedly confronted with the argument that nuclear power is a 'clean, green' energy source and that it is the only viable solution to climate change. However, nuclear power could at most result in relatively small reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and it must be rejected even as a partial solution because of the weapons proliferation risks and other hazards associated with the nuclear fuel cycle. There are significant constraints on the growth of nuclear power such as its high capital cost and, in many countries, lack of public acceptability. As a method of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, nuclear power is further limited because it is used almost exclusively for electricity generation, which is responsible for less than one third of global greenhouse gas emissions. Because of economic and public acceptability problems, and nuclear power's limited applications other than in electricity generation, the potential for nuclear power to contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions is limited. Few predict a doubling of nuclear power output by 2050, but even if it did eventuate it would still only reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 5% less than one tenth of the reductions required to stabilise atmpospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases. As a senior analyst from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Alan McDonald, said in 2004: "Saying that nuclear power can solve global warming by itself is way over the top". Nuclear weapons proliferation Chief among nuclear power's problems is the strong link between 'peaceful' nuclear power and research programs and the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Global expansion of nuclear power could contribute to an increase in the number of nuclear weapons states - as it has in the past - and it would probably lead to an increase in the number of 'threshold' nuclear states which could produce weapons in a short space of time drawing on expertise, facilities and materials from their civil nuclear program. Supposedly 'peaceful' nuclear facilities and materials can be and have been used in various ways for weapons production including the production or diversion of fissile material. Of the 60 countries which have built nuclear (power or research) reactors, over 20 are known to have used their 'peaceful' nuclear facilities for covert weapons research and/or production. In some cases the R&D was small-scale and short-lived, but in other cases nation states have succeeded in producing nuclear weapons under cover of a peaceful nuclear program India, Pakistan, Israel, South Africa and possibly North Korea. In other cases with Iraq from the 1970s until 1991 being the most striking example substantial progress had been made towards a weapons capability before the weapons program was terminated. The 'peaceful' nuclear power and research sectors have produced enough fissile material to build about 160,000 nuclear weapons, with 1,600 tonnes of plutonium from power reactors accounting for a large majority of the total. If 99% of this plutonium is indefinitely guarded against military use, the remaining 1% would suffice to produce 1,600 nuclear weapons, each with a yield similar to the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) safeguards system still suffers from flaws and limitations despite improvements over the past decade. At least eight Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) member states have carried out weapons-related projects in violation of their NPT agreements, or have carried out permissible (weapons-related) activities but failed to meet their reporting requirements to the IAEA Egypt, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Romania, South Korea, Taiwan, and Yugoslavia. In particular, the nuclear weapons program in Iraq from the 1970s to 1991 demonstrated numerous, serious flaws in the safeguards system. Recent statements from the IAEA and US President Bush about limiting the spread of enrichment and reprocessing technology, and the need to establish multinational control over sensitive nuclear facilities, are an effective acknowledgement of the fundamental flaws and limitations of the international non-proliferation system. Civil nuclear programs also support nuclear weapons programs in the five 'declared' nuclear weapons states the US, Russia, the UK, France, and China. In particular, civil programs provide pools of expertise from which military programs draw. It is no coincidence that the five declared nuclear weapons states account for almost 60% of global nuclear power output. Another serious deficiency is that the NPT places no stronger obligation on the five declared nuclear weapons states than to engage in good-faith negotiations on nuclear disarmament. IAEA Director-General Mohamed El Baradei noted in a speech in 2004: ''There are some who have continued to dangle a cigarette from their mouth and tell everybody else not to smoke.'' The intransigence of the nuclear weapons states provides incentives and excuses for other states to pursue nuclear weapons and civil programs can provide the expertise, the facilities and the materials to pursue military programs. Nuclear smuggling much of it from civil nuclear programs presents a significant challenge. The IAEA΄s Illicit Trafficking Database records over 650 confirmed incidents of trafficking in nuclear or other radioactive materials since 1993, at least 17 of which involved small quantities of fissile material. In 2004 alone, almost 100 such incidents occurred. Smuggling can potentially provide fissile material for nuclear weapons or a wider range of radioactive materials for potential use in 'dirty bombs'. Civil nuclear plants are potentially "attractive" targets for terrorist attacks because of the importance of the electricity supply system, because of the large radioactive inventories in many facilities, and because of the potential or actual use of civil nuclear facilities for weapons research and/or production. Proliferation concerns have led a number of nation states to use conventional weapons to attack nuclear facilities Iraq's nuclear facilities have been bombed by Iran, Israel and the US, and Iraq itself targeted a nuclear plant in Iran in the 1980s and claimed to have targeted Scud missiles at Israel's Dimona nuclear plant during the 1991 Gulf War. Radioactive waste Radioactive wastes arise across the nuclear fuel cycle. High-level waste which includes spent nuclear fuel and the waste stream from reprocessing is by far the most hazardous of the waste types. A typical power reactor produces 25-30 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel annually. Annually, about 12,000 to 14,000 tonnes of spent fuel are produced by power reactors worldwide. About one third of the global output of spent fuel has been reprocessed. Reprocessing poses a significant public health and environmental hazard, as well as a major proliferation risk. Reprocessing plants release significant quantities of radioactive wastes into the sea and gaseous radioactive discharges into the air. Cogema's reprocessing plant at La Hague in France, and BNFL's plant at Sellafield in the UK, are the largest source of radioactive pollution in the European environment. Not a single repository exists anywhere in the world for the disposal of high-level waste from nuclear power. Only a few countries have identified potential sites for a high-level waste repository. The legal limit for the proposed repository at Yucca Mountain in the US is less then the projected output of high-level waste from the current cohort of reactors operating in the US. If global nuclear output was increased almost three-fold from 364 to 1000 gigawatts (GWe) new repository storage capacity equal to the legal limit for Yucca Mountain would have to be created somewhere in the world every 3-4 years. Attempts to establish international repositories are likely to be as unpopular and unsuccessful as was the attempt by Pangea Resources to win support for such a repository in Australia. Hazards of the nuclear fuel cycle Calculations indicate that the probability of a reactor core damage accident is about one in 10,000 per reactor per year for current reactors, and the probability of a significant release of radioactivity is about ten times smaller. In a world with 1000 such reactors (compared to the current 440), accidents resulting in core damage would occur once per decade on average. Passive or 'inherent' safety systems, such as the use of gravity rather than (failure-prone) pumps to feed coolant into the plant as required, can improve overall plant safety. However, safety will remain dependent on a range of technical factors and on proper operation (which in turn is dependent on proper management and regulation). While the nuclear industry is promoting a new generation of 'passively safe' reactor technology, closer inspection reveals that much of the talk is little more than speculation. The improved safety features fall a long way short of the sweeping claims being made, and in some cases the technology is not even new. At least some 'new' reactor types such as the 'Pebble Bed' high temperature reactors are modified versions of old, failed technology. Further, the potential safety advantages of new technology can be undermined by familiar commercial pressures for example, there are plans to develop 'Pebble Bed' reactors with no containment building. In addition to the hazards posed by accidents, radioactive emissions are routinely generated across the nuclear fuel cycle. The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation has estimated the collective effective dose to the world population over a 50-year period of operation of nuclear power reactors and associated nuclear fuel cycle facilities to be two million person-Sieverts. Applying a standard risk estimate of 0.04 fatal cancers per person-Sievert gives a total of 80,000 fatal cancers. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions: energy efficiency and renewables Numerous studies have detailed how major reductions in greenhouse gas emissions can be achieved through a combination of energy efficiency measures and renewable energy sources. A July 2002 study by The Australia Institute maps out a plan to achieve a 60% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in Australia by 2050. The study envisages widespread energy efficiency measures, a major expansion of wind power, modest growth of hydroelectricity, significant use of biomass, and niche applications for solar photovoltaic electricity. <http://www.tai.org.au/WhatsNew_Files/WhatsNew/DP48sum.pdf> In 2004, the Clean Energy Future Group which comprises renewable energy companies and the Worldwide Fund for Nature produced a report which details how major greenhouse gas emissions reductions can be achieved. It finds that Australia can meet our energy needs and halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2040 using a range of commercially-proven fuels and technologies. The study envisages the following energy mix by 2040: natural gas provides 30%; biomass from agriculture and plantation forestry residues provides 26%; wind provides 20%; photovoltaic and solar thermal systems provide 5%; hydroelectricity provides 7%; and coal and petroleum continue to play a minor role in electricity generation. <http://www.wwf.org.au/News_and_information/Features/feature10.php> The extent to which renewable energy sources can replace fossil fuels and nuclear power depends to a significant extent on investment in research and development programs. The Howard government provides fossil fuel industries with $9 billion of subsidies annually, according to a 2003 report from the UTS Institute for Sustainable Futures. By contrast, the Howard government: closed the Energy Research and Development Corporation in 1997-98; withdrew funding from the Co-operative Research Centre for Renewable Energy in December, 2002; introduced the Mandatory Renewable Energy Target but set the target at a measly 2%; appointed a Rio Tinto employee as the government's Chief Scientist; and allowed fossil fuel companies to buy their way onto the Australian Bureau of Agricultural Resource Economics panel dealing with climate change issues. Further reading on the greenhouse/nuclear debate: Friends of the Earth, Australian Conservation Foundation and others, 2005, Nuclear Power: No Solution to Climate Change, http://www.melbourne.foe.org.au/documents.htm. Mycle Schneider, April 2000, Climate Change and Nuclear Power, published by World Wide Fund for Nature, http://www.panda.org/downloads/climate_change/fullnuclearretwwf.pdf. Greenpeace, Nuclear Energy: No Solution to Climate Change, http://archive.greenpeace.org/comms/no.nukes/nenstcc.html. Friends of the Earth (UK), Nuclear power and climate change, http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/briefings/nuclear_power_climate.pdf. WISE/NIRS, 2005, A back door comeback: Nuclear energy as a solution for climate change?, Nuclear Monitor #621 & #622, http://www.antenna.nl/wise. |
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Last updated 21 March 2006 |
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