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Nuclear Energy's Future is Aglow

Denis E. Beller

Many people in the nuclear power industry and academia at the beginning of the 21st Century have the same optimistic outlook as the founders did a half-century ago, and opponents of technology, especially nuclear technology, feel as if they're facing the same battles they fought in the 1970s and 1980s. For a variety of reasons that will be explained in this essay, young nuclear proponents have what appears to be a brilliant future, which might mean opponents do as well. At the same time, opponents of all things nuclear-energy as well as nuclear medicine; use of nuclear reactors to eliminate weapons materials; recycling of used nuclear fuel; irradiation to sterilize consumer products, medical equipment, and food; industrial applications; etc.-may believe they are hearing the same overly optimistic projections and claims as in the distant past, when nuclear technology advanced rapidly and a nuclear construction boom produced most of the reactors that now provide 20 percent of U.S. electricity. Those who have been the "pro" part of this battle for decades may feel like they are still hearing the same opposing arguments to which they have been listening for decades, akin to hearing the little boy cry "nuclear wolf" for thirty or forty years. But the little boy has grown old while the industry has proven itself to be the safest major source of electricity in the Western world; yet the old man is still crying.

One reason for the recent optimism in the nuclear industry is an ever increasing worldwide demand for energy. Demand for electrical energy leads that growth. Other recent trends and forces include demand for cleaner forms of energy in general and electricity in particular, as well as global pressure for sustainable development and reductions in carbon emissions, all of which support the need for increasing supplies of nuclear energy. Nuclear power is the only energy source that can be developed on a massive scale that will meet all the requirements for tremendous increases in generation. For economic and resource sustainability, new sources of energy must be clean, affordable, reliable, environmental, safe and secure, and sustainable. Before describing why Western nuclear power meets these requirements, let me tell you why we need to use more clean electricity and other forms of energy, not less.

Those of us who have it use energy to benefit humankind. We naturally seek to use energy to multiply our labor, increasing our productivity. In developed nations energy is used to build and light grammar schools and universities, to run hospitals and police stations, to purify water and produce medicine, to power farm machinery and mass transit, to drive sewing machines and robot assemblers, and to store and move information. A particular form of nuclear energy, nuclear radiation, is also used to sterilize mail in the nation's capital, consumer products found on grocery store shelves and elsewhere, and medical equipment used in every hospital and clinic in the nation. For the betterment of the human condition, the world needs massive additions of clean and affordable energy supplies. Development depends on energy, we use it to fight poverty and disease, to create and administer medicine, to grow and distribute food, and to provide the means for people to learn their way out of poverty, which is the most dangerous "thing" on Earth.

Energy Apartheid
Our global neighbors need much more energy to achieve the standards of living of the developed world. One-third of the six billion people on Earth today lack access to electricity. Another two billion use just 1000 kilowatt hours per year, which is barely enough to keep a single 100-watt light bulb lit. In addition, one billion people have no sanitary water, which could be provided easily and inexpensively if energy were available to operate desalination and/or purification plants. Energy is needed for development, prosperity, health, and international security. The alternative to development, which is easily sustained with ample energy, is suffering in the form of poverty, disease and death. This suffering creates instability and the potential for widespread violence, such that national security requires developed nations to help increase energy production in their more populous developing counterparts.

The relationship between energy use and human well being is demonstrated by correlating the United Nations' Human Development Index (HDI) with the annual per capita use of electricity. The UN compiles the HDI for almost every nation annually. It is a composite of average education level, health and well being (average life expectancy), and per capita income or gross domestic product. One such correlation that was done a few years ago showed that electric consumption first increases human well being, then people who are well off increase their electric consumption.

A deeper investigation into the data underlying the HDI reveals the effects of what Dr. Eric Loewen, a delegate to the United Nations 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, now calls "energy apartheid." People in the western world, who have and use large amounts of energy, have a life expectancy of about eighty years, while those in undeveloped nations where most people have no access to electricity, will die decades earlier. Thus, billions of our global neighbors without sufficient electricity die decades before they should. Those who live in poverty live in the most dangerous of conditions.

Without substantial increases in electricity generation, the proportion of the Earth's population without sufficient electricity will increase in the next fifty years as it grows by 50 percent to near 9 billion people. Preventing global conflict will require even more addition of electricity. The product of increased population and increased per capita energy usage by people who today have access to nearly none is a great growth in global electricity usage. Estimates for future increases in energy and electricity use, even with substantial efficiency improvements and conservation efforts, range between doubling and tripling in the next fifty years. Even with conservation, "energy star" appliances and homes, mandated fuel economy, massive government purchases of "renewables," and energy saving and efficiency measures, our use of electrical energy has been growing faster than total energy usage. Electricity use in the United States increased 57 percent between 1980 and 2000, while total energy use increased just 27 percent.

Future Energy Scenarios
The International Energy Agency (IEA) of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) projects 65 percent growth in world energy demand by 2020, two-thirds of that coming from developing countries. That is near-term growth of 65 percent, and it is in the future you and I can influence. This view of the future presents us with an immense challenge: how can we meet the global demand for energy without unsustainable long-term damage to the environment? The damage could include sinkholes, acid-mine runoff, mountaintop removal for coal extraction, pollution of our waters, earth, and air, and possibly global warming. Will we get that energy from fossil fuels, nuclear power, hydroelectric, or renewables? The answer is unquestionably "yes, we must" instead of a restrictive choice of one or a few of these options. To meet the world's demand for energy, we must use every available resource; but international conflict, economic prosperity, and local, regional, and global pollution will all be influenced by our future energy choices.

Back to the Present
The United States is the world leader with 103 of the world's 441 operating power plants (as of 2002). Whereas 17 percent of global electricity is produced by nuclear power, it supplies more than 20 percent of that used by Americans and 35 percent in the European Union. The U.S. is not constructing new plants, but production has been growing as fast as electricity demand because the industry has increased performance as well as increased capacity through plant upgrades and uprates. In 2002, U.S. nuclear power industries generated more than 780 billion kilowatt-hours, which was worth more than $50 billion. Last year reliability of nuclear plants averaged more than 90 percent, compared to about 60 percent in the 1980s. Compare that to the capacity factors for other sources of electricity: coal-68.7 percent, natural gas-49.2 percent, heavy oil steam turbine-26.5 percent, hydro-29.3 percent, wind-29 percent, solar-21.6 percent, and geothermal-77 percent.

United States nuclear generation has set new records every year since 1997, and that trend is continuing in 2003. In fact, during the last decade of the twentieth century, U.S. nuclear generation increased by more than 30 percent, which was equivalent to building more than twenty new commercial reactors. Safety performance improved, worker exposures to radiation decreased, and emergency shutdowns dropped to near zero per reactor. Nuclear power is alive and thriving in the United States, at least for existing power plants. The industry is increasing capacity, increasing capacity factor, and making even more clean and affordable electricity for America. With additional capacity uprates currently under consideration by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I expect the nuclear power industry will set new records again in the near future. With license renewals, we can now expect many of these plants to run until mid-century.

The NRC has given twenty-year license extensions to eighteen reactors to accompany record performance and safety levels and reductions in waste production. The U.S. nuclear industry has applied for license extensions for fourteen more reactors, has notified the NRC that they will apply for twenty more during the current Bush administration, and has announced plans to extend the licenses of almost all reactors. Unknown to most, new U.S. nuclear pioneers are in the midst of a renaissance.

Nuclear Power is Safe and Secure
This figure shows the results of an ongoing analysis of the safety impacts of energy production from several sources of energy. Of all major sources of electricity, nuclear power has produced the least impact from real accidents that have killed real people during the past 30 years, while hydroelectric has had the most severe accident impact. The same is true for environmental and health impacts. Of all major sources of energy, nuclear energy has the least impacts on environment and health while coal has the greatest. The low death rate from nuclear power accidents in the figure includes the Chernobyl accident in the Former Soviet Union.

Our nuclear plants are also among the most secure industrial facilities in the nation. In a recent report on homeland security, U.S. nuclear plants were given the only "A" grade. According to the Los Angeles Times, in California, emergency planners recently evaluated potential targets, categorizing them and giving point scores for various aspects. While highly visible places like the Golden Gate Bridge, the Los Angeles Airport, and Disneyland were at the top of the list, they thought nuclear plants were not worth attacking, rating the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station less than 400th.

The World Will CARESS Nuclear Energy

To benefit mankind without imposing unacceptable burdens, new sources of energy need to provide a number of attributes. The best would provide all of the following. They should be clean, which means non-emitting with compact wastes that can be easily and inexpensively controlled. They should be affordable, especially for the impoverished, but they should not be cheap. As Californians demonstrated during the recent electricity crisis and blackouts, economics is the best incentive for conservation. New sources of electricity must also be reliable. No one wants the power to fail while their children or grandchildren are on the operating table, and electricity disruptions have crippled California's, and probably the nation's, economy in the past two years. Energy has in the past become more and more environmental (not the same as clean), and it must continue to do so. In addition to these attributes, massive new sources of energy must also be safe, secure, and sustainable. The initials of these attributes-clean, affordable, reliable, environmental, safe and secure, and sustainable-make up the acronym CARESS. It is obvious from a review of recent global activities and proclamations that the world is now CARESSing nuclear energy as a top choice to meet global demand for new sources of electricity.

Back to the Future of Nuclear Power
Visionaries in U.S. nuclear power industries are planning "New Nukes" for us as well. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) decided to choose nuclear power over too costly coal, so they are recovering a reactor that has been shut down for more than a decade. The recovery of Brown's Ferry Unit 1 follows by many years the restart of Unit 2 and Unit 3, which are rated among the top 25 percent performers. And those earlier restarts taught TVA management valuable lessons, so the current $1.8 billion project is now partially complete, with spending and progress on track. The re-start project is self-financed, by TVA large customers with no need to borrow at high interest rates.

While all of this has been going on, the nuclear industry in the United States has also been planning to build new Advanced Light Water Reactors. The U.S. NRC granted licenses to reactor designs by General Electric, Combustion Engineering, and Westinghouse, and they are considering a second Westinghouse design at this time. A license should be issued in the next year or two, just in time for construction at one of several pre-licensed sites. The federal government also initiated a new licensing process designed to avoid historical delays in starting new reactors. Several plants were sited for more reactors than were constructed, and some of these sites hold existing state and local construction permits. To test this new licensing process, on Sept. 25, 2003, Exelon (Illinois) and Dominion (Virginia) filed Early Site Permit (ESP) applications with the U.S. NRC: Exelon for a second reactor at its Clinton, Illinois plant, and Dominion for another reactor at its North Anna, Virginia plant. A third power company, Entergy, should apply for an ESP before the end of 2003 for a second reactor at its River Bend, Mississippi plant. These three licenses could be the beginning of the nuclear construction renaissance in the United States. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry has a vision of increasing generating capacity by 50 percent, or about 50 plants or 50,000 megawatts, by 2020. In addition, the U.S. DOE is preparing to construct a new, high-temperature gas-cooled reactor for developing the technology to generate hydrogen instead of (or in addition to) electricity by using heat from nuclear power.

Conclusion
If the affluent, caring citizens of the world would CARESS nuclear energy, we could all look forward to a better world, especially for the billions without access to electricity or clean water. A time traveler returning from the distant future might observe that early twenty-first century engineers and policy makers had the foresight to make the right choice for both people and their environment.

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Dr. Denis E. Beller is a Research Professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and a Visiting Research Professor at the Idaho State University, where he conducts nuclear research to develop advanced technologies to reduce the quantity and radio-toxicity of nuclear waste bound for deep-underground disposal and to recycle and reuse nearly 97 percent of our used nuclear fuel.

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ENDNOTES:

¹ "Environmental" implies more than clean, meaning not putting hazardous matter into our water and air. It also includes the responsible and ethical use of our resources, including land, water, and air. While not "dirty," activities like sinkholes, mountain top mining, release of toxic water from coal-bed methane extraction, and drowning millions of acres behind dams are certainly not environmentally sound practices.

² Eric Loewen, Global Energy Apartheid: The Disparity Between the Haves and Have-Nots, Address at Director's Special Seminar, Advanced Photon Source, Argone Nat'l Laboratory (Jan. 28, 2003).

³ Dr. Stefan Hirschberg, et al., Comparison Of Severe Accident Risks In Fossil, Nuclear And Hydro Electricity Generation (2001).

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The foregoing is an excerpt of the paper (with full references) to be published in the University of Utah Law School Journal of Land, Resources, & Environmental Law in January 2004. Copies of that Journal, including all articles from the April 18, 2003 Symposium, are available for $20 from: William S. Hein & Co., Inc., 1285 Main Street, Buffalo, NY 14209-1987, phone: (800) 828-7571.