Powering Up Three

America’s Energy Future


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Dinner at the Square



3.

The Nuclear Power Debate Version 2.0: What’s Old, What’s New, What’s Hype, What’s True

Read presentation notes and Q&A here.
Find our program here.

Catch our speaker bios and presentation notes here:
Jerry Paul here.
Tom Cochran here.

Powerpoint presentations:
Jerry Paul here.
Tom Cochran here.

Draft Recommendations 3.0:



1. Nuclear power is a significant source of zero to low greenhouse gas energy
that should remain part of a diversified energy mix.

“Nuclear power emits virtually no greenhouse gases. The complete nuclear power chain, from uranium mining to waste disposal, and including reactor and facility construction, emits only two to six grams of carbon per kilowatt-hour. This is about two orders of magnitude below coal, oil, and even natural gas.” Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, Director of the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency)


2. Nuclear is the only zero/low greenhouse gas energy source currently capable of providing the baseload (24/7) power required to meet a projected 35 to 40% increase in demand and/or the international goal of a 70% decrease in greenhouse gas emissions.

“True that it will take decades to replace all greenhouse gas emitting forms of energy with nuclear, but it’s hard
to say that you’d throw out the largest contributor in favor of the smaller ones.”– Jerry Paul

Nuclear currently provides 70% of our greenhouse gas emission-free energy. With what some project as a substantially increasing energy demand, the aggressive goals in decrease of greenhouse gases, the upcoming need to replace aging currently operating nuclear plants to simply not move backwards on emissions, along with the imperative to rely less on pulverized coal, it seems inevitable that new nuclear capacity will be put on line. Right or left of the political aisle on energy, new nuclear addresses important imperatives from both camps. That the timeline to get nuclear on line is long (8-13 years) relative to our current needs does not eliminate the imperative to build them, rather it underscores the need to move to get it done now.



3. If we’re concerned with greenhouse gas emissions, choosing not to build
new nuclear capacity is giving up a sure thing in favor of a hopeful bet.

“The Governor of the State of Florida has set a broad standard of 1995 standards by 2015 and it’s less likely you’ll do it with coal. The increased demand, and you take away coal that was in the ten year site plans – even if you fill in with maximum solar that the industry was pursuing, 4,000 MW, and ramp up gas as fast as you can you still have a very significant hole, EVEN after you build the 4 reactors proposed in Florida. You have to ask how we’re going to meet the goal. Should you fill the hole with nuclear energy, you bet.” —Jerry Paul

“…you’re going to lock yourself in to some huge nuclear investments that won’t produce power until 2017 and you’re going to lock yourself out of investing in other alternatives that are going to get you there quicker and cheaper.” – Tom Cochran

We have to invest resources in technological investment in zero-emission energy sources and in clean coal, but if we don’t invest something in new nuclear, we put all our chips on the bet that we’ll succeed technologically. We’ve got to do some of both. This recommendation weighs the environmental risk of not developing a sure, firm response to climate change (albeit a longer term one) as higher than the economic risk of building a new generation of nuclear that is ultimately bested by newer technologies that out compete nuclear. When advanced technologies beat nuclear in a competitive market, including the cost of building and waste disposal of nuclear, nuclear will have served the role of a mid-term transitional technology.

4. In comparing health effects and mortality rates, nuclear power
is statistically safer than coal & natural gas.

“As they make 51 percent of our e1ectricity, coal-fired plants cause the premature deaths of twenty-four thousand Americans every year as well as hundreds of thousands of cases of lung and cardiovascular diseases…”
–Gwenyth Cravens, The Power to Save the World

Nuclear power has caused less than five deaths in American history. Since 1984, approximately 800 people have died skiing. You hear about “deadly radiation” but not “deadly electricity” although 1,200 Americans on the average die from electrocution each year or “deadly natural gas” although it kills 500 people annually of asphyxiation.

The EPA has a standard called Fencepost Man, a hypothetical individual that you assume lives all year on the boundary of a nuclear site, all his food there and gets water from a well onsite. Radiation levels are regularly monitored at radiological monitoring stations (within a ten-mile radius- they test the fish and cows, the water, soil, air, trees, and grass). The Fencepost Man cannot get more exposure than 15 millirems (a measure of radiation absorbed by tissue) annually. Living in northeastern Washington states weighs in at 1,700 millirem annually. Find a list of millirem measures here.

There is no indication of pockets of higher cancer rates around these plants. The highest rates of cancer are usually around centers of heavy industry, especially chemical and petrochemical facilities - not nuclear power plants.

5. The long radioactive half-life of nuclear waste is not a measure of its danger.

Rather than an indication of how fantastically dangerous nuclear waste is, the fact that it takes thousands of years for half of its radioactivity to dissipate is a measure of its stability. A longer half-life means it is a more stable compound and outgases its radioactivity slowly. No-salt, a salt substitute found in the grocery store, has a radioactive half life of a million years.

6. While it is true that nuclear waste is radioactive for 100,000 years, the risk
decreases substantially in a tiny fraction of that time.

“Toxicity changes rapidly over time, after a few hundred to a thousand years, it starts to look like an ore mine in terms of its radioactive content. Its still a hazard in terms of potential drinking water, but sometimes it’s overplayed in terms of its long term hazard; it’s radioactive forever, but there are other chemical elements such as lead that are hazardous forever. “
- Tom Cochran



7. Waste disposal is the fundamental technological challenge ahead.

“… “[Nuclear power] produces the only waste that is dangerous enough that government has to assume responsibility for its disposal.” –Tom Cochran
“NRC cannot license Yucca Mountain on results from a black box, and it should so inform DOE.” –Tom Cochran at Vanderbilt University 1/2008

Currently there is one successfully operating long-term waste disposal facility in the U.S. – Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). WIPP is in southeastern New Mexico, it opened in 1999 and is a deep geologic repository for defense-related nuclear waste.

On June 3, 2008 the EPA submitted an application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to license Yucca Mountain. There is strong political opposition in Nevada to the project.

8. U.S. nuclear plants are unlikely targets for terrorist attacks given
the absence of highly enriched uranium.

“But in terms of terrorism, a much much greater risk is associated with the terrorists use of highly enriched uranium which is not used in any existing plant the United States, but it is used overseas. It’s a problem because it is difficult to detect and easy to make with highly enriched uranium IF you have the requisite material which is NOT easy to get… the bottom line is that this isn’t the issue (in the U.S.), there are other issues we need to focus on.” — Tom Cochran

“The nuclear industry has the most stringent security regime. America’s the last place you would go if your design was to infiltrate a nuclear power plant to get your hands on and leave with special nuclear material… I respectfully reject any implication that our operating nuclear power plants cannot withstand a 9/11 type attack. Indeed they can… The plants are designed to withstand an airplane impact and I do not believe that is a measurable risk. ” –Jerry Paul

“To reach a reactor, terrorists would have to get through a tornadoproof, locked-nine-ways-from-Sunday, heavy steel door in the containment building wall, and then to negotiate an air lock.” –Gwenyth Cravens, The Power to Save the World


While there was disagreement between our speakers on the vulnerability of nuclear plants to a 9/11 type of attack (Tom Cochran thinks we are vulnerable in a particular type of plant that has a spent fuel pool elevated above the ground; Jerry Paul thinks a rigorous testing regime gives us a high degree of confidence that plants can well withstand this kind of attack) both thought that the absence of highly enriched uranium (weapons grade uranium) in U.S. nuclear plants make them unattractive targets for terrorists.

9. With nuclear, subsidies are the rub.

“It’s not whether you’re for or against nuclear, whether you believe it should or shouldn’t be in the mix- it is in the mix. The issue is whether at the federal and state government level we can be subsidizing new nuclear plants… About a half a billion, three-quarters of a billion dollars in subsidies go to some of the wealthiest companies on Wall Street.” — Tom Cochran

“We need to recognize the need in America to transform the way we do energy. There’s going to have to be a change from the status quo then that implies there’s going to have to be some form of government intervention. What is needed will be on a case-by-case basis depending on type of generation form. With some forms of generation, for some to increase generation capacity it’s R&D, with others, it’s reducing regulatory uncertainty. Regulatory uncertainty is one of the largest chilling effects in building new nuclear power plants, especially costly is the delay in the process by lawyering-up and litigating every single step of the licensing process. So it’s the time value of money that makes the application uneconomical.” –Jerry Paul

The place for subsidies is to subsidize long term R&D of new technologies and to break into the marketplace new technologies such as solar voltaics that have the possibility of getting their costs reduced (by innovation & maturity of the technology). The nuclear business has gotten its share of subsidies – it’s a 50-year-old industry. We’ve retired plants… it’s had its day, it’s time for it to move over and subsidize newer and cleaner more promising technologies… but we don’t need to have a renaissance on subsidizing nuclear power. It’s not going to change the underlying economics…” –Tom Cochran

Subsidies are a complex subject that we didn’t find any real agreement on between our two speakers. Pay attention to our blog in coming weeks as we try to unravel the topic of subsidies. Some thoughts…

While a focus on Research & Development seems the most likely use of governmental subsidies (which wouldn’t include nuclear) or perhaps a subsidy to push a technology to the point of marketability where the costs come down (which also not likely include nuclear), isn’t another reasonable use supporting a business risk that no business would otherwise take - i.e. the expensive up-front costs of building a nuclear power plant – not knowing what legal challenges to your plans lie ahead, not knowing what delays would occur? Alternatively, the whole business of government subsidies of businesses, akin to corporate socialism, is a subject that deserves the scrutiny of the public. An informative read on this topic: Free Lunch by David Cay Johnson is a fascinating read on this topic.

10. Defuse the debate by knowing whether you’re talking domestic
nuclear issues or international nuclear issues.

A rogue regime hiding behind nuclear energy and morphing fuel into highly enriched uranium for bombs and reactor fuel needed for operating nuclear facilities in this country have nothing to do with each other. –Jerry Paul

“We haven’t talked about proliferation – selling it around the world – what countries – Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, Arab Emerates – which one is going to be where the next Iran/Iraq problem will be. This technology comes at some cost. It’s a cost your children are going to see if they go to war in some Middle Eastern country because someone is trying to build a nuclear bomb.” –Tom Cochran

Until the United States begins to reprocess its nuclear waste, something we may choose to do in order to solve some of the waste problem, building new nuclear plants in the United States does not increase the likelihood of proliferation internationally. By waiting to solve our domestic energy issues in order to take on the complexity of the international issues, we may be delaying solving our energy dilemmas indefinitely.

11. Building new nuclear plants is expensive, we just don’t know how expensive.
Corollary: Nuclear priced at less than 2 cents KW/hr is a half-truth.

“Last year Keystone Center study of environmental experts, nuclear industry experts, regulatory experts said cost was NOT 6.7 to 7 cents per kw hour levelized – estimated costs of new plant up to 8 to 11 KW/hour… Since then getting numbers for proposed plants in Florida, numbers coming in at 14-18 cents a KW/hour”
- Tom Cochran

“The graphic doesn’t show the capital costs to build the plant which are very high. Nuclear is the cheapest to run, but the cost of building is substantial. Run 40 years plus, so the costs get recovered quickly.”
- Jerry Paul

If you hear nuclear priced at less that 2 cents KW/hr, they’re using a misleading figure which doesn’t include capital costs of building new plants. Nuclear power generated from existing plants is that cheap. But then again, it would be cheap to live in your home if you didn’t have to pay to build it…

Comparing nuclear to other energy alternatives: Coal plant electricity costs 4-5 cents KW/hr; natural gas 7-9 cents; new nuclear 8-10 cents (according to Susan Story); existing nuclear .5-1.5 cent per KW hour. Biomass competitive at 8-12 cents; wind in Florida (because of low capacity) 15-20 cents (vs. west Texas 4-5 cents); solar 30 cents if centralized.

12. Transparency, transparency, transparency.

In order to move forward on building new nuclear generation capacity, the industry needs to be transparent in cost estimates, risk assessment and waste disposal challenges. Without transparency, they risk a second generation of nuclear no more successful in sustaining new growth than the first generation was, which came to a sudden halt with failure to report safety issues and substantial cost overruns. The industry’s understandable tendency to protect itself by lacking transparency has had the overall unintended effect of making the public more rather than less suspicious of the nuclear industry.



13.To maximize our ability to use nuclear energy intelligently (likely with reprocessing) we
need to address the challenging international proliferation picture.

“(Nuclear) is the only technology that requires special international safeguards & export control regime to prevent countries from making nuclear weapons at fuel cycle facilities… only technology where the government has to assume the liability for catastrophic accidents.”
– Tom Cochran

“A global partnership that further develops, disseminates, and trains tens of thousands of people in the complex chemical techniques for separating long-lived weapon-usable materials, like plutonium, as cesium and strontium, can hardly be called ‘proliferation resistant’.”–Jonathan Schell

The Baruch Plan, rejected by the Soviets in 1946, contains in the recommendation by IAEA Director Mohammed ElBaradei, supported by international financier Warren Buffet, which places control of nuclear fuel production for peaceful purposes under an international authority. Jonathan Schell, in The Seventh Decade: The New Shape of Nuclear Danger, describes the problem with this plan, despite its promise in eliminating one of the major obstacles to nuclear power, especially to reprocessing which would solve waste problems: “However, the United States and other nuclear powers, unwilling to surrender their own fuel cycle technologies to international managers, demurred-underscoring once again their commitment to double-standard solutions.”