Subject: plutonium and energy Date: Fri, 12 Dec 1997 10:26:35 -0700 From: Michael C Baker Reply-To: mcbaker@pathfindermail.com Newsgroups: sci.energy Shown below is a talk presented this past summer. I'd like to hear your comments. Michael Baker, Ph.D. ----------------------------------------------------------- The Role of Plutonium in Energy Production Outside the US by A. Waltar, Plutonium Futures Conference, Sante Fe, NM Few events in history have borne more potential impact for the human condition than the discovery of plutonium. Proponents of this vastly powerful substance hail it as the energy source that can fuel the world for countless centuries. Opponents decry it as "unnatural" and are clamoring for the world to rid itself of this "dangerous" substance. Ironically, it is within the United States, the nation in which this substance was discovered and first harnessed for energy production, that the most vocal dissonant voices are being heard. A hard-core anti-nuclear subculture has been highly successful in manipulating the media and even major political movements into believing that the U. S. would be better off to rid itself of plutonium at the earliest possible date. Yet despite what happens in the U. S., the value of plutonium has not gone unnoticed in the rest of the world. Plutonium will be used in ever increasing quantities to provide the prodigious quantities of electricity required to fuel an increasing global population. Modern communications have allowed this growing population to become more and more aware of the quality of life that electricity can provide. These world citizens are not to be denied. Nearly 20% of the electricity generated around the world currently comes from nuclear power. Whereas most of the population believes this energy is generated solely from uranium, the fact is that approximately one-third of it is generated by plutonium, simply due to the buildup of plutonium in the normal isotopic balance of nuclear reactor operations. With the higher burnups now being attained in commercial light water reactors, the fraction of electricity generated by plutonium will continue to increase. As a direct result of the plutonium produced during normal power reactor operations, over 60 metric tons (MT) of plutonium is currently being discharged in spent fuel from the global commercial nuclear power industry each year. According to IAEA projections, this will rise to over 100 MT/year early in the next century, reaching some 400 MT/year by 2050. The total accumulated plutonium in spent nuclear fuel is now about 100 MT, and is projected to rise to some 10,000 MT by the year 2050. Given the enormous energy potential of this fuel, it has always been the goal of the scientific community to recycle this spent fuel to extract the useable plutonium (and uranium) setting aside the fission products for burial or future beneficial use. With only a few exceptions, this is precisely the path being followed by most modern countries outside the U. S. Mixed (Pu, U) Oxide (MOX) fuel was first tested in light water reactors in the 1960s in Belgium, and has since been utilized in France, Germany, and Switzerland. Some 22 reactors in Europe are currently loaded with sizeable quantities of MOX fuel, with about twice this many reactors scheduled for MOX loadings within the next 10 years. Three MOX fuel fabrication facilities are already in operation in Europe. Concrete plans for burning MOX are being implemented in Japan, and strong interest has been shown in South Korea and Russia, the latter interest being generated mainly by the desire to burn weapons-return plutonium. The use of recycled plutonium for energy production will undoubtedly continue to generate controversy, both within and outside of the United States. However, the fact remains that this material is currently the only known material that has the technical maturity to provide the energy needs to a growing world population for literally a millennia, and to do so in a manner compatible with preserving our environment. Consequently, it is essential that the scientific community find effective ways to help take the mystery out of plutonium and provide assurances to a skeptical public that the continued development and utilization of plutonium will provide them a far better quality of life than any other known source of energy. A denial of the proper utilization of plutonium will most assuredly result in more reliance on fossil fuels, with the attendant crucially needed for a wide variety of other uses. What are the consequences of the United States permanently turning its back on the commercial utilization of plutonium for the generation of electricity? Would this significantly alter the approach the rest of the world may take? If experience to date with the U. S. denial of reprocessing has any bearing on this question, the answer is that it will have very little lasting effect, internationally. In fact, the U. S. stand on reprocessing could well be argued to have been counterproductive to the stated U. S. non-proliferation goals, since the U. S. soon became known as an unreliable supplier. This spurred both France and the U. K. into an aggressive program to become self-sufficient, and their closed nuclear system is now fully operational. Consequently, a denial of the benefits of plutonium by the U.S. will, at a minimum, result in further erosion of U.S. influence on nuclear matters on the international scene. It will also (1) eventually place the U. S. in a strong dependency on other nations for energy resources, and (2) gradually force our country into a third-world status. The full consequences of such a scenario would please very few thinking Americans! Plutonium is currently being recognized outside of the United States as a most precious commodity. The fundamental question is whether the U. S. has the courage to regain leadership in this field, or whether we will elect to be a by-stander. The fate of our nation awaits that answer. AND: From: "Carl Dean" Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Newsgroups: sci.energy > I know there are experts on this newsgroup who know about reprocessing Already found a good website on this! Feel free to add any comments though. http://www.nuke-energy.com The page on fuel burnup is: http://www.nuke-energy.com/html/after_burnup.html Carl AND From: Steven Peterson Subject: Re: Power from Nuclear Warheads: How Much? >Hi, > >I have heard about nuclear fuel reprocessing plants which recycle spent fuel >rods. > >Any idea how expensive this is? Or rather, how expensive they WOULD BE >if operated on a scale of recycling about 180x49x724/4 = about 1.6 million >fuel rods a year? This would be the situation using my plan. > >Then of course the related issue: what about the Pu created in the fuel rods? > >PS I would like to add your letter to that web page file. Any objection? Go ahead. I don't know what the cost would be, but the concentration of 235U in the spent fuel is still a lot higher than in uranium ores, so it is economically attractive. The problem is that the spent fuel is intensely radioactive, so the shielding needs to be like what they built at Hanford and West Valley. The Pu can be recycled too, for use as reactor fuel, or it can be sequestered by leaving it mixed with fission products. However, long term storage is then required, and it can always be recovered by mere chemical separation (compared to U which requires isotope separation to get weapons grade 235U). For anyone worried about the long term danger of Pu recovery and use in weapons, the best thing to do with it is to use it as nuclear fuel and destroy it. On the other hand, if used in a breeder cycle, it can keep reducing the need to burn fossil fuels for a long time. There are no technology barriers to prevent what you want to do, only political and social ones. That doesn't mean they are trivial. Steven H. Peterson, Ph.D. Naval Research Laboratory Surface Chemistry Branch Geo-Centers, Inc. PO Box 441340 Ft. Washington, MD 20744 202-404-1807 202-767-3321 (FAX) http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/Strasse/3931 AND: Subject: Re: Windpower VS Nukes, CO2 production Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2000 04:15:00 GMT From: Gregory Greenman Organization: @Home Network Newsgroups: sci.environment, talk.environment, alt.save.the.earth References: 1 , 2 , 3 Tim O'Flaherty wrote: > > Disagree, While I can't quantify it the fact that long after the > nukes are shut down we will be storing the waste, most of which has no > way of being recycled as fuel, (recycling the rods for more fuel will > generate even more waste at least in terms of volume), plus the mines > and processing plants for the original fuel I think puts the win in the > wind collumn. Think acre/centuries. However... Tim, The amount of energy you get if you recycle is on the order of the nominal burnup - which is about 40,000 Megawatt-days / metric tonne. Also, recycling of waste lessens the half-life. Once-through nuclear fuel contains Pu-239 with a 24,000 year half-life. Whereas, if all actinides are recycled as fuel, Pu-239 included; then the only waste will be fission products. The longest lived fission product of any consequence is Cesium-137 with a half-life of 30 years. A concept developed at the Argonne National Lab is a very good idea: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/reaction/interviews/till.html Dr. Gregory Greenman Physicist