Archive: Opinions

Nationally and locally there is evidence of a fear of nuclear energy that is severely limiting our options for alternatives to fossil fuels.  Students at Lansing’s high school make little mention of nuclear energy when alternatives to fossil fuels are discussed, or often dismiss it as nearly as damaging as fossil fuels.  Those that do not fear the power plants still take issue with the waste that is produced, and claim that nuclear energy is also a “non-renewable” power source.

In regard to the second issue, they are right; we could run out of U235 (fissionable uranium).  But, the amount of power generated by the amount of U235 that is available to us readily enough, could power the planet for another century if used wisely, and do so without the pollution associated with fossil fuels.  In addition, at the current rate of development, good alternatives to nuclear should easily be available within an hundred years.

Their first issue, that we have a nuclear waste storage problem, could be solved easily, but this nation has so far refused to.  The first part of an answer is that each plant is already required to have storage capacity on site for one hundred years of waste from that plant.  Most have operated for no more than forty years, so there is no overcrowding yet. 

Next is the fact that France has been using, for many years now, a method of recycling their spent fuel rods.  The material is separated into three components: small amounts of not-yet-reacted U235, Pu239 (fissionable plutonium) byproduct from the reaction, and a variety of non-usable materials.  The U235 can be reused in a standard reactor, the Pu239 in a modified reactor, and the other materials are far less radioactive, and have far shorter half-lives than unprocessed nuclear waste.  This system reuses the most dangerous parts of the waste, giving us more energy, and at the same time makes the waste we store less dangerous, and more quickly neutral material. 

The best part of this system is that the French have made it work economically, which means that other nations ought to be able to as well. If the waste can be dealt with, and the long-term supply of energy is not at risk, then the only fear left is reactor malfunction.  Only the Soviets have blown up a reactor, and there has only been one accident in the US in our forty years or so of operating close to one hundred nuclear plants.  Clearly this fear is not really a concern.

The only reason that the US has not developed nuclear energy as it should is that a large portion of the government opposes it, and the people have not been told how safe and viable a solution it can be.


From: Timothy Shea

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