Energy Crisis Solved by Science

[DracoSuave]

You mean absolutely false statements like "U-235 is a renewable energy resource?

Absolutely false? Are you that poorly informed? Yes, you are evidently.

http://www.whatisnuclear.com/articles/recycling.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

Consider yourself schooled.

Uranium 238 becoming plutonium is not renewing uranium 235.

Nor is it renewable at all, once you have plutonium, you don't go back to u-235.

I know a little concept like 'Conservation of mass' and 'energy' is rough, so I'll explain what happens when you use fission on Uranium 235 which is NOT Uranium 238.

U-235, when hit with a neutron, becomes U-236, which in turn is unstable. This causes it to become two other elements, along with a release of great amounts of energy, and some neutrons. This process is irreversable, as those elements... if they could combine... would require great amounts of energy and some neutrons... and would become U-236. U-236 is unstable, and would simply fission again.

Now, if the neutrons hit U-238 (which again, is NOT U-235), then it will undergo decay that will change it to Plutonium, which is also a fissionable material like U-235. However, that doesn't make this a renewable reaction... it only means that one reaction, in a breeder reactor, will create another fissable material out of material that is otherwise useless.

The problem is... once fissile material is used it's done for permanently... there exists absolutely no way to undo the reaction, from fission to fusion, and even if you could, it'd be an endothermic reaction... it would require as much energy to undo as it took to do.

But good on you posting on breeder reactors, because it makes an excellent rebuttal to:

I was refering to weapons of mass destruction... you know... the OTHER thing nuclear reactors make.

This is incorrect on so many levels it's not even funny.

See above about breeder reactors being used to turn u-238 into plutonium, thusly allowing for more fissile material that can be used to make fission bombs.

 

[Aurora219]

Dihydrate monoxide all over again.

 

[Blue_vision]

Nuclear power of any kind, although playing a big role, can't solve the energy crisis on its own because you can't power vehicles (except boats) with it. Without most modes of transport, there will be no global food and goods network, and no country is anywhere near being self sufficient at this point.

Well funny enough, it potentially could. The coming decades will need to see transport almost entirely revamped, and a huge amount of automobile traffic in the world could be replaced by trains, which could easily be electrified and run off of nuclear power. You've also got the potential for electric cars, which could make up almost everything that legitimately needs personal automobile use. Also, the global food and transport network is a bit shoddy in it's basic idea; you could save a lot of energy by just making things close to you rather than shipping it halfway around the world.

I see what you did there!
Anyway, you are greatly understanding the costs of this kind of fuel usage. Although there are little to no greenhouse gas emissions, it still has a terrible effect on the environment. Once the actinouranium, Uranium for those of you slow on the uptake, can no longer be used as fuel we have no real way to get rid of it. While it can't produce any usable energy it is still producing very dangerous levels of radiation and can't be properly disposed of.
I'm not saying that I'm completely against nuclear power, but its risks should be taken into account.

Uranium can easily be bred so that almost no significantly radioactive material remains, raising the efficiency of uranium fuel a shit ton. Only, no countries fully breed nuclear fuel, and some of the biggest users don't do it at all.

Well. Heres the thing. Fossil fuels are running out and renewable CANT physically fuel all of the worlds needs, it can in certain areas like iceland and their fantastic geothermal shtick, but others cannot. Nuclear fuel is the only way to go, whether people like it or not. They can object to nuclear fuel out of fear mongering bullshit (Meltdowns cannot occur without the powerplant being particularly shoddy or it being done on purpose, chernobyl was a dump of a place and that wasnt even a meltdown, it was a steam explosion that catapulted the fuel over the country side). So the point is, object and go hook a horse up to a treadmill or shut the fuck up and accept it.

Chernobyl was in fact a meltdown. The core melted down and got into the water, which ended up creating all that steam. But you're right, Chernobyl shouldn't be anymore representative of the Nuclear industry than

Are there a shitton of methods for obtaining clean energy? God yes. Do they produce ANYWHERE near enough to matter? Not really.

The very highest current theoretical yield of solar cells is about 28-ish% for example, and solar cells are a major source of renewable energy. If only we could get that to 100%. Probably won't happen for another gajillion years, though. SCIENCE IS HARD.

Most experts agree that 100% renewable-based energy would be quite easy to obtain, given time to shift from fossil fuels and the will to do so.

 

[funguy2121]

snip

/posts stupid less-clever-than-he-thinks-it-is picture that reads "I see what you did there."

Are you asking us to take this grand revelation and embrace nuclear power on a grander scale?

First reaction to the thread title: No fuckin' way! (that's sarcasm for those of you who can't differentiate irony from redundancy from confusion )

 

[funguy2121]

Also: would that stigma be the ease of which nuclear power could erase us from the planet and forever render it uninhabitable?

 

[Twilight_guy]

That's nice but scientists aren't really that far away from achieving controlled sustained hot fusion. Although they have yet to produce a self sustaining reaction they have created fusion reactions before. The great about fusion is that the elements used to fuel it can be extracted from water int he ocean (Horray tridium!) giving us an essentially infinite supply. The byproducts are helium and some radioactive protective plating used in the reaction that must be replaced every so often. It also supplies more power then most conventional methods of power generation. As far as I know fusion is the cleanest method of mass power generation scientist know of right now and must be fairly good at generating energy considering that keeps stars burning.

 

[ImprovizoR]

You know there is no such thing as energy crisis. There is only coal and oil crisis and it will only affect rich corporations that depend on it. There's a lot we can use for energy that works better than coal and oil. For example - cannabis. Yeah, that's right, the plant used to make marijuana. The plant that only has one bad side and about million good sides to it. You can grow cannabis on an infertile soil and the soil will regenerate. You can make plastic, paper, fuel, medicine, textile etc. out of cannabis and industrial cannabis. You can make fuel and medicine all by yourself if you wanted too. All you have to do is educate yourself about this plant and you will realize what's the real reason behind it being outlawed. Henry Ford made a car and fuel out of cannabis. He had a vision of future, but his vision didn't sit well with oil companies.

 

[vivster]

as a proponent of nuclear power(over fossil fuels) that's no news to me
fossil fuels cost much more deaths than nuclear power
not to speak of the air pollution

also i don't understand the complaints about the nuclear waste
this stuff couldn't harm you if you were standing 100m away from it let alone through hundreds of meters of stone
no one ever goes down there and it's well below ground water
so it can't possibly hurt anyone..not now and not in a million years.. unless you go willingly down there and cuddle with the barrels
also i have yet to hear about any fatalities caused by radioactivity in fukushima

the problem with this whole thing is the uneducated mass
radioactivity is dangerous(in very high doses) and it's also invisible and a lot of science stuff is going on
that's of course scary for most people... the same people who think that cellphone waves can cook your balls...
not knowing that there is more radioactivity going through our bodies due to natural causes than by nuclear plants or other technical stuff combined

nuclear power is not the answer to the energy "crisis"(that's solar power)
but it's a few magnitudes more useful and less dangerous than any fossil fuel

 

[Grospoliner]

Snip

Point being is that nuclear material is recyclable, the same as any other material. Nothing is 100% recyclable and nothing in reality is 100% renewable. After all the sun expends fuel to produce sunlight meaning that both microwave and solar power are non-renewable in the sense that people generally use them.

As for nuclear proliferation that is a whole other topic to discuss and really doesn't play a role in the energy debate.

 

[Grand_Arcana]

I prefer nuclear fusion. Less waste, less risk, and a near unlimited supply of fuel (hydrogen is only the most abundant element in the universe!)

Bio-synth fuel would also work. I could go into detail about my idea, but I intend to get a patent ; )

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Well it is still fission but I personally think we should be moving to fission as a sort of teething form of energy or stepping stone until we can implement and perfect actual renewable sources. Although while all sources carry risks I don't think we should spend too long on fission as it will end up with big waste problems.

 

[manaman]

well all we need to do is not see how much extra power we can get by taking the control rods further out. like the russians at chernobyl. anyway, i'm a supported of nuclear power, except when it goes wrong, because thats like a nuclear explosion. mainly because it is. but it does provide a lot of power.
the problem is the waste. we need lead boxes to keep the waste safe, then we need to bury them, then wait a few thousand years.

A meltdown is not a nuclear explosion. That requires compressing the mass in order for the reaction to occur at speeds that create the blast, I'm a melt down that never happens, sure shit loads of energy are created, but not fast enough to create the blast. The blast you referenced up there were steam explosions, and a hydrogen explosion (there where several blasts). You don't need straight lead to block radiation either. Some forms of radiation pass through relatively dense materials like lead with ease, while plastics or glass stop them completely. It's about building the most effective shielding possible, not the thickest. The real problem is that it is impossible to stop all radiation leakage, you still end up with minor ammounts, which are not overly harmful in shorter exposures but can contaminate ground water. Then you have a problem. Unless you happen to know of a place that sees average decade rainfalls of less than an inch, and you tumble out a mountain in that place so far above the water table (that is basically non existant to begin with). Then you might just have a solution to the waste.

Add in opening up post processing of the spent rods before storage to remove leftover fuel, and other usable materials to commercial ventures and you have even less dangerous waste to dispose. It starts to look a lot safer.

OT, everyone is more interested in the thorium cycle these days.

 

[Berenzen]

First off I would like to point out that the reactors in Japan that melted down use an inferior model (ABWR and BWRs) that was getting phased out to the safer CANDU reactors, the ones in the U.S. and are getting switched out to these as well.

Second, for those thinking that being proximal to nuclear power plants is dangerous. Yes if it melts down with the fuel rods exposed, chances are you will die, but (possibly greater)danger can also be applied coal plant explosions. Futhermore, radiation doses received by civilians from either the 3-mile incident and/or the fukashima incident are mere percentages to what we experience normally in a year.

Now for the people people trying to make the argument of chernobyl, but in all honesty- the soviets simply f**ked up. They didn't have proper containment, overloaded the reactors to try and pump more energy out, then tried to cool it off once it overheated, causing a steam explosion and sending nuclear fuel out of there, as well as melting the other fuel rods.

Now I'm not saying that nuclear fission reactors are the best choice, but they are better, more efficient and less lethal- yes even in the waste- than coal reactors. Yes nuclear waste can take a fairly long time to decay, but is fairly safe and easy to contain in concrete canisters and/or structures, for 50+ years and after 100 years gives off 0.3 Sv/h at 30cm (1 foot) and exponentially decreases as you get further away. After 500 years, not millennia as some have suggested, the rods are essentially harmless, requiring you to spend thousands of hours by the rods before you would get even minor radiation poisoning.

As for storage, putting the waste away from water in a lead containment shield would essentially completely minimize the any danger posed from nuclear waste.

If you don't believe me, check out: http://www.cna.ca/curriculum/cna_safety/nuclear_waste-eng.asp?bc=Nuclear%20Waste&pid=Nuclear%20Waste and http://xkcd.com/radiation/ and make your own conclusions.

As for the safety of CANDU reactors check out: http://www.cna.ca/curriculum/cna_safety/candu_safety-eng.asp?bc=How%20Safe%20Are%20CANDU?&pid=How%20Safe%20Are%20CANDU?

The CNA is the Canadian Nuclear Association, who are responsible for making rules and regulations of nuclear products within Canada. The XKCD radiation chart is a chart made by Randall Munroe with the help of a Senior Reactor Operator, you can check his sources there out yourself.

As a postscript, I would like to add that I do not believe that nuclear power is the best source of power, a 100% renewable resource would be much preferred obviously, but it still will take a while to develop that form of energy source.

 

[Febel]

3. Waste- Apart from the mentioned greenhouse gases produced by coal, it also produces approximately 3 tones of ash -Per Second- and over 100,000,000 *One Hundred Million* tones of waste per year. To compare, Kernel power produces just small amount of spent Actinouranium rods per year, which can be safely stowed deep underground without posing any threats to the environment.

Please tell me this is sarcasm.
Waste is the issue of nuclear power precisely because you can't just put it underground and pretend it doesn't exist (although most governments do just that anyway).

Are you by any chance a NEI representative?

Um...You absolutely can just bury it underground. Just so long as it's far below water tables and in dry areas like deserts it's generally safe.

 

[Ultra_Caboose]

That does make me wonder, though... Why don't we just sent our waste to the sun yet? Load up a rocket with spent fuel, launch and let inertia coast it to the big ball o' fire..

It is incredibly expensive to launch things into space. The recently retired shuttles cost roughly $450,000,000 to launch, and carry a payload of 26,786 kg. There is around 2,721,000kg of high level nuclear waste generated per year in the US. To launch this to orbit, let alone to The Sun, with current technology would cost around $47,000,000,000 per year. This is of course a very rough estimate, with possiby unreliable data, but illustrates the difficulty of doing so.

In the long term, this cost could be reduced by developing better ways to deliver the payload, but that in itself will be incredibly expensive. The money could be better spent researching new fuel sources such Fusion.

Because a statistically significant fraction of rockets suffer catastrophic failure before they exit the atmosphere.

We typically get 4-5 such events every year, and nobody wants to run the risk that the rocket carrying nuclear waste is going to be the one that explodes at 20,000 feet.

... Well... That shut me up.

I don't have much more to add that everyone else hasn't mentioned already. Nuclear energy is clean and effective energy, but the potential risks are often higher than most people would want to take, especially given the NIMBY principle.

 

[kokoska]

when it comes to a debate over the merits of nuclear power (for the few who still don't get it, that's what this was about), i find little to no redeeming argument against its use.

consider this: name 3 big nuclear power plant disasters. if you named Fukushima, 3 mile island and Chernobyl, congratulations, you named them all. now consider how each disaster was caused and later panned out. Fukushima was cause by a magnitude 9 earthquake and consequent tsunami, enough to wreak havoc on any facility. Chernobyl occurred 30 years ago due to inept soviet technicians trying to cut corners on safety protocols, and remains a powerful reminder of what happens when nuclear power goes wrong. 3 mile island on the other hand occurred due to a mechanical failure, and was swiftly repaired. the damages of 3 mile island have been regarded by experts as negligible and people continue live within short distance of the location.

Sure it's safe as long as there isn't a disaster, but there will inevitably be some kind of accident around a nuclear facility. If you have an earthquake near a coal plant it isn't going to irradiate the surrounding area for generations. It's hydrogen powered cars, right? It's very environmentally friendly and efficient, but the problem is that if you get into an accident it will probably explode. It works well by itself, but it's like playing with a loaded gun.
Again, I am still pro-nuclear power, but it does carry far greater risks than other forms of energy when accidents or acts of nature happen.

first of all, thank you for your response

as for your point, i would reemphasize parts of my initial post; a coal plants impact on the environment, your health and your bank funds are a constant negative. it is an actual drain on all said resources well being. the nuke plant may well be a loaded gun, but so long as you keep the safety on the actual drawbacks are negligible. interesting question: would you rather have a coal plant in your back yard or a nuclear plant?

i suppose the crux of your argument was risk versus reward. while above i think i outlined my perceived lack of risk and abundance of reward, i also think its worth considering the risk inherent in not pursuing -more- nuclear power. energy demands are constantly on the rise, and since the industrial revolution pollution has followed a similar trend. whats more fossil fuels will soon be reaching depletion. solar farms, wind farms, and other alternate sources have proven themselves (at least in their current state) to be largely impractical (impracticality being a measure of pollution safety and cost versus output). as for the few who are banking on cold fusion: OK sure, but that doesn't exist yet.

in the most wildly biased terms we can either pursue a future where the sky and water is blackened by pollutants churned out endlessly from inefficient costly dirty smoke towers, more of which are constantly in production through a vain effort to keep up with the multiplying populations insatiable demand, causing high electricity bills, further stratifying the rich from the poor, creating a dystopian hell scape in which we eat babies to survive and Sarah Palin wins the 2012 election. all because we didn't trust the nuclear scientists to make sure their shit was in order. (SATIRE)

how hard can it be to run a power plant? i mean heck, its not rocket science. in nuclear physics. (that was a joke too.)(just clarifying.)

 

[Android2137]

BTW, Actinouranium = Uranium 235, for those wondering

Darn it! I was hoping for corn! I know used french fry oil can run a car (after filtering of course).

 

[shrub231]

you do realize that switching everything over to nuclear fission using uranium 235 is a bandaid step at best right. even if the entire wqorld was all for it and quit fossil fuels cold turkey, the worlds uranium deposits would be spent in less than a single human life time. things like photovoltaic cells, and solar boilers are the best bet for no emmisions, but the waste produced from the creation of the voltaic cells, and the waste associated with the batteries needed to store the energy is also at a point of being unpractical. sure uranium gives us time, but it is not the fix you are hoping for.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

With nuclear power you have the waste you need to store, but again you're bringing energy into a closed system. Cold fusion will be no different, since we'll effectively be making minature suns and will, if the need for energy keeps rising as it does, release an ever growing amount of energy in the system. This will have effects.

The earth, like everything that has any heat above absolute zero, radiates energy out into space with radiation. If it didnt the sun would have baked us long ago. We are fine on that front, any heat we add will be miniscule. Greenhouse gases are a different matter.