Power with a low carbon footprint

Dubai: It was way back in 1898 that Madam Marie Curie discovered radiation; yet it took more than half a century before Dr. Enrico Fermi achieved the first controlled nuclear chain reaction with the first demonstration reactor, called The Chicago Pile I, in 1942.

And from then on, that miniscule of an atom has been exploited for energy production, medicine, agriculture, space, etc., among the numerous other uses that man could think of.

The world's future looked bright from then on. With energy requirements on the rise, nuclear power plants gained popularity mainly because of their potential to generate huge amounts of energy from small amounts of fuel.

Nuclear power stations work in pretty much the same way as fossil fuel-burning stations, except that a 'chain reaction' inside a nuclear reactor makes the heat instead. The reactor uses uranium rods as fuel, and the heat is generated by nuclear fission.

Carbon dioxide is estimated to be responsible for half of any global warming. However, with its near exhaust-free status, no carbon emissions or any sulphur sludge to be carted away (like that caused by the burning of coal), nuclear power stations ensured purer air quality, devoid of smog, as well as avoiding acid rain problems. In fact, hardly any greenhouse gases are given out.

A natural gas-fired plant belches about 150 metric tonnes of carbon while generating one million kilowatt-hours of electricity, in contrast to 265 metric tonnes from a coal-fired plant, and 220 metric tonnes from an oil-fired plant - but there is no such carbon from a nuclear power plant. It is only in the uranium-enrichment process that coal-fired plants are needed to supply electricity, when about 10 metric tonnes of carbon are emitted.

Consequently, the capital costs of air pollution controls too come down considerably. Even the used cooling water that gets warmed is non-tainted and contains no harmful pollutants, thereby causing no harm to the aquatic life in the water to which it is discharged.

One might wonder why a technology that was the fastest-growing source of power in much of the world in the 1990s is the second slowest-growing now.

Allaying fears

What could be a contributory factor, and a normal concern to the public, is safety, especially in dealing with nuclear waste. Radioactive waste is produced at every stage of the fuel cycle, right from the mining of uranium to the reprocessing of the spent nuclear, although the UAE will not be involved in mining or enriching of uranium, rather obtaining it from reliable and transparent sources.

Yet, highly-radioactive waste will have to be regularly removed from the reactor, sealed up and buried for many years to allow the radioactivity to decay. Also, the technology and expertise needed for this exercise, together with the costs involved in the storage, can be exorbitant.

Critics also talk of 'explosions' in a nuclear reactor that could be catastrophic. Here it is important to understand that a chain reaction resulting in an explosion can only come when there is a high concentration of U-235. But reactor-grade uranium contains only about three per cent U-235, and with advanced technology available these days, there is simply no way that it could explode.

So, if we are talking of sustainable development, then maybe a combination of nuclear power together with other renewable energy sources is the best solution.

The writer is an academic counsellor and lecturer in Environmental Issues at the American College of Dubai.

A natural gas-fired plant belches about 150 metric tonnes of carbon while generating 1 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, in contrast to 265 metric tonnes from a coal-fired plant, and 220 metric tonnes from an oil-fired plant - but there is no such carbon from a nuclear power plant.