Topic:Uranium, thorium, plutonium

Reminder: check each week for any newAnnouncements.

Minerals and metals in the lithosphere are largely responsible for the presence of human civilization, and this continues to be true. Fossil fuels remain important, but we shall concentrate on what comes next. Improvements in energy storage are required in order to fully utilize technologies like solar and wind. Nuclear reactors are offered as a way around such difficulties, since they are designed to operate continuously. Both approaches are likely to be pursued with increasing intensively in the near future.

Nuclear technologies yield power without directly generating atmospheric carbon, although the mining and refining of uranium and the building and decommissioning reactors remains carbon-intensive. The biggest concern remains the toxic nature of the fuel, partly because of the nuclear power and weapons industries' often ignored history of mistakes, disasters, and near-disasters, and partly because of its vulnerability to terroristic intentions. New reactor designs claim to address some of these issues. I'll leave these things for you to consider. Whatever ends up happening with uranium, plutonium, and thorium, it will probably play out in your lifetimes.

Watch:Thorium and the Future of Nuclear Energy [PBS Space Time]

https://youtu.be/ElulEJruhRQ

Watch:Could Advanced Nuclear Power Replace Fossil Fuels? [Journey]

https://youtu.be/eg613DFBR8s

Watch:Small Modular Reactors. Are they now unavoidable? [Just Have a Think]

https://youtu.be/yofGtxEgpI8

Having asked students for several years now about this recent disaster, I remain unsurprised at how little discussion has taken place in the classroom or on the news. I have to give the Japanese reporters at NHK credit for having dug so deeply into the causes and consequences of placing nuclear reactors with fatal design flaws on one of the most seismically active coastlines in the world.

Watch:Understanding the accident of Fukushima Daiichi [IRSN]

https://youtu.be/YBNFvZ6Vr2U

Watch:Fukushima's ghost towns

https://youtu.be/xKfnsYzQWjw

1.1:Nuclear energy and conflict

Watch at least threeof the following five videos.

How likely are nuclear disasters and cyber warfare in Ukraine? | DW News Mar 2, 2022

https://youtu.be/zOng3E4hzpo

Russian forces take control over Europe's largest nuclear power plant | DW News Mar 3, 2022

https://youtu.be/QrBP3sydgXg

Ukraine: Nuclear power plants under Russian control | DW News Mar 7, 2022

https://youtu.be/_QjTgF_c_nk

Shelling at Ukraine nuclear power plant puts world on edge | DW News Aug 6, 2022]

https://youtu.be/aTxJpfbh2ko

Shelling Zaporizhzhia would cause a disaster 'worse than Fukushima' [Times Radio, Aug 9, 2022 ]

https://youtu.be/YnbPKdZJAmE

1.2:Personal memories of the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station

I'm probably one of the few people who worked as a technician on projects in both a commercial Nuclear Fission reactor and an advanced Nuclear Fusion project (many engineers and physicists must have worked in both domains, but I just played a minor role). I was hired to fill out a work team at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station, in Forked River, New Jersey:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oyster_Creek_Nuclear_Generating_Station

The reactor is in the cube-shaped building in the center of this picture:

The upper portion with the cladding around it is one large room, with the reactor embedded in the center and pools full of water to either side. Above on girders, a large industrial crane can lift the lid off the reactor, and remove the 'spent' fuel rods. The crane immediately lowers each rod into one of the refrigerated pools, where it continues to emit heat (and more dangerous forms of radiation) for many years. They are left there at least until they are sufficiently cooled. After the spent rods are removed, the crane can reload the reactor with new rods. The problem then was (and this continues to be a problem for the nuclear industry), where to then put the spent fuel (and any other contaminated material) more permanently. Since there is no reprocessing industry in the US, and since federal storage proposals are being challenged by states, the rods from such reactors often remain is sealed casks somewhere on the grounds.

Recommended:What If You Fell Into a Spent Nuclear Fuel Pool? [What If]

https://youtu.be/mM-5DhIhYmQ

Our team worked in that big room above the operating reactor. Our job was to rearrange brackets that had been installed on the floor of the pool in order to accommodate a higher density of fuel rods. Even in the 1970s, storage had become a problem. The technology we used was very basic: wrenches on long poles handled by technicians at the edge of the pool, as guided by other technicians with binoculars to screw and unscrew brackets that were deep underwater. You would not otherwise want to get anywhere near that water. Anything coming out of the pool would need to be wiped down with acetone to reduce their potential toxicity. That was my job.

The plant that I worked in is now shut down, but when I was there in the 1970s, it was in full operation. The room was physically hot, regardless of the season, as the result of its proximity to the reactor itself. The disposable outer clothing and booties that we wore were similar in style and effectiveness to the gear used in semiconductor manufacturing clean rooms today, but in a nuclear reactor they were required to keep contaminants away from your personal clothing and body. At the time, there was only one guard with a handgun at the entrance to the room above the reactor. The place made me uneasy, and I didn't stay long. When I left the plant for the last time, I was given a full body scan in a trailer that the NRC kept on site. They discovered that I had absorbed some radioactive iodine in my few weeks on the job. If I had taken iodine supplements prior to working there, my thyroid might not have absorbed any of the bad stuff. In fact, as part of its civil defense plan, the federal government had distributed iodine pills throughout the US during the Cold War in anticipation of a potential nuclear attack.

Homework 12:

Reminder: check each week for any newAnnouncements.

1. Describe some of the prospects for nuclear power around the world. Be region-specific if you can. What are some of the differences between traditional reactor designs and fuels and current generation designs, including 'small nuclear reactors' and those that use thorium?

2. Describe the circumstances leading up to the Fukushima Daiichi disaster. You might begin with the decision to site nuclear plants on Japan's eastern shore. What precisely is the situation now? Why did Japan decide to go so strongly with nuclear energy? Has anything changed?

3. Describe the situation with regard to Ukraine's nuclear power plants. Such facilities, regardless of whether they happen to be active, are vulnerable in many ways. In addition to the reactors themselves, there are backup generators, load balancing circuits, spent fuel storage, etc. that can quite easily be hit, leading potentially to massive releases of radiation and fallout. Given this situation, do you think the world is ready for a large increase nuclear power generation? Will small scale facilities really help out?