January 15, 2008

U.S. nuclear power’s time has come—again

By Bob Percopo

U.S. positioned to lose

While the U.S. ponders the economics of building as many as 30 new nuclear plants, China, India, Russia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Romania, and others are planning and executing aggressive nuclear plant construction programs. Unfortunately, the U.S., Western Europe, and Japan are acting as if they have a choice about increasing nuclear power production. The only country with a different attitude is France, the poster child for success in nuclear power on every front—development, O&M, fuel reprocessing, and safety. France gets 80% of its electricity from nuclear reactors.

While the G-8 nations endlessly debate the risks of meltdowns, spent-fuel storage, plutonium proliferation, and terrorist attacks on nuclear plants, developing economies are rushing to add more reactors or join the nuclear generation club. If its procrastination continues, the West will paint itself into a corner and suffer the costs of energy dependence and carbon sequestration.

Nuclear power is not an immature technology like integrated gasification combined-cycle generation. Over its 40-year history, nuclear generation has improved its efficiency from 50% to more than 90%. Its two major perceived negatives are safety and the need to manage spent fuels. Safety concerns naturally arose after a partial core meltdown at the Chernobyl plant in 1986. But the Chernobyl unit had virtually no containment. Modern reactors are housed in containment vessels, and many new units are designed to withstand a direct hit from a fully fueled aircraft.

With respect to spent fuels, most Americans believe that somewhere there’s an area the size of Texas filled with barrels of oozing radioactive waste. However, all the spent fuel from 40 years of reactor operations in the U.S. would fit in a football field 15 feet deep. If the U.S. were to recycle its nuclear waste, the volume would shrink to that of one end zone 10 feet deep. Compare those numbers to the volume of a single ton of CO₂ at sea level (60 feet by 20 feet by 16.3 feet). The average 250-MW coal plant emits 1.7 million metric tons of CO₂ every year.

Economics and common sense dictate less debate and more action. Worldwide, there are four reactor manufacturers and only one supplier of specialty steel, and they sell their products on a first-come, first-served basis. Arriving “too late for lunch” will have its consequences for the U.S.

—Bob Percopo is executive vice president of AIG Global Marine and Energy (www.aigglobalmarineandenergy.com).