Reaction Time: Climate Change and the Nuclear Option

Quarterly Essay #27

by Ian Lowe

Australia is at a crossroads: if we are to halt global warming, do we need to stride resolutely into a nuclear future?

In this engrossing and persuasive essay, Ian Lowe discusses his one-time belief in the benefits of nuclear power and explains why that belief has faltered. He engages with the leading environmentalists, like James Lovelock, who advocate going nuclear, as well as with the less savoury aspects of the Australian politicking. He discusses whether other countries might need to use nuclear power, even if Australia doesn't, and offers an authoritative survey of Australia's energy alternatives - from solar and wind power to clean coal. Above all, he explains why taking up the nuclear option would be a decisive step in the wrong direction - economically, environmentally, politically and socially.

"Promoting nuclear power as the solution to climate change is like advocating smoking as a cure for obesity. That is, taking up the nuclear option will make it much more difficult to move to the sort of sustain able, ecologically healthy future that should be our goal." —Ian Lowe, Reaction Time

Genres: Nonfiction, Environment

128 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2007

About the author

Ian Lowe is emeritus professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University and president of the Australian Conservation Foundation. He studied engineering and science at the University of New South Wales and earned his doctorate in physics from the University of York. In 1991 he gave the ABC’s Boyer Lectures. He is the author of many books, including A Big Fix and Living in the Hothouse.

Reviews

[Clare Snow · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this in 2007, around the time of the APEC Summit in Sydney.

"After nearly fifty years of nuclear power, the world has produced more than 250 million tonnes of radioactive waste, with some 10,000 tonnes of it highly radioactive, yet nobody has found a permanent solution to the storage problem. In the absence of such a solution, expanding the rate of waste production is irresponsible."

Professor Ian Lowe began his scientific career in 1968 as a nuclear scientist, and was President of the Australian Conservation Foundation when he wrote this.

"There is no objective proof about the future performance, cost and safety of nuclear reactors…The nuclear option does not make sense on any level: economically, environmentally, politically or socially. It is too costly, too dangerous, too slow and has too small an impact on global warming…The rational response to our situation is to combine vastly improved efficiency with an investment in renewable energy technologies."

In the late 1990s a uranium mine was proposed at Jabiluka in the World Heritage Area of Kakadu National Park. After much protest from local communities and environmental groups it never opened. The Ranger Uranium Mine is located in Kakadu National Park, but the area it occupies was excised from the park. It was opened in 1969, and only agreed to by the land’s traditional owners under duress.

After uranium is removed from the mined ore, the leftover material is stored in huge reservoirs (containment ponds). The radioactive sand is called uranium tailings.

The hazard per gram of mill tailings is low relative to most other radioactive wastes, the large volume and lack of regulations for their containment have resulted in widespread environmental contamination." - ANAWA.

The containment ponds Ranger uses for its uranium tailings are not adequate because of the monsoonal rainfall in the far north of Australia (this rainfall wasn't accounted for in their design). The mine has released water from these ponds into the Magela Creek system. In 1991 the Office of the Supervising Scientist found losses of contaminants to the environment were increasing and their presence was measurable in local water bodies and streams.

Even if tailings are properly contained, when the mining company finishes extracting what it wants and leaves the area, the radioactive tailings are left for future generations to deal with.

After mining, the uranium needs to be enriched before it can be used in electricity generation. The ore is a combination of two types (isotopes) of uranium and it needs to be processed to increase the proportion of the more radioactive isotope. This is very expensive and energy intensive.

After the enriched uranium is used in electricity generation, more radioactive waste is produced. This waste is also left for future generations. Whatever storage option is decided on may be compromised in the next hundred or thousand years (either deliberately or accidentally), while the waste is still radioactive.

This is from my blog.

[Loïne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential reading for any person or community wanting, or having, to consider the merits of nuclear energy or radioactive waste disposal. This is a highly informed examination of the nuclear option and the claims that the industry has become much safer.

[Lee Belbin · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent, well-researched and well-considered comment about nuclear energy. It was dated, politically, but many of the strategies used by government and industry remain relevant. If you want to be informed about the utility of nuclear power, then this is a must read.