Nuclear's CO2 cost 'will climb'

[hoon]

The case for nuclear power as a low carbon energy source to replace fossil fuels has been challenged in a new report by Australian academics.

It suggests greenhouse emissions from the mining of uranium - on which nuclear power relies - are on the rise.

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Nuclear's CO2 cost 'will climb'

[SwitchBlade]

"A significant proportion of greenhouse emissions from nuclear power stem from the fuel supply stage, which includes uranium mining, milling, enrichment and fuel manufacturing.

Others sources of carbon include construction of the plant - including the manufacturing of steel and concrete materials - and decomissioning. "

All of that applies to any other source of fossil fuel in some form or another. With no numbers, the story doesn't say anything useful.

[spadlet]

SwitchBlade I guess you'd have to get hold of a copy of the Environmental Science and Technology journal that the findings are published in. It's a subscription journal so you'd either have to pay them some money or find a library with a copy in.

I think that the article is trying to make the point that despite all of the claims that Nuclear Power is a zero carbon technology, there has not been much research into the actual carbon emissions from the technology to back up these claims.

[mellow_hendrix]

Man this is getting way to complicated.

[LMagic007]

I agree, I think it's about making a point and rightfully so, that nuclear industry is not zero emissions. All the ancillary processes already mentioned, produce carbon emissions. Overall though it's still comparatively low emission for fossil fuels. i.e. compared to gas or coal.

[Besoeker]

Originally Posted by LMagic007

I agree, I think it's about making a point and rightfully so, that nuclear industry is not zero emissions. All the ancillary processes already mentioned, produce carbon emissions. Overall though it's still comparatively low emission for fossil fuels. i.e. compared to gas or coal.

Yes, I think that's right.
A point that isn't mentioned is that the volume of uranium that has to be mined, transported etc is vastly less than for say, coal for the same energy output.

[blackfoxtrade]

So they are trying to say that mining uranium produces CO2, but drilling oil is OK? Steel and concrete? What about the steel and concrete used to build conventional power plants? It's strange that when people talk about nuclear energy, they include ALL the emissions, but when talking about oil, coal or gas power plants, they only seem to include the emissions from burning the fuel.

Nuclear energy is not zero carbon. So what? It's a step in the right direction. Shouldn't we be focusing on that? Even with wind turbines and all the new solar technologies, some carbon is still emitted. But that is not the point. The point is that we should lower the emissions before it's too late.

[spadlet]

Originally Posted by blackfoxtrade

So they are trying to say that mining uranium produces CO2, but drilling oil is OK? Steel and concrete? What about the steel and concrete used to build conventional power plants? It's strange that when people talk about nuclear energy, they include ALL the emissions, but when talking about oil, coal or gas power plants, they only seem to include the emissions from burning the fuel.

I was under the impression that renewable power plant CO2 emissions took into accout the CO2 released from the manufacture of the technologies. The same is true for fossil fuel generation. An example can be found in DTI publication ETSU-R-122. The link to the pdf is http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file21102.pdf and you want to look at Appendix B: Environmental Implications (Page 212 onwards and the first table of figures + information is on P213).

I'm providing this mearly to illustrate that for all of the other electricity generating technologies in the UK an attempt has been made to include emissions for the construction phases of the plant and the extraction and processing phases for the fuel. I'm not stating in any way that the exact figures are correct. Given this, do you not think that the same process should apply to nuclear power generation?