Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout: The Making of a Sensible Environmentalist (50 page)

The major nuclear powers—the U.S., Russia, the U.K., and France—have a large surplus of plutonium and highly enriched uranium. All of this can eventually be used as nuclear fuel to produce energy. The supply is immense, especially when you take into account the much larger stockpiles of depleted uranium that resulted from the enrichment of uranium for bombs. The main use for depleted uranium is on armored vehicles and tanks, and for bullets and shells. It is harder than steel and heavier than lead, so it serves both those military purposes well. But wouldn’t it be better to burn this uranium in fast reactors to power our world?

The most significant example of nuclear swords to plowshares today is the fact that 50 percent of American nuclear energy is fueled with uranium from dismantled Russian warheads. Yes, 10 percent of all US electricity comes from bombs taken apart under disarmament agreements. In 1993 the U.S. and Russia signed a 20-year agreement for 454 tonnes (500 tons) of Russian highly enriched uranium (90+ percent U-235) to be down-blended to reactor grade uranium (4 to 5 percent U-235) and shipped to the U.S., where it would be used as nuclear fuel. As of June 2009, 367 tons of weapons grade uranium had been converted into 9,635 tonnes (10,621 tons) of reactor fuel. This is by far the largest effort to convert nuclear weapons to peaceful purposes.
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Russia has announced that it will not renew the contract when it expires in 2013, presumably because it wants to use the fuel in the 50 new reactors it plans to build in the coming years.

I have told this story to at least 50 reporters, many of whom work for large newspapers, television networks, and magazines. Not one mention of this situation has been included in the many articles and TV pieces based on these interviews. I have searched the Internet for news stories and found only two mentions of the deal since it was signed in 1993. This more or less proves the adage, “good news is no news.” What a shame.

If we add up all the uranium that can be mined from the earth’s crust, all the thorium, which is at least four times as abundant as uranium, all the used nuclear fuel with more than 95 percent of the energy remaining, all the weapons grade uranium that is now in stockpiles, and all the depleted uranium from the production of both nuclear weapons and nuclear fuel, there is enough nuclear fuel for thousands of years. How about adding the highly enriched uranium that is still in active nuclear warheads? That may still be a dream, but we are now surely moving in that direction.

Following on the agreement between the United States and Russia to reduce their nuclear weapons arsenals, in April 2010 it was announced both countries would take 34 tons of plutonium out of their military stockpiles for use as nuclear fuel. The 68 tons of plutonium are enough for 17,000 nuclear warheads.
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This is ample evidence that on balance we are moving toward more peace and less war.

A Nuclear Renaissance

The term
nuclear renaissance
did not come into general use until 2006. Now it pervades media reportage and public statements around the world. An Internet search produced more than 327,000 mentions of the term. Nuclear energy will likely be the most important energy technology for the next 100 years and beyond.

At present there are 436 operating nuclear reactors in 31 countries and they provide 15 percent of the world’s electricity. Fifty-six new reactors are under construction, mainly in Asia, where China has 21 and India and South Korea each have 5 reactors under construction. Russia is building 11 reactors and others are under way in Finland, Slovakia, Korea, Romania, Japan, Argentina, France, Bulgaria, and Iran. Canada has announced it will build between 4 and 8 new reactors in Ontario, which already produces 50 percent of its electricity with nuclear power. In all there are about 100 firm plans for new reactors beyond those already under construction and proposals for about 250 additional plants. As of late 2009, there were 30 plants in the planning stage in the United States, with 20 of those already in the process of obtaining licenses to build and operate through the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Most of these are planned for existing nuclear sites, where public opinion strongly favors the new plants.

The number of operating reactors may well double in the next 30 to 40 years. This truly is a nuclear renaissance of global proportions. Unlike 30 years ago, there are no 10,000-strong marches or demonstrations against the proposed nuclear plants. Only a handful of diehard activists strenuously oppose the renewed commitment to nuclear energy. Most environmentalists are more strongly focused on preventing new fossil fuel plants from being built. Even though many of them publicly oppose nuclear energy they are quietly aware that the choice in many countries, in particular those with no additional hydroelectric potential, is between fossil fuel and nuclear power. Their lack of direct action against nuclear proposals speaks loudly that they would prefer nuclear to coal. This was not the case 30 years ago, long before climate change drifted to the top of environmentalists’ agendas.

Perhaps the biggest boost to date for the nuclear renaissance in the U.S. came in President Barack Obama’s February 2010 announcement of $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees for the construction of two nuclear reactors in the state of Georgia.
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He also announced that he intended to triple the total loan guarantee program from $18.5 billion to $54.5 billion.
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In his speech the president stated, “On an issue that affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we can’t keep on being mired in the same old stale debates between the left and the right, between environmentalists and entrepreneurs.”

His announcement represented a direct challenge to the antinuclear movement, most of whose members tend to support the Democratic Party, to get with the program and change their stance on nuclear power. President Obama has always made it clear he favors nuclear energy. After all, the 11 reactors in his home state of Illinois produce 50 percent of the state’s electricity. And he knows a majority of Democrats in Congress also support nuclear energy, despite the fact that a vociferous minority in the party strongly opposes it. One hopes the president’s announcement will put to rest any doubts about the United States’ determination to join the nuclear renaissance.

Fossil Fuels

Early humans harnessed fire for heat and cooking more than 100,000 years ago. Eventually they learned to smelt copper and iron ores and to melt sand to make glass. For 100,000 years most of the fuel for these tasks was wood. While there are records of coal being used to smelt copper ore as early as 3,000 years ago in China, it was the invention of the steam engine by James Watt in 1775 that ushered in the era of widespread use of fossil fuels.

Fossil fuels were created from organic sediments in the sea and from plants on the land. Much of the oil (petroleum) and natural gas (methane) was produced from marine sediments, with plankton such as diatoms, which are tiny plants, contributing the bulk of the material. Coal was generated from swamp forests, where trees and other plants died and decomposed. These processes took millions of years as the organic remains became buried and subject to heat and pressure.

The fossil fuels have in common their chemical composition as hydrocarbons, essentially hydrogen and carbon. As you move from the lightest, natural gas, to the heaviest, coal, the carbon content increases and the hydrogen content decreases. When hydrocarbons burn, energy gets released from both the carbon and the hydrogen. This is why coal produces the most carbon dioxide and natural gas produces the least carbon dioxide per unit of energy generated.

Today coal, oil, and natural gas supply 86 percent of the world’s primary energy. In the space of two centuries, with most of the growth in consumption occurring in the past 50 years, we have become utterly dependent on the unsustainable use of these fuels. Our future depends greatly on how we manage the remaining fossil fuels and how we eventually transition to other forms of energy as fossil fuels become depleted. There are fiercely competing theories about how we should go about this evolution.

It comes down to nothing less than the fundamental debate over how we should be organized as a society. On one side are the free-marketers, who believe the invisible hand will guide us collectively to solutions without the need for major state intervention. On the other side are the planners and socialists, who believe we must implement controls on the use of fossil (carbon) fuels by intervening in the market in such a way that individuals and organizations change their behavior and use less fossil fuels, even before they become depleted. This can be done with incentives, disincentives, or prohibitions. No wonder it seems impossible to come to consensus on the subject; our most critical energy resources and our most basic political divisions are wrapped up in one whopper of a philosophical disagreement.

The three main fossil fuels have basic chemistry in common, but they are very distinct from one another in their applications. Let’s look at them individually:

Natural Gas

Natural gas is composed primarily of a single compound, methane, and is the simplest of the hydrocarbons, one carbon and four hydrogen atoms. It is generally found in the same regions, often in the same drill-hole, as petroleum. Even though it is a simple compound natural gas is an extremely versatile material. Aside from its use as an energy source for heating buildings, producing electricity, and powering industry, it is one of the main inputs into making vinyl (PVC). When converted to methanol it has myriad uses in chemistry and manufacturing, and it is the primary source for the production of hydrogen in industry.

Natural gas is the cleanest burning fossil fuel, both in terms of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. While the gas contains impurities such as sulfur and carbon monoxide when it is pumped from the earth, these are removed in refineries close to the wellhead before the gas is sent to market. Burning gas for heating and electricity production does produce considerable amounts of nitrogen oxides, a contributor to smog. Even this can be reduced substantially with pollution control technology.

North America consumes about 25 percent of global gas production. Until recently it was believed domestic production would continue to decline as North America had only about 5 percent of conventional global gas reserves. Plans were well under way to expand the ability to import liquid natural gas (LNG) from offshore. But only a few years ago a technology was developed that made it possible to extract natural gas from shale formations in Texas. Recently a shale formation in Louisiana has also been tapped. There are extensive deep shale formations across much of the U.S., and it is possible there will be an ample supply of gas well into the future. In 2008 the declining production trend in the U.S. was reversed with a 7 percent increase in production. Natural gas prices have fallen, making it more economic to use gas to produce electricity. The future of large-scale LNG imports is now not so certain. This highlights the fact that just when we think we are running out of a particular fossil fuel, new discoveries and advances in technology can change the picture, at least for the time being.

Most of the world’s reserves of natural gas are in the same locations as the major oil deposits. The Middle East, Russia, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Venezuela have large reserves. Canada, the U.S., and Mexico have smaller reserves, but the shale gas development in the U.S. may change that for a period of decades. However, availability is not the only factor. The European countries have very little oil or gas reserves. They have traditionally been reliant on the Middle East for oil and have recently become dependent on Russia for natural gas. This raises a serious issue of energy security, as Russia seems willing to use this dependence to play politics, or at least to play hardball with countries that don’t pay their bills on time. The Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008 was seen by many as spurred by competition for alternative gas pipeline routes.

Natural gas is clearly the most desirable fossil fuel from an environmental point of view. In spite of the shale discoveries, it is limited and should therefore be conserved as much as possible if alternatives exist that are not so limited. For example, instead of heating buildings with natural gas geothermal heat pumps can be used. These can run on clean electricity, such as hydroelectric, nuclear, and wind. Hydrogen could be produced by high-temperature nuclear reactors rather than from natural gas. The hydrocarbon for vinyl production could be obtained from coal, which is in abundant supply, rather than natural gas. But achieving these developments would require public policy that treated natural gas supplies as a matter of national (global) security rather than just another commodity in the marketplace.

Petroleum

Commonly known as oil, petroleum provides nearly 35 percent of the world’s energy, making it the most important energy source today. And yet the world’s major oil companies—Exxon-Mobil, Shell, Chevron, and British Petroleum (BP) —are vilified as symbols of environmental destruction due to the greenhouse gas emissions associated with burning fossil fuels. They are characterized as holding the world hostage, making obscene profits, and refusing to embrace a politically correct energy policy that would favor renewable energy over fossil fuels. And yet they remain strongly focused on continuing to produce our most important energy resource; shouldn’t they be cheered for this, even if oil does become much scarcer in the future due to no fault of their own?