The Emperor Has No Clothes A Practical Guide for Environmental and Social Transformation (21 page)

In the PRISM design the heat is transferred
from the reactor to the steam boiler through a secondary system.
The secondary system still uses sodium, but the nuclear reactor
itself is isolated from any potential contact with water.

Another advantage to the 4th generation type
of plants are that they are comprised of standard modules (311,000
kW each),as already mentioned, they will not have the scale up
problems that occurred with the start up of the 2nd generation
plants. Since only one perfected design is being used it will also
allow reductions in their cost if significant numbers are produced
through the economies of large scale mass production.

While $390.06 billion is a lot of money to
build these reactors, when this cost is considered in the light of
how much the public is paying for the externalized costs of using
coal ($345 billion per year from the Harvard study), 4th generation
reactors are an extremely good investment since they would pay for
themselves by eliminating the costs of coal in slightly less than
14 months. A potential source of funding that already exists may
also be available. If you recall $30 billion is being held in
escrow for the disposal of radioactive waste being stored at the
light water plants. Fast neutron reactors are specifically designed
to dispose of this waste. If the $30 billion were made available
for construction, twenty three one million kilowatt 4th generation
plants could be fabricated. Building these plants would Provide a
“jump start' for the transition away from fossil fuels while
reducing the stock pile of nuclear waste. The other nice aspect
about using the $30 billion escrow would be that these first twenty
three plants would essentially have no need to acquire further
funding for their construction cost! Therefore, this would be an
ideal way of starting the nuclear renaissance by using the escrow
for the construction of publicly owned plants. At the present time
26% of the electricity generated in the United States is produced
by publicly owned utilities. These publicly owned utilities have an
average product cost 18% lower than privately owned utilities. I
would also argue that public ownership in addition to producing
much cheaper power would also have a much higher standard of
management since their activities are a matter of public record. By
having this type of transparency it would be difficult to cover up
problems like the private power industry did. A publicly owned
utility would also have the advantage of having no means of
externalizing costs onto the public such as we saw for the Montana
gold mine and more recently with the nuclear clean up escrow
termination.[81]

81. Since the estimated net
clean up costs without the use of 4
^th
generation plants was $145
Billion this is 1,000 time greater than the public cost for the
gold mine in Montana,
WOW!

By having public ownership the mechanism of
transferring public resources to the owners of these businesses
would be eliminated. Publicly owned institutions also have much
greater access to state and federal resources (assuming these
plants would be owned by municipalities or counties). Using the
escrow money in this way would also provide a great incentive for
start up since the cost of power to the public owners / subscribers
would be extremely low, being comprised of only operating costs.
Moreover, the lower costs of public ownership would also have a
large impact on improving the prosperity of the people in the
community. This would occur as a result of reduction of across the
board business costs, as well as personal expenses. Another
possibility would be to approach the federal government for plant
construction funding to eliminate the 500 tonnes of bomb making
nuclear waste. These plants would have to also have federal
security forces and be modified to use this material as fuel. Using
these materials are not a security danger, bomb making materials
have to be diluted for fuel use, which makes this type of fuel
useless for bombs.

In my view the best start up approach would
be to present an educational program to correct the erroneous,
obsolete, and PR disinformation that is creating the inaccurate
prevailing impressions that most people have about nuclear power.
This is essential because the local political establishment will
not support this type of initiative without adequate public
support. After adequate public support for construction of the new
type of power plant is created, the conditions for county or
municipal government officials to initiate construction would
exist. The construction program could then quickly proceed by
simply having a bond issue to raise the necessary funds. Once the
plant is under construction or constructed then an attempt to gain
access to the other (escrow and other) potential sources of funds
could then be undertaken. If obtaining the additional funding is
successful the acquired funds could be used to buy back the bonds
or provide electric rate reductions.

If the suggested 300 plants are constructed
they would reduce the amount of green house gasses being produced
by the United States by 32% for carbon dioxide, methane 11%, and
nitrous oxide by 6%.

Since we are interested in reducing pollution
and eliminating public costs derived from externalization of
business expenses, another sector of our energy usage could be
changed to utilize nuclear power. At the present time 30% of the
fossil fuel energy used in the United States is for space
heating.[82] It would be quite simple to replace the fossil fuel
heating systems with electric heat, thereby eliminating the same
plethora of fossil fuel expenses and environmental problems
originating from this source too. At the present time by
eliminating fossil fuels from this sector a further 30% reduction
of emissions and the pollutants from mining would be realized.[83]
According to the EIA the amount of fossil fuel energy used for
residential space heating was 6.42 quadrillion BTUs per year and
for commercial space heating 3 5/8 quadrillion BTUs per year. So
lets run the numbers to see what it would cost to replace fossil
fuel heating with nuclear.[84]

~~~~~~~~~~

The total cost to replace fossil fuel space
heating would be $460.69 Billion.

82. The amount of energy usage in the US for
space heating is 40% but 10% is provided by electric, giving us 40%
- 10% = 30% from fossil fuels mostly from natural gas.

83. At the present time geothermal heating
and air conditioning systems use 1/5 the amount of energy as
conventional electric heating and cooling systems. If this
technology were widely implemented a fewer number of power plants
would be required in proportion to the level of geothermal usage.
These systems are more costly than conventional heating systems
though.

84. We consume 10.55 quads of BTUs per year
or 10.55 quads / (364.25 days/ year X 24 hr. / day) = 1.21 billion
BTUs / hr.1 kWh = 3415 BTU per hr.

so we need - 1.21 billion BTU / 3415 BTU/kWh
= 354,319,180 kWh = 354.32 one million kWh plants.

The plant cost would be 354.32 million X
$1,300 /kWh = $460.62 billion

Land cost 354.32 X 200 acres X $1000/acre =
$ 70.9 million

Total cost is $460.62 billion + $70.9
million = $460.69 Billion

~~~~~~~~~~

The number of modules required –
354.32 / .311 = 1139

The land required: 70,864 acres.

The number of reactor modules required:
1139

This would reduce US greenhouse gas
emissions by 30%.

This would eliminate the energy equivalent
of 1.43 billion barrels of oil per year!

~~~~~~~~~~

Railroads are another fossil fuel energy
consumer that could be converted to electrical power derived from
nuclear reactors. They currently consume 446,999,921 gallons of oil
per year or 10,642,855 barrels of oil. If coal usage to fuel power
plants were eliminated it would reduce railroad freight tonnage by
51%, thereby eliminating 51% of the oil consumed by trains giving a
residue consumption of 5,215,000 barrels of oil. A barrel of oil
when burnt produces 1,433 kg of carbon dioxide and if we do the
arithmetic.[85] The amount of carbon dioxide eliminated by
switching to nuclear power, thereby reducing train fuel usage would
be:

~~~~~~~~~~

Carbon dioxide reduction = 7.473 million
tonnes.

~~~~~~~~~~

Railroads are very efficient at moving
freight, the amount of fuel used to move 4 tonnes of freight by
rail will only move one tonne of freight by truck over the same
distance. According to railroad industry analysis, if 10% of the
long distance truck freight were switched to rail it would
eliminate 23.8 million barrels of truck fuel usage. Once again
doing the arithmetic:[86]

~~~~~~~~~~

Amount of carbon dioxide reduction:
34,105,400 tonnes.

The number of 1 million kWh plants needed:
6.6 comprised of 21 modules.

The cost is $8.625 Billion.

~~~~~~~~~~

So by changing to an electric rail system and
utilizing more inter-modal rail transport to offset some of the
long distance truck freight a total reduction of 23.8 million
barrels of oil has been achieved.

At the present time 492 million barrels of
jet fuel are used per year, if half of the usage of air transport
were switched to electric rail it would save a further 246 million
barrels of oil. Let's run the numbers for this.[87]

85. 5,215,000 barrels of oil X 1,433 kg
carbon dioxide per barrel / 1,000 kg per tonne = 7.473 million
tonnes of carbon dioxide.

86. 23.8 million barrels of truck fuel X
1,433 kg carbon dioxide /barrel = 34.11 Million tons of carbon
dioxide reduction per year.

The number of power plants needed would be
5.8 billion kW / (364.25 days x 24 hr / day) = 6.6 million kW /
hr.

The number of plants needed would be 6.6 and
the cost would be 6.6 million X $1,300 = $8.625 Billion

The number of modules needed 6.6million /
.311 = 21

87. So we need the energy
equivalent of 246,000,000 barrels of oil.

The amount of carbon dioxide
reduction: 246 million barrels of oil X 1,433 kg carbon dioxide /
barrel = 353 million tonnes 246 million barrels of oil = 353
million tonnes.

~~~~~~~~~~

Cost for nuclear power plants: $62.21
Billion.

Number of one million kW plants: 47.8
comprised of 154 modules

Amount of carbon dioxide averted: 353
million tonnes.

~~~~~~~~~~

Summary for Nuclear Power

~~~~~~~~~~

Number of 1 million kWh
plants..............708.4 comprised of nuclear reactor 2,278
modules.

Cost
..........................................................$ 925.6
Billion [
88
]

Greenhouse Gas
Reduction.......................86.2% (Note: The .2% came from
switching urban mass transit to electric).

Nuclear Waste Elimination 708 Tonnes / year
(42,480 tonnes over the 60 year life expectancy of these
plants).

~~~~~~~~~~

88. The $910 Billion is based upon producing
power plants in a lot size of one, i.e., as one offs, the actual
cost if the lot sizes were larger say 300 modules would be much
lower, so the above price is really high if we decide to convert to
this energy source.

Let's consider the effects on cost through
the economies of scale that would accrue since a large number of
4th generation modules would be required to achieve the reductions
described above. To arrive at a more realistic rough cost we will
assume a 10 year goal for completion of the project, which gives us
a lot size of around 250 per year.[89] The unit cost adjustment is
based upon my personal experience of estimating projects. Of course
we were not making nuclear power plants and these values should
only be considered an approximation for this type of product. When
I worked in industry the cost for making larger lot sizes than one
unit usually worked out to have the following cost reductions. If a
lot of 4 units of the same thing were produced the cost would drop
by around ¼. If a larger lot size of 10 items were produced the
unit cost was about 2/3 of the cost of a one-off. These cost
reductions would gradually continue down as the lot sizes became
larger until they became quite large, whereupon, at some point no
further cost reductions could be obtained. I will make an educated
guess that the cost reductions described above probably are at
least in the “ball park” of what could be expected. So if the $30
billion in the disposal escrow fund were used to place a blanket
order we should get around 110 modules using the 2/3 discounted
cost. Thus, we would get 34 one million kW plants comprised of 110
(311 megawatt) modules. If these funds were applied at the one-off
price we would get 23 one million kW plants comprised of 74 (311
megawatt ) modules. Since I have suggested that the new energy
system be publicly owned, the fabrication of the electrical
generation equipment could incorporate a contractual requirement
that they would be produced domestically in the United States. By
having this type of requirement large numbers of long term high
paying domestic industrial jobs would be created. In addition to
the jobs created by manufacturing the plants a large number of
construction jobs would also be required to site them, and of
course many additional high paying permanent jobs for the power
plant operating, administrative, and maintenance personnel would be
created.

89.
We will need to make around 2,500 modules assuming a .8% per
year increase of electrical usage which is the current value. So
2,500 modules / 10 years = 250 modules / year.

One often hears the argument of why should we
bother with this type of program since China is producing more
carbon dioxide than the United States (in 2012 China produced 8.3
billion kilo-tonnes and the US produced 5.2 billion kilo-tonnes of
carbon dioxide)? At the present time (2014) the United States has a
debt of $2 trillion dollars with China, it seems likely that the
Chinese would probably accept payment for part of this debt in
nuclear power plants since they have a number of motivating
circumstances. At the present time China has a severe energy
shortage and pollution problem which they are having difficulties
solving. Their remaining coal deposits are small and are dwindling
very rapidly. Thus, the Chinese are facing an impending energy
resource shortage. Of course other countries such as India are
emerging as industrial giants and are also burning lots of coal,
and experiencing coal energy related problems. These overseas
problems could be mitigated if the United States could start up
some type of program similar to the “Lend Lease” we had with the
British during World War II. This type of approach would go a long
way to solve their problems as well as the entire global pollution
and energy situation. If this type of program were implemented the
offshore nations using these reactors would need nuclear fuel for
their new reactors, perhaps we could make some of our nuclear waste
available for this purpose to offset the costs of the “Lend Lease”
program. By using this approach we could eliminate the US stock
pile of nuclear waste much more rapidly.