Will Nuclear Energy be our Future or Demise?

Author: Katie Kaulbach, 281

Date: May 31st, 2021

The world has viewed Nuclear Energy as the enemy of our environment since the 1940s. And for good reason! The potential radioactive contamination of our environment would put thousands of lives at risk and leave our homes unlivable. But suddenly, scientists began proposing Nuclear Energy as a potentially invaluable tool in the fight to preserve our environment. Nuclear Energy poses as an energy source that uses little material with little to no Carbon Dioxide emission. For these reasons, many scientists believe that Nuclear Energy has to be a part of the equation in the pursuit to achieve zero carbon emissions.

So, what is nuclear energy? Nuclear Energy is energy produced by the division of atoms. A lot of energy is necessary to keep an atom together (National Geographic). This means that Nuclear Division, the division of an atom, produces massive amounts of energy and this energy can be converted to electricity. This happens when uranium is broken apart and produces heat; then the heat warms the cooling agent, which is usually water, and produces steam. The steam turns turbines or wheels which can produce electricity. 15% of the world’s energy comes from nuclear energy. Nations such as Lithuania, France, and Slovakia produce a large majority of their electricity from nuclear power plants (National Geographic). Nuclear energy provides nearly 55 percent of America’s carbon-free electricity (NEI).

Unfortunately the innovative technology of Nuclear Division can also be used for harm. The threat of Nuclear weapons is clear, as they can be used to deteriorate cities within seconds. If this power is abused, hundreds of thousands of people can be killed, injured, or left homeless (National Geographic). The Nuclear Bomb also contaminates all surrounding areas with radioactive particles, making this land uninhabitable and unusable (UK Essays).

Also, the process of nuclear division creates potential harmful byproducts. If the disposal of this waste is unregulated, radioactive waste could contaminate our environment and resources. This would be a devastating blow to the world's ecosystems. Therefore, there are very rigorous rules in how radioactive material can be disposed of. The radioactivity of uranium mill tailings, a kind of radioactive waste of nuclear division, decreases with time, so the safest practice to deal with nuclear waste is to put it in a structure that will hold in the radioactive atoms until the waste loses its radioactivity. Spent nuclear reactor fuel, nuclear fuel that was used and can no longer produce energy, goes through a process in which it is cooled, using water, and then is stored in dry storage facilities. The United States still does not have a permanent storage facility for storing this radioactive material (EIA) which poses a concern for most opponents of Nuclear Energy as our country has not invested enough money to make permanent storage facilities for the disposal of Radioactive Material despite the fact that Nuclear Energy is 10% of our electricity source (Ritchie).

Nuclear has the potential to be an energy source of the future due to its relative sustainability (EIA). It should be noted that Nuclear is generally considered not to be a renewable energy since the materials used in nuclear division, uranium and plutonium, are not renewable resources, meaning that they cannot be replenished at the rate that they are used (National Geographic). On the other hand, the process of nuclear division does not produce Carbon Dioxide emissions, which is currently one of main constituents of Climate Change (EIA). The Nuclear Energy Institute, NEI, reported that the US saved more than 476 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions in 2019 by using nuclear energy instead of fossil fuels. Although, to harvest the uranium or plutonium, other energy is used. If the energy used to harvest the uranium or plutonium is not a renewable energy, such as wind or solar, then Nuclear Energy is much less sustainable (EIA). If the energy used to harvest the uranium or plutonium is a renewable energy or the energy produced by nuclear division, the nuclear energy produced is a clean, sustainable source of energy that allows people to use energy without damaging the Earth.

Another upside of nuclear energy is the small land footprint that it uses. Compared to Nuclear Energy sources, Solar Energy sources need 75 times the amount of land to produce the same amount of energy, and Wind Energy 360 times the amount of land (NEI). Land use matters because as we use less land for energy production or agriculture, the more land available for nature reserves that will preserve ecosystems for future generations.

Another great reason to support Nuclear Energy is the relatively small material that it actually uses. Even though nuclear uses a nonrenewable resource, the energy contained in uranium or plutonium goes a long way. The energy converted from a single pellet of uranium is equal to the amount of energy converted from 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas, 120 gallons of oil, and 1 ton of coal, separately. Also, there is a process which can recycle the uranium already used for nuclear division so that we can use it again (Office of Nuclear Energy). Most studies show that in order to achieve the goal of using only clean energy, we must embrace Nuclear Energy (NFI). The technology of solar and wind is still developing and the preexisting technology of Nuclear keeps our air clean, has a low land use, and uses relatively low material (Office of Nuclear Energy).

There is concern about using Nuclear Energy due to the potential danger that it poses to us and the environment. The fact is that if nuclear waste were to contaminate the environment or us, it would cause damage that could not be repaired. Also, the United States has not committed to a plan to deal with the storage of nuclear waste, causing the waste to be held in temporary storage facilities until it loses its radioactivity. This lack of action would make anyone wary of using this fuel. The disposal of nuclear waste is inefficient and could be improved. This is preventing Nuclear Energy from being embraced as the potential hero that it could be (Rhodes). In the pursuit of stopping Climate Change and being a sustainable civilization, there is no one solution. We will need to use numerous tools; some of these tools are already established and some are still developing. These tools will recycle our trash and produce more energy for us while using less material and land. Nuclear Energy is one of the many tools that scientists will use to achieve net zero carbon emissions.