View Full Version : The Future of Nuclear Energy?
It looks pretty bleak according to a recently released peer-reviewed study. Uranium reserves are going to deplete so quickly over the next couple of decades that prices will increase rapidly. According to the uranium production graphs in the study it looks all over by the middle of this century.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969713004579
Uranium reserves are going to deplete
I get that!
$41.95? It's the end of cheap books!
Tubthumper
02-Jul-13, 22:51
Plenty money to be made cleaning up after it.
Bring back Dounreay, thought it was a fast breeder reactor. bred its own fuel or something better?
Well, if it is over by then for nuke energy we're gonna be goosed. Oil will have pretty much gone too so we'll be back to mining for coal.
I suspect there are a few megacorps landbanking under the guise of renewables in the short term.
Bill Fernie
03-Jul-13, 07:15
Interesting point and I am not competitent to give an answer. One thought on Peak Uraniaum as with Peak Oil that the demand may create more exploration and finds of uranium may go up to alleviate the problem. As with oil the higher price wil lead to more exploration. If you were cynical ( who could possibly be on energy matters) then you might think that some company somehwere already knows where it is likely to be and are prepared to go and get it when the price is right.
Supply and demand curve comes to mind and as the price goes up then more effort wil go into finding this finite resource. Also other interventions in the energy equation will perhaps intervene if only for a few decades. For example the rush in USA to get gas from fracking and reduce their energy costs is sparking a world-wide hunt for shale gas and might see for a while at least reductions in energy costs and hence less need for uranium at least. Perhaps too simplistic as it is is not an easy thing to get to grips with as there are so many variables and not helped by the bias often used by those on either side of the "green" "wind" "panic - don't panic" "energy companies" "anti-pro" arguments that appear endlessly.
and now to switch something off to salve my conscience.......
A few links for more thoughts -
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Nuclear-Fuel-Cycle/Uranium-Resources/Supply-of-Uranium/#.UdO8n2L2Yto
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=how-long-will-global-uranium-deposits-last
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium)
oldchemist
03-Jul-13, 19:16
As uranium prices rise alternative reserves may become viable. There are enormous reserves in seawater but currently too expensive to recover. However I understand that the Japanese are working on commercial U extraction from the sea. Don't give up on fission just yet. Interested to read yesterday that Eon are withdrawing from the Pelamis wave power project, citing the immaturity of the technology as a show stopper for them. Wee Eck's Saudia Arabia of the North may be some distance over the horizon. Nuclear fusion, long touted as the great salvation, also seems to have made little progress in recent decades.
As uranium prices rise alternative reserves may become viable. There are enormous reserves in seawater but currently too expensive to recover. However I understand that the Japanese are working on commercial U extraction from the sea. Don't give up on fission just yet. Interested to read yesterday that Eon are withdrawing from the Pelamis wave power project, citing the immaturity of the technology as a show stopper for them. Wee Eck's Saudia Arabia of the North may be some distance over the horizon. Nuclear fusion, long touted as the great salvation, also seems to have made little progress in recent decades.
I agree that rising uranium fuel prices will lead to alternative resources being exploited, that is sheer commonsense.
BUT, at what cost to the environment and cost to the consumer? If uranium deposits get profitable in lower concentrations then it doesn't take an Einstein to realise that you will need to dig a bigger and bigger hole to get at the uranium. It is ultimately self-defeating not just in cost to the consumer but because you eventually get to the point when it takes more energy to dig the hole that what you can get from the uranium in the hole.
On the Japanese thing, yes they were experimenting with sea extraction but Fukushima got in the way and I'd be very surprised if they are still on with that. And furthermore, the area of the extraction interface that is in contact with the sea is far greater than the area of what a solar panel occupies to produce the same energy. It sort of defeats the notion of the energy density of uranium far exceeds any other energy source.
Plenty of Uranium in the Solar System. I'm looking for a partner to go into the mineral extraction of the Asteroid Belt business with. Phill....Phill?
captain chaos
05-Jul-13, 14:06
No need to worry about uranium stocks for the next century and beyond ...
The price of a mineral commodity also directly determines the amount of known resources which are economically extractable. On the basis of analogies with other metal minerals, a doubling of price from present levels could be expected to create about a tenfold increase in measured economic resources, over time, due both to increased exploration and the reclassification of resources regarding what is economically recoverable.
This is in fact suggested in the IAEA-NEA figures if those covering estimates of all conventional resources (U as main product or major by-product) are considered - another 7.6 million tonnes (beyond the 5.3 Mt known economic resources), which takes us to 190 years' supply at today's rate of consumption. This still ignores the technological factor mentioned below. It also omits unconventional resources (U recoverable as minor by-product) such as phosphate/ phosphorite deposits (up to 22 Mt U), black shales (schists) and lignite (0.7 Mt U), and even seawater (up to 4000 Mt), which would be uneconomic to extract in the foreseeable future, although Japanese trials using a polymer braid have suggested costs a bit over $250/kgU
And then they could just change to thorium, in fact Chile and Indonesia are both well advanced to having thorium reactors running within the next 3 years, one to supply a city and one to power a water desalination plant.
Plenty of Uranium in the Solar System. I'm looking for a partner to go into the mineral extraction of the Asteroid Belt business with. Phill....Phill?Way ahead of you Duke! Just picked up a cheap space rocket from Kazakhstan, only been used once, some minor cosmetic damage but Vlad the fence reckons it'll polish out.
Way ahead of you Duke! Just picked up a cheap space rocket from Kazakhstan, only been used once, some minor cosmetic damage but Vlad the fence reckons it'll polish out.
Oh no! I bought an ex demo parachute from Vlad once....that didn't go so well. :eek:
No need to worry about nuclear power in Scotland. So long as there is a SNP government no new nuclear power stations will be built. Doing our bit to conserve uranium.
No need to worry about nuclear power in Scotland. So long as there is a SNP government no new nuclear power stations will be built. Doing our bit to conserve uranium.
By the time we find out we need it the bliddy English will have snaffled it all. :mad:
Nobody remember the plan to quarry uranium in Orkney?
No need to worry about uranium stocks for the next century and beyond ...
The price of a mineral commodity also directly determines the amount of known resources which are economically extractable. On the basis of analogies with other metal minerals, a doubling of price from present levels could be expected to create about a tenfold increase in measured economic resources, over time, due both to increased exploration and the reclassification of resources regarding what is economically recoverable.
This is in fact suggested in the IAEA-NEA figures if those covering estimates of all conventional resources (U as main product or major by-product) are considered - another 7.6 million tonnes (beyond the 5.3 Mt known economic resources), which takes us to 190 years' supply at today's rate of consumption. This still ignores the technological factor mentioned below. It also omits unconventional resources (U recoverable as minor by-product) such as phosphate/ phosphorite deposits (up to 22 Mt U), black shales (schists) and lignite (0.7 Mt U), and even seawater (up to 4000 Mt), which would be uneconomic to extract in the foreseeable future, although Japanese trials using a polymer braid have suggested costs a bit over $250/kgU
And then they could just change to thorium, in fact Chile and Indonesia are both well advanced to having thorium reactors running within the next 3 years, one to supply a city and one to power a water desalination plant.
And that is the problem not the solution.
Bigger prices means bigger holes and bigger environmental damage.
captain chaos
10-Jul-13, 14:30
So its okay to drive a hybrid that has Li/ion batteries which are open cast mined of which the chemicals cause horrendous environmental and human damage, but not to mine uranium.
Great thing progress, with electric hybrids forget how polluting and damaging mining and manufacturing the batteries are, then claim the vehicles are environmentally friendly, Not
So its okay to drive a hybrid that has Li/ion batteries which are open cast mined of which the chemicals cause horrendous environmental and human damage, but not to mine uranium.
Great thing progress, with electric hybrids forget how polluting and damaging mining and manufacturing the batteries are, then claim the vehicles are environmentally friendly, Not
How many times can that lithium deliver a charge? A 1000 charges before it needs recycling into another lithium battery I reckon. Uranium is once through or 60 times via fastbreeding. No comparison on the environmental damage.
How many times can that lithium deliver a charge? A 1000 charges before it needs recycling into another lithium battery I reckon. Uranium is once through or 60 times via fastbreeding. No comparison on the environmental damage.
& how much lithium is needed to provide the same amount of power as uranium?
& how much environmental damage is caused producing the power to recharge your lithium batteries?
Whitewater
10-Jul-13, 22:42
Nobody remember the plan to quarry uranium in Orkney?
Yes sids I remember plans to quarry uranium in Orkney, Caithness was also mentioned, that was in the late 50s/early 60s, but the demand for it dropped. One of the operational mines in Queensland Australia (Mary Kathleen) had to shut down. I don't know if it ever reopened.
However, Dounreay from its "fast breeders" produced a considerable amount of Plutonium and I'm sure if need arose more Fast Breeders could be built.
& how much lithium is needed to provide the same amount of power as uranium?
& how much environmental damage is caused producing the power to recharge your lithium batteries?
I'd say minimal damage compared to nuke. Nuke can only provide 3 percent of our energy until resources begin to dwindle in couple of decades then we will be left with centuries of looking after the waste.
Lithium batteries will provide us with a means of storing enough energy to provide for our daily transport which is currently about 20 percent of our needs.
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