nuclear-news

Nuclear power would put our energy security into Russian hands.

 George Baxter: Developing nuclear power would put our energy security into
Russian hands. Whenever there’s debate on energy and climate change, as
we are seeing fleetingly in the 2024 election campaign, you can rely on
nuclear power fans to flood the zone with claims that it is the answer.

It all seems so simple. But it isn’t. Far from it.

Take uranium. It’s not talked about much, but nuclear’s raw material is a global commodity – and we don’t have any. The global market is dominated by Russia which
controls around 50% of the supply of raw ore. Mining uranium isn’t the only
issue. Despite sanctions over the war in Ukraine, Russia continues to
supply western nuclear power plants with enriched uranium fuel. According
to the Royal United Services Institute, Europe and the US have scrambled to
build alternative supply chains for enriched fuel to reduce dependencies on
Russia. It is an intensifying international resource power play.

Replacing our vulnerability to international energy shocks and the market volatility
of fossil gas, with long term dependencies on uranium ore and nuclear fuel
hardly seems the wisest path to take, especially when your land and seas
are awash with untapped renewable energy.

A baseload of constant power
output from nuclear is not needed to make the electricity system work. Over
ten years ago the CEO of National Grid said the concept of baseload was
“already outdated.” while casting doubt on the role of large nuclear on
a modern green electricity network.

Nuclear creates more problems than it
solves because it isn’t very flexible. So when it is really windy or
sunny, it’s renewables that get turned off.

And worse, if there is a problem (and there have been issues in Scotland including cracks in the reactor cores of both Hunterston and Torness) the shut down can last for
weeks or months, and other reactors of the same design risk shut down as a
precaution.

If a wind turbine is attacked or damaged, there’s little drama,
we just put another one up. The reactors at Fukishima are not back in
operation – 13 years on – lest we forget. Renewables are variable in
nature, and predictably so, well in advance. To manage variability of some
renewable sources like the wind and sun, more flexible non-nuclear
technologies are a much better fit by far.

 Herald 2nd July 2024

https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/viewpoint/24422691.nuclear-power-put-energy-security-russian-hands/

July 5, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | spinbuster, UK