Advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy.
Written by alternativeenergy on February 6, 2009 – 4:17 pm -Advantages and Disadvantages of Nuclear Energy
When looking at the advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy it is clear to see that there is a balanced argument for and against. Nuclear energy is generated in vast quantities through a process of nuclear fission, which involves splitting of a heavy atoms nucleus. Just to put this nuclear energy release into perspective on an atom to atom basis compared to fossil fuel nearly 10 million more times energy is released.
To evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy I will provide the information in list form for ease of reading.
Advantages of Nuclear Energy
- One of the big advantages of nuclear energy stations is that they are clean in operation and do not produce the ozone damaging gases like carbon dioxide and smoke
- Uranium, which is used at the heart of the nuclear process, is relatively cheap to mine and world reserves are vast.
- In the nuclear process vast amounts of energy are produced from very little feedstock.
- Nuclear power costs when compared to coal are very similar.
- Another one of the major advantages of nuclear energy is the fact that the amount of waste produced is small.
- The nuclear energy generation system is very reliable.
- One of the final advantages of nuclear energy is the fact that the fuel used Uranium is very compact therefore saving on transportation costs.
To balance our argument on the advantages and disadvantages lets take a look at the disadvantages of nuclear power
Disadvantages of nuclear power
- One of the main disadvantages of nuclear power is the high start-up cost involved in building, commissioning, maintaining and disposal of the waste product.
- Although only a small portion of waste is generated from the nuclear power process, the waste is highly toxic and safe disposal is a primary concern. The main means of disposal is via sealed containers, which are buried for long length of time so that the radioactivity levels diminish. But of course no one can predict if these containers may be disturbed by acts of god like earthquakes or floods.
- Nuclear waste can always be misused by unscrupulous individuals to reap havoc on society by creating so called dirty bombs.
- The impact of serious nuclear accident can have a very large immediate impact and also a legacy for many years. One such example was Chernobyl in 1986 when due to a failure of the nuclear reactor, radiation fallout affected many thousands of people and the geographic spread of the radiation was immense even reaching the shore of the UK
So when looking at the advantages and disadvantages of nuclear power there are a lot of factors to bear in mind before making a firm decision.
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