There has been a lot of debate about Australia changing to nuclear power in the media lately. The main reason to change to nuclear energy is to fight Global Warming. Well this statement may be true, but I know that many people are still against nuclear power, including me. Why? Because nuclear power is dirty and has its own dangers and risks.
So if nuclear power is so dangerous, why does our current federal government want to use it? Our government sees it as a way of reducing carbon emissions, therefore helping to stop global warming. The current energy source that we’re mainly using (oil and coal) is the major reason for Global Warming because they release carbon dioxide into the air. This is why nuclear power is being considered- because unlike oil and coal, it does not create carbon dioxide…
Or does it???
Lets look further into this area. The question is, “Does nuclear power emit carbon dioxide?” It is claimed that nuclear power does not emit any carbon dioxide at all into the air. However, this is only partly true. Yes, the nuclear reaction itself does not release any carbon dioxide into the air, but the process of converting uranium ore into nuclear fuel (eg. mining, refining and concentrating) is a highly polluting process. A huge amount of energy is also needed for the construction of a nuclear power station. And we go straight back to what we’re using now (coal and oil) for this energy. Therefore, if the making of nuclear power and its requirements are taken into account, nuclear power is in fact responsible for a large amount of carbon dioxide emissions.
Nuclear power really doesn’t have many more advantages other than its reaction doesn’t emit carbon dioxide. Actually, many of its other factors are quite worrying. There’s the threat of terrorism/making of nuclear weapons, the fact that the waste is dangerous and must be handled very carefully and I’m not even going to mention the overwhelming cost of it all.
My main worry for changing to nuclear power is how dangerous it is. The disposal of nuclear waste is a dangerous process, and the waste will last for thousands of years. Because the waste will be radioactive, it will need to be handled very carefully. Have you ever tried burying a plastic bag to see what will happen to it? As you may already know, plastic bags can take up to 1000 years to decompose, so most likely that plastic bag will remain in the ground much longer than you will remain on earth. It’s like this with nuclear power. The waste that is created from nuclear power will not simply “disappear” or “decompose”, but it will remain there for thousands or years. And on top of that, it is also very dangerous, so we will have to dump this dangerous waste somewhere where it cannot escape. And we all know how much power we use right now in Australia (I’m sure we’re all guilty of spending many hours a day watching TV or using the computer for MSN etc.). So therefore, Australia is going to have a lot of nuclear waste to deal with if our government decides to switch our main energy source to nuclear.
So because the waste is such an issue, the question is, what will we do with it? Well there have been some bizarre ideas on how to get rid of this waste such as burying it under the ocean floor and shooting it into space. The most likely one, however, is burying the waste under the ground. However, another issue arises from this as to where underground should the waste be buried. If we, Australia, were to go nuclear, we must be careful not to store the waste in an area where there is ground water flowing through. Ground water could erode the containment sealers and carry the waste into the environment if it flows through a waste storage area. Another factor to be careful of when choosing a containment area is to pick an area well away from a fault line/an area where geological activity occurs. We don’t want an earthquake to occur 1000 years into the future, because this will release the reactive nuclear waste into the environment as well.
When I was researching this nuclear topic, I came across a sentence that really shocked me. Quote: “Low level waste can be buried near the surface of the earth. It will have lost most of its radioactivity in a couple hundred years.” A couple of hundred years?! I thought. This was the lowest level of waste, and even this level will take hundreds of years to loose its radioactivity. And even when it finally loses its radioactivity, it doesn’t mean it’s completely gone. It will still remain there for most likely another couple of hundred of years, or maybe even more. But what scared me was that if this is how long it takes ‘low level nuclear waste’ to stop being radioactive, how long will it take ‘high level nuclear waste’ to stop being radioactive?! The site said that high-level waste is harder to get rid of and takes thousands of years to become stable. This waste must be contained for a very long time. If it is not contained, it could come in contact with human population centers and wildlife, putting their health at great risk. Therefore, the waste must be sealed up tightly.
I am worried about the risk of a nuclear disaster happening in Australia that could affect our health. One of the most well known nuclear disasters happened in 1979 at Three Mile Island in the USA. The disaster was caused by a meltdown. Luckily, no one was killed, but apparently the disaster affected the drinking water, which may have impacted on people’s health. The cleanup process was also very slow and costly.
Below is a picture of the Three Mile Island nuclear power station which I believe is still running today. Have a look at the colour of the water around it.
In the past, there have also been fatal nuclear disasters. This includes the Chernobyl nuclear disaster which was considered the worst nuclear power disaster in history.
Besides all the dangers, nuclear power shouldn’t even be considered now, simply because it cannot reduce carbon dioxide emissions quickly enough to prevent dangerous climate change. Nuclear power is not the answer.
Many environmentalists have spoken out against nuclear power.
“Nuclear power is too expensive and too dangerous. Wasting billions on more nuclear reactors would distract from the real task of developing renewables and reducing energy demand. Nuclear power is the ultimate unsustainable form of energy – for a little energy now, we would be condemning 10,000 generations to deal with the radioactive waste we would produce.” Andrew Lee, Director of Campaigns for WWF
“Nuclear power is a dangerous distraction from the real solutions to tackling climate change and it rightly deserves to be so unpopular,” commented Robin Oakley from Greenpeace. “It’s a hideously expensive and ridiculously antiquated way to generate electricity.”
I’m sure our prime minister wouldn’t like a nuclear reactor in his own backyard (just in case something was to happen!), but by changing to nuclear power, he’s putting nuclear reactors in his own country’s backyard!
My advice would be to leave the uranium right where it is in the ground. Clearly it was never meant to be touched by humans. Considering how costly nuclear power is, the money should be put towards renewable energy sources instead.