By Cyril Anderson

In the past decades, there has been a movement for "green energy" away from polluting energy generating methods like coal and oil fired plants.  As well, there has been a push for hydrogen as a source of fuel for cars.  Now this is a good thing.  It is good to not burn coal or oil.  Not necessarily because of alleged "greenhouse effects" of CO₂, but rather because oil is better used to make important organic chemicals for the chemical industry.

For civilization to be sustained, and for development to continue so as to bring a good standard of living to all the earth's inhabitants, a goal that should be a moral imperative of sorts for any believer in God, immense amounts of power will be needed.  Indeed this need for energy for increased development and growth is a law of nature.  Calculations show that as the level of technology of a society increases, the power used per capita, and power usage density rise correspondingly.

This has been matched with dependence on more and more powerful sources of energy to provide for this.  Early on, mankind used wood or brush, after, charcoal, later, coal, later still, oil, and for launching rockets and shuttles for space exploration, hydrogen gas.  Each of these representing a step up in terms of energy delivered per unit mass of fuel.  As well, with each step up, there has been a corresponding improvement in the “cleanness” of the energy source.

All of these previous developments however represent chemical sources of energy, given by the breaking and forming of chemical bonds governed by the electromagnetic force of nature.

In the 20th century, there were great discoveries in physics regarding the nature of the atom, in particular, its nucleus, and the even stronger nuclear force governing it.  In the mid-20th century, research by physicists and engineers unlocked the possibilities of using the immense energy of the atomic nucleus as a source of energy, both in a positive in the first experimental nuclear reactors, and more negatively, in the development of nuclear weapons.

Starting in the second half of the 20th century, this initially military technology began to be used for civilian power generation.  Unfortunately, through hysteria from largely misinformed environmental groups, resistance to nuclear power appeared, beginning in the turbulent times of the 1960’s.  Thankfully, this hysteria is beginning to fade, and nuclear being seen for the excellent option it is, as a high energy density and clean alternative to other sources of energy that promises to provide the basis for the economic development of the coming decades.

Nuclear energy can not only replace coal, gas and oil-fired power plants, but can also help to enable other technologies that can improve human civilization.  Nuclear power plants can be used as a source of energy for the energy intensive production of hydrogen gas from water, allowing the replacement of oil as a source of energy for automobiles.  In addition, the heat from nuclear power can be used for industrial desalination that can be used to keep up with the increasing water demands of increasing populations and increasing industrialization.

Still, the objection raised because of so-called "nuclear waste."  However, the fact is that much of what is called nuclear waste can actually be recycled through reprocessing.  First, it is useful to examine in some detail the nuclear fuel cycle.  First uranium ore is mined, and natural Uranium oxide ore, UO₂ ore is extracted from mines.  The Uranium metal is then processed to Uranium Hexaflouride gas, UF₆.  It is then useful to note that natural Uranium has two isotopes , or forms: U₂₃₈, which is not radioactive, and which makes up 99.5% of Uranium, and U₂₃₅, which makes up the remaining 0.5% and which undergoes fission decay, producing heat. The UF₆ gas is then processed to "enrich" the level of U₂₃₅, exploiting either differential gas diffusion through membranes, or using centrifuges for separation of the gases, which have different densities.  For nuclear power plant fuel, the U₂₃₅ is enriched to a little under 5% concentration, while for nuclear weapons, the enrichment is more on the order of 95%.  The lowly enriched uranium fuel is then fabricated into fuel for power plants, in the form of fuel rods or pellets, depending on the reactor design.  The fuel is usually used for a period of a few years, and then removed.  After a cooling down period, the spent fuel is currently usually buried, but in a fully functioning fuel cycle, this spent fuel can be reprocessed to extract un-reacted trace U₂₃₅ and Plutonium, usable as fuel in more sophisticated reactors.  Theoretically, the "waste" could also be processed to make radioactive isotopes for radioactive medicine and other uses.  The tiny leftover highly radioactive remnants can then be buried in secure locations for disposal.  Those environmentalists who would make mountains out of the molehill of this waste should reflect on the tonnes of waste produced by coal and oil plants that is overall much more hazardous.

Nuclear power represents an order of magnitude step up beyond any other existing power source in terms of energy per mass of fuel, giving about a million times as much energy, gram per gram, as petroleum.  No other currently viable source is even in the same ball park. This represents a natural continuation of humanity's increased levels of technological power over time.  The next generation, given further research, would be nuclear fusion, the energy source of the stars, an even greater order of magnitude leap above nuclear fission in terms of energy output per gram of fuel, and even cleaner, producing Helium gas as a waste product and using Hydrogen isotopes as a fuel.  Industrial scale fusion power, however, is not anticipated to be feasible for at least 25-30 years, fission power is a necessity to maintain and permit real global economic growth.

So called “alternative energies” are really no alternative.  Wind and solar are not viable options for a modern, industrialized world with a decent standard of living for 6 billion or more human lives.  The power density offered by wind and solar are simply not sufficient for the task at hand.  Simply put, it is a pipe dream, much like the much-ballyhooed "bio-diesel," or ethanol fuel for cars, which actually requires more petroleum than it saves, once the oil needed for the energy intensive process of preparing, planting, harvesting, and fermenting the products of fields of corn for ethanol is factored into the equation.  It is pure insanity driven by short-sighted political machinations, going to show the folly of trusting those under the influence of ethanol!  Estimates indicate that to replace even a paltry 25% of America's gasoline needs with ethanol would require the planting of over 10% of the US landmass with corn!  This is aside from any agriculture for food for humans and animals. 

The truth is that an aggressive program of development of nuclear power, as contemplated or on the books currently in Ontario, the United States, some nations in Europe, Russia, China, India, and now, Iran is really the only sane solution to the demands of truly sustainable development that will allow the whole world to reach the standard of living that we in Canada tend to take for granted.