Electricity - nuclear versus wind power
Sam Carana
US and the UK are coming to the end of their lives, triggering a debate
whether to rebuild them, or look for alternatives.
Clean and renewable energy accounted for less than one-fifth of the
world's electricity in 2003 - most of it generated by hydro-power
projects. According to the International Energy Agency, small-scale
projects (such as power generated by wind, solar, geothermal, wave,
biomass and waste) overtook nuclear power's output in 2005, without
even counting large hydro-electric projects.
Wind power accounts for most of the increase and is getting ever more
popular. Wind farms in Germany and Spain alone added as much
electricity in 2004 as the entire world's nuclear industry is expected
to add this decade (i.e. from 2000 to 2010) and many new wind farm
projects are planned.
The Westmill wind farm in Oxfordshire, England, will generate 6.5
megawatts of electricity with just five turbines. Adam Twine, who owns
the land for the farm, had no problems finding investors for the
project.
Scotland has approved a 140-turbine wind farm at Whitelee for
completion in 2009. Output will be up to 322 megawatts - enough to
power virtually all homes in Glasgow.
In Massachusetts, USA, the 130-turbine Cape Wind project will generate
over 400 megawatts of electricity - enough for 400,000 homes.
By contrast, the interest in building new nuclear power plants seems to
restricted to nations like North Korea and Iran, where possession of
nuclear weapons is glorified to bolster the nationalism and populism
that keep rogue regimes in power. And then, there are of course
emerging giants like India and China, who look at nuclear power as a
cheap way to resolve their growing energy needs. But, how cheap is
nuclear power?
Until now, advocates of nuclear power have used two arguments. They
argued that nuclear power was cheaper than alternatives and that
nuclear plants made countries less dependent on foreign suppliers of
energy such as coal, gas and oil. Recently, they have added another
argument, i.e. that nuclear power doesn't come with the emission of
harmfull gases that plague alternatives like oil, coal and gas.
The dependency argument is starting to backfire. Nuclear power requires
access to uranium and huge technical skills. There are only a handful
of consortia in the world capable of building nuclear plants. Operating
the plants requires a continuous supply of skilled staff over many
years. The simplicity of wind turbines makes them look ever more
attractive in this regard.
Costwise, wind power is also looking increasingly attractive compared
to nuclear power plants. Many cost elements of nuclear power have until
now been under-estimated, specifically the cost of security,
litigation, waste disposal, safety, cleaning, and staff training. In
the past, many cost elements, such as developing and building nuclear
power plants, building up and sustaining the technical know-how and
ensuring there is competent staff to run the plant, have been partly
hidden in scientific and military projects that aimed to give a country
access to nuclear weapons. The link between nuclear power plants and
nuclear weapons has long been a hidden argument to choose nuclear power
for countries that aspired more military power.
But increasingly, the link between nuclear power and nuclear weapons
starts to count against nuclear power plants. Concern for proliferation
of nuclear weapons has increased since 9/11, as people worry more about
terrorists getting their hands on nuclear weapons to hold the world at
ransom. Furthermore, there is increasing concern that nuclear power
plants become targets for terrorists or that terrorists could hijack
nuclear waste to create a 'dirty' bomb.
Most western countries have ruled out nuclear power, partly for its
links with nuclear weapons. The countries with the most nuclear power
plants are the US, France and Japan, and they have ever less interest
in nuclear weapons, as modern weapons such as guided missiles with
conventional explosives can take out enemy targets with pin-point
accuracy, without the massive death of people and destruction of
infrastructure that comes with nuclear weapons.
Perhaps the biggest argument in favor of wind power is that it's clean,
renewable energy that doesn't add to the greenhouse effect or to global
warming, unlike nuclear power and burning fossil fuel. While nuclear
power doesn't come with the emissions of greenhouse gasses that make
burning of coal, gas and oil unattractive, the radio-active waste of
nuclear plants is polluting in a much more insidious way. Furthermore,
nuclear plants add heat that causes global warming, while alternatives
like solar, hydro, geothermal and wind power merely re-use energy that
was already there. As concern for global warming and climate change
increases, the latter argument adds further weight to wind power.
Ironically, while pollution clearly is one of the strongest arguments
in favor of wind power, some opponents claim that wind power created
environmental problems. According to a recent column in the Times,
Senator Kennedy, whose family's sport compound is in sight of the
proposed Cape Wind project, claimed it would cause environmental
problems. What Senator Kennedy means is that it would spoil his views.
But if you had the choice, what would you prefer, the sight of a
windmill, or of a nuclear power plant?
My conclusion is that wind power is looking increasingly attractive,
but as discussed before, we should look at many alternatives in
smaller-scale projects, rather than to put all our eggs into one
massive, centralised system.
Cheers
Sam Carana
Related threads:
http://groups.google.com/group/humanities/browse_thread/thread/5dbe6d184241c8cb
http://groups.google.com/group/greenhouseeffect/browse_thread/thread/302077ef2d146024