NMENT INFLUENCED BY
?
with water, which leaks a lot, Nuclear: the greenest of
NO MORE NUCLEAR!
the grid delivers 98.5% of the technologies
energy fed into it. In a bid to cut Nuclear technology is advancing.
GREENPEACE’S MAIN ARGUMENTS AGAINST NUCLEAR electricity costs and improve effi- The fast reactor promises a 50- to
ciency, the grid replaced local 60-fold increase in energy derived
Environmental campaign charity, Greenpeace has always fought generation in 1926. By linking from natural uranium. The pebble-
vigorously against nuclear power because it is “an unacceptable super-efficient power plants and bed reactor, operating at tempera-
risk to the environment and to humanity”. According to the developing nationwide transmis- tures up to 900
o
C, enables electric-
group, the “only solution” is to halt the expansion of all nuclear sion, at a stroke redundant ity generation without the raising
power, and for existing plants to be shut down. standby capacity was abolished, of steam and is fail safe.
”Despite what the nuclear industry tells us, building enough economy of scale introduced and Temperatures can rise to 1,600
o
C
nuclear power stations to make a meaningful reduction in cheap electricity made available without danger.
greenhouse gas emissions would cost trillions of dollars, create for the populace. Also, it can easily be adapted to
tens of thousands of tons of lethal high-level radioactive waste, The Tories’ call for a move make an excellent rector as small as
contribute to further proliferation of nuclear weapons materials, towards local generation flies in 400MW. Perhaps more important-
and result in a Chernobyl-scale accident once every decade,” the face of science and indeed eco- ly, chemical processes have been
says the organisation, arguing that constructing new nuclear nomics as it is vastly more cost- developed which may use nuclear
plants will squander the resources for things like wind farms. effective to produce energy cheap- heat to make hydrogen very effi-
Of chief concern is safety. Radioactive, spent fuel requires ly, transport it efficiently and then ciently, and hydrogen is the only
constant cooling. If this fails, it could lead to a catastrophic drop from 400,000 volts to 240 possible alternative to carbon fuel.
release of radioactivity. There are also problems with dealing with volts for household supply at local Oh for a little more attention to
waste, and no country in the world has a solution to high-level substations. The 5% losses David science and perhaps a little less
waste that stays radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. Cameron complains of are hardly hubris.
The least damaging option at this current time is for waste to be surprising since the local system is
stored above ground, in dry storage at the site of origin, but this at a lower voltage, hence a higher Richard H Phillips is a scientist
option also presents major challenges and the threats. amperage and greater heating loss- with the Joan Pye Project
es – little more than Ohms law. w
www.joanpyeproject.org
Sustainable Business 27❘ June 2009
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36