Nuclear Power - Final Thoughts

To conclude my section on Nuclear Power I wanted to do a brief summary of the threats and opportunities it presents. More detail and references to relevant information on each aspect can be found in previous posts, this is just a quick conclusion!

Opportunities

• Reliable and continuous form of energy
• Ongoing research to improve the safety and efficiency of the process
• Offers energy security and independence for many countries
• Low carbon technology compared  to fossil fuels
• Public perception

Threats

• Very expensive technology and decommissioning costs
• Safe disposal of radioactive waste
• Risk of fallout after accidents or natural hazards
• Taking focus from renewable energy
• Public perception

I have deliberately put public perception in both opportunities and threats. A wealth of research suggests that a lot of the general public are very opposed to nuclear power, largely for concerns over safety. After disasters such as Fukushima and Chernobyl this isn't overly surprising (Macilwain, Nature, 2011). However, the ultimate challenge nuclear power has to overcome is the cost. A study by MIT in 2003 and again in 2009 showed that the cost of building a nuclear power plant had doubled in just five years from $2000/kW to $4000/kW (Du and Parsons, CEEPR, 2009). These units represent the price per kilowatt hour to build a new rector. The price of oil and gas power plants has also increased though not as rapidly. 

The increasing cost of nuclear reactors is set to increase due to material costs, safety improvements and uranium costs. Ultimately this increasing cost will eventually make nuclear power unprofitable as a energy source over the next 50-100 years (European Parliament Conference). 

My final thought, living in a country that never experiences devastating earthquakes it is difficult to imagine the reaction to the Fukushima Nuclear Power plant disaster. This week the UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction commemorated its work with Japan by hosting a symposium on the disaster with representatives from UCL and Tohoku University. Attending the symposium helped me understand this a little more and I wanted to finish with a map of the world showing nuclear power plants and seismic activity. The devastation after Fukushima really makes you question if nuclear power is worth it.

Worldwide nuclear power plants and earthquake zones - courtesy of MAPTD 2013

Blue dots - The location of 248 atomic energy plants, including numbers of reactors
Heatmap - Every earthquake after 1973 with a magnitude over 4.5. Around 173,000 in total

A Good Day to Die Hard

You can't go wrong with a classic action plot line, although I have to say that Die Hard Five (hilariously named "A Good Day to Die Hard") pushes the limits slightly.

The final seen sees Bruce Willis and his son (who conveniently is undercover for the CIA) destroy a house containing a large amount of uranium weapons: the same technology used in commercial nuclear reactors. What caught my eye in this scene was the iPad app that Brucey was using which told him the radiation levels in the house: informing him they were in a perilous situation. I wanted to see if there was much science behind this or whether Hollywood was just having a laugh. 

During the Japan Earthquake and Tsuanami in 2011, radio and TV were recorded as being the most useful media for distributing information. However mobile devices which can connect to wifi are becoming increasingly significant, alongside this is a the development of apps for emergency situations. 

Earthquake Warning App - using data from the Japan Meteorological Agency, users get an early warning about an earthquake. This only gives a few minutes warning but allows people to go into emergency procedures such as turning off gas supplies and getting to a safer location. 

Defibrillator App - this app shows the users proximity to automated defibrillators which can be used by anyone to restart someone's heart. This is one example of many useful apps which relate to emergency services and healthcare in the area. 

Safe Area Checker - this app was created after the disaster at the Fukushima power plant so that users can check their proximity to the area which is deemed unsafe to enter. This app has been incredibly popular. 

I couldn't find any 'die hard' style radiation apps yet but there are certainly some really helpful products being created. The ones focused on getting information or support to people during or after the event seem great, providing they are kept up to date. I'm a little more sceptical about ones that aim to 'predict' events or show augmented realities of what different hazards would do. To me this seems unnecessary scaremongering and I'm not sure what 'evidence' some of the apps are based on. 

Information sourced from Emergency Journalism website 

Meet the Frackers - Part 1

“Meet the frackers” has become a popular name for news articles, TV documentaries and campaign groups linked to fracking. Over the next few weeks I am focus on fracking for my blog posts. Firstly lets introduce the process of hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas and address two of the key issues the process has raised.

Hydraulic fracking is a process where fluid is pumped into rock at high pressure which causes the rock to fracture. This creates more space within the rock and allows oil and gas to percolate through the formation therefore it can be pumped to the surface and extracted. It has been used in the USA, extracting gas from areas such as the Marcellus Shale, for the last decade and has recently been given the green light by the UK government.

Video: BBC Horizon programme "Fracking: The New Energy Rush" 

Issue One: Does fracking cause earthquakes?

The honest answer: yes it can. The more the more important question is do these earthquakes matter and can they be avoided? Recorded earthquakes induced by hydraulic fracturing have a magnitude in the range of 1.0 – 3.8. This causes comparable ground shaking to a large articulated lorry driving past your house. Much higher magnitude earthquakes have been recorded from the use of controlled explosions in mining, up to 5.1, and from reservoir impoundment where the weight of the water causes ground fracturing, up to 7.9. (Davis et at 2013). So the earthquake damage cause by earthquakes induced by fracking doesn't even come close to other anthropogenic causes. 

Even if the earthquakes are small, it is important that oil and gas companies do all they can to avoid it in the first place. This can be achieved by improved research and method in the operations. A review of fracking in the UK was carried out which addressed the earthquakes causes in Blackpool (Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineers 2012). They recommended that better fault plane analysis could help minimise risk of earthquakes by avoiding injecting fluid directly into fault planes. Overall they gave fracking the go ahead in the UK. 

Issue Two: will fracking contaminate groundwater?

 Image courtesy of John Cole Cartoons (The Times Tribune, Pennsylvania) 

Water contamination has been a huge issue for some US fracking operations. Using geochemical isotropic tracers at a fracking site in Pennsylvania, it was shown that increased levels of methane, chlorine and potassium in groundwater are “related to stray gas contamination directly linked to shale gas operations”. (Darrah et al 2012, Procedia of Earth and Planetary Science). This maybe a case where improved technology and processes can prevent this occurring again however for some communities fracking has already had a severe impact on quality of life.