Myth Buster

Nuclear power plant myths

1) Uranium is running out

There is 600 times more uranium in the ground than gold and there is as much uranium as tin. There has been no major new uranium exploration for 20 years, but at current consumption levels, known uranium reserves are predicted to last for 85 years. Modern reactors can use thorium as a fuel and convert it into uranium  and there is three times more thorium in the ground than uranium.

Uranium is the only fuel which, when burnt, generates more fuel. In short, there is more than enough uranium, thorium and plutonium to supply the entire world’s electricity for several hundred years.

2) Nuclear is not a low-carbon option

During its whole life cycle, nuclear power releases three to six grams of carbon per kiloWatthour (GC kWh) of electricity produced, compared with three to 10 GC/kWh for wind turbines, 105 GC/kWh for natural gas and 228 GC/kWh for lignite (‘dirty’ coal).

3) Nuclear power is expensive

With all power generation technology, the cost of electricity depends upon the investment in construction , fuel, management and operation. Like wind, solar and hydroelectric dams, the principal costs of nuclear lie in construction. Acquisition of uranium accounts for only about 10 per cent of the price of total costs, so nuclear power is not as vulnerable to fluctuations in the price of fuel as gas and oil generation.

4) Reactors produce too much waste

Production of all the electricity consumed in a four-bedroom house for 70 years leaves about one teacup of high-level waste, and new nuclear build will not make any significant contribution to existing radioactive waste levels for 20-40 years.

5) Building reactors takes too long

The best construction schedules are achieved by the Canadian company AECL, which has built six new reactors since 1991, from the pouring of concrete to criticality (when the reactors come on-line), the longest build took six-and-a-half years and the shortest just over four years.

6) Leukemia rates are higher near reactors

Childhood leukemia rates are no higher near nuclear power plants than they are near organic farms. ‘Leukemia clusters’ are geographic areas where the rates of childhood leukemia appear to be higher than normal, but the definition is controversial because it ignores the fact that leukemia is actually several very different diseases with different causes. Men who work on nuclear submarines or in nuclear plants are no more likely to father children with leukaemia than workers in any other industry.

7) Reactors lead to weapons proliferation

More nuclear plants would actually reduce weapons proliferation. Atomic warheads make excellent reactor fuel; decommissioned warheads (containing greatly enriched uranium or plutonium) currently provide about 15 per cent of world nuclear fuel. Increased demand for reactor fuel would divert such warheads away from potential terrorists

8) Reactors are a terrorist target

Terrorists have already demonstrated that they prefer large, high visibility, soft targets with maximum human casualties rather than well-guarded, isolated, low-population targets. Any new generation of nuclear reactors  will be designed with even greater protection against attack than existing plants, and with ‘passive’ safety measures that work without human intervention or computer control.