1. Chapter 12
Nuclear Energy

2. Politics

3. Enrichment Enrichment: Gaseous & Centrifuge
Enrichment:
Gaseous & Centrifuge
U235 is enriched to 3-5% from 0.7%
1 pellet of U-235 enriched to 3% = one ton of coal

4. Centrifuges

5. Georgia Power Georgia’s Electrical Generation Coal 74%
Nuclear 18% - France 75%
Oil & Gas <6%
Hydro <3%
Renewable

6. Introduction to the Nuclear Process
Fission – nuclear energy released when atom split
Fusion – nuclear energy released when atoms fused

7. Fuel Assembly
A fuel assembly consists of a square array of 179 to 264 fuel rods, and 121 to 193 fuel assemblies are loaded into an individual reactor - numbers vary greatly

8. Fuel Assembly

9. Nuclear Fission Primary/Secondary/Tertiary water circuits?
Vogtle Power Plant
Primary/Secondary/Tertiary water circuits?

10. Cooling Towers

11. Natural Draft Cooling Towers
Cooling water absorbs heat in the condenser and is pumped to the cooling towers where the water pours over a horizontal grid. Upward airflow cools it off. A minor part of the cold cooling water flows back into the river.

12. Spent Fuel Storage

13. GA Power Decisions Nuclear: Power Produced: 2,200K Megawatts
Cost: 14 Billion Original budget 5 from GA Power
Funding: federal loan guarantee 6.5 billion
Overrun: 7 years 2016 now
Jobs: 5k construction / 800 permanent
Natural Gas:
Power Produced: 2,500K Megawatts / 625K Homes
Cost: 200 million
Funding: GA Power – rate increases
Time: 3 years for all three
Jobs: 2K construction / Permanent ?

14. Pu-239 Breeder Reactor U-235 <1% of worlds uranium
The plutonium-239 core is surrounded by a layer of uranium-238 – which becomes or is “bred” into Pu-239
U-235 <1% of worlds uranium
Most available U-238
Issues:
Pu- 239 extremely carcinogenic
Half-life 24,000 years
Sodium coolants are explosively reactive
U-235 could run for 200 years at current rates of consumption.
Breeder reactors could match today's nuclear output for 30,000 years

15. Accidents Can Happen

16. Three Mile Island 1979, Three Mile Island plant in PA
the most serious nuclear reactor accident in the USA
-human error (cooling system failed)
-50% meltdown of reactor core
Luckily, containment building kept radioactivity from releasing into the countryside

17. What caused 3 miles island?
Minor malfunction in cooling causes Emergency shutdown
Steam relief valve opens but does not close as it should
Instruments indicate valve had closed
Coolant levels dropped and reactor heated up
Later that day hydrogen gas build-up threatened an explosion

18. Chernobyl Disaster 1986, Ukraine (former Soviet Union)
Worst accident ever (?) to occur at a nuclear power plant
-blew up nuclear reactor; upper part completely destroyed

19. Safety Issues in Nuclear Power Plants
Radioactive fallout from Chernobyl:

20. What caused Chernobyl?
Plant operators ran a safety test of back-up safety systems - specifically the generators that would power coolant
Control rods were removed and when “SCRAM” was initiated
Control rods jammed 1/3 of the way in as fuel rods warped
Explosion was from steam pressure followed y fire as oxygen mixed with heated graphite

21. Impact Fire broke out and explosions spread radioactive waste
350,000 people relocated
4,000 Deaths
2 million acres of farmland lost
1,700,000 acres of forest lost
Resurgent animals?
-effects
-harmful radioisotopes spread across Europe
-fire broke out, had to be contained so other reactors wouldn’t explode
-firefighters later died from exposure
-170,000 people had to abandon their homes permanently
-immediate cleanup
-no pictures (film ruined from radiation)
-soil removed from site
-buildings and roads had to be scrubbed because of radioactive dust
-farmland and forests still contaminated today
-loss of agricultural revenue
-people can’t drink water, eat produce, nurse babies
-radioactivity causes those affected to develop cancers

22. Japan
Tsunami:

23. The Future of Nuclear Power
Issues:
Making nuclear power safer
Standardizing power plant designs
Decommissioning Nuclear Power Plants
Lowering construction costs
Securing Long Term Waste Storage
Monitoring storage - weapons