Gaze into Your Crystal Ball

I think the new development of bioengineered extremophile bacteria that make fuel from CO2 and sunlight is an example of the possibilities of using industrial scale biology to solve problems.

Modular Nuclear Power Plants

Like this one?

The pebble bed is a particularly interesting nuclear power system. Actually was first developed by the Germans in the late 1970's and saw a small scale commercial demonstration in Germany. In my personal opinon, this is the technology that carries the future of nuclear power. Babcock & Wilcox has a modular as does Toshiba. Several of the Toshiba plants are in the works for Alasaka.

Interesting, but what about the other 2/3 of the life cycle of the fuel?

I'm really not sure of your question . . .but let me try . . . usually the fuel lasts for approximately 5 years . . .In the B&W and Toshiba plants that is the time of life for full 100% power production . . . the reactor module is then taken to a refueling facility. With the pebble bed, the "fuel pebbles" can be removed from the reactor, analyzed electronically and either returned to the reactor or sent to a storage system and a new fuel pebble installed, thus basically the pebble bed reactor core is "refueld while in operation" and is only shutdown for maintenance on the "Balance of Plant". Again as has always been the case, the highly radioative expended fuel taken from the reactor can be reprocessed. The remaining fissile material recovered and reused. Yes there will be a quantity of waste that must be stored in a waste repository. Keep in mind that for many years the US Department of Defense has recycled reactors from submarines. The reprocessing of fuel from a commercial nuclear power plant is NOT technology limited . . . it is politically limited. I hope this answers your questions, if not please ask, I will attempt to give you my best answer.

The 1st 1/3rd would be the mining & refining of the fissile material[s].

The 3/3rd would be the storage of the waste

reprocessing will minimize the amounts of both that need to be done

there are plenty of superfund sites that will probably never be cleaned up

which doesn't mean nuclear power can't be done in a safe & sane way.

Just because the navy has been doing it for 50+years isn't much of an endorsement, since all the branches of the military throw the national security card when safety rules get in the way...

The reprocessing of fuel may be a politically limited but,

The storage of waste has yet to have a good technical solution, considering the risk will most likely out live human civilization by more than 100's or 1000's of years...

The generation is the interesting part, the rest just details...

I do appreciate when guys like you & Rhabe, speak about all aspects of this subject, having some actual experience

Hello Garthh;

Yes, I do have to register some concern about the mining processes, I am a devoute environmentalist, from the perspective that engineering when conscientiously applied can and should minimize harm.

With respect to the fuels source, the alternative fuels, yes even the nuclear power technology has alternative fuels, including thorium, plutonium, and of course the various isotopes of uranium. Thorugh a program of technological diversity it is now full within the capability of the technology to NEVER again conduct a mining operation, as we currently view the technology. I do not believe that mining for SOME of the necessary materials will NOT cease, but it is technologically feasible that it could.

See this link at wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

Via the breeder more fuel is created than used. Sure from the breeder comes materials that must be "processed" . . . and to some degree that can be viewed as "reprocessing" . . . but the technology is HERE and NOW to do that reprocessing provided that politically the processes can be disconnected from weaponization and impact of long term storage of a quantity of waste justified.

Waste Storage:

I do have to admit being marginally, at best, knowlegable of the waste process, I have just never been involved in the intimate detail. All I can really add to this topic is this . . . that any long term storage repository, designed and constructed to good practices and standards, will be a thousand fold improvement over the current storage process, where we today have hundreds of high level radioactive material storage facilities spread all across our country.

It is my humble opinion that the knowledge of a serious condition, and taking action to correct it, is a much better approach than allowing the millions of tons of deterimental waste from say, fossil fuels, from being the broadcasting of the "slow destruction" and thus make the fossil power plant localities of today the superfund sites of tomorrow.

I do believe that we are dealing with a set of "fears" and it is easy to scare us, as humans, but it can be impossible to "unscare" us.

There is certainly a large amount of "the cat being out of the bag". We already have serious issues to resolve from the past... stuffing fingers in our ears & chanting La La La won't make them go away.

Best to devote some resources to mitigating or resolving the negatives

In theory it is better reduce the amount of fossil fuels being converted into energy.

My perspective is can we engineer a cradle to grave lifecycle of the process to have a low enough level of risk, that

I would work there [or my children]?

The whole conversation as you point out is scary

Cancer makes people's head spin where rational discussion is no longer possible.

Thank you for spending time to reply