I'm seeing a few comments on this, let me answer some of them:
Q. What about all that nuclear waste?
96% of spent fuel rods (nuclear "waste" ) is reusable, and the remaining 4% is so incredibly small in waste and has a much smaller half-life compared to the pure radioactive fuel rods (meaning they are far less radioactive and in half the time)
All of the used nuclear fuel produced by the U.S. nuclear energy industry over the last 60 years could fit on a football field at a depth of less than 10 yards!
That waste can also be reprocessed and recycled, although the United States does not currently do this as it was outlawed for nonsensical reasons over fifty years ago. The current waste amount is incredibly smaller than most people think.
Q. But it's radioactive! And deadly!
While this technically is true, if you count all deaths from nuclear (including the catastrophes that were only due to old designs and negligent mismanagement) nuclear has killed less people than coal does in a single month from radioactivity.
I'm fact, coal ash is more radioactive than nuclear waste.
The waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy.
Q. Isn't solar or wind better because you can build more?
Solar and wind requires batteries, this is to store the energy to be used. These batteries are commonly made from lithium and cobalt, both a precious resource we are already running low on. This is to offset power delivery when power output is low, but the mining and geo-political/social issues run abundant on this, not only this but there is a constant need to replenish with new storage methods as constant discharging and recharging reduces the capabilities of the battery (think similar to your phone, how the battery is not anywhere near as great as it was when you first received it).
Nuclear does not require this as it can work in any weather or climate situation. They have a constant output from a miniscule amount of fuel.
Q. Does nuclear really produce more energy?
Yes! For example, in relation to renewable energy, the density can be measured in terms of electricity produced per unit area. For wind this is typically between 1-2 watts/sqm and for solar energy, this is typically around 6 watts/sqm This is indeed very low when compared with nuclear power. For example a typical nuclear power station generating 1000 million watts (Mw) of electricity would occupy around 0.5 square miles of land. A wind farm generating the same amount of electricity would occupy around 300 square miles. To put this into perspective 300 square miles is roughly half the size of Greater London. 1000 Mw of electricity generated by solar panels would require around 60 square miles.
Another way of considering energy density is in relation to the amount of fuel needed to generate electricity. The energy density in coal is typically around 24 MJ/kg, natural gas has an energy density of around 50 MJ/kg. A 1000 Mw coal fired power station would consume around 9,000 tons of coal per day.
Nuclear power is in a different league. The fission of a single atom of U235 releases 208 MeV of energy which equates to 85,000,000 MJ/kg. A nuclear power station generating 1000 Mw of electricity will consume around 3.5kg of U235 per day. The very high energy density in the atom means that electricity can be generated using considerably less land than any other form of energy. It also means that the nuclear fuels can be manufactured anywhere and economically shipped around the world.
Not only this, but it doesn't release any carbon emissions in production!
Q. Okay, but how much fuel do we have and when will we run out?
The next generation of nuclear power stations (so called fast breeder reactors) are designed to convert the other more abundant isotope (99.3%) of uranium, U238, into plutonium. Plutonium is used as a substitute for U235 and thereby increases the utilization of uranium as an energy source by a factor of 60.
The use of fast breeder reactors could provide mankind with up to 3000 years of electricity supply.
Q. It takes decades to build a reactor, decades!
That used to be true, and sadly it's a misnomer that it takes so long, but with the current and next generation of reactor designs the average time to build is about 3-5 years for most reactors, and 7.5 years for all reactors including the outliers.
The true mean construction time for nuclear reactors is only 7.5years¹ and this does not take into account the new Small Module Reactors (SMR) that are substantially smaller that are starting to be put into production.
Nuclear is the only way to radically reduce our carbon emissions in the short term and long term, solar and wind help(!) but they can't do it alone or fast enough to reverse our current climate course. We need nuclear!
