Those most responsible for creating the problems [of climate change] will see it to it that they profit from the solution that they propose. – Arundhati Roy, 2019, quoted in ‘Nuclear is Not the Solution’ MV Ramana (Verso)
The recently published book Nuclear is not the answer by Prof. M.V. Ramana of the University of British Columbia makes a comprehensive and well-researched contribution to the evolving debate on the relevance of nuclear in our energy mix. This is a timely work in the context of the concerted global campaign to dress up nuclear as a partial solution to global warming and the climate crisis.
In Australia, Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party have unveiled their policy of building seven small, modular nuclear reactors on old coal sites to be operational by the mid-2030s. Their claim that, “zero-emissions” nuclear plants, supported by cooling water capacity and the use of existing transmissions infrastructure, offers a simpler and cheaper alternative to greenhouse gas has attracted much attention. Several commentators have pointed out the serious flaws, including the astronomical costs, unrealistic timelines, and wholly untested technologies that underpin the proposal. The cynical wedge politics involved in pitting renewables against nuclear has been highlighted by Sophie Vorrath, quoting John Martin, chair of the Clean Energy Investor Group.
Ramana’s main thesis is that nuclear energy based on either the old reactor design or the newer, small modular reactors is infeasible and cannot offer a viable solution to the climate crisis. To begin with, the risks to the environment and people’s health from nuclear energy are too high. The rhetoric of safe nuclear power produced by the new generation of clean nuclear plants is not supported by available evidence. The risks of catastrophic Chernobyl or Fukushima-style accidents and their disastrous consequences are largely unchanged and cannot be understated. Despite the low probability of major nuclear accidents based on theoretical models, the basic lesson we can learn from the accidents is that the structural complexity of the technology will give rise to conditions for their occurrence from time to time. As well, the nuclear waste disposal problem and the associated radiation leaks continue to pose significant challenges.
Political leaders have a tendency to exaggerate the role of nuclear in the transition to net-zero and underplay the costs and the time to build new nuclear capacity. Despite grandiose speeches by the likes of Emmanuel Macron advocating a dual strategy of both nuclear and renewables, and the nuclear renaissance promised by Boris Johnson, there has been a substantial decline in the contribution of nuclear to electricity generation globally. Using 1997, the year of the Kyoto agreement as a starting point, the contribution of nuclear to world-wide electricity production has declined from 17% to slightly over 9% in 2022. This has to do with a number of factors, including massive costs and lengthy delays in installing new capacity, decommissioning of old reactors, and the not-infrequent shutdowns of functioning reactors due to safety and other operational concerns. In contrast, the contribution of renewable sources has gone up from 1% in 1997 to 14% in 2022. The average construction cost of nuclear plants as of 2021 was around US$10,300 per kilowatt compared to US$875 for a utility scale photovoltaic plant. The average cost per megawatt hour of electricity from newly erected nuclear plants is estimated to be five times that of solar and wind power.
One of the curious aspects of Dutton’s nuclear strategy is the proposal for the Government to fund the building of the nuclear plants in partnership with “experienced nuclear companies”. This is a recipe for the socialisation of costs and risks, while profits accrue to private parties. Ramana has presented several case studies of this pattern in the construction of nuclear plants in several countries. When things go wrong which they often do, the taxpayer inevitably is left to pick up the tab. In the UK, the Government had to reassure potential investors with offers of massive rewards for investing in nuclear power. When British Energy went bankrupt, it had to be rescued at a cost of over £10 billion to taxpayers.
Another reason to be wary of nuclear technology is the longstanding connection between nuclear power generation and nuclear weapons. After all, the oldest application of nuclear energy is the nuclear weapon. The infrastructure to produce nuclear electricity also provides the capacity to make nuclear weapon materials. Countries like India and Pakistan started out with claims of using nuclear for peaceful purposes and then went on to produce nuclear bombs. It is not a coincidence that a vast majority of functioning nuclear plants are located in countries that possess nuclear weapons. Expanding nuclear energy can only make the goal of eliminating nuclear weapons and achieving nuclear non-proliferation more difficult.
Ramana does an excellent job of debunking the magical thinking around nuclear power and the roles of the billionaire messiahs and nuclear cheerleaders like Bill Gates, Peter Thiel and Elon Musk. This is despite the fact that their investment in the next-generation nuclear technology start-ups have ended in failures. The most egregious example is Trans atomic Power launched by Lesley Dewan, an MIT-trained nuclear engineer. The company promised “more power-dense and cheaper” modular nuclear technology based on a previously known molten salt reactor. After burning more than $5 million of venture funds including $200,000 from the US Department of Energy, the company had to fold after an MIT professor demonstrated that the technology was infeasible and had serious design flaws that violated the basic laws of physics. Several other start-ups with similar ideas have made little progress.
The book makes a convincing argument for sustained investments in renewables as the correct approach to achieving greenhouse gas reduction while addressing their key limitations. These investments must be accompanied by a complete overhaul of the current electricity grids, requiring a significant transformation of the system. Nuclear and other faux solutions are distractions that can only delay the transition to a renewables-based future.
Joseph G. Davis
Joseph G. Davis is a Professor Emeritus at the School of Computer Science, the University of Sydney.
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