How nuclear energy is different from other source of energy (fuel, hydro, wind, solar) that makes uranium hazardous than those, and what justify nuclear energy is relevant in the first place?
Sorry if the questions don’t really relate to each other. They’re just running wild in my mind. Sorry for the bad english – english is not my first language.
In: 0
Your question does not make much sense because of the bad english so im not quite sure what you are trying to ask exactly
The key component of nuclear energy is that you are using radioactive decay to generate heat, that heat is then used to boil water which is then used to spin a turbine which is then used to generate electricity.
So the initial source of energy, radioactive decay, is that makes it different from say coal, which uses the energy from burning coal to spin a turbine, or wind, which uses energy from the wind to spin a turbine, or hydro, which uses energy from water flowing downhill to spin a turbine
Nuclear energy uses uranium to generate heat. Once the material stops generating usable heat, we have nuclear waste. This waste can be dangerous to people, and it remains dangerous for a long time, so we have to do something with it.
Burning fossil fuels also produces waste, in the form of smoke and pollution. There might be ways to capture this “waste”, but in general, we don’t manage it, which is a problem, that waste also causes health issues for humans.
The other forms of energy you mentioned don’t produce waste. The equipment might wear out, but there’s not left over sunlight or left over wind that we have to manage.
As for the relevance of nuclear power, the issue with solar and wind power is that it’s not constant. If the sun isn’t out and it’s not windy, we don’t produce electricity, so we either need to find a way to store the electricity for later or manage our electricity more carefully when energy supplies are low. Nuclear and fossil fuels can produce electricity at all hours of the day. Nuclear has a lot of proponents because it doesn’t produce CO2 emissions like coal and, if the plants are managed and maintained properly, don’t cause health issues for people.
Hydroelectric, wind, and solar produce no waste. Fossil fuels release waste that is dangerous, but not nearly as dangerous as nuclear waste. Nuclear waste is extremely radioactive.
Radioactive material releases dangerous radiation. The energy of radiation is often measured in electron volts (eV). A UV ray strong enough to give a sunburn has about 3 eV. A gamma ray from radioactive decay will have hundreds of thousands or millions of eV. Gamma rays can also penetrate material, so they get deeper inside of you, and they can’t be stopped by physical barriers. There are also other particles released during radioactive decay, and they all can burn you and give you cancer much more easily than intense sunlight.
Also, nothing can be done to nuclear waste to make it stop being radioactive other than just waiting. That can take tens or hundreds of thousands of years. We need to figure out how to store this waste, and how to prevent accidents and terrorist attacks from releasing it.
Most forms of electricity generation take something with potential energy and make it do mechanical work like turning a turbine that than gets translated into electricity.
You burn coal to boil water to turn a turbine with steam and the turbine works like a reverse electro motor and produces electricity.
You can also use radioactive material to heat boil water and do the same thing.
You can also have instead water flowing downhill turn a turbine or wind blowing past a windmill do the same.
Solar is different because it turns sunshine directly into electricity.
In theory you also have many different types of batteries that store electricity in for example chemicals and can release that anergy in the from electricity later.
Most of these things with the exception of solar and wind rely on storing something that holds a lot of energy before it can be converted into electrify.
There is always the danger that that energy is released uncontrollably all at once. Releasing lots of energy in an uncontrolled fashion tends to be catastrophic.
For example coal has energy that can be liberated by burning it, but if you store the coal you want to burn wrong and get a lot of coal dust that might result in a big explosion.
Natural gas is even worse in that regard, a gas leak and a spark is all it takes to go boom.
Water will not explode easily, but if you have a lot of it behind a dam that is a lot fo potential energy you are storing and a dam failure can have catastrophic effect if all the energy get released in the form of a flood wave killing large numbers of people downstream.
Even chemical batteries can release their energy all at once is mishandled causing small or not so small explosions and fires.
Wind and solar (and the occasional tidal power generators) are different because we don’t usually store wind and sunshine next to the power plant and just use what the planet already has as it comes up, so there is no danger of a catastrophic solar spill as a panel releases days worth of sunshine all at once.
So most ways we generate power and electricity have a danger of the energy we are trying to harness being released in ways we don’t want.
Nuclear is not that different from natural gas or hydro in that regard.
What is a big difference is the worst possible case and potential side effects of.
A dam bursting may kill thousands of people but in the end you just have water to deal with if you want to rebuild in the destroyed area.
Nuclear contamination is harder to deal with than most other stuff and the worst case scenario of things going bad can be quite bad depending on the type of reactor.
It doesn’t help that radiation is invisible while people can see water and fire and ash, which makes it a bit scarier.
Nuclear energy also has the problem of what to do with the used up nuclear fuel and the all the nuclear trash.
In theory we can bury it somewhere, but nobody want it buried near where they live so that most spent fuel rods just sit in a water tank next to the reactor they were used in waiting for collection for decades.
However nuclear power also had advantages or at least it used to have some, fewer today.
One advnatge is that you only need a small amount of uranium to run them and are independent of any oil and gas exporters trying to raise prices or blockade or boycott you. It gives you independence from striking coal workers and similar. It also means that you can’t easily be cut of from your fuel source during war time.
Another advantage is that some types of reactors can be used to create the material necessary to build nuclear bombs. This is a bonus if you want to build bombs.
An advnatge that used to be touted in the past was price. Nuclear was supposed to bring cheap electricity. Nowadays several other types of power plants, most notably solar power are cheaper to produce.
Newer nuclear power plant design are safer and better in many ways, but due to the cost involved in building one and the protests of the local population, many of the reactors currently running in developed countries tend to be mostly nearing their end of life.
Latest Answers