Rethinking the Role of Nuclear Power After Fukushima

Aug 4, 2011

The March, 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan has renewed concerns over the safety and viability of nuclear energy in the United States. These concerns are timely as the United States seeks to reduce carbon intensive fossil-fuel based energy production while meeting growing energy demands through clean energy.

After a hiatus of more than two decades following the nuclear accident at Three Mile Island, nuclear power is experiencing a resurgence of support as a key part of the future U.S. energy mix. With growing concern over rising fossil fuel emissions, the lack of reliable renewable power and a smart national grid, and the debate over a clean energy standard, nuclear power is seen by many as a clean and stable source of power.

While nuclear power may be touted by proponents as a viable and necessary source of energy, the earthquake and resulting nuclear disaster in Japan illustrate the inherent dangers of this thinking, as do other past events at Chernobyl or Three Mile Island which were caused by mechanical failures and human errors. Many of the 104 operating nuclear power plants in the United States have experienced serious problems related to design, structural integrity, and age, threatening major metropolitan areas in the case of malfunction. Furthermore, issues remain over economic feasibility, re-licensing, storage, long-term disposal of highly radioactive waste, proliferation, and terrorist attacks.

Taken together with the health, economic, environmental, and proliferation risks implicit in nuclear power, the technology does not meet the criteria for a sustainable energy future. It must be phased out of future energy plans, beginning with a halt to any construction on new nuclear plants and continuing with a moratorium on re-licensing operating plants, the removal of spent fuel from storage pools into dry casks, and an end to all subsidies for the nuclear industry. To meet present and future energy demands, the United States must invest in truly clean and renewable energy sources that can move the country toward a safe and healthy carbon-free economy.

The (Un)-Economics of Nuclear Power Plants

If the benefits of nuclear power are so attractive, where are the investors?

Nuclear power plants are unable to compete on the open market without large government subsidies. This is because:

• A new nuclear power plant can cost as much as $12 billion dollars to build due to high capital costs, and cheap alternative energy sources.
• The financial payoff from an investment in a nuclear plant takes decades to mature.
• While a nuclear meltdown or a serious accident is an extremely rare event, it is almost impossible to predict and the consequences are catastrophic.
• The lack of a clear federal policy on nuclear power makes it difficult for the nuclear industry to project future profits and commit large amounts of capital in an un-certain environment.

These reasons have made private lenders reluctant to invest capital, leaving taxpayers to shoulder the cost through large government subsidies.

Subsidies to the nuclear industry come in the form of taxpayer-backed loan guarantees, production tax credits, shutdown subsidies, anti-trust exemptions, taxpayer financed plant construction, and federal cost-sharing liability agreements such as the Price-Anderson Act of 2005, which limits the amount of primary insurance that nuclear operators must carry and establishes an industry-funded liability cap of $12.6 billion. These subsidies not only leave taxpayers with the immediate risk of loan defaults, but also with continued financial responsibility for nuclear waste, safety, security, and potential accidents. ¹

The goal of subsidies to the nuclear industry is to shift the associated risks from the operator to the taxpayer. A 2011 Union of Concerned Scientists report on subsidies² explains that current nuclear subsidies have four principal objectives:

• Reduce the cost of capital through loan guarantees and tax incentives.
• Reduce the true cost of producing nuclear power through subsidies to mining and water usage.
• Shift the risks of accidents from the industry to the public.
• Shift the costs of waste storage from the industry to the public.

While the exact amount of subsidies that the nuclear industry has received is hard to determine, the amount is sure to be in the hundreds of billions of dollars. The Green Scissors Report estimates that since the 1940s, the nuclear industry had received more than $125 billion dollars in federal subsidies for research and development, construction, cleanup, and insurance.³ What is also clear is that ongoing subsidies range from "13 percent to 98 percent of the value of the power produced. Even at the low-end, subsidies account for a significant portion of nuclear power's operating cost advantage over competing energy sources."⁴

Unfortunately, large amounts of this money has been wasted: $13.5 billion dollars was invested in the halted Yucca Mountain project, $30 billion on the Nuclear Waste Fund, which was intended to finance the disposal of used nuclear fuel even though to date no viable solution for waste exists, and countless dollars on failed research and development, cost overruns, and energy price hikes.⁵ Most recently, the current administration has proposed an additional $36 billion dollars to finance the construction of new nuclear plants over the next 20 years.

These financial lifelines to the nuclear industry do not change the exorbitant costs; they simply switch the financial burden from the private investment market to the taxpayer. This distorts the market and hinders the ability of other economically feasible energy technologies from gaining a foothold. A 2009 study by Dr. Mark Cooper of the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School projected that 100 new reactors would cost between $1.9 to $4.4 trillion more than meeting the equivalent electricity demand with efficiency and renewable sources.⁶ What if just half of the subsidies that the nuclear industry has received had been invested in scaling up renewable energy technologies? If the government is going to be choosing winners and losers of energy technologies, it should pick affordable, safe, and renewable sources instead of nuclear power.

Re-Licensing of Nuclear Plants

One of the most pressing issues regarding nuclear power in the United States is the relicensing of aging reactors.

Licenses are required for the operation of nuclear power plants in order to ensure adequate protection of public health and safety. The licensing process is conducted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), which overseas all aspects of the United States civilian use of nuclear energy. Licenses are granted for a set time period, normally 20-40 years, after which the nuclear operator must secure another license for continued operation. The licensing process can take many years, and cost hundreds of million of dollars.

As nuclear reactors around the country near the end their expected operating life, many owners apply for license extensions to operate reactors for an addition 20 years in order to avoid the expensive process of decommissioning a nuclear plant or building a new one. Due to the low cost of fuel once a nuclear power plant is built and the capital-costs are paid the continuing operations costs are minimal, resulting in higher profits as the plant ages. Often in order to maximize profit owners apply for relicensing far in advance of the license expiration date in order to avoid problems associated with relicensing an aging plant, which include dated technologies and lower safety standards.

The relicensing of old nuclear plants compromises the safety of these facilities and of people living in close proximity to these plants. Many of the problems that have been documented at existing nuclear plants, such as mechanical failures and issues of structural integrity, will be exacerbated if these plants are allowed to continue operation past their initial license date. A recently released report by the Union of Concerned Scientists entitled "The NRC and Nuclear Power Plant Safety in 2010," examines the causes of 14 narrowly-avoided accidents at U.S. nuclear plants in 2010, which include inadequate employee training, maintenance, and design.⁷ Events such as these exemplify the safety threats inherent at nuclear plants, which will intensify as plants age and owners overreach on the expected operating life. It is important to note that a significant number of U.S. nuclear plants seeking license extensions share the same design to the reactors in Fukushima, Japan.

Since 2000, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved license extensions for 32 reactors. Currently, 20 additional nuclear plants are currently in the process of applying for an extension with 17 more expected to apply.⁸ So far not one application had been denied.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission should impose a moratorium on the relicensing of aging nuclear power plants. A policy of this kind would reduce the safety and health risks poised by old plants, and force the nuclear industry to confront the economic reality of building new plants.

Health and Environmental Destruction

Nuclear power plants generate power by splitting apart atoms, which produces radioactive waste that, if released, is one of the most serious and fatal health issues involved in nuclear power production. During a nuclear accident this risk is multiplied because large amounts of radioactive material can be emitted into the atmosphere and carried hundreds of miles depending on the wind and ocean currents. Exposure to large amounts of radiation can kill or mutate cells of living organisms. Cells that are altered by radiation can produce more abnormal cells, which can lead to cancers, birth defects, genetic damage, and lowered immunity to disease.

A comprehensive study of health effects of the 1986 Chernobyl accident by the World Health Organization found greatly increased incidences of thyroid cancer, leukemia, and cataracts. A number of these cases were found up to 500 miles away from the site of the plant, and were due to both indirect and direct exposure of radiation.⁹ Furthermore, radiation contamination can last for decades, causing prolonged health risks over vast amounts of once populated areas. In twenty, forty, or sixty years, what will be the health effects of the Fukushima accident?

The environmental impacts of nuclear energy are often misunderstood. While nuclear plants emit a limited amount of carbon dioxide in their end product – electricity – the industries which supply the raw materials for nuclear power plants release a lot of carbon, which contributes to global climate change. The production of uranium, which powers most nuclear plants, is one of the most carbon-intensive industrial operations, once the mining, milling and chemical conversion processes are factored in. When the full life-cycle emissions are taken into account, nuclear energy is not so clean.

Nuclear facilities also routinely emit toxic radiation and waste into the air and water. Studies in the Irish, Kara, and Barents Seas, as well as in the Pacific Ocean, show that radioactive material does travel with ocean currents and does become integrated at various levels in the marine food chain.¹⁰ It remains to be seen what the environmental impacts will be from the Fukushima Plant where thousands of gallons of highly radioactive water have been released into the ocean.

Nuclear accidents away from large bodies of water can render large tracts of land uninhabitable and cause significant environmental damage to native species, and agricultural crops. The nuclear accident at Chernobyl contaminated 125,000 square miles in Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia, and spread radioactive material as far as the British Isles 1,500 miles away.

Storage and Disposal of Nuclear Waste

Waste from a nuclear reactor is highly radioactive and must be disposed of in a way that protects people and the environment from exposure and contamination. While the radioactivity of waste does diminish over time, it can continue to be dangerous for several hundred thousand years. Currently, over 2,000 metric-tons of high level radioactive waste and 12 million cubic feet of low level radioactive waste are produced annually in the United States.¹¹ Unfortunately, there is no permanent solution for this waste. The storage of nuclear waste can be broken down into two categories, interim storage and long-term storage, both of which present unique challenges.

Interim-Storage

Commonly, nuclear waste is stored and cooled in pools of water, as was the case at the Fukushima Nuclear Plant. If, for some reason, the water in the pools is lost, the used fuel rods can catch fire and melt, releasing radioactive material. A 1997 study for the NRC by Brookhaven National Laboratory found that a severe pool fire could render 188 square miles inhabitable, cause as many as 28,000 cancer fatalities, and cost $59 billion in damages.

In the United States, these interim storage pools are usually housed in reactor buildings several stories above ground and are not protected inside a containment structure as is commonly perceived. This leaves storage pools vulnerable to both accidents and intentional attacks that could lead to a loss of pool water. Other findings suggest that these pools do not meet adequate safety standards in the event of a loss of on-site power or from an attack.¹² There is no way to be certain that these pools will not be damaged by an undetectable or unstoppable attack, natural disaster, or human error.

With the absence of a permanent storage option and the recent decision to cancel plans for a disposal site at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, nuclear plants are holding an increasing amount of spent fuel in storage pools. On average US plants are holding five times the amount of spent fuel allowed by their original license.¹³ According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, U.S. reactors have generated close to 65,000 metric tons of spent fuel, 75 percent which is stored in pools.¹⁴

With the vulnerabilities of storage pools, a better solution would be to move spent fuel into dry casks. Spent fuel can be moved into casks after being cooled in a pool for over one year. These casks are typically steel cylinders full of inert gas that are welded closed, and placed into a large concrete vault. While dry casks are still vulnerable to attacks, and are not a permanent solution, they are a more viable and safe option than storage pools. It is estimated it would take roughly 10 years at a cost between $3.5 and $7 billion to transfer all the spent fuel that is currently in storage pools into dry casks. ¹⁵ Yet it remains to be answered what to do with the casks after they reach their expected life.

Long-term Storage:

No permanent solution for long term storage of nuclear waste exists yet which is problematic because spent fuel can stay radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. It seems unlikely that the waste can be isolated from the environment for that long, when human civilization has only been around for some 10,000 years.

Many options for long term storage have been proposed, but the consensus is that nuclear waste should be stored in underground “geologic” repositories. In 1982 the Nuclear Waste Policy Act was established to create a legal framework for site identification, construction, and funding of multiple underground repositories, but due to technical and political concerns construction has yet to begin.

If a suitable location is ever agreed upon the site must be highly vetted, based on strong scientific data. The risk of any repository depends on the geochemistry of the site, which can account for the chances of seismic activity, leakage, and groundwater contamination. There are also significant political hurdles to overcome when choosing a site, such as happened with the decision to build a repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

According to the Associated Press and the Nuclear Energy Institute, the United States has nearly 65,000 tons of nuclear waste that is growing by over 2,000 tons every year.¹⁶ Without a viable option for disposal of this waste risks to citizens and the environment grows day by day.

Nuclear Proliferation

There is no way to completely separate the nuclear technologies employed for ‘peaceful’ purposes from those technologies employed in weapons.

Nuclear plants produce plutonium that can be used to form the core of a nuclear bomb. Plutonium and uranium can be separated from nuclear waste and reused at the plant, but that plutonium can also be dangerous: separated plutonium is much easier to steal and employ in a nuclear weapon than the plutonium that is encased, with the rest of the waste product, in highly radioactive spent-fuel assemblies. It takes less than 20 pounds of plutonium to build a small nuclear bomb.

While some nuclear power advocates believe that reprocessing would solve the problem of long-term waste disposal, plutonium actually consists of only 1 percent of the spent fuel in the United States. Furthermore, any U.S. reprocessing program would add to the current stockpile of plutonium from dismantled weapons, by more than 500 metric tons.¹⁷ This would only increase the amount of nuclear bomb material, undermining any attempts to reduce the risks of nuclear war.

Due to concerns over proliferation, the U.S. has maintained a policy against the reprocessing of nuclear fuel since the mid-1970’s, and has instead put resources towards advancing a policy for underground repositories. Unfortunately attempts to reverse this policy have been made, and any growth of nuclear power in the U.S. will surely bring renewed interest in reprocessing dangerous nuclear waste.

Conclusion

Building a sustainable, healthy, and carbon-free economy should not include nuclear power. The safety, health, and environmental consequences of nuclear energy production are just too big to overcome. Alternative renewable energy sources are both economically and technologically viable right now to support a transition to clean energy. Limited financial resources should not be spent on supporting an un-sustainable industry, but should be redirected towards clean, safe, and environmentally sustainable sources of energy.

The Friends Committee on National Legislation recommends:

1. A moratorium on relicensing of operating nuclear power plants.
2. A moratorium on construction of all new nuclear power plants.
3. Move spent fuel from overcrowded storage pools to dry casks.
4. Continue a policy against reprocessing spent-fuel.
5. End all subsidies to the nuclear power industry.

Footnotes

1. Nuclear Facts, Natural Resources Defense Council.
2. Nuclear Power: Sill Not Viable Without Subsidies. Union of Concerned Scientists, 2011.
3. Green Scissors Report, 2010.
4. Nuclear Power: Sill Not Viable Without Subsidies. Union of Concerned Scientists, 2011.
5. DOE Life Cycle Cost Estimate and Fee Adequacy Report for Yucca Mountain Project (2008). http://www.doe.org
6. The Extreme Costs of Nuclear Power. Beyondnuclear.org, September 2010.
7. The NRC and Nuclear Power Plant Safety in 2010: A Brighter Spotlight Needed, Union of Concerned Scientists. 2010.
8. Resources and Stats, Nuclear Energy Institute
9. WHO Expert Group report "Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident and Special Health Care Programmes: Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Health Expert Group," Editors Burton Bennett, Michael Repacholi and Zhanat Carr, World Health Organization, Geneva, 2006.
10. Grossman, Elizabeth. “Radioactivity in the Ocean: Diluted, But Far from Harmless.” Yale360.org. 4/7/11. 
11. Factsheet #4: Radioactive Waste. Public Citizen. 
12. A study by the Institute for Policy Studies, says that U.S. spent fuel pools are not required to have “defense-in-depth” nuclear safety features, which means they are not under heavy containment structures that cover the actual reactors. US regulation of spend fuel pools, or lack there of, does not require operators to have backup power supplies to circulate water and keep pools cool, in the case of a los of on-site power. http://www.ips-dc.org/nuclear
13. Nuclear Power in a Warming World. Union of Concerned Scientists, 2007. P45 
14.  Nuclear Waste: Amounts and On-Site Storage, Nuclear Energy Institute. 
15. Reducing the Hazards from Stored Spent Power-Reactor Fuel in the United States. April 21, 2003, Robert Alvarez, et al., in Science and Global Security, Spring 2003
16.  Nuclear Waste: Amounts and On-Site Storage, Nuclear Energy Institute. 
17. Nuclear Reprocessing: Dangerous, Dirty, and Expensive. Union of Concerned Scientists.