Is Nuclear Energy Answer to the Energy Crisis by Albert You

Firstly, the atomic incidents of Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and Chernobyl in Russia are often mentioned as examples for nuclear plants being unsafe. In both cases failures of workers led to a meltdown in the reactors and increased radiation in the surrounding area (Henderson 12-17). And as the recent disaster in Japan shows, a nuclear crisis cannot only be caused by human mishaps, but also by unpredictable and untamable natural hazards. Consequently, nuclear crises cannot be predicted or prevented completely. Nuclear plants are, furthermore, considered uneconomical because in the eighties the construction costs of nuclear plants were underestimated and exceeded the estimation by $100 billion (Henderson 103). Therefore, the nuclear power opponents are arguing that nuclear power is burdening the American economy unnecessarily. According to the nuclear physicist Jeff Eerkens, antinuclear groups are also claiming that nuclear power is not necessary for the future since renewable energy sources, such as solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal power will be providing sufficient energy for the United States, and are at the same time much cheaper than the costly nuclear power plants (Eerkens 20). Over all, opponents consider nuclear power to risky and inefficient to “deserve further support from U.S. taxpayers” (Henderson 104).

The use of nuclear power can have several negative impacts on the economy. The use of nuclear power can be costly. The building of the plants can cost between $12 - $18

When people hear the term “nuclear energy”, the first thing that jumps to their minds is most often “danger”. Who could blame the world for their intense fears of nuclear power, especially after reading the reports from Dr. Ira Helfand and the American writer, David Biello? Dr. Helfand’s article, “Radiation’s Risk to Public Health”, attacks the nuclear energy with facts and concerns like those of the National Research Council BEIR VI report. Whereas Dr. Helfand supports his claims with scientific evidence, David Biello only had a script from a discussion that followed the Fukushima crisis. David Biello’s article, “How Safe Are U.S. Nuclear Reactors? Lessons from Fukushima”, he uncovers secret concerns and future plans about the incredibly disastrous incident. Although David Biello used credible sources and attempted to appeal to ethos, logos, and pathos, Dr. Ira Helfand contains an authority in his education and knows a great deal more about nuclear power and definitely has the best representation of ethos, logos, and pathos.

William Tucker, author of “Why I Still Support Nuclear Power, Even after Fukushima”, gives perquisite explanation of interesting points supporting his cause. Tucker believes that after all the harm from nuclear power in Fukushima, Japan, nuclear power is better than any other natural resources used for the same cause, such as, coal, natural gas, and even a hydroelectric dam. In William Tucker’s words, he claims, “The answer is that there are no better alternatives available. If we are going to maintain our standard of living—or anything approximating it—without overwhelming the earth with pollution, we are going to have a master nuclear technology.” William Tucker addresses the emotions and sense of worry of his audience. I believe William

The Three Mile Island accident happened on March 28th, 1979 near Middletown, Pennsylvania (Vijayan, Kamble, Nayak, Vaze, and Sinha 2013). Ignorant workers, defects in the design of the plant, and disastrous equipment were major components in the Three Mile Island disaster. Basically, a valve erupted from too much pressure; this released just under 1,000,000 gallons of polluted water into the basement of the plant. Only a small amount of radiation was leaked into the atmosphere, but it was enough to scare people for years to come (Vijayan, Kamble, Nayak, Vaze, and Sinha 2013). Only fractions of a millirem were found 50 miles away from the accident. A rem is a large dose of radiation; a millirem is a thousandth of a rem (Edelson, 1986). This shows that there was not much radiation that leaked into the atmosphere, unlike Chernobyl. In Sweden, they discovered numerous millirems of radiation, which puts into perspective how big the Chernobyl disaster was. After the Three Mile Island Accident, there were major changes including safety and defense-in-depth improvements (Vijayan, Kamble, Nayak, Vaze, and Sinha 2013). The United States put forth major changes in safety and technology for their nuclear power plants after the Three Mile Island accident, but the Soviet Union did not believe this would happen in their plants. They believed they had no flaws in their system and didn’t want to add stronger safety features to their nuclear power plants to protect them from

Lastly, the lack of proper supervision and protection for the nuclear plants can potentially cause detrimental amount of damage to the environment and society. We need to take responsibility for the safety for our next

To answer the question, the author will compare and analyze the three incidents that occurred in different parts of the world, in countries with different government regulations and policy establishments, and caused by different triggers: the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant (NPP), U.S., Chernobyl NPP, Ukraine (former Soviet Union), and Fukushima Dai-ichi (Fukushima I) NPP, Japan.

There have been lots of nuclear accident around the world. One of the accident that had a major impact on the world was the Chernobyl disaster. The disaster took place on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine. The disaster was caused by a reaction explosion induced by design faults and staff application errors. The accident took place in the course of scheduled tests to check the power supply mode in the event of external sources loss. Even after 10 days, explosions and ejections of radioactive substances continued. The release of radiation and radioactive substance polluted the places within 30 km of Chernobyl, and those areas have been closed for a long period of

Fuel prices are an important part to look at, and when doing so you can see an obvious difference in the numbers between coal burned power plants and nuclear power plants. The fuel costs make up 30 percent of the overall production costs of nuclear power plants. Fuel costs for coal, natural gas and oil, however, make up about 80 percent of the production costs. Between these two lies a fifty percent difference for fuel costs. For nuclear run plants it is every 18-24 months that a nuclear power plant needs to be refueled. Because nuclear plants refuel every 18-24 months, they are not subject to fuel price volatility like natural gas and oil power plants. The numbers $300 million to $500 million—includes estimated radiological, used fuel ($100 million) and site restoration costs (about $300 million) (Costs: Fuel, Operation, Waste Disposal & Life Cycle,

Nuclear power was the world’s fastest growing form of energy in the 1990’s. However, presently it is the second slowest growing worldwide. Considering that nuclear power accounts for eleven percent of the world’s energy supply, one must ask what happened [Nuclear Power]. Why is it that the growth of nuclear power has almost completely stalled? The simple answer is that after meltdowns such as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, many people are afraid of nuclear power plants, which causes great opposition to the expansion of the industry. Unfortunately, most people are not well informed about nuclear energy; many do not take the time to view its positives and negatives.

"After Chernobyl, thousands and thousands of people, if not millions, were given a death penalty and had to pay the price..." (Wladimir Klitschko). On April 26, 1986, the Chernobyl Power Station in Pripyat, Ukraine, was running low power tests when the reactor overheated leading to an explosion and radiation releasing into the atmosphere. Despite this being one of the most serious nuclear disasters in world history, causing great harm to the earth and life around it, we now know more about the dangers of nuclear energy than ever before. It is very important that we continue to strengthen our regulations to make nuclear energy a safe, reliable energy source.

As a result, numerous countries are creating more nuclear power plants. From the 1990s, the rate of nuclear power plants constructed increased because of technological and managerial, deregulation, and safety improvements.

Opponents of the nuclear industry conjure up frightful images of nuclear accidents to spread terror to those who could benefit from its awesome bounty. A misguided desire to protect the environment blinds people to the reality that nuclear power is a "green" energy source. Nuclear power is superior to traditional power generation in almost every way whether it is looked at from an environmental, economic or technical point of view.

On April 26th, 1986, the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine dramatically changed the world 's opinion about using nuclear reaction for power. At 1:23am, reactor four exploded, releasing more than a hundred times the radiation of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Rosenberg, 2014). As a result of the incident and producing fire, large amounts of radioactive material were consequently released into the environment. The accident caused the largest uncontrolled radioactive release into the environment ever recorded for any civilian operation, and large quantities of radioactive substances were released into the air for about 10 days. This caused serious social and economic disruption for large populations in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine (Chernobyl Accident, 2014). While the radiological impact from this disaster was minimal outside of Russian and Ukraine, it did bring to light the risks associated with the use of nuclear energy across the global stage. Over the next sixteen years, world leaders devoted their attention to conducting reactor safety studies, as well as improving emergency preparedness for public workers and these industries.

Global demand and consumption of energy is at an all time high; the world needs a safe, efficient, clean, and high producing source of energy production. The solution is something we already use for energy production, Nuclear power. From the beginning of nuclear energy there has been concerns over the safety of the power plants and its impact on the environment. With climate change and more accurate information on nuclear power the tide is shifting in its favor. This paper will explore the positives of nuclear power, political change on nuclear power, safety of the energy source and new technologies associated with the nuclear power process. Most importantly are the risks associated with nuclear power worth it? Research suggests that nuclear power is safer now more than ever and has less of an impact on the environment than coal or oil. Public support and misconceptions over the years have been up and down due to political agendas and those who are misinformed about nuclear power. Individuals who are involved in the energy field are in favor of nuclear power and building more plants with newer technology.