Nuclear-fuelled Ireland would be totally dependent on supplier

PHILIP WALTON continues to press the case for nuclear electricity in Ireland (Letters, June 18).

He makes it all sound like a no-brainer.

It is true that the energy available from a kilogram of uranium and other fissile materials is enormous by comparison with the energy from a kilogram of any other currently accessible energy source.

It is true that when nuclear fuel is ‘burned’, it does not directly produce any carbon dioxide or polluting gas, such as sulphur dioxide.

It is true that burning any fossil fuel, especially coal, produces massive quantities of greenhouse and other polluting gases.

So why object to electricity generated from nuclear energy?

The problem is a host of intractable facts about nuclear technology that nuclear advocates never address.

Some of these facts are technical, some are economic, some are social and political and some are military in nature — all are overlapping and interlocking mostly in very unpleasant ways.

I want to focus on just one technical aspect of nuclear energy that would pose a fundamental problem for our economic and political independence of action, especially in relation to international issues.

Uranium ore effectively contains two distinct types of uranium atom — more than 99% of the atoms are of the variety called U-238 while under 1% are of the variety called U-235.

Now it turns out that only the U-235 type is fissile, meaning that such atoms can be split into two halves and release energy in the process.

In order to create a usable nuclear fuel it is necessary therefore to increase the ratio of U-235 atoms in the fuel to above a minimum of 3%, with higher percentages in the case of other reactor types, and ultimately above 85% for conventional nuclear weapons — although a 20% ratio is considered weapons-usable.

This process is called enrichment and is the unavoidable route to both civil nuclear power and nuclear weapons.

Because enrichment is expensive, energy-intensive and militarily a highly sensitive business, we would have to purchase our nuclear fuel needs from some ‘suitable’ supplier.

Maybe Prof Walton would like to kick off the ‘real’ debate by nominating such a supplier. Apart from other obvious implications and complications, it is clear, based on this one technical aspect alone that we would be utterly dependent on that foreign supplier.

We would be replacing our dependence on foreign oil and gas, where there are a number of supplier options, with a totally subservient dependency on probably one or two suppliers (who in any case would be conjoined twins).

By its nature the lead-in time to commission a nuclear power station is of the order of a decade or, most likely, much longer.

In contrast, measures to use renewable energy, eliminate waste, improve efficiency, increase public transport, implement the highest insulation standards in buildings, encourage the use of eco-friendly cement, and so on, can be done immediately.

This is the way to go and, in a rational and just world, is the no-brainer.

Con Hayes

Kerry Road

Tower

Blarney

Co Cork