Antinuclear

Peter Dutton in his ignorance is pushing nuclear reactors in Australia – including small nuclear reactors

1. Light water reactors designs – these will be smaller versions of present-day pressurized water
   reactors using water as the moderator and coolant but with the same attendant problems as
   Fukushima and Three Mile Island. Built underground, they will be difficult to access in the event
   of an accident or malfunction.
2. SMRs will be expensive because the cost per unit capacity increases with decrease in reactor size. Billions of dollars of government subsidies will be required because Wall Street is allergic to nuclear power. To alleviate costs, it is suggested that safety rules be relaxed including reducing security requirements and a reduction in the 10 mile emergency planning zone to 1000 feet.

SMRs will be expensive because the cost per unit capacity increases with decrease in reactor size.
Billions of dollars of government subsidies will be required because Wall Street is allergic to nuclear
power. To alleviate costs, it is suggested that safety rules be relaxed including reducing security
requirements and a reduction in the 10 mile emergency planning zone to 1000 feet.

2. High-temperature gas cooled reactors HTGR or pebble bed reactors. Five billion tiny fuel kernels
   consisting of high-enriched uranium or plutonium will be encased in tennis-ball-sized graphite
   spheres which must be made without cracks or imperfections –or they could lead to an
   accident. A total of 450,000 such spheres will slowly and continuously be released from a fuel
   silo, passing through the reactor core, and then re-circulated ten times. These reactors will be
   cooled by helium gas operating at high very temperatures (900 C).

A reactor complex consisting of four HTGR modules will be located underground, to be run by just two
operators in a central control room. Claims are that HTGRs will be so safe that a containment building
will be unnecessary and operators can even leave the site – “walk away safe” reactors.

However should temperatures unexpectedly exceed 1600 C the carbon coating will release dangerous
radioactive isotopes into the helium gas, and at 2000C the carbon would ignite creating a fierce graphite
Chernobyl-type fire.

If a crack develops in the piping or building, radioactive helium would escape, and air would rush in, also
igniting the graphite.

Although HTGRs produce small amounts of low level waste they create larger volumes of high level
waste than conventional reactors.

Despite these obvious safety problems and despite the fact that South Africa has abandoned plans for
HTGRs, the US Department of Energy has unwisely chosen the HTGR as the “Next Generation Nuclear
Plant”.

3. Liquid metal fast reactors (PRISM)
   It is claimed by proponents that fast reactors will be safe, economically competitive, proliferation
   resistant, and sustainable.

Fueled by plutonium or highly enriched uranium, and cooled by either liquid sodium, or a lead-bismuth
molten coolant. Liquid sodium burns or explodes when exposed to air or water and lead-bismuth is
extremely corrosive producing very volatile radioactive elements when irradiated.

Should a crack occur in the reactor complex, liquid sodium would escape, burning or exploding. Without
coolant, the plutonium fuel could reach critical mass, triggering a massive nuclear explosion scattering
plutonium to the four winds. One millionth of a gram of plutonium induces cancer and it lasts for
500,000 years. Extraordinarily, claims are that fast reactors will be so safe they will require no
emergency sirens and emergency planning zones can be decreased from 10 miles to 1300 ft.

There are two types of fast reactors, a simple plutonium fueled reactor and a “breeder” in which the
plutonium reactor core is surrounded by a blanket of uranium 238 which captures neutrons and
converts to plutonium.

The plutonium fuel, obtained from spent reactor fuel will be fissioned and converted to shorter lived
isotopes – cesium and strontium which last 600 years instead of 500,000. Called “transmutation”, the
industry claims that this is an excellent way to get rid of plutonium waste. But this is fallacious, because
only 10% fissions leaving 90% of the plutonium for bomb making etc.

Construction. Three small plutonium fast reactors will be grouped together to form a module and three
of these modules will be buried underground. All nine reactors will then be connected to a fully
automated central control room operated by only three operators. Potentially then, one operator could
simultaneously face a catastrophic situation triggered by loss of off-site power to one unit at full power,
in another shut down for refueling and one in start-up mode. There are to be no emergency core cooling
systems.

Fast reactors require a massive infrastructure including a reprocessing plant to dissolve radioactive
waste fuel rods in nitric acid, chemically removing the plutonium and a fuel fabrication facility to create
new fuel rods. A total of 10,160 kilos of plutonium is required to operate a fuel cycle at a fast reactor
and just 2.5 kilos is fuel for a nuclear weapon.

Thus fast reactors and breeders will provide extraordinary long-term medical dangers and the perfect
situation for nuclear weapons proliferation. Despite this, the industry is clearly trying to market them to
many countries including it seems, Australia.

December 16, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | technology