Nuclear energy, EXPLAINED
Energy markets are at the centre of geopolitics. Nuclear power has promised a revolution in the sector since the 1950s. In this report, we present everything you need to know on this, from basic physics to current investment trends.
December 1, 2024
Nuclear fission — the process of splitting atoms (often of uranium), releases huge amounts of energy.
Nuclear reactor — a device that uses nuclear fission to split more atoms, causing a chain reaction.
Criticality — a state of the nuclear chain reaction going on continuously without spinning out of control, splitting just enough atoms.
Nuclear power plants collect the heat produced in the reactor. The heat creates steam, which is used to spin turbines and generate electricity.
Nuclear energy grew from the development of nuclear weapons at the peak of the Second World War.
The effort, known as the Manhattan Project, was led by the US in collaboration with the UK and Canada. The first nuclear reactor achieved criticality in 1942.
The Soviet Union was the first country to connect a nuclear reactor to the power grid in 1954, near Moscow, and built dozens more across the country in the next decades.
In 1986, the largest and first of the two major nuclear disasters happened at a Soviet power plant in Chernobyl, Ukraine.
It spread radioactive contaminants across Eurasia, causing thousands of long-term deaths from conditions like cancer and around $700 billion in estimated economic damages.
The Chernobyl disaster boosted anti-nuclear political movements globally, which took shape in the 1970s at the peak of plant start-ups.
Italy held a series of referendums in 1987 on nuclear energy, voting to stop any efforts in the field.
While some other countries also scaled down their nuclear programs, the sector continued to expand and reached its peak share of global energy generation in 1996, at 17.5%.
In 2011 the second major nuclear disaster was caused by an earthquake off the coast of Japan.
Fukushima disaster resulted in radioactive contaminants leaking into the sea. Approximately 51 deaths were caused by the evacuation and 1 person died from a lung cancer likely triggered by radioactive exposure from the accident.
Fukushima has also promoted some countries to review their nuclear programmes and led Japan to close all its reactors temporarily.
Japan currently operates 13 out of 33 working reactors in the country. A 2023 survey showed that 51% of respondents in Japan favoured the restart of nuclear plants, with 42% opposed.
There have been two main waves of new nuclear plant start-ups, with the first peak in 1974 with 26 grid connections and the second in 1984-85, when there were 66 connections in 2 years.
Over the past two decades, 102 new reactors started up while 104 were closed — China accounted for 49 of these start-ups and none of the shut-downs. Outside of China, there has been a decline in the number of reactors worldwide.
Nuclear power plants cost a lot to build and take years before entering operation.
Unlike wind or solar, nuclear power does provide stable output of large amounts of energy, independent of the weather and without the level of emissions associated with oil, gas or coal.
There are other risks in the form of accidents and the environmental damage associated with uranium mining and processing, as well as the long-term management of the radioactive waste produced by the industry.
The radioactive waste is currently supposed to be buried in deep underground (geological) storage, with some other methods available or proposed. However, most of the waste is currently in non-permanent storage.
The waste can potentially be reprocessed to create nuclear weapons, which poses a risk of it being used by malicious actors, such as terrorist groups.
In 2023, nuclear power made up 9% of global energy generation, the lowest in 40 years.
Meanwhile, renewable energy (mostly solar, wind and hydro) accounted for 30% of energy generated. This is expected to reach 37% by 2026.
Five countries accounted for 72% of all nuclear-powered electricity in 2023: the US, China, France, Russia, and South Korea.
The US remains the largest generator of nuclear power, with around 30% of global total. However, it meets a decreasing share of its energy needs with nuclear power.
China meanwhile is investing heavily in new plants — with 27 under construction as of mid-2024 — and generated more electricity from nuclear than France for a fourth consecutive year in 2023.
Worldwide, 59 reactors are currently under construction in 13 countries, but 23 of these are delayed. Russia, which dominates the export of reactors, is currently building 26 units, 20 of which are overseas (in Bangladesh, China, Egypt, India, Iran and Turkey).
442 nuclear reactors are currently operating worldwide, 96% of which are water-cooled.
Investment in renewable energy has been higher than nuclear for decades. In 2023, this trend continued and accelerated.
As countries try to reduce dependence on fossil fuels and emissions of greenhouse gases, more energy is converted into electricity, with renewable sources generating a growing share.
By 2050, world electricity generation is expected to grow by 30-76% compared to 2022 levels, depending on models used.
31 countries have pledged to treble nuclear power capacity by 2050 as part of efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, with six new nations signing up at the recent COP29 climate summit. The dominant builders of new nuclear plants, China and Russia, have not signed up.
New-build nuclear power is the most expensive source of energy, compared to fossil fuels and renewables.
Its cost went up 49% since 2009, as measured by a US-focused Levelized Cost of Energy report.
In contrast, the cost of solar has fallen 83% since 2009, while onshore wind has declined 63%.
Other reasons for low investment in nuclear power include:
High upfront costs of building nuclear power plants and facilities, with long-term and large-scale required before any energy generation begins
Legal and political challenges, as some countries adopt anti-nuclear policies
Complex risk assessments: uncertainty on safety risks, waste disposal and investment returns
At the moment, renewable sources of energy generation, especially solar power, present a more attractive alternative to nuclear, as a solution for green energy.
Geopolitics
China and Russia are behind all 35 of the new starts in construction of reactors since late 2019. 22 of these were in China with the remaining 13 undertaken by Russia across eight countries.
In 2022, Russian armed forces captured the Chernobyl power plant in the first days of the invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine returned control over the plant by April 2022, however it has remained switched off with safety licensed revoked. Ukrainian officials claim key equipment was taken from the plant.
In March 2022, Russian armed forced captured the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia, Europe's largest. It is currently under Russian control, in the first case of a military occupation of a nuclear power plant.
In the first year of the war, 13 instances of the Zaporizhzhia plant being shelled or mined have been documented by the International Atomic Energy Agency, as well as 16 when it was disconnected from the grid (the reactors and spent fuel require external power to continuously cool them with the reactors shut down).
Nuclear power plants rely on a stable connection to the power grid to maintain safety systems.
Widely condemned Russian missile attacks against Ukrainian energy infrastructure — prohibited under international humanitarian law — have intensified in recent weeks, prompting the United Nations to warn of an "escalating risk of nuclear disaster" due to disruptions in the Ukrainian power grid.
In summer 2024, Ukraine captured a part of the Russian region of Kursk, and advanced towards one of the country's three largest nuclear power plants.
Russia plays a significant role in the global supply of nuclear fuel, with a 46% share in uranium enrichment capacity.
Despite sanctions, the European Union has imported twice as much uranium from Russia in 2023 than in 2021, to fuel its nuclear power plants, especially as oil, gas and coal are phased out.
The US banned imports of enriched uranium from Russia in 2024.
Decommissioning
Most operating nuclear reactors have design lifetimes of 40 years, while recent designs often have design lifetimes of 60 years.
Since 1984, the average age of operating nuclear plants has been rising — to 32 years as of mid-2024, versus 26.3 years in 2010.
Many countries continue to extend the lifetimes of their nuclear reactors or prepare to do so. 84 of the US's 94 operating nuclear reactors have had their initial 40-year licenses extended to up to 60 years.
It takes on average about 20 years to decommission (close down) a nuclear reactor, but the timescale can vary dramatically.
The full decommissioning process of at least one reactor has only been completed by 4 countries. The US has completed the most decommissioning with 17 units, while Germany, Japan and Spain decommissioned 6 units combined.
190 reactors worldwide are awaiting decommissioning or in the process of being decommissioned by mid-2024.
Future
There are two major developments in the nuclear power sector:
Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) — simpler and portable nuclear reactors that can be factory-built and delivered to the place of use.
The US government has been actively promoting the concept of SMRs globally since its early stages.
So far, SMRs have proven difficult to bring to life, with many delays and cancellations.
Google and Microsoft have been amongst major technology firms to strike deals with SMR developers for future supplies of electricity to power their huge data centres.
Nuclear fusion reactors — these devices use the process of merging, not splitting, atoms, to create energy.
There are plenty of potential advantages to nuclear fusion:
Much safer than fission
Produces less radioactive waste
Waste can not be repurposed for weapons
Uses cheap and abundant fuel – hydrogen – instead of rare uranium or plutonium
Can potentially generate 4 times more energy from 1 kilogram of fuel than fission, and thousands more than oil or gas
Since 2007, a global collaborative project ITER is building the largest fusion reactor in France, set for completion by 2034.
Microsoft has been among the companies investing in another fusion project, the startup Helion, working on a reactor since 2013.
By Post factum staff
Editor Anton Kutuzov
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