Nuclear Power
by Oliver St John
Nuclear power has frequently been touted as a clean alternative to the burning of fossil fuels. While the notion of nuclear power does conjure up mental images of World War II mushroom clouds and recollections of the disasters at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, nuclear power has become significantly safer in recent years, and accounts for a large amount of power generation in the world today.
Unfortunately, much of the fuel used to power nuclear reactors is in fact fission-based - specifically, using isotopes of uranium. This in itself is not a tenable solution since uranium itself is not a renewable resource. Compared to the current trends toward the exhaustion of fossil fuels, uranium will last a comparatively long while - possible another two centuries at current usage levels. This is in large part because a pound of uranium has the potential to deliver a quantity of energy approximately equal to that generated by three million pounds of coal. As atoms of uranium deteriorate, the heat released is used to heat water, creating steam to drive electricity-generating turbines - much the same way as a coal-fired power plant operates. A plus point to nuclear fission is that the process does not produce air pollution or release gases held responsible for global warming and acid rain.
There is, however the problem of what to do with the spent fuel rods. The disposal of nuclear waste has been a hot political issue for some time, since nobody wants to have this stored on their land, nor is it permissible to dump it in the ocean. The making of containers to absorb the radiation from this waste fuel is also a time-consuming and energy-inefficient process. It is also estimated that the spent uranium will take over a thousand years to regain its potency, and is extremely hazardous in the interim.
A suggested alternative is nuclear fusion. There can be no doubt of the "natural" quality to this method - it is the very mechanism which powers the stars themselves. The power is considered most likely to be provided by the fusion of hydrogen atoms. This is ecologically sound since the hydrogen can be extracted from water, which is itself plentiful.
The primary problem with nuclear fusion, however, is that in order for the reaction to begin, a tremendous amount of energy has to be applied, since the reaction will only occur at high temperatures. This is considered an energy-efficient process, however, since the energy released by the reaction is typically considerably greater than that which is put in.
So where's the problem? Mostly, the problem is that it doesn't work very well. Indeed, the term 'cold fusion' - the initiation of fusion reactions without providing immense quantities of energy - has been considered almost within the realm of science fiction. Research is ongoing, but if indeed a cold-fusion reactor can be reliably built, we may yet have a long-term solution to electricity generation.