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Lord Felch Demon
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May 26th, 2007, 03:59 PM
This thread is now about the advantages of Nuclear power over other, more traditional means.
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As of 2004, nuclear power provides 6.5% of the world's energy and 15.7% of the world's electricity. The U.S., France, and Japan together account for 57% of all nuclear generated electricity.[1] As of 2007, the IAEA reported there are 435 nuclear power reactors in operation in the world [2], operating in 31 different countries [3].
The United States produces the most nuclear energy, with nuclear power providing 20% of the electricity it consumes, while France produces the highest percentage of its electrical energy from nuclear reactors—80% as of 2006.[4][5] In the European Union as a whole, nuclear energy provides 30% of the electricity.[6] Nuclear energy policy differs between countries, and some countries such as Austria and Ireland have no active nuclear power stations.
Many military and some civilian (such as some icebreakers) ships use nuclear marine propulsion, a form of nuclear propulsion.
International research is ongoing into various safety improvements such as passively safe plants, the use of nuclear fusion, and additional uses of produced heat such as the hydrogen production (in support of a hydrogen economy), for desalinating sea water, and for use in district heating systems. Controlled nuclear reactions are also used for other purposes such as transmutation and particle radiation, for use in research (such as particle accelerators), medicine (such as PET scans), and various other applications (such as smoke detectors and atomic batteries).
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On June 27, 1954, the world's first nuclear power plant to generate electricity for a power grid started operations at Obninsk, USSR. The reactor produced 5 megawatts (electrical), enough to power 2,000 homes.[8][9]
One of the first organizations to develop utilitarian nuclear power was the U.S. Navy, for the purpose of propelling submarines and aircraft carriers. It has a good record in nuclear safety, perhaps because of the stringent demands of Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, who was the driving force behind nuclear marine propulsion. The U.S. Navy has operated more nuclear reactors than any other entity, including the Soviet Navy, with no publicly known major incidents. The first nuclear-powered submarine, USS Nautilus (SSN-571), put to sea in 1955. Two U.S. nuclear submarines, USS Scorpion and Thresher, have been lost at sea, though for reasons not related to their reactors, and their wrecks are situated such that the risk of nuclear pollution is considered low.
The world's first commercial nuclear power station, Calder Hall in Sellafield, England was opened in 1956 with an initial capacity of 50 MW (later 200 MW).[10] The Shippingport Reactor (Pennsylvania, 1957) was the first commercial nuclear generator to become operational in the United States.
In 1954, the chairman of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (forerunner of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission) talked about electricity being "too cheap to meter" in the future, often misreported as a concrete statement about nuclear power, and foresaw 1000 nuclear plants on line in the USA by the year 2000.[11]
In 1955 the United Nations' "First Geneva Conference", then the world's largest gathering of scientists and engineers, met to explore the technology. In 1957 EURATOM was launched alongside the European Economic Community (the latter is now the European Union). The same year also saw the launch of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Enrico Fermi and Leó Szilárd in 1955 shared U.S. Patent 2,708,656 for the nuclear reactor.
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As of March 1, 2007, Watts Bar 1, which came on-line in 1997, was the last U.S. commercial nuclear reactor to go on-line. This is often quoted as evidence of a successful worldwide campaign for nuclear power phase-out. However, political resistance to nuclear power has only ever been successful in parts of Europe, in New Zealand, in the Philippines, and in the United States. Even in the US and throughout Europe, investment in research and in the nuclear fuel cycle has continued, and some experts predict that electricity shortages, fossil fuel price increases, concern over greenhouse gas emissions, new technology such passively safe plants, and national energy security will renew the demand for nuclear power plants.
Many countries remain active in developing nuclear power, including Japan, China and India, all actively developing both fast and thermal technology, South Korea and the United States, developing thermal technology only, and South Africa and China, developing versions of the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR). Finland and France actively pursue nuclear programs; Finland has a new European Pressurized Reactor under construction by Areva. Japan has an active nuclear construction program with new units brought on-line in 2005. In the U.S., three consortia responded in 2004 to the U.S. Department of Energy's solicitation under the Nuclear Power 2010 Program and were awarded matching funds—the Energy Policy Act of 2005 authorized subsidies for up to six new reactors, and authorized the Department of Energy to build a reactor based on the Generation IV Very-High-Temperature Reactor concept to produce both electricity and hydrogen. As of the early 21st century, nuclear power is of particular interest to both China and India to serve their rapidly growing economies—both are developing fast breeder reactors. See also future energy development. In the energy policy of the United Kingdom it is recognized that there is a likely future energy supply shortfall, which may have to be filled by either new nuclear plant construction or maintaining existing plants beyond their programmed lifetime.
On September 22, 2005 it was announced that two sites in the U.S. had been selected to receive new power reactors (exclusive of the new power reactor scheduled for INL)—see Nuclear Power 2010 Program.
It is possible that the first new nuclear power plant to be built in the United States since the 1970s may be installed in the remote town of Galena, Alaska. The town's City Council approved the idea, and Toshiba proposed to install its model 4S "nuclear battery" in Galena free of charge as a test.
For a discussion of new nuclear plants, see Economics of new nuclear power plants.
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unlike some of my posts
Linear Mode
