The Integral Fast Reactor (IFR) is a fast reactor design developed from 1984 to 1994. The design includes both a new reactor and a new nuclear fuel cycle. The reactor is called the Advanced Liquid Metal Reactor (ALMR). The ALMR is a "fast" reactor--that is, the chain reactions between fissile material is maintained by high-energy unmodereted neutrons. The fuel cycle is distinguished by being closed; meaning that the fuel is produced, the power is generated, the fuel is reprocessed utilizing pyroprocessing, and the waste is managed all on site, reducing the risk ofaccidents during delivery and the risk of proliferation from theft of the nuclear material.

The funding, the scale, and the duration of the research project make it the largest energy research project in US history.[verification needed] Over the course of ten years of research over a billion dollars was allocated to the Argonne National Laboratory (today known as Idaho National Labs) in order to develop a nuclear reactor which reduced the risk of proliferation, decreased the amount of nuclear waste, and increased the efficiency of the fuel cycle. The project was given ample funding and was progressing well, but then was canceled abruptly during the Clinton administration with the only reason given that "We will terminate unnecessary programs in advanced reactor development."[1] The project was not only canceled, it was also ordered to silence by the Department of Energy and all the progress that was made by the scientists over the decade of research was ordered to not reach the public ear.[2][3]Template:Credibility

Nuclear Fission

A diagram of a uranium-235 fission reaction. The fission results in two separate atoms, barium-141 and krypton-92, as well as releases 2-3 neutrons and beta radiation.
A chain reaction is started when the free neutrons from uranium-235 fission induce fission in other atoms
Buildup of heavy actinides in present thermal reactors,[4] which cannot fission actinide nuclides that have an even number of neutrons. Fast reactors can fission all actinides.

Fissile vs Fissionable Materials are said to be fissionable if they have atoms that can undergo nuclear fission. "Fissile" materials are defined as materials that are fissionable by neutrons with low kinetic energy. "Fissile" thus, is more restrictive than "fissionable" — although all fissile materials are fissionable, not all fissionable materials are fissile.

Nuclear fission occurs when a fissile atom is bombarded with a neutron and splits. The resulting split releases energy, free neutrons, and results in the atom decaying into multiple atoms lower on the periodic table. Fissile atoms (such as uranium-233, uranium-235, and plutonium 239) are atoms which will fission which impacted with a slow neutron. Fertile atoms (such as thorium-232 and uranium-238) are atoms that do not (usually) fission when hit with a slow neutron but will absorb it and later decay in to a fissile atom which can then undergo fission.

There are two ways to cause fission, with fast neutrons and with thermal (slow) neutrons. Thermal reactors induce fission by means of neutrons which are moderated, usually by water, which slows them to thermal speeds, or about 8 times the speed of sound. Fast reactors do not utilize a moderator and as such the neutrons resulting from fission are much more energetic and move at about 7% of the speed of light.

Only 0.7204% of naturally occurring uranium is uranium-235. This is too low a concentration to sustain a nuclear chain reaction without the help of a material known as a moderator. A moderator is a material that can slow down a neutron without absorbing it. Slow neutrons are more likely to react with uranium-235 and reactors using natural uranium can be made using graphite or heavy water as a moderator. Once the levels of uranium-235 have been increased to about 3%, normal water can be used as a moderator.

Uranium-238 is not fissile and will not undergo fusion with struck by a slow neutron. It is fertile however and will absorb a neutron to become uranium-239. Uranium-239 is not stable however and will decay to neptunium-239 is just a few minutes. Neptunium-239 is also not stable, having a half-life of 2.35 days, and will shortly decay to plutonium-239 which is fissile.

Because most of the fuel in a reactor is uranium-238 many neutrons are captured and over the course of the fuel cycle much of the uranium-238 will transmute to plutonium-239 which in turn will fission while in the reactor. Much of the energy generated in a reactor in fact, an estimated 50%,[verification needed] comes from this plutonium-239 which was bred from the unranium-238. In this manner all reactors, thermal or not, are breeder reactors in some regard. Some reactors are intentionally engineered to be better at breeding however.

Many of the lighter elements that are created from fission become abundant in the fuel and slow down the chain reaction by absorbing the free neutrons until there are none left to cause fission in a process called neutron poisoning. Neutron capture in a thermal reactor eventually slows down the fission chain reaction until it comes to a halt and the fuel must be either discarded or reprocessed. In a thermal reactor the total fuel utilized is less than 1% of the fissionable material.

In a fast reactor this is less of an issue because more neutrons per fission are created which results in a surplus than what is needed to maintain the fission chain reaction. The rest of the neutrons can absorbed by fertile material to transmute in to fissile material to further fuel the reactor. In addition, as mentioned, uranium-238 is not fissile but it is fissionable and it undergoes induced fission when impacted by an energetic neutron with over 1 MeV of kinetic energy. The neutrons in thermal reactors are moderated to too slow of speeds to induce fission in uranium-238 but in fast reactors moderators are not used. The free neutrons resulting from a fission often have over 1 MeV of kinetic energy which means that when they impact uranium-238 they induce fission rather than being absorbed.


Thermal Reactors

Thermal-reactors use water floods to the core to slow neutrons and keep it cool. Almost all of the nuclear reactors in the world currently in operation are thermal reactors.[verification needed] They induce fission by using slow neutrons with the temperature being regulated by water. The fission heats up the water which then is turned in to steam to spin a turbine.

In thermal reactors water is used as a neutron moderator to reduce the speed of these neutrons to thermal speeds. Moderation reduces the high kinetic energy of the freed neutron. Moderation is also known as neutron slowing down because with the reduction of energy comes a reduction of speed.


Fast Reactors

edit

A schematic of the two types of liquid metal fast breeder reactor (LMFBR)
Design schematic of advanced liquid metal reactor
Fast breeder reactor Super Phenix in France

The ALMR and other fast reactors employ a pool of circulating liquid sodium as the coolant. Because sodium atoms are much heavier than both the oxygen and hydrogen atoms found in water, the neutrons lose less energy in collisions with sodium atoms which subsequently makes sodium a good conductor of heat which improves the efficiency of heat delivery to the electric generation facility. Because water is used as a moderator, which slows neutrons down in thermal reactors, and is not used in fast reactors, the neutrons in a fast reactors move at fast speeds and are called fast neutrons. The definition of a fast reactor is a fission reactor which uses no neutron moderator in which more than half of the fissions occur from fast moving neutrons rather than thermal neutrons, also known as slow neutrons.

Nuclear reactions occur in the core and heat the radioactive liquid sodium running through it. That heated sodium is pumped through an intermediate heat exchange where it transfers its thermal energy to non-radioactive liquid sodium by running through separate but adjacent pipes. The non-radioactive sodium finally brings heat to adjacent water running through separate pipes which finally steams and spins turbines.

Fast reactors are able to breed more fissile material than they consume. Fast neutrons, unlike slow neutrons, are able to induce fission in fissionable materials like uranium-238 and thorium-234 as well as fissile isotopes such as uranium-235, uranium-233, and plutonium-239. The higher energy of a fast neutron makes it more likely that a fertile atom like uranium-238 will fission when struck. When a fast neutron impacts a uranium-238 atom it has a chance of inducing fusion, or being absorbed. When uranium-238 absorbs a neutron it turns in to uranium-239 which has a short half life which decays into neptunium-239 which also has a short half life and then decays in to plutonium-239 which is fissile.

The ratio between the plutonium-239 (or uranium-235) fission cross-section and the uranium-238 absorption cross-section is much higher in a thermal spectrum than in a fast spectrum. Therefore a higher concentration of fissile material relative to fertile material is needed in a fast reactor in order to reach a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction. Once this chain reaction has been reached however, the abundance of neutrons caused by fast neutron fission allows the reactor to utilize fissionable and fertile material rather than fissile material. Fast neutrons have a better fission/capture ratio for many nuclides, and each fast fission releases a larger number of neutrons, so a fast breeder reactor can potentially breed more fissile fuel than it consumes.

This means that what a traditional reactor has to dispose of, a breeder reactor can utilize; in fact, it can also use already spent nuclear waste of other reactors as fuel. Because the reactor utilizes all of the material it also removes many of the radioactive material that otherwise would take thousands of years to neutralize. At the end of the process rather than millinia the half life is reduced to decades.[5]

Uranium Fuel Cycle

A 1,000-megawatt-electric thermal-reactor plant, for example, generates more than 100 tons of spent fuel a year. The annual waste output from a fast reactor with the same electrical capacity, in contrast, is a little more than a single ton of fission products, plus trace amounts of transuranics. Waste management using the ALMR cycle would be greatly simplified. Because the fast-reactor waste would contain no significant quantity of long-lived transuranics, its radiation would decay to the level of the ore from which it came in several hundred years, rather than tens of thousands.

Once through

Once Through: In a once through route (as is used in the USA) fuel is burned in thermal reactors and is not reprocessed. The cycle can use about 5 percent of energy in thermal reactor fuel (the enriched uranium) and less than 1 percent of energy in uranium ore. It cannot burn depleted uranium (removed when the ore is enriched) or uranium in spent fuel. The cycle requires fuel enrichment to concentrate fissile uranium. The reactor requires interim waste storage (until waste can be permanantly disposed of) as well as permanent storage able to securely segregate waste for 10,000 years. Plutonium results as a byproduct of the fission and is unable to be utilized because of neutron poisoning which results in increasing inventories of plutonium in used fuel and excess weapons-grade plutonium degraded only slowly by mixing in to fresh fuel

With PUREX reprocessing

PUREX recyling: Using PUREX processing fuel is burned in thermal reactors after which plutonium is extracted. This process uses about 6 percent of energy in original reactors fuel and less than 1 percent of energy in uranium ore. This process cannot be used to burn depleted uranium or uranium in spent fuel. The cycle requires fuel enrichment facilities, plutonium blending (mixing), and off-site purex reprocessing (due to the size and complexity of the process). The waste is not sufficiently decreased so this process also requires interim waste storage, off-site waste processing, and permanent storage able to securely store for 10000 years. The process results in weapons grade plutonium which must be securely protected which creates proliferation risks. The waste from the PUREX reprocessing can be solidified with vitrification and is much mroe stable than conventional waste.

With pyrometallurgical processing

Fast reactor with pyrometallurgical processing: With full recycling using pyrometallurgical processing the fuel would be burned in fast neutron reactors. The process can recover more than 99 percent of energy in spent thermal reactor fuel. After spent thermal reactor fuel runs out the fast reactors can burn depleted uranium to recover more than 99 percent of the rest of the energy in uranium ore. The process requires on site fuel fabrication, and on site pyrometallurgical processing (with fuel recycling part of a closed cycle to prevent proliferation risks). The process would necessitate storage able to segregate waste for less than 500 years. No extra uranium mining would be necessary for centuries if spent thermal reactor fuel and available uranium resources were utilized. No uranium enrichment would ever be needed. Plutonium stockpiles would eventually shrink to only what is in use in reactors and in recycling, weapons grade plutonium can be disposed of rapidly by being used as fuel. The plutonium in the fuel it self would be too impure for diversion to weapons. The waste from a fast reactor with pyroprocessing would have a much shorter half life and would only remain intact for 500 years. The waste volume is far less due to the fuel efficiency and the leftover waste could be solidified with vitrification and encased in high strength glass that would remain stable long beyond how long it would take for the radioactivity to subside.

Uranium Reprocessing

The spent fuel consists of three classes of materials. The fission products, which make up about 5 percent of the used fuel, are the true wastes, the ashes of the fission fire. They comprise a mélange of lighter elements created when the heavy atoms split. The mix is highly radioactive for its first several years. After a decade or so, the activity is dominated by two isotopes, cesium 137 and strontium 90. Both are soluble in water, so they must be contained very securely. In around three centuries, those isotopes’ radioactivity declines by a factor of 1,000, by which point they have become virtually harmless.

Uranium makes up the bulk of the spent nuclear fuel (around 94 percent); this is unfissioned uranium that has lost most of its uranium 235 and resembles natural uranium (which is just 0.71 per-cent fissile uranium 235). This component is only mildly radioactive and, if separated from the fission products and the rest of the material in the spent fuel, could readily be stored safely for future use in lightly protected facilities.

The balance of the material the truly troubling part is the transuranic component, elements heavier than uranium. This part of the fuel is mainly a blend of plutonium isotopes, with a significant presence of americium. Although the transuranic elements make up only about 1 percent of the spent fuel, they constitute the main source of today’s nuclear waste problem. The half-lives (the period in which radioactivity halves) of these atoms range up to tens of thousands of years, a feature that led U.S. government regulators to require that the planned high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada isolate spent fuel for over 10,000 years. [6]


PUREX reprocessing

PUREX, the current standard method, is an acronym standing for Plutonium and Uranium Recovery by EXtraction. The PUREX process is a liquid-liquid extraction method used to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, in order to extract uranium and plutonium, independent of each other, from the fission products. This is the most developed and widely used process in the industry at present. When used on fuel from commercial power reactors the plutonium extracted typically contains too much Pu-240 to be useful in a nuclear weapon. However, reactors that are capable of refuelling frequently can be used to produce weapon-grade plutonium, which can later be recovered using PUREX. Because of this, PUREX chemicals are monitored.[citation needed]

Pyroprocessing

edit


see electroplating and electrowinning for more details.

Extracted uranium and actinide elements from spent thermal-reactor fuel are plated out on the cathode of an electrorefinner during the pyroprocessing procedure. After further processing, the matallic fuel can be burned in fast-neutron reactors.

The pyrometallurgical process extracts the majority of transuranic elements present in used uranium-fuel instead of just plutonium, as in the PUREX route. Its name derives from the high temperatures to which the metals must be subjected during the procedure.

The spent fuel is placed in an anode basket which is immersed in a molten salt electrolyte. An electrical current is applied, causing the uranium metal to plate out on a solid metal cathode. Many of the actinides and other fission products (such as caesium, zirconium and strontium) remain in the salt to later be absorbed into a liquid cadmium cathode. [7][8][9][10]

Next the accumulated combination of fertile and fissionable materials is scraped off the electrode, melted down, cast into an ingot and passed to a refabrication line for conversion into fast-reactor fuel. The combination of fission products and transuranics is unsuited for weapons or even for thermal-reactor fuel. The mixed actinides produced by pyrometallic processing can be used again as nuclear fuel, as they are virtually all either fissile, or fertile, though many of these materials require a fast breeder reactor in order to be burned efficiently.

When the bath becomes saturated with fission products, technicians clean the solvent and process the extracted fission products for permanent disposal. Thus, unlike the current PUREX method, the pyro-process collects virtually all the transuranic elements (including the plutonium). Only a very small portion of the transuranic component ends up in the final waste stream.[11] Since the majority of the long term radioactivity, and volume, of spent fuel comes from actinides, removing the actinides produces waste that is more compact, and not nearly as dangerous over the long term. The radioactivity of this waste will then drop to the level of various naturally occurring minerals and ores within a few hundred, rather than thousands, years.[12][13]

In addition pyroprocessing is more compact than aqueous methods, allowing on-site reprocessing at the reactor site, which avoids transportation of spent fuel and its security issues. Instead storage of a much smaller volume of fission products on site as high-level waste is possible until decommissioning.

Although pyrometallurgical recycling technology is not quite ready for immediate commercial use, researchers have demonstrated its basic principles. It has been successfully demonstrated on a pilot level in operating power plants, both in the U.S. and in Russia.[verification needed] It has not yet functioned, however, on a full production scale.

Radioactive Waste Management

The technical issues in accomplishing this are daunting, due to the extremely long periods radioactive wastes remain deadly to living organisms. Of particular concern are two long-lived fission products, Technetium-99 (half-life 220,000 years) and Iodine-129 (half-life 15.7 million years), [14] which dominate spent nuclear fuel radioactivity after a few thousand years. The most troublesome transuranic elements in spent fuel are Neptunium-237 (half-life two million years) and Plutonium-239 (half-life 24,000 years).[verification needed]

Consequently, high-level radioactive waste requires sophisticated treatment and management. This usually necessitates treatment, followed by a long-term management strategy involving permanent storage, disposal or transformation of the waste into a non-toxic form.

Governments around the world are considering a range of waste management and disposal options, though there has been limited progress toward long-term waste management solutions.[15]

Vitrification

A vitrification experiment for the study of nuclear waste disposal

Long-term storage of radioactive waste requires the stabilization of the waste into a form which will not react, nor degrade, for extended periods of time. One way to do this is through vitrification.[16]

Currently at Sellafield the high-level waste (PUREX first cycle raffinate) is mixed with sugar and then calcined. Calcination involves passing the waste through a heated, rotating tube. The purposes of calcination are to evaporate the water from the waste, and de-nitrate the fission products to assist the stability of the glass produced.

The 'calcine' generated is fed continuously into an induction heated furnace with fragmented glass[17]. The resulting glass is a new substance in which the waste products are bonded into the glass matrix when it solidifies. This product, as a molten fluid, is poured into stainless steel cylindrical containers ("cylinders") in a batch process. When cooled, the fluid solidifies ("vitrifies") into the glass. Such glass, after being formed, is very highly resistant to water. [18]

After filling a cylinder, a seal is welded onto the cylinder. The cylinder is then washed. After being inspected for external contamination, the steel cylinder is stored, usually in an underground repository. In this form, the waste products are expected to be immobilized for a very long period of time (many thousands of years).[19]

The glass inside a cylinder is usually a black glossy substance. All this work (in the United Kingdom) is done using hot cell systems. The sugar is added to control the ruthenium chemistry and to stop the formation of the volatile RuO4 containing radio ruthenium. In the west, the glass is normally a borosilicate glass (similar to Pyrex), while in the former Soviet bloc it is normal to use a phosphate glass. The amount of fission products in the glass must be limited because some (palladium, the other Pt group metals, and tellurium) tend to form metallic phases which separate from the glass. Bulk vitrification uses electrodes to melt soil and wastes, which are then buried underground.[20]

In Germany a vitrification plant is in use; this is treating the waste from a small demonstration reprocessing plant which has since been closed down.[21]

Integral Fast Reactor

The fast-reactor system with pyro-processing is versatile. It could be a net consumer or net producer of plutonium, or it could be run in a break-even mode. Operated as a net producer, the system could provide start-up materials for other fast-reactor power plants. As a net consumer, it could use up excess plutonium and weapons materials. If a break-even mode were chosen, the only additional fuel a nuclear plant would need would be a periodic infusion of depleted uranium (uranium from which most of the fissile uranium 235 has been removed) to replace the heavy-metal atoms hat have undergone fission.[22]


Safety

The Three Mile Island incident occurred in 1979. The Chernobyl accident happened on April 26 of 1986. A month before this, at a test reactor in Idaho, scientists working with the IFR purposefully subjected the reactor to the same conditions of TMI to demonstrate the reactors passive safety design and the reactor accordingly shut down with no operator intervention. The IFR relies on inherent safety which does not depend on human or mechanical intervention; instead the physics of how the reactor works prevents the possibility of a meltdown. They also subjected the prototype of the reactor, EBR-II, to the same conditions that would cause the meltdown at Chernobyl and the result was the same; the passive safety system caused the reactor to automatically shut down with no operator intervention. [23][24][25][26]

Since a fast reactor uses a fast spectrum no moderator is required to slow the neutrons neutrons. In a water moderated reactor the water is kept at extreme pressure and at beyond boiling temperatures. On the other hand, sodium runs at atmospheric pressure since its boiling point is higher than the reactor's operating temperature which means that there is no internal pressure to cause the primary dangers which Light Water Reactors are engineered to avoid. [27]

The reactor for the IFR uses metallic fuel rods whereas Light Water Reactors (which make up the majority of reactors in use today) use oxide fuel. Metallic fuel rods are good conductors of heat whereas oxide is not. The interiors of metal rods stay much cooler meaning there is far less heat stored in an operating ALMR. In the event of a loss of coolant flow there would be much less heat present to raise the temperature of the fuel so a hypothetical accident would be much less severe.[28]. The combination of the low heat content of the metal fuel rods and the ALMR sitting in a pool of liquid sodium means that, if there were to be loss of control power, the core would be cooled passively by convection.[29]

Hazards

A disadvantage of sodium is its chemical reactivity, which requires special precautions to prevent and suppress fires. If sodium comes into contact with water it explodes, and with air, it will burn. Stringent regulation and safety standards would need to be met to prevent a leakage accident. So long as the reactor is built safely maintenance becomes less of an issue however because sodium does not react with the stainless steel pipes that would be containing, and because it is kept at atmospheric pressure, it it could remain within them for potentially thousands of years without breaking through.

In 1995 at the Japanese "Monju" fast reactor a temperature sensor broke and sodium leaked from a secondary sodium loop and caught fire. The plant was shut down and has not yet been restarted. No one was hurt in this accident and no radiation was released nor was the reactor it self damaged. The accident was classified as Category 1 on the international scale of 0 to 7 (with 0 being the least serious) by a committee of independent specialists.[30] The accident itself has been attributed to design flaws and insufficient operator training.

S-Prism

An issue with cost in the past regarding nuclear power plants is that each plant was specifically tailored with the parts built on site rather than built on an assembly line and then shipped to the construction site. This inefficient system raised prices substantially as there was no uniformity in design between different reactors so each model had to be custom made and repaired. General electric has a prototype of the IFR called S-Prism. Because this commercial version can be built in a factory then assembled on site, costs are significantly reduced. They are ready to build the reactor vessel which has a price tag of about $50 million.[31]

Deterrent to global warming

greenhouse gas emissions from electricity production in grams of CO2/kwh [32] (low to high estimate)
energy source direct emissions from energy production indirect emissions from lifecycle total
coal 176-289 790-1017 966-1306
gas 77-113 362-575 439-688
hydro 4-236 4-236
solar-pv 100-280 100-280
wind 10-48 10-48
nuclear 9-21 9-21

Global energy production, coal burning in particular, is responsible for 20% of greenhouse gas emissions which contribute to the global climate change commonly called Global warming.[33] 49% of current US energy production is provided by coal burning.[34] In a major Department of Energy study done in 2002, nuclear power was determined to be the best bet for combating global warming, and particularly a reactor design called the Integral Fuel Reactor.[35] Already nuclear power provides 70% of the carbon free electric power in the US even though there hasn't been a new reactor built in 30 years.[36] Former leading member of Green Peace and author Mark Lynas has also endorsed nuclear for its ability to combat global warming.[37] The IFR is also supported by leading climate change expert Jim Hansen who has placed 4th generation nuclear power generation as one of the top five priorities suggested for the Obama adminstration.[38] According to Hansen completely eliminating coal power generation is the most important step in stopping global warming and he suggests nuclear power plants as a replacement. [39]




As a renewable energy source

Years of resource availability for various nuclear technologies [40]
Reactor/Fuel Cycle Years of 2002 world nuclear energy generation with known conventional resources Years of 2002 world nuclear energy generation with total conventional resources
Once-through fuel cycle 85 270
Recycling fuel cycle 100 300
Light water and fast reactors (mixed with recycling) 130 410
Fast reactor fuel cycle with recyling 2550 8500

Around 99.284% of natural uranium is uranium-238.[41] Light water reactors, which make up the vast majority of nuclear reactors in service today, can only utilize and process the more highly radioactive uranium-235 which only makes up %0.711 of total uranium.[42]The Integral Fast Reactor, being a breeder reactor, is capable of utilizing uranium-238 as fuel which greatly increases potential fuel reserves. Depleted uranium consists mainly of the 238 isotope, and enriched uranium has a higher-than-natural quantity of the uranium-235 isotope. Sea water contains approximately 3.3 mg per cubic meter of uranium. While this is a relatively low concentration, on a worldwide scale the reserves become huge. At the Takasaki Radiation Chemistry Research Establishment of the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute (JAERI Takasaki Research Establishment) researchers have developed a means of uranium extraction using a material which can recover >1 kg of yellowcake after 240 days of submersion in the ocean. According to the OECD uranium may be extracted from seawater using this method for about $300/kg-U.[43] By utilizing uranium in seawater in a fast breeder reactor the concern of uranium reserves running out become essentially non-existent. At the rate of $300/kg-U power generation is far cheaper than petroleum or coal.

This table is using reprocessing for its data rather than considering a breeder reactor. Reprocessing is only capable of recovering a small amount of total uranium whereas breeder reactors are able to utilize ~99% of total uranium.[44] According to professor emeritus of the University of Chicago Bernard Cohen with breeder reactors and by extracting uranium from sea water uranium reserves are virtually endless[45][46]


When technicians remove the depleted fuel, only about one twentieth of the potentially fissionable atoms in it (uranium 235, plutonium and uranium 238) have been used up, so the so-called spent fuel still contains about 95 percent of its original energy. In addition, only about one tenth of the mined uranium ore is converted into fuel in the enrichment process (during which the concentration of uranium 235 is increased considerably), so less than a hundredth of the ore’s total energy content is used to generate power in today’s plants.[47]

Proliferation

Nuclear missles worldwide [48]
Country Long-Range Missiles Long-Range Aircraft Mid- and Short Range Systems Total Deployed Held in Reserve Awaiting Destruction Total
Russia 2,200 900 2,100 5,200 8,800 14,000
United States 2,500 1,100 500 4,100 1,300 5,150 10,550
France 240 0 60 300 ? 300
China 26 0 150 176 65 241
Britain 150 0 0 150 50 200
Israel 80
Pakistan 60
India 50
North Korea 5–15
Total 5116 2000 2810 9926 25486-25496

As with all nuclear technology, there are social/political concerns about weapons proliferation. This risk is reduced with the IFR for a couple reasons. First, the fuel in an IFR remains highly radioactive and must be handled with special shielded cells.  To be transported, the fuel must be in containers which way many tons to prevent lethal radiation exposure.[49] The fuel recycling process takes place at the power plant, so fuel won't have to be transported. While the IFR has many passive anti proliferation design features, it can also help eliminate global stockpiles of nuclear weapons by creating electricity from the former warheads.[50] The recycling process in the IFR removes all the potential material for making nuclear bombs out of so when the waste is removed from the closed fuel cycle in the plant it could not be used for making nuclear warheads.[51] [52]

Given an estimated total of 25491 nuclear bombs worldwide[53] with an average of 39.5 kg of uranium per bomb[54] total uranium content in all nuclear bombs worldwide is 1.01E+06 kilograms. Using e=mc^2 the energy potential of this mass is 9.05E+22 joules which converts to 2.51E+07 terawatt hours. 2007 world energy consumption was 17480 terawatt hours[55]. At 33% energy conversion (a low end estimate for a nuclear reactor) with uranium recycling through a breeder reactor total nuclear disarmament for use as fuel would provide 475 years of 2007 energy needs.

Other

Coupled with a desalination plant, fast breeder reactors can efficiently create drinkable water from sea water. This has been implemented successfully in the past with the BN-350 reactor.[56]

References

  1. Congressional Record: Nov. 6, 1997 (Senate) Page S11890-S11891
  2. Ask a physisist
  3. "the DOE ordered the scientists working on the project not to talk about it"
  4. http://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jnst/41/4/448/_pdf Neutron and Gamma Ray Source Evaluation of LWR High Burn-up UO2 and MOX Spent Fuels] Journal of NUCLEAR SCIENCE and TECHNOLOGY volume 41,issue 4, pages 448–456
  5. Nuclear Reaction: Why do Americans fear nuclear power?
  6. Scientific American Dec. 2005
  7. [1]
  8. Development of plutonium recovery process by molten salt electrorefining with liquid cadmium cathode
  9. [2]
  10. High Throughput Electrorefining of Uranium in Pyro-reprocessing Nuclear Technology Research Laboratory
  11. Scientific American Dec. 2005
  12. Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative
  13. Scientific American Dec. 2005
  14. Environmental Surveillance, Education and Research Program
  15. See, for example, Paul Brown, 'Shoot it at the sun. Send it to Earth's core. What to do with nuclear waste?', The Guardian, 14 April 2004.
  16. M. I. Ojovan, W.E. Lee. An Introduction to Nuclear Waste Immobilisation, Elsevier, Amsterdam, 315pp. (2005)
  17. Laboratory-scale vitrification and leaching of Hanford high-level waste for the purpose of simulant and glass property models validation
  18. Corrosion of nuclear waste glasses in non-saturated conditions: Time-Temperature behaviour
  19. The Economics of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle, OECD Nuclear Energy Agency
  20. Waste Form Release Calculations for the 2005 Integrated Disposal Facility Performance Assessment
  21. Economic Comparison of Nuclear Fuel Cycle Options, Hensing, I., and W. Schultz, 1995, Energiewirtschaftlichen Instituts
  22. Scientific American Dec. 2005
  23. Frontline PBS interview with Charles Till
  24. Congressional Record: Nov. 6, 1997 (Senate) Page S11890-S11891
  25. Ask A Scientist Is the IFR safe? What safety tests have been run?
  26. Integral Fast Reactors: Source of Safe, Abundant, Non-Polluting Power by George S. Stanford, Ph.D. "Wasn't passive cooling tested in a prototype ALMR?"
  27. Integral Fast Reactors: Source of Safe, Abundant, Non-Polluting Power by George S. Stanford, Ph.D. "Liquid sodium"
  28. Integral Fast Reactors: Source of Safe, Abundant, Non-Polluting Power by George S. Stanford, Ph.D. "Why are metallic fuel rods an inherent safety feature?"
  29. Integral Fast Reactors: Source of Safe, Abundant, Non-Polluting Power by George S. Stanford, Ph.D. "Other safety features"
  30. Monju fast reactor
  31. Steven Kirsch: "GE has created a commercial plant design called the S-PRISM.... We can start building a reactor vessel for around $50 million."
  32. IAEA report on GHG emissions by energy source
  33. Coal and Climate Change Facts
  34. NY Times citing EIA
  35. DOE Nuclear Study
  36. Steven Kirsch: "Nuclear provides 70% of the carbon free electric power in the US even though we haven't started building a new nuclear plant in 30 years!"
  37. Mark Lynas: the green heretic persecuted for his nuclear conversion
  38. Tell Barack Obama the Truth -- The Whole Truth
  39. ibid p.5
  40. OECD/IEA 2003 Report on uranium, p67, table 26
  41. Status of Health Concerns about Military Use of Depleted Uranium and Surrogate Metals in Armor-Penetrating Munitions. Nato. D.E. McClain et al. Section 2.1
  42. ibid
  43. "Uranium Resources 2003: Resources, Production and Demand" (PDF). OECD World Nuclear Agency and International Atomic Energy Agency. p 22.
  44. How do IFRs help conserve natural resources?
  45. How long will nuclear energy last?
  46. The nuclear energy option
  47. Scientific American Dec. 2005
  48. Nuclear missles worldwide
  49. Ask a scientist
  50. [3]This paper was allegedly on the Berkeley Nation Labs site until it was removed on July 31st, 2008.
  51. Ask a scientist What kind of facility would this take?
  52. Ask a scientist Can IFR wastes be used in nuclear weapons?
  53. Nuclear missles worldwide
  54. how much uranium in nuclear bombs?
  55. CIA world factbook
  56. BN-350 reactor

External links

Cookies help us deliver our services. By using our services, you agree to our use of cookies.