NUCLEAR USE POLICY IN SPACE AND ON EARTH: PART I

by Bruce Behrhorst

[ PART II ]

Heated debate, political hypocrisy, petrol money chasing 'ethics' investment funds worth billion of dollars will not change climate or provide adequate solar system space transportation.

  Nor will protocols to discuss remedial efforts or 'carbon' tax offenders of greenhouse gas emissions. Neither will climatologists suggesting as though from a movie script where the maniacal protagonist villain "Dr. Mysterious" intent on destroying the planet for his own ends by "inseminating ' volcanos to spew forth sulfur toxins into the atmosphere. This is no Hollywood movie. There is a serious geo-engineering proposal in a drastic measure to correct the effects of ozone depletion and gas emissions by release of sulfur particulate into the atmosphere to screen (shade) our planet to reflect the Sun's rays and thus correct climatological imbalance. Will these measures work? I doubt any one policy will work unless real change on energy policy is made soon. Addressing the issue regardless of how governments and industry want to posture themselves before the issue of greenhouse gas emission release in our atmosphere. It can only be reduced significantly by providing efficient nuclear energy technology without forcing human populations to regress toward a lifestyle reminiscent of 13th century energy economics to satisfy proposed energy conservation standards.

  A measure of providing energy needs and maintaining reduced intrusive energy systems requires high density nuclear energy as the only source depends on locality, a competitive energy system cost analysis, availability and impact studies as does conservation measures to insure proper usage. A new proposal made this summer by the Department of Energy is GNEP the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership with a number of key nuclear energy industrial nations like; Japan, France, United Kingdom, Russia. The idea is to develop advanced fast reactor technology such as Advanced Burner Reactors (ABR) and to integrate waste or spent fuels sources for extraction and refining schemes to fuel these advanced reactors. Advanced fast reactors are apt to use metallic fuel rods, which is an inherent safety feature. Metal makes for a good heat conductor and interiors stay much cooler and predictable as it progresses through fission reactions; as opposed to oxide, that tends to warp and collect unwanted impurities in the fissioning process. The advantages help profile this reactor design like "Resonance Doppler Effect" which causes the reactivity to change somewhat with temperature. In Advanced liquid metal reactor (ALMR) types temperature does not change much, so in a hypothetical accident the reactor is much more stable. Another advantage is molten sodium runs at atmospheric pressure which means there is no internal pressure to cause accidents which is a major operational concern in the Light Water Reactor (LWR) type (massive pipe rupture causing a 'blowdown' of coolant). Sodium is not corrosive like water.

  Whatever administration were to take power in Washington D.C. in the next few years the IFR/ALMR reactor issue could take on more importance than it does currently as environmental climatic arguments and media attention suggests for a more focused policy in an effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions heats up the political landscape in North America.

LIQUID METAL FAST REACTORS

 In liquid metal Fast (breeder) Reactors the chain reaction is maintained by fast neutrons. Consequently moderator materials cannot be used to impede high energy neutrons. To avoid material of low atomic mass the core coolant is a liquid metal (sodium, lead or a potassium sodium mix). Liquid metal is an excellent heat transfer at normal atmosphere (1atm.) not requiring any pressurization to avoid boiling. However sodium becomes radioactive when it absorbs neutrons and also reacts violently with air or water. To prevent radioactive sodium from possibly interacting with a water/steam loop, an intermediate loop of non-radioactive sodium is used to transfer the heat energy from the primary loop to the water/steam loop and barriers.
  Fast reactors can be designed and operated as either a net breeder or net burner. All thermal moderated (mod) reactors are net burners of nuclear fuel in a wasteful way besides prolific breeding of plutonium. One of the reasons being in the thermal neutron spectrum many fission products and actinide isotopes absorb neutrons quickly without undergoing fission. They are said to have a high "capture cross section". Total low-energy interaction neutron x-section for uranium computed for neutron energy lies in the keV range (<1eV) where as for fast fission x-section (higher energy interaction 1eV<E<20MeV) for example, in three fissionable uranium isotopes (U232, U234, U238) for neutron energy occurs at the 1-1.5 MeV level. Fissile isotopes are isotopes which can undergo fission upon the absorption of a thermal neutron and this piles up in a thermal reactor as fuel product, thus a thermal reactor cannot be a net burner of actinides such as thorium, uranium, neptunium, americium, curium - because thermal fission does not release enough extra neutrons. A breeder reactor is one that can be designed and operated as either a net breeder or net burner of fissile material.

Breeder reactions:

²³²₉₀Th + ¹₀n ----> ²³³₉₀Th -_22m-^{b -}--> ²³³₉₁Pa -_27d-^{b -}--> ²³³₉₂U

²³⁸₉₂U  + ¹₀n ----> ²³⁹₉₂U  -_24m-^{b -}--> ²³⁹₉₃Np -_56h-^{b -}--> ²³⁹₉₄Pu

A basic disadvantage with thermal reactors Gen 1, Gen 2, Gen 3 is they burn more fissile material than they give back as plutonium-239. In part for historical reasons, since fast reactors were originally investigated for their potential to breed Pu-239 and because there is confusion and an incredulous public, there still exists 'guilt by association' idea that fast reactors would mean rampant weapons grade plutonium. The main point missing with this argument against IFR (integral fast reactor) systems is you can choose to engineer not to breed plutonium, whereas with thermal reactors you make plutonium and have no choice - production is guaranteed. If you compare electrical output capability between two systems with the same electrical output the difference is a 1,000MWe thermal reactor plant generates more than 100 tons of spent fuel per year. The annual output of a fast reactor with the same electrical capacity is just over a single ton of fission products plus trace amounts of transuranics.

PREVAILING PHILOSOPHY: IF IT AIN'T BROKE; DON'T FIX IT

  The once through 'throw-away' N-fuel cycle favored by most industrialized countries' nuclear power plant industry is a "Broken" idea whose time has come to stop the practice. Take U.S. nuclear power plants as an example; the U.S. uses considerably less than a hundredth of the energy potential of mined uranium. Even with recycle, less than 1% can be extracted. IFR reactors can use over 99%.

  Can we really afford to suffer more electrical 'Blackouts' and 'Brownouts'? How extensive are unfair monopoly practices in the electrical generating industry favoring the hydrocarbon sector? Do we continue to disregard of greenhouse emission standards and international protocols designed to minimize the global effects of industrial pollutants on the climatic environment? Another concern is how to relieve current tensions in the Middle East exacerbated by the politics of oil and the role it has in creating a destabilizing force in Middle East domestic affairs. Enemies of the United States and its allies do exist and will continue to exist 24/7. And the policy of 'containment of its enemies' and its appropriateness and value should be re-examined instead of the "Broken" policy of 'Preemption by Invasion/liberation' to secure the nation against its enemies. We need a shift in direction to answer difficult questions.

  Nuclear fuel proliferation toward N-weapons (WMD) by efficient safeguards to eliminate its availability can begin with using appropriate chemical and isotopic refining techniques largely ignored in the past. It is the responsibility of governments to insure N-weapons fuels are rendered ineffective and to lobby through negotiations to set N-arsenal limits and the nonproliferation treaty countries to be signatories. Using UREX in place of PUREX which was modified so only U and Tc are extracted. UREX solvent extraction of transmutation of long-lived radionuclides is the current extraction process promoted by DOE/Westinghouse to address disposal of commercial nuclear reactor fuel and improve deposits for geologic repository. It will separate fuel into a transuranium TRU product stream for conversion to mixed oxide (MOX) reactor fuel. The separation of Technetium (Tc) 99 and Iodine 129 from conversion to target for transmutation and a uranium product that meets criteria for disposal as a class C low-level waste (LLW). The goal of the UREX process is to recover >99.9% of the uranium and >95% of the Tc in separate product streams while rejecting >99.9% of the TRU isotope to the raffinate. The process is designed to use Acetohydroxamic acid (AHA) and Nitric acid. By reducing PUREX you reduce deposits of plutonium and the isotopes that become increasingly attractive over the next 100,000+ yrs. the half-life of Pu-239 is 24,000 yrs. since choice fuels for nuclear explosive devices are U-235, Pu-239 and U-233. Fast reactors are not prolific breeders of weapons grade plutonium fuel as an incidental by-product of reactor design.

Also "Broken" is the idea that water sources exist to build hydro dams altering river/lake environments forever. The idea waste by the electrical generating coal plant site offer to sequester CO2 emissions by the carbon sequestration process. At least with nuclear fuel it can be manipulated so that waste is still made to provide electrical power and not buried in the ground as wasted energy.

Now is the time to fix what needs fixing-not later!

INTERVIEW WITH DR. GEORGE STANFORD

I’m speaking today with Dr. George S. Stanford physicist who worked on fast reactor development before retiring from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory.

His work focuses on experimental nuclear physics, reactor physics and fast-reactor safety He is co-author of “Nuclear Shadowboxing Contemporary Threats from Cold War Weaponry” (Fidlar Doubleday). Welcome to nuclearspace.com and thanks for your participation today.

BRUCE: According to the Gen IV initiative IFR/ALMR reactors aren’t due for commercial production till 2030. So why the big rush to get Gen IV reactors re-examined for integration with fuel reprocessing on site before commercial licensing of Advanced Burner Reactors (ABR)? Aren’t other fast reactors designs like lead-cooled reactors with auxiliary processing of thermo chemical production of cheap hydrogen gas for the automotive industry just as viable?

GEORGE: I think one of the main reasons for feelings of immediacy is the waste problem. As you know, Yucca Mountain is having political difficulties mainly because of long life actinides, the transuranic elements. Those are elements can be consumed in fast reactors, but cannot be fully consumed in thermal reactors. If we did have fast reactors, that would change the time scale for the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository from 10,000 year requirement for nuclear power plant waste isolation to about 500 years. That would remove a lot of the objections to using Yucca Mountain and also to the expansion of nuclear power.

BRUCE: Pyroprocessing and nuclear electrorefining of spent heavy radioactive element fuel from reactors, hasn't this already been demonstrated by government programs?

GEORGE: Yes, the pyroprocessing has been demonstrated on a laboratory scale. There has been no commercial scale demonstration - that would be the next step. Are you familiar with GNEP the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership?

BRUCE: Yes...I'll get to that. But could I ask you why has the NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) been reluctant so far to license fast reactor technology for commercial use in generating electricity?

GEORGE: I don't think any commercial operator has applied for a license and it has yet to be commercially demonstrated. And there has not been the economic motivation either since uranium has been so cheap.

BRUCE: Isn't the prevailing economic thinking that the nuclear power plant industry does not have the ability in the short term to turn a big profit or large payoff, unlike the hydrocarbon energy industry is able to do. So commercial builders and operators like GE, Westinghouse etc. don't want to invest in fast reactors since they prefer a quicker return on their investment in order to compete in the energy market.

GEORGE: The utility industry is sort of 'stodgie'. The fact remains we're getting the electricity we need as things are now. The main problem is the waste, but also in the longer-term consideration is the fuel supply. There is a long-term need to develop nuclear power and it's not too soon to get going on it. But there is no terrible financial incentive for the utilities to start commercially right now.

BRUCE: You mentioned GNEP. This describes Argonne National Laboratories (ANL) work done in this area before; it's just now with another acronym. For example the DOE has made available online presentation describing an overview of the UREX procedures in particular the UREX+1A treatment that involves the aqueous solvent extraction processes; +1, +1A, +2, +3. +4 to isolate U, Tc, Cs, Sr, transuranics (TRU), Pu+Np plus others. This is again a government sponsored development program. When do you see this envisioned multi purpose facility technology actually developed commercially? And is the government really committed to GNEP?

GEORGE: I'm not sure how firm the commitment is yet. As I understand it's mainly a proposal and very modestly funded at this point by the government. However, the DOE announced in August that they intend to build a complete commercial demonstration of the process. It's a development program that we need and should be instituted.

BRUCE: One facet of GNEP-TD is to demonstrate fast reactor recycling - the possible use of sodium cooled fast reactor systems. There's been some criticism over its use mainly because of some glitches. I understand it's a new technology...Well, not that new. It's been known in nuclear science for years (ZIP/EBR-1). There was an incident in Japan in the late '90 's and to the credit of Japanese Nuclear Firefighters, they were able to contain a non-radioactive secondary sodium loop leak and the sodium fire that resulted. Was this a one time incident? Is there an inherent flaw?

GEORGE: All technologies have problems. And you don't get perfect safety with anything. I think what you're referring to is the fire at Monju reactor in Japan?

BRUCE: Yes.

GEORGE: That was a fire that caused the reactor to be shut down. It didn't actually damage the reactor. Things can happen that will be minor glitches in the operation of an N-power plant; actually fast reactors in general have performed quite well. There are a number of fast reactors that are working very well. Most of their problems have been political rather than technical.

BRUCE: What makes the secondary cooling loop of a sodium liquid metal fast reactor design non-radioactive sodium?

GEORGE: A liquid metal fast reactor has a primary loop and a secondary cooling loop. The two loops have separate sodium supplies. There is to be no contact between the two sodium streams. The secondary sodium is heated by passing it through the primary heat exchanger.The idea is to keep radioactivity within the reactor vessel, so some of the designs for sodium cooling and perhaps also for lead cooling, though I'm not too familiar with those, have the primary loop and heat exchanger entirely inside the reactor tank. The purpose is to keep all the radioactivity in tank so you are not passing radioactivity through the turbines or through the steam generators, which are external to the reactor.

BRUCE: You explained that very well. Now... if this GNEP program works with participating countries do you think countries that are controversial in the way they process and weaponize spent fuel (N. Korea, Iran); if they were to say, "This is a good idea, but costly to integrate into our present reactor systems we would need some subsidy money to help us join GNEP." Do you think they might be interested in GNEP the future?

GEORGE: I think what N.Korea and Iran are mainly motivated by the need they feel to protect themselves against invasion. If they get atomic weapons, that gives them an ability to retaliate. One of the things you have to do to keep more countries from getting N - weapons is to guarantee they don't need them to maintain their territorial integrity. That's what GNEP is designed to do is to supply nations with the technology and fuel they would need to generate electrical power. First, to guarantee they get this fuel and secondly, guarantee they would not be invaded. Then N-weapons would not be necessary for self-defenses.

BRUCE: In regard to 2nd and 3rd tier countries. According to online sources there are reactor designs tailored to address economies of scale. Grid-appropriate reactors (small grid reactor) International Reactor Innovative and Secure (IRIS). Apparently this is an affordable reactor design for countries trying to supplement self sufficient domestic electrical power demand by plugging their electrical grid into a nuclear reactor plant. Do you have any information on this type of reactor design?

The Earth at night. The need to provide world energy needs efficiently.

GEORGE: Is this a small reactor for use in other countries?

BRUCE: Yes...these are IAEA proliferation secure and safe advanced LWR's standard design 50 to 350 MW electrical range N-power plants.

GEORGE: Maybe similar to the Galena, Alaska system. Are you familiar with this case?

BRUCE: No.

GEORGE: The town of Galena, Alaska is rather isolated and electricity bills for the towns-people is rather expensive. The Toshiba Company in Japan has offered to give them a reactor for the electricity they need.

BRUCE: So these are small scaled reactors (SMR) for municipalities electrical power needs?

GEORGE: They come in any size you want. The reactor would be installed and connected to their electricity generators. And it would run for 15-30 years without being refueled. When its core life is over it would be traded for a new one.

BRUCE: I suppose they would also be secure and safeguarded?

GEORGE: They would be located underground. There would be no external fuel, and would be quite un-susceptible to terrorist attack. They could do far more damage by attacking other targets.

BRUCE: Have a firefighting question. How do you put out a high temperature sodium fire, is it with sand, helium gas, Epsom salts?

GEORGE: I guess, some kind of inert gas like nitrogen. Sodium has been used industrially for a long time. Industry is quite practiced at it.

BRUCE: I had listened to the " Atomic Show with Rod Adams " interview with Rodney Ewing, professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering
and the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Michigan. In the interview they were discussing the nuclear industry and the tough time it has with recycling spent fuels; whereas in other industries recycling is accepted practice and profitable. I understand the LWR spent fuel problem with transuranics pile up and filling up storage space. Is there a possibility with a shift in political power toward the Democrats in Washington, do you think GNEP and programs like it will speed up or slow down in funding?

GEORGE: I can't predict. It should go faster. You say the industry has trouble recycling. The fact is there has been no financial incentive to recycle spent fuel. The type of recycling that has been done involves extracting Pu from spent fuel (the PUREX process) to burn more of it in thermal reactors. That's fine in principle, but in terms of utilizing the uranium resource it doesn't do much. It adds about 20% to the energy you get from the amount of uranium you mine. Whereas with fast reactors you can get over 100 times as much energy from the uranium that you mine. So what we could get from GNEP would be a whole new ball game in the reprocessing area.

BRUCE: What would be the expense to integrate pyroprocessing, electrorefining and UREX to a fast reactor all-in-one site facility?

GEORGE: The economics of that have not been established yet and I can't comment. In terms of forestalling the need for more Yucca-Mountains type repositories, no matter what the expense, it's bound to be cheaper than trying to develop, license and implement new repositories. The main thing is that uranium has been so cheap.

BRUCE: But, the processed refined spot price of uranium on the market is at a steady climb day-by-day from a $7.00 USD/lb a year ago.

GEORGE: Yes... that's right.

BRUCE: With these newer fast reactor designs combined with on site fuels reprocessing and refining at end of lifetime, how would decommissioning of these sites present different circumstances from older thermal reactors?

GEORGE: It's not my field. But I don't think it would make much of a difference. Do you have anything in mind that would make a difference?

BRUCE: No...I would imagine since Shippingport reactor and some of these older reactors are successfully decommissioned. I would imagine there would be no difference.

GEORGE: As you know people that get their power from nuclear reactors pay a fraction of a cent for decommissioning costs, so this is taken care of in your utility bill.

BRUCE: Thank you Dr. Stanford for this interview.

[ PART II ]

[Note: For improved clarity, Dr. Stanford has kindly edited this interview.]

Ref. reads:

- George S. Stanford, "Integral Fast Reactors: Source of Safe, Abundant, Non-Polluting Power."
- Yoon I. Chang, “Advanced Fast Reactor: A Next-Generation Nuclear Energy Concept.”
- W. H. Hannum, G. E. Marsh and G. S. Stanford, “Smarter Use of Nuclear Waste,” Scientific American, December 2005, pp 84-91.
-The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP).
- George S. Stanford, “LWR Recycle: Necessity or Impediment?” From the Proceedings of “Global 2003,” ANS Winter Meeting, New Orleans, November 16–20, 2003.
-"Statement of Dr. Phillip J. Finck, Deputy Associate Laboratory Director for Applied Science and Technology and National Security, Argonne National Laboratory, before the House Committee on Science, Energy Subcommittee, Hearing on Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing ­ June 16, 2005"