Pro(ton)s of Nuclear Power

Now that we have gone through the business of looking at the history and chemistry behind nuclear power, we can start looking at the debate over its use.  This week, we will look at nuclear power in a positive light, and go through the benefits of using nuclear power for energy.

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One of the biggest ways that nuclear power is beneficial is that it is very efficient according to Conserve Energy Future.  This efficiency is due to the chemistry of nuclear reactions (yes, chemistry again).  If you remember back to the last post, fission, is a nuclear reaction where an atom splits into two smaller atoms.  When this atom split, it releases a neutron that goes shooting off, and hits another radioactive atom.  This continues as more and more atoms split apart, and neurons shoot off hitting other atoms and repeating the process.  This is referred to as a chain reaction, and because of this, nuclear reactions can keep going on without more energy being needed to start them.  This means that a great amount of power can be created with just a little bit of energy to start.

Conserve Energy Future went on to say that nuclear power is beneficial because it does not have any carbon emissions.  This is important because carbon emissions have been associated with the rise in global warming of the world.  This makes nuclear power a much more environmentally friendly fuel source, compared to coal and other fossil fuels.  Why is this?  Well it has to do with a certain science that we all know and love (and some of us hate) called chemistry.  This time it's pretty simple.  Carbon emissions result from the burning of fossil fuels, because the fossil fuels are organic materials, and the definition of an organic material is that it contains carbon.  On the other side, the fuel for nuclear energy, usually uranium, is an inorganic element, and therefore has no carbon (and because they are two different elements).  Since nuclear power has no carbon emissions, it is much more environmentally friendly and does not contribute to the problem of global warming.

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Another advantage of nuclear power is that the fuel needed to create it does not cost very much.  Conserve Energy Future lists several reasons for nuclear power's low cost.  These reasons include; the cost of uranium, the cost of maintaining a nuclear power plant, and the amount of energy released from each atom.  First, the cost of uranium is low according to Conserve Energy Future.  Second, according to Conserve Energy Future, nuclear power plants are very expensive to build, but once built, they do not take very much money to keep functioning.  The third reason for the low cost of nuclear power is because a lot of energy is created from a very small amount of uranium.  A great amount of energy is released each time an atom splits.  Therefore, a small amount of uranium can make a lot more energy than a small amount of coal, oil, or any other fossil fuel.  All of these reasons add up to the low cost of nuclear power.

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Another advantage of nuclear power, and the one that is most well known, is that it is a very powerful fuel source.  The reason that nuclear energy is so powerful is because ,as I have said before, when the bond holding the atom together splits, it releases a tremendous amount of energy.  Since a great amount of energy can is created, it can create a great deal of electricity to power the world.  Also, since atoms are so small, and each one releases a great amount of energy, 1 kg of uranium would be able to make much more energy than 1 kg of coal or other fossil fuels.

Nuclear power is a powerful fuel source of energy and has many different benefits.  Greatest among these benefits are efficiency, low carbon emissions, and low costs.  This is thanks to the chemistry behind nuclear power plants, such as the great amount of energy created from splitting atoms, the ability to create chain reactions, and because the fuel is inorganic.  With so many benefits to nuclear power it may seem surprising that so many people are against its use.  However, even with all of these benefits, there are still disadvantages to the use of nuclear power.  Next week, we will look at these disadvantages to nuclear power to see the argument from the other side.

A Half-Life History

Throughout history, we have always searched for ways of improving people's lives.  This evolution can be seen through how we have powered our lives.  Even into today, the argument continues as to what is the best way that we can power our cities in the future.  Will we continue to use fossil fuels or will be change to more renewable resources like solar power or wind power?  One of the ways that we can power our world, is through nuclear power.  However, the use of this source of power is a hotly debated topic through our country and the world.  This blog will look at the issue of nuclear energy.  We will be presented points from both proponents and opponents as well as cases throughout history in the hopes of better understanding nuclear.

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Now that we are through the business part of the post, let's look at the history of nuclear energy.  To understand the history of nuclear energy, we must dive into a little bit of high school chemistry (If chemistry wasn't your thing, and you blocked all memory of chemistry from your mind, you might want to skip this paragraph).  In chemistry, there are two types of nuclear reactions.  There is a fission reaction, where an atom is split into two smaller atoms, and there is fusion, where two smaller atoms combine to create a larger atom.  Of the two reactions, fusion is considered much safer and more powerful, but too much energy is required to perform the reaction.  For this reason, we only have fission reactors at this time (On a side note, do you know of any natural fusion reactors? Hint:  They're in the sky).

The Nuclear Energy Institute says that nuclear plants make energy as follows.  The energy from fission reactors are indirectly used in nuclear power plants.  The nuclear reactors are immersed in water.  Inside the reactors are radioactive atoms, the most common being uranium.  These radioactive atoms are unstable due to having to many neutrons in their nuclei.  A uranium atom splits and a neutron goes shooting off, and hits another atom to make it split and shoot off another neutron.  This chain reaction of uranium atoms being split and shooting off neutrons continues on to the other atoms.  As the uranium atoms are split, energy is released, which warms the water surrounding the nuclear reactor.  The warming of the water then creates stream as the water comes closer to boiling.  The steam coming off of the water then rises and spins turbines.  The spinning of turbine produces electricity.  This electricity can then be sent off to power everything from the lights in your home, to the toaster to toast your toast.  Now that we understand the way nuclear plants work, we can look at the history of how they came to be.

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The history of nuclear power goes back over a century as told by What is Nuclear? (If history isn't your thing either, I apologize for the next section as well).  The site went on to say that the scientists then discovered fission by shooting uranium with neutrons.  After this discovery, scientists continued to develop their understanding of nuclear power and eventually created bombs using nuclear power.  These bombs were then used to end World War II.  After this, the first nuclear reactor used to generate electricity was created in 1951.  Before nuclear reactors were used to create widespread power, the were put into submarines (The first submarine with a nuclear reactor was called the USS Nautilus, but it was not captained by a man named Nemo).  Later on, the first commercial nuclear reactor was built in Shippingport, Pennsylvania.  Since then, the number of nuclear power plants across the country has grown tremendously.

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Now that we have gone through the history of nuclear energy, as well as the how nuclear reactions occur and how nuclear power plants work, we have a basic understanding of nuclear energy and how we came to our current issue (I'm sorry if chemistry and history are both things that are not very interesting to you, but they were necessary to understand this debate).  Over the next several weeks, we will look at the benefits and consequences of nuclear energy.  Next week we will look at the benefits of nuclear energy.