• Question: Is nuclear power the answer to tackling climate change or security of supply.

    Asked by emmapritchard to Laura, Lily, Mark, Paul, Sarah on 21 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by seeraylove, highburyzmz, milliegollifer.
    • Photo: Sarah Bardsley

      Sarah Bardsley answered on 18 Jun 2010:

      Great question. I think we should have a mix of energy sources. So we should have nuclear power stations, wind farms, turbines in rivers and solar cells. We should have big stations which can service a lot of people but we should also have many smaller energy generation centres which supply energy for local communities. This way we can produce cleaner energy to support our growing population in a less environmentally damaging way. Plus making it at home means we can control its production and generate income for our economy. We also need to focus on using less energy. This is the ultimate way to reduce our environmental impact.

    • Photo: Laura Maliszewski

      Laura Maliszewski answered on 20 Jun 2010:

      Nuclear power could be one component of achieving a sustainable energy infrastructure.

    • Photo: Mark Roberts

      Mark Roberts answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      It’s certainly one of the possible answers as it does allow us to produce the electricity we are all used to using without producing lots of CO2

      However there are other options such as hydro, solar, tidal, wind, etc which will also form part of the solution as will being more efficient with the energy we use.

    • Photo: Paul Roche

      Paul Roche answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      Nuclear power is probably one solution, but it takes a lot of energy and money to build a nuclear power station, and then we have the very nasty by-products. Ideally, we need to solve the problem of nuclear fusion (the process that powers stars) rather than just using nuclear fission (splitting atoms, which is what our current reactors do).

      If we can build a fusion reactor that generates power (currently we have to put more energy in than we get out – so that’s rubbish as a power supply…), we will have made an enormous leap forward. But that requires a lot of money and research time, so if we ever do solve that problem, it may be years of decades in the future.

      I would like to see much more renewable energy, especially tidal and geothermal power – our Earth releases a huge amount of energy every day, but most of that is “wasted” (in terms of what humans do with it). If we could tap into just a small fraction of the Earth’s energy, we could power all of our cities etc. – but cars, planes and similar machines would still need their own independent power supplies, so you would still need something to replace oil.

      Security of supply is always going to be difficult, and will mainly be a question of global politics – and as resources start to run out (especially water, oil and gas), control of th eremaining supplies will give some countries a lot of power (but potentially put the smaller ones in a lot of danger, if bigger countries want what they have…).

    • Photo: Lily Asquith

      Lily Asquith answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      Yes, I think it is.

      Nuclear power has a bad name because of the radioactuive waste it tends to produce. This is certainly true of uranium. But there are other ways- thorium is an element that can be used in nuclear power plants, that does not produce lots of nasty radioactive waste and is abundant in America, making the problem with security of supply less difficult for the Western world.

      I don’t know masses about this, but from listening to colleagues who do I would say that nuclear power is the way forward.

      The sun is a nuclear reactor, so really nuclear power is the most `natural’ source of power that there is!

Comments