Chernobyl
On April 26th 1983, reactor number 4 at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded. It was the worst Nuclear Disaster in history, reaching a Category 7 on the International Nucelar Event Scale. The reactor was located in what is now the Ukraine, but the radioactive plume created after the explosion spread over all of Europe and even North America. Belarus was the country worst affected, receiving 60% of the fallout. The effects of the disaster are still being felt there today, though it is amazing to see the amount of wildlife that has returned to the area surrounding the site.
Although only 2 workers were killed in the initial steam explosion, the number of people affected by fallout was much higher. There were 237 people directly affected by radiation from the site, mostly firemen and rescue workers, and countless more people who were indirect victims of radiation poisoning.
Vladimir Shevchenko, a Ukranian filmmaker, was the first person on the site with a video camera. With no protection, he filmed workers tunneling under the structure to place concrete in order to stop the building collapsing on itself. He also captured an MI-8 helicopter losing its bearings and crashing into the structure below, killing the two man crew.
Back when I was in primary school, we were given the task of creating a project based on a disaster. While everyone else was building erupting models of Mount Vesuvius, I created a mini-Chernobyl out of paper mache milk cartons and toilet rolls. The melted reactor core was simulated using a wound ferrite rod from an old radio, and to top it all off I added some cotton ball smoke, cellophane flames and a flashing battery powered light.
Chernobyl project I made as a kid
The reactor that exploded was far more complicated than my model. It was an RBMK-1000, capable of producing 1000MW of electric power. The Chernobyl site had four of these reactors, the last two of which only went out of service in December 2000.
This reactor design is now quite old, but it is interesting to note that 70% of Lithuania’s energy is still produced by an RBMK located at the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, albeit a supercharged version producing 1360MW. Originally, two of these reactors were in operation there, accounting for 80% of Lithuania’s power production. Number one was decommissioned in December 2004, as a condition of Lithuania’s entry into the EU. Number two is expected to close in 2009, to make way for a new plant with 3000 to 3200 megawatt capacity.
During my travels through Europe, I noticed a few nuclear power plants from the windows of buses and trains. France is the country most dependent on nuclear energy, at 87.5%, with Lithuania taking second place. So will Australia ever adopt this technology?
At the moment, 90% of our energy comes from gas and coal. As supplies run short, the demand for alternative energy increases. Australia has about one third of the world’s known uranium resources, and it accounts for 22% of all international uranium production. With all that potential on our doorstep, what is stopping us from turning it into a viable energy solution?
As Dr. Ziggy Switkowski, chairman of ANSTO, says “it’s kind of interesting when you travel around the world and you discuss with these nuclear-powered countries Australia’s thinking, they’re a bit perplexed as to why we find it hard to take that step to go all the way to nuclear electricity because for them it’s turned out to be clean, efficient, the technology is reliable, it’s now off the shelf and most of the historical issues associated with the management of the spent fuel rods etc … lend themselves to relatively straightforward engineering solutions.”
With increasing focus on climate change, and Australia’s recent ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, it is now our responsibility to search for cleaner forms of energy that reduce our carbon emissions. Nuclear power produces almost no emissions, and methods of effectively disposing of spent fuel rods have been developed quite extensively.
There are other issues to consider, though. Nuclear power has a high startup and capital cost, but low fuel cost. Building a reactor costs billions of dollars, and during the lifetime of a project (40-60 years) it may only just recoup the operating, construction, and decommissioning expenses.
Regardless of Nuclear Power’s advantages and disadvantages, there is still something quite primitive about our reliance on fossil fuel. To paraphrase James May in episode three of Big Ideas, “it’s amazing that despite all of mankind’s modern achievements, our primary source of energy is derived by digging a hole, extracting a lump of rock made from million year-old dead trees and animals, and setting fire to it.”
Although fears of a Chernobyl-like catastrophe are not without ground, it is important to take incidents like these and learn from them what we can. In the wrong conditions, nuclear power has the potential to destroy, but if we take the necessary precautions and learn from our mistakes, nuclear power is a step towards the future. And that’s a step in the right direction.
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