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64 | Closing the Civilian Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Spent Nuclear Fuel: The Opportunity and the Challenge Written by Michael R. Greenberg, based in part on an interview with Paul Lisowski, with comments by Thomas H. Isaacs Background Federal elected officials, Department of Energy staff, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, utilities that rely on nuclear power, environmental advocate groups, and other parties with an interest in the energy future of the United States face the difficult challenge of making informed judgments and decisions about the management of spent (used) civilian nuclear fuel. (See “Managing the Nuclear Weapons Legacy.”) Traditionally, nuclear fuel, once used in a nuclear power reactor, is referred to as “spent nuclear fuel” in the United States because the United States has not recycled the fuel to recover the unused energy potential remaining. Typically, 1% to 5% of the energy potential of nuclear fuel in a typical light water reactor is used currently, with over 90% of the energy potential theoretically available for recovery and recycle if the fuel is used in a fast reactor. Thus, the phrase “used nuclear fuel” may be more appropriate than “spent nuclear fuel.” One key current issue is whether the U.S. government should pursue reprocessing this spent fuel to extract and recycle the reusable components of the fuels as some select nations are doing. Or should the United States continue its decades-long policy of “once-through” fuel usage where the spent fuel is stored for ultimate permanent disposal, likely to be at least decades away? This fundamental question, which has been continuously discussed over the past 30 or more years, is now emerging as a key issue along with energy concerns, resource utilization, economic, security, and waste management implications . The challenges and opportunities derive from increasing energy demand, domestic and international politics, and ultimately science and technology . This section summarizes these challenges and ties them to the civilian nuclear fuel cycle. Closing the Civilian Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Spent Nuclear Fuel | 65 The United States, the European Union, China, India, Japan, and many other nations of the world with growing economies face the shared challenge of meeting increasing global demand for energy. The U.S. Department of Energy has estimated that world nuclear energy consumption will increase 57% between 2004 and 2030. The largest increases are clearly expected to be in Asia, South America, and Africa, much more than in the developed countries of Europe and North America (EIA, 2006). In the United States, in addition to an increase in energy demand, there is a growing awareness that we cannot continue our reliance on coal to meet base load electrical generation. One reason is growing evidence that global warming has been occurring largely driven by the emissions from the burning of fossil fuels. (See “Sustainability” and “Global Warming and Fuel Sources.”) A second is increasingly stringent fine particulate emission standards. Base load power stations are the workhorses of the electricity system, continuously generating electricity. They halt production only when outages occur and for planned maintenance. In contrast to base load facilities, peak power stations use natural gas and, less often, diesel oil to supply additional electricity during peak demands , typically during the summer when air-conditioning use is high. (Peak load stations typically can start generating electricity in 30 minutes or less, but they are expensive to operate per kilowatt hour produced.) In short, the United States and its counterparts require a reliable source of base load energy production. The great majority of increase in that base load will almost surely be provided by coal or nuclear energy for some time to come. Other options are either intermittent (such as solar and wind), often located far from where the energy is needed (such as with tidal power), or exceedingly expensive until major new technical advances are made (such as with solar electric). We will need and must pursue all effective solutions, but nuclear likely will be among the most important in the coming decades. Nuclear fuel is one way of meeting the expected global and domestic increase in electricity demand. Worldwide 439 nuclear power plants are operating , another 36 are being constructed, and over 200 are planned (EIA, 2006; World Nuclear Association, 2008). It is plausible that there could be hundreds more new nuclear reactors built during this century to meet the growth in base load electricity needs. The United States has a “once through” fuel cycle. That is, ore is mined, enriched, and then light water reactor fuel is fabricated. The...

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