Nuclear Power in Latin America: An Overview of Its Present Status

1983 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 377-415 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margarete K. Luddemann
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Field Studies ◽  
Energy Agency ◽  
Self Sufficiency ◽  
Policy Concern ◽  
Alternative Sources

The pivotal role energy plays in national economics not only converts the access to sources of supply into a vivid issue of foreign policy concern, but also causes an understandable preoccupation with investment capabilities and self-sufficiency. A report prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 1974 predicted a bright future for nuclear energy in the i developing countries and encouraged use of this form of energy after numerous field studies.A nation that commits itself to nuclear energy by purchasing nuclear power-generating technology but not fuel cycle facilities incurs the risk of becoming dependent upon the supplier country because a quick switch to alternative sources of supply is difficult in cases of curtailment of fuel.

scholarly journals LEGAL PERSPECTIVES ON NUCLEAR ENERGY AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN MALAYSIA

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 169-188
Author(s):  
Farahdilah Ghazali ◽  
Abdul Haseeb Ansari ◽  
Maizatun Mustafa ◽  
Wan Mohd Zulhafiz Wan Zahari
Keyword(s):  
Power Generation ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Energy Security ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Atomic Energy ◽  
Nuclear Power Generation ◽  
Power Sector ◽  
Energy Agency

This paper explores the potential of nuclear energy, particularly in the power sector, to solve energy challenges and to address the pertinent issues regarding energy sustainability in Malaysia. The deployment of nuclear energy in various developed and developing countries has conspicuously helped sustaining energy security and sustainability due to its compatibility and protection of the environment. In addition to energy security, nuclear energy also offers significant benefits to socio-economic aspects. Thus, nuclear energy in developing countries, including Malaysia, has the potential to emerge as a new prospect in the energy sector using sophisticated technology and expert personnel to maximize the energy benefits with the least environmental risk. This step would certainly meet future energy demands and help accelerate the country’s development with optimum energy generation in the country. Therefore, Malaysia should aim to resort to nuclear power generation whereby the current power sector is mainly generated by traditional means, with only a small fraction of it being renewable energy. With no experience in this field, Malaysia needs to establish collaboration with some country rich with nuclear-resource in order to build, maintain nuclear reactors and treat nuclear wastes. The development of such facility should also comply with the requirements of the International Atomic Energy Agency. Moreover, Malaysia has to introduce legislation and policies related to future nuclear energy. Thus, this paper discusses some of the pertinent issues related to the prospects of nuclear power generation in the country towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).   Keywords: Atomic energy, energy security, governance, sustainable development.   Cite as: Ghazali, F., Ansari, A. H., Mustafa, M., & Wan Zahari, W. M. Z. (2020). Legal perspectives on nuclear energy and sustainable development in Malaysia. Journal of Nusantara Studies, 5(1), 169-188. http://dx.doi.org/10.24200/jonus.vol5iss1pp169-188

Transmutation and the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership

2006 ◽  
Vol 985 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Bresee
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Energy Use ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Spent Fuel ◽  
Closed Fuel Cycle ◽  
State Of The Union ◽  
Foreign Countries ◽  
The U.S

AbstractIn the January 2006 State of the Union address, President Bush announced a new Advanced Energy Initiative, a significant part of which is the Global Nuclear Energy Initiative. Its details were described on February 6, 2006 by the U.S. Secretary of Energy. In summary, it has three parts: (1) a program to expand nuclear energy use domestically and in foreign countries to support economic growth while reducing the release of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide. (2) an expansion of the U.S. nuclear infrastructure that will lead to the recycling of spent fuel and a closed fuel cycle and, through transmutation, a reduction in the quantity and radiotoxicity of nuclear waste and its proliferation concerns, and (3) a partnership with other fuel cycle nations to support nuclear power in additional nations by providing small nuclear power plants and leased fuel with the provision that the resulting spent fuel would be returned by the lessee to the lessor. The final part would have the effect of stabilizing the number of fuel cycle countries with attendant non-proliferation value. Details will be given later in the paper.

Scenario Analysis on the Benefits of Multi-National Cooperation for the Development of a Common Nuclear Energy System Based on PWR and LFR Fleets

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marco Ciotti ◽  
Jorge L. Manzano ◽  
Vladimir Kuznetsov ◽  
Galina Fesenko ◽  
Luisa Ferroni ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Proper Time ◽  
Nuclear Fuel Cycle ◽  
Levelized Cost Of Electricity ◽  
Base Load

Financial aspects, environmental concerns and non-favorable public opinion are strongly conditioning the deployment of new Nuclear Energy Systems across Europe. Nevertheless, new possibilities are emerging to render competitive electricity from Nuclear Power Plants (NPPs) owing to two factors: the first one, which is the fast growth of High Voltage lines interconnecting the European countries’ national electrical grids, this process being triggered by huge increase of the installed intermittent renewable electricity sources (Wind and PV); and the second one, determined by the carbon-free constraints imposed on the base load electricity generation. The countries that due to public opinion pressure can’t build new NPPs on their territory may find it profitable to produce base load nuclear electricity abroad, even at long distances, in order to comply with the European dispositions on the limitation of the CO2 emissions. In this study the benefits from operating at multinational level with the deployment of a fleet of PWRs and subsequently, at a proper time, the one of Lead Fast Reactors (LFRs) are analyzed. The analysis performed involves Italy (a country with a current moratorium on nuclear power on spite that its biggest utility operates NPPs abroad), and the countries from South East and Central East Europe potentially looking for introduction or expansion of their nuclear power programmes. According to the predicted evolution of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) a forecast of the electricity consumption evolution for the present century is derived with the assumption that a certain fraction of it will be covered by nuclear electricity. In this context, evaluated are material balances for the front and the back end of nuclear fuel cycle associated with the installed nuclear capacity. A key element of the analysis is the particular type of LFR assumed in the scenario, characterized by having a fuel cycle where only fission products and the reprocessing losses are sent for disposition and natural or depleted uranium is added to fuel in each reprocessing cycle. Such LFR could be referred to as “adiabatic reactor”. Owing to introduction of such reactors a substantive reduction in uranium consumption and final disposal requirements can be achieved. Finally, the impacts of the LFR and the economy of scale in nuclear fuel cycle on the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) are being evaluated, for scaling up from a national to a multinational dimension, illustrating the benefits potentially achievable through cooperation among countries.

Global non-proliferation policies: retrospect and prospect

1982 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Nuclear Proliferation ◽  
The United States ◽  
United States Government ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
Supply Contracts ◽  
Energy Agency ◽  
States Government ◽  
The Relationship

The 1980 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference will chiefly be remembered for the inability of the delegates to agree on a final document. There were several visible reasons for this, some related to the immediate political concerns of the participants, some linked to the nature of the treaty itself. The statements of the participating states indicated that they held differing conceptions of the purposes of the treaty, and possessed very diverse views on the action that should be taken to achieve them. Four sets of assertions dominated the discussions: that the nuclear states had not fulfilled their obligation to negotiate measures of nuclear disarmament as specified in Article VI of the treaty; that the advanced industrial states had not fulfilled their obligations to assist and encourage the global development of peaceful uses of nuclear energy contained in both Articles IV and V of the treaty; that the attempts by the United States government to discharge its obligations under the 1978 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act by threatening to terminate fuel supply contracts to both treaty parties and non-parties, unless they accepted International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards on all their nuclear installations, was inequitable and improper (the same accusation was also directed at Canada); and that the major danger of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East and Africa originated in the threats posed to the states in these regions by the regimes in Israel and South Africa. One issue on which there did appear to be agreement, however, was that the safeguards regime foreshadowed by Article III of the treaty had functioned satisfactorily, in that no Feaches of it had been reported to the Review Conference by the IAEA. Yet the differing interpretations of the balance of rights and obligations contained in the treaty masks a much deeper set of issues: what precisely is the problem of nuclear proliferation, to what extent is the predominant diplomatic rhetoric of nuclear non-proliferation discussions unrepresentative of the real concerns and interests of the participants, what was and is the relationship between nuclear weapons and nuclear power, and does the NPT itself address (or was it ever intended to address) the problem of nuclear proliferation in the form in which it seems likely to be encountered in the 1980s?

An Initial Study on Modeling the United States Thermal Fuel Cycle Mass Flow Using Vensim

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Brinton ◽  
Akira Tokuhiro
Keyword(s):  
Mass Flow ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Flow Model ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Spent Fuel ◽  
Uranium Ore ◽  
Plant Construction ◽  
Mox Fuel ◽  
Fuel Fabrication

According to current forecasts, nuclear power plant construction and nuclear-generated electricity production is projected to increase in the next half-century. This is likely due to the fact that nuclear energy is an ‘environmental alternative’ to fossil fuel plants that emit greenhouse gases (GHG). Nuclear power also has a much higher energy density output than other alternative energy sources such as solar, wind, and biomass energies. There is also growing consensus that processing of low- and high-level waste, LLW and HLW respectively, is a political issue rather than a technical challenge. Prudent implementation of a closed fuel cycle not only curbs build-up of GHGs, but can equally mitigate the need to store nuclear used fuel. The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) is promoting gradual integration of fuel reprocessing, and deployment of fast reactors (FRs) into the global fleet for long-term uranium resource usage. The use of mixed oxide (MOX) fuel burning Light Water Reactors (LWR) has also been suggested by fuel cycle researchers. This study concentrated on modeling the construction and decommissioning rates of six major facilities comprising the nuclear fuel cycle, as follows: (1) current LWRs decommissioned at 60-years service life, (2) new LWRs burning MOX fuel, (3) new (Gen’ III+) LWRs to replace units and/or be added to the fleet, (4) new FRs to be added to the fleet, (5) new reprocessing and MOX fuel fabrication facilities and (6) new LWR fuel fabrication facilities. Our initial work [1] focused on modeling the construction and decommissioning rates of reactors to be deployed. This is being followed with a ‘mass flow model’, starting from uranium ore and following it to spent forms. The visual dynamic modeling program Vensim was used to create a system of equations and variables to track the mass flows from enrichment, fabrication, burn-up, and the back-end of the fuel cycle. Sensible construction and deployment rates were benchmarked against recent reports and then plausible scenarios considered parametrically. The timeline starts in 2007 and extends in a preliminary model to 2057; a further mass flow model scenario continues until 2107. The scenarios considered provide estimates of the uranium ore requirements, quantities of LLW and HLW production, and waste storage volume needs. The results of this study suggest the number of reprocessing facilities necessary to stabilize and/or reduce recently reported levels of spent fuel inventory. Preliminary results indicate that the entire national spent fuel inventory produced over the next ∼50 years can be reprocessed by a reprocessing plant construction rate of less than 0.07 plants/year (small capacity) or less than 0.05 plants /year (large capacity). Any larger construction rate could reduce the spent fuel inventory destined for storage. These and additional results will be presented.

scholarly journals International cooperation in the sphere of peaceful uses of nuclear energy as a resolution of energy supply and nuclear proliferation problems

2009 ◽  
pp. 163-174
Author(s):  
M. V. Zharkih
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Nuclear Proliferation ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
The Us ◽  
Made In

Comparative analysis of the Russian and the US initiatives. The article gives an outline of such a promising branch of international cooperation as cooperation in the sphere of peaceful uses of nuclear energy, in particularly its multilateral aspects – initiatives of States based on the multilateral principle of uses of nuclear power. The comparative analysis of the two large-scale initiatives in the field ofmultilateral approaches to the nuclear fuel cycle – these are the Russian initiative on the development of the Global infrastructure of nuclear energy and the American Global nuclear energy partnership –made in the article discloses the main principles of work of the abovementioned mechanisms of interaction as well as their advantages and disadvantages. The goal of such an analysis is to figure out which one has a greater potential for international security and future development of the nuclear energy sector.

scholarly journals Achievability of radiological equivalence associated with closed nuclear fuel cycle with fast reactors: impact of uncertainty factors in scenarios of Russian nuclear power development through to 2100. Part 1. Fast and thermal reactors

2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 62-76
Author(s):  
V.K. Ivanov ◽  
◽  
A.V. Lopatkin ◽  
A.N. Menyajlo ◽  
E.V. Spirin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Energy Development ◽  
Radioactive Wastes ◽  
Fast Reactors ◽  
Power Development ◽  
The Public ◽  
Radiation Risks ◽  
Nuclear Power Development

The Russian Government approved the Energy Strategy of the Russian Federation (Government Decree No.1523-r of June 9, 2020). The Strategy envisages the use of both thermal (TR) and fast (FR) reactors. The Strategy points out that the problems of nuclear power are associated with po-tential high expenses for irradiated fuel and radioactive wastes management. The previously de-signed model of the Russian nuclear energy development suggested that fast reactors only would operate at NPPs after 2010. Radiological equivalence, expressed as the equivalence of lifetime radiation risks to the public from radioactive wastes and from primary uranium ore, was shown to be achieved after 100-year storage. The burnup of 241Am, 237Np и 242Сm in closed nu-clear fuel cycle with fast reactors is a key part in the achievability of radiation risks equivalence. Scenarios of the Russian nuclear energy development through to 2100 with account of uncertain-ty factors in the measurement of contribution of fast and thermal reactors to the electric energy production are considered in the paper. The following three scenarios were developed: uncer-tainty is replaced by FRs; uncertainty is replaced by TRs; 50 per cent of FRs and 50 per cent of TRs replace uncertainty. If the energy is produced by fast reactors only (scenario 1) radiological equivalence was found to be achieved in 412 years. In two other scenarios radiological equiva-lence will be achieved after more than 1000 years. Contribution of main dose-forming radionu-clides and relevant ratios of potential biological hazards is included in models regardless of whether uncertainty in nuclear energy development is taking or not taking into account. Results of the study of conditions for radiological equivalence achievement should be used for amending Strategic plan of Russian nuclear power development through to 2100 that meets requirements of radiation ecology and radiation protection of the public.

La situazione dell'energia nucleare nel mondo: un quadro di sintesi

2009 ◽  
pp. 19-36
Author(s):  
Maurizio Cumo
Keyword(s):  
Radioactive Waste ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Technological Development ◽  
Reactor Technology ◽  
The World ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
Generation Costs ◽  
Jel Classifications

- This article gives an overview of the situation of nuclear power in the world and analyzes the problems of this source of energy from different points of view: the generation costs, fuel cycle, particularly with regard to the resources of uranium and radioactive waste, and the programs of technological development of new reactors.Key words: Nuclear energy, generation costs, uranium resources, radioactive waste, new reactor technology.JEL classifications: L94 Q40 Q31

4. Nuclear power

2019 ◽  
pp. 74-84
Author(s):  
Nick Jenkins
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Electricity Generation ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Fuel Cycle ◽  
Nuclear Reactors ◽  
Nuclear Fission ◽  
Nuclear Fuel Cycle

Of all the sources of energy used for electricity generation, nuclear power is the most contentious with strong opinions both favouring and opposing its use. Some well-known environmentalists consider that the use of nuclear power is essential to limit climate change, while expressing reservations over its environmental impacts. ‘Nuclear power’ explains that there are two mechanisms by which nuclear energy could be used to create heat and so generate power; nuclear fission and fusion. Nuclear power reactors create heat, which is used to make steam that is then passed through a turbine to generate electricity. The nuclear fuel cycle is described along with the different generations of nuclear reactors.

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