NUCLEAR ENERGY
Benefits
Benefits
Nuclear energy, already deployed widely with a variety of purposes, is safe, saves lives, and reduces pollution
- Kharecha and Hansen 13
- Global nuclear power has prevented:
- 1.84 million deaths related to** air pollution
- 64 gigatonnes of CO2 emissions that would have resulted from fossil fuel burning
- On the basis of global projection data that take into account the effects of the Fukushima accident, nuclear power could, by midcentury, additionally prevent:
- an average of 4.2 hundred thousand to 7.04 million deaths
- 80 to 240 gigatonnes CO2 emissions due to fossil fuels
- World Nuclear Association 19
- Nuclear energy now provides about 10% of the world’s electricity from about 450 power reactors.
- Over 50 countries utilise nuclear energy in about 225 research reactors.
- These reactors are used for the production of medical and industrial isotopes, as well as for training.
- Center for Nuclear Science and Technology Information of the American Nuclear Society
- Pollution prevented from being released into the atmosphere:
- 5.1 million tons of sulfur dioxide
- 2.4 million tons of nitrogen oxide
- 164 million metric tons of carbon
- Material Cost — one kg of Uranium is the approximate equivalent of:
- 42 gallons of oil
- 1 ton of coal
- 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas
- Monetary Cost:
- Nuclear plants: 2.40 cents per kilowatt-hour
- Coal-fired plants: 3.27 cents
- Oil: 22.48 cents
- Gas: 3.40 cents
- Efficiency
- Nuclear power plant capacity factors: over 85%.
- Fossil fired plants: 50-60%
- Solar and wind: 30% or lower