Transcript How Nuclear Power Works - Darien Men`s Association

How Nuclear Power Works
How Nuclear Power Works
by
Dr. Bob Masterson
MIT ScD. (Nuclear Engineering)
Harvard MBA (emeritus)
Affiliate Professor, Virginia Tech
President, Cornerstone Technology Partners
How Nuclear Power Works
• Reactors produce energy by “burning” several
different types of Uranium, which is a common
“nuclear fuel” used in nuclear power plants today
• The uranium we find in nature consists of three
different varieties
– U-234
– U-235
– U-238
but only one of these varieties can be used to
produce electric power directly
How Nuclear Power Works
• The others just absorb nuclear particles
and do not produce energy directly
• Does anyone have any idea what variety
of Uranium this is ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• The Answer is U-235
• The most common variety of the element
Uranium – U-238 can absorb a neutron and
produce Plutonium-239, which is another
important nuclear fuel, but it does not
produce nuclear power directly
How Nuclear Power Works
• U-235 produces energy by absorbing
neutrons (common nuclear particles) and
splitting apart or “fissioning”
• In fact, for you “Dark Matter” enthusiasts,
about 40% of the visible matter in the
universe today consists of these ordinary
neutrons.
• (Most of the rest of it is protons)
How Nuclear Power Works
• When a U-235 nucleus absorbs a free neutron
with just the right energy, it splits apart and
releases some additional energy in the process
• This process is called nuclear fission, and the
reactors which use this process to produce
nuclear power are called fission reactors.
• This is because the mass of the particles coming
out of the reaction is less than the mass of the
particles going into the reaction
How Nuclear Power Works
• From Einstein’s equation
E = mc2
the total energy released is
E = mc2
where m is the difference between the
mass of the particles going into the reaction
and the mass of the particles coming out of
the reaction
How Nuclear Power Works
• The process of nuclear fission is illustrated in the figure below
Path 2
Standard Fission
FP 1
83 %
Chance
FP 2
U-236

n
U-235
Stable
17 %
Chance
U-236
Path 1
U-236*
U-236
Radiative Capture
• Fission involves splitting apart very heavy elements and only uranium
and plutonium can be split apart in this way
How Nuclear Power Works
• Energy can also be produced by “fusing”
together very light elements. This process is
known as nuclear fusion.
• An example of the fusion process is shown on
the next page
• The process of nuclear fusion is used by our sun
and other stars to generate heat, light, and
power
• However, for a variety of reasons, a practical
fusion reactor is probably 100 years away
How Nuclear Power Works
• The nuclear fusion and the nuclear fission
process compared together
Comparing fission and fusion
Fission Process
Neutron
Fusion Process
Deuterium
Tritium
U-235
U-236
Neutron
Ba-144
Kr-89
Helium
How Nuclear Power Works
• Does anybody have any idea how many
nuclear fissions it takes per second to
produce 1 Watt of electric power ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• The answer is that it takes about 100
billion fissions per second to generate one
Watt of useful power.
• Hence, trillions of U-235 atoms have to be
split apart every second to produce the
huge amounts of electric power that a
typical nuclear power plant produces today
How Nuclear Power Works
• Unfortunately there is not a lot of U-235 in
the Uranium ore we mine today to produce
all of this power
• As a matter of fact, there is about 150 times
less U-235 than there is U-238 in natural
uranium ore
• So why is there so little U-235?
• Did we get unlucky when the universe was
made ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• No
• It turns out that we have more than our fair
share of uranium compared to other
planets on a cosmic scale
How Nuclear Power Works
• The amount of uranium compared to other
elements in the universe is shown in the
slide on the next page
• On average, we got about 10,000 times
more than the average planet gets
How Nuclear Power Works
• Here is the natural abundance of the
elements in the universe as a whole:
12
H
11
10
He
Relative Abundance of the Elements in the Universe
Natural Abundance (Log10)
9
8
O
C
Ne
7
Fe
Si S
6
N
Ar Ca
5
4
Na
3
Ni
Ti
Co
F
Li
Cu
Zr
V
B
1
Nuclear Fuels like Uranium
and Thorium
Zn
P
2
Ga
Sc
Te Xe
Mo
Sn
Ba
Pt
As
0
W
Be
-1
The abundance of Si
is normalized to 106
Nb
Au
Pr
-2
Pb
Hg
Bi
Re
Th
-3
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
55
Atomic number, Z
60
65
70
75
80
85
90
U
95
How Nuclear Power Works
• In the Earth’s crust, the uranium is not located in
the just one place
Russia
Canada
Kazakhstan
USA
Uzbekistan
Brazil
Namibia
South Africa
Hard ores
Soft ores Each globe represents 0.1 Tg uranium
Australia
How Nuclear Power Works
• The universe was created in a colossal explosion of
space and time that occurred about 15 Billion years
ago
• In the world we live in to day, this explosion has
become known as the Big Bang
• Most of the elements in the universe were created in
the Big Bang, but the uranium we mine on the Earth
today was not !
• Does anybody have any idea where the uranium on
the Earth today came from ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• The history of the universe from the beginning of time until
today
Beginning
The
Universe
Today
of Time
14
How Nuclear Power Works
• All of the hydrogen and the helium in the
universe were created in the Big Bang but
most of the heavier elements such Iron,
Carbon, Aluminum, Nickel, and Chromium
that our industrial society is based upon
were not
• Does anybody have any idea where these
heavy elements came from ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• These heavy elements were produced after the universe
was born by “cooking” them in the cores of stars such as
our sun
• In other words, they were produced by Nuclear fusion when
lighter elements such as Hydrogen and Helium were fused
together
• However, this process stops with the element Iron and
heavy elements such as Uranium CANNOT be produced in
this way
• So where did the Uranium that we find on the Earth come
from ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• The Uranium on the Earth today was produced by the
gravitational collapse of massive stars called Super Novas
• When these stars died, they exploded and spewed their
“guts” back into empty space
• Eventually this material condensed into planets and other
stars
• The Earth and the Sun are examples of the remains of
these Super Novas today
• In other words, the gravity during the gravitational collapse
“squeezed” the energy into the Uranium ore that we are
trying to extract from it today
How Nuclear Power Works
• An example of the remnants of one of these supernova
explosions is shown in the figure on the next slide
• This is a picture of the Crab Nebula that Chinese
astronomers saw explode about 1000 years ago
• (They didn’t understand what exploded at the time)
• This picture was taken by the Hubble Space telescope
• The different colors in the image represent the different
elements that were produced by the explosion of this Super
Nova
How Nuclear Power Works
• A picture of the Crab Nebula as seen by the Hubble Space
telescope
How Nuclear Power Works
• When the Earth was first formed about 5
billion years ago (the universe is much
older than this), there was almost as much
U-235 as U-238
• However, the U-235 got cut in half every
700 million years (because that was it’s
radioactive half life), while the U-238 got
cut in half every 2.8 billion years
How Nuclear Power Works
• So if you play this scenario out over the
life of the planet (which is about 5 billion
years), it turns out that there was about 64
times more U-235 (relative to U-238) when
the Earth was first formed than there is
today
How Nuclear Power Works
• This means that the Earth was a once a
very hot and radioactive place (about 5
billion years ago) !
• In fact, it was so hot that most scientists
believe that the radiation (from the decay
of the U-235) kept the Earth’s crust molten
for about a Billion years
How Nuclear Power Works
• In fact, this excess uranium even created
its own natural nuclear reactors that
burned on their own for millions of years.
• The best known example of these reactors
are the great natural nuclear reactors of
Oklo, which are located in the West
African country of Gabon today
How Nuclear Power Works
• These reactors burned for millions of years
and released more energy than most
atomic bombs !
• The remains of one of these great natural
nuclear reactors is shown in the figure on
the next page
How Nuclear Power Works
• A picture of the remains of one of the great natural
nuclear reactors of Oklo
How Nuclear Power Works
• In fact, these reactors burned hundreds of times longer
than the age of the great pyramids of Egypt such as the
great pyramid of Kufu shown below
How Nuclear Power Works
• They burned up a lot of the Earth’s Uranium235 in the process
• These nuclear reactors operated peacefully
(and not so peacefully) for millions of years
• Hence, the first nuclear reactors on Earth
were of natural origin and were not made by
man (Some conspiracy theorists believe
they were built by aliens)
How Nuclear Power Works
• As a point of comparison, the average
lifetime of a nuclear power plant today is
about 50 years
• (Some people are trying to extend the
lifetime of these plants to about 100 years)
How Nuclear Power Works
• Over time, the Earth cooled, and most of
the remaining uranium sunk to the planet’s
core
• Why ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• Because it is so heavy !
• However, some of it still remains in the
Earth’s crust and in the oceans of the
world today
• The concentration over time is shown in
the graph on the next page
How Nuclear Power Works
• The U-235 and U-238 concentrations in
the Earth’s crust over time
Historical abundance (Percent)
U-235 in the Earth's Crust as a Function of Time
100.00
90.00
80.00
Relative Abundance in Percent
70.00
60.00
50.00
40.00
30.00
Present
20.00
10.00
0.00
0
1
2
3
4
5
Increments of 704 Million Years
6
7
8
How Nuclear Power Works
• Today, the average concentration of
Uranium in the Earth’s crust is about 3
parts per million (3 PPM)
• Moreover, the average concentration of
Uranium in the Earth’s oceans, which is
dissolved in ordinary seawater, is about 3
parts per billion(3 PPB)
How Nuclear Power Works
• The most common uranium ore deposits in
the world today are shown in the picture on
the next page.
• Notice that the majority of the world’s uranium
ore can be found in just a dozen countries
• Very little (if any) uranium can be found in the
Oil-rich Mid East
• When the oil runs out, the Sheiks will be in
trouble !
How Nuclear Power Works
Russia
Canada
Kazakhstan
USA
Uzbekistan
Brazil
Namibia
South Africa
Hard ores
Soft ores Each globe represents 0.1 Tg uranium
Australia
How Nuclear Power Works
• Notice that the United States currently has
the world’s 6th largest supply of natural
uranium ore (the original Soviet Union plus
Kazakhstan had the largest)
• So what are Putin and Hillary Clinton up to ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• In total there are at least 6 million tons of
uranium available to be mined, and that
only 1 million tons, or 15 % of it has been
extracted to date.
• A large percentage of this amount found
its way into nuclear weapons during the
Cold War, and it is currently being recycled
for peaceful purposes.
How Nuclear Power Works
• In fact, uranium is more common in the
Earth’s crust than either gold or silver !
• It is about 450 times more common than
gold and about 25 times more common
than silver, so on a planetary scale, we are
fortunate to have as much uranium as we
do
How Nuclear Power Works
• In an average year, all of the nuclear
reactors on the Earth only burn 70,000
metric tons of this Uranium
• And these 70,000 metric tons produce
about 20 % of the world’s electric power !
• In some countries such as France, the
percentage of electricity produced by
nuclear power plants is even higher
How Nuclear Power Works
• As a matter of fact, France is about 80 %
nuclear today
• Does anyone have any idea how “nuclear”
the United States is ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• Answer:
• Today about 20% of the electric power in
the United States is produced by nuclear
power plants
• However, this percentage could be
considerably larger if the politicians were
not so scared of it
How Nuclear Power Works
• Most of this fear is irrational and in an
average year, about 100 times more
people die from flumes and pollutants from
coal and gas fired power plants in the
United States than they do from all of the
nuclear power plants in the world
combined !
How Nuclear Power Works
• The number of nuclear power plants and
the amount of their electricity produced by
nuclear power is compared on the next few
slides
• Notice that China and India are building
large numbers of new nuclear power plants
over the next couple of years
• They are certainly not afraid of it !
How Nuclear Power Works
History of the Global Nuclear Power Industry
300
city
d Capa
Realize
ity
ac
ap
C
d
lle
sta
200
In
100
Power (Giga-watts)
400
0
Fukushima
500
400
s
tor
ac tion
e
lR c
na nstru
o
i
dit Co
Ad der
Un
300
Active Reactors
200
100
0
1955
1960
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
2015
Number of
Power Reactors
Chernobyl
Three Mile
Island
How Nuclear Power Works
How Nuclear Power Works
Number of Reactors under Construction
China
Russia
India
United States
South Korea
Japan
Taiwan
Pakistan
Slovenia
Ukraine
Argentina
Germany
Brazil
Finland
France
UAE
0
5
10
15
20
Number of Reactors
25
30
How Nuclear Power Works
How Nuclear Power Works
• There are currently about 500 nuclear power
plants in the world today (not including
research reactors and test reactors)
• This number is expected to double to about
1000 reactors over the next 50 years
How Nuclear Power Works
• Moreover, the cost of generating electricity
from nuclear power plants is about half of the
cost of electricity from other energy sources
• In fact, it is two to three times less expensive
than the cost of electricity produced by most
alternative energy sources
How Nuclear Power Works
• Why ?
• Because after a nuclear power plant is
built and put in operation, the annual fuel
cycle costs are about 3 times lower than
they are for a coal-fired power plant and
even some natural gas powered plants
How Nuclear Power Works
• The costs of generating electric power
from a nuclear power plant are compared
to the costs of generating electric power
from other power plants in the slide on the
next page
How Nuclear Power Works
Fuel as a Percentage of Electric Power Generation Costs since Y2K
8%
Conversion
Fabrication
15%
Waste Fund
Fuel
31%
31%
Enrichment
O&M
69%
42%
Uranium ore
4%
Fuel
78 %
O&M
22%
Coal
Fuel
86%
O&M 14%
Natural Gas
Nuclear
The Nuclear
Fuel Cycle
How Nuclear Power Works
• So unless you want your electric bill to be
two or three times higher than it is today,
nuclear power is by far the most cost
effective large scale alternative to produce
electric power
• The average nuclear power plant produces
electricity and delivers it to a retail consumer
in the United States for a price of between 9
and 10 cents per kilowatt hour
How Nuclear Power Works
• Some commercial companies can get this
electric power for between 6 and 7 cents per
kilowatt hour
• Consequently, as long as there is enough
investment capital to build nuclear power plants,
and the cost of this capital is low, nuclear power
is “dirt cheap” compared to other large-scale
power sources (except hydro) because the cost
of the fuel is so low (the water is free)
How Nuclear Power Works
• So what happens if the cost of the nuclear
fuel (i.e., the Uranium) gets really high – like
oil did during the oil crisis in the 1980’s ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• It turns out that it doesn’t matter much
because even if the cost of Uranium
triples, the cost of your electric bill will only
go up by 50% !
How Nuclear Power Works
• Let’s finish our presentation by examining
why this is true.
How Nuclear Power Works
• Over the years, the price of the natural
Uranium used to make nuclear fuel has
averaged about $100 per kilogram (or
about $50 per pound).
• If you are a commodity or hedge fund guy,
it’s historical price performance is shown
on the next slide
How Nuclear Power Works
• So here is the spot price of uranium since 1972
How Nuclear Power Works
• This is the spot price for a refined version of
uranium ore called uranium yellowcake that
is used to make nuclear fuel rods
• Uranium yellowcake has about the same
consistency as a sack of premixed concrete
(but it is somewhat heavier)
• From the slide on the next page, you can
see that it has a bright yellow color
How Nuclear Power Works
• A picture of Uranium Yellowcake (right) which is
used to make nuclear fuel rods and the uranium
ore called Pitchblende from which it is made (left)
How Nuclear Power Works
• Pure uranium that is extracted from this yellowcake
is a silvery metal that has a dull grey surface similar
to that of a silver coin
• When it is put in nuclear fuel rods, it is combined
with two oxygen atoms to form a ceramic compound
called Uranium dioxide or UO2
• Uranium dioxide has about the same melting point
as the heat tiles on the US space shuttle so it is
very hard to melt – even in a nuclear power plant
How Nuclear Power Works
• Whatever you do, don’t lick it or put it near
water !
• Why ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• Pictures of metallic uranium and the uranium
dioxide used to make nuclear fuel rods are
shown on the next slide.
• Normally the fabrication and the enrichment
costs for natural uranium are less than the
costs of the raw uranium ore !
How Nuclear Power Works
• Pure uranium metal (left) and uranium dioxide fuel
pellets which are made from it (right)
How Nuclear Power Works
• The uranium dioxide that is used in nuclear fuel rods has
about the same melting point as the heat tiles that are used
on the US Space Shuttle. They look a lot alike – don’t they ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• It turns out that even if all the uranium in
the Earth’s crust runs out, and there is no
more uranium left to be mined, we can still
extract it from seawater.
• As a matter of fact, the Japanese are
doing this today !
• An example of this process is shown on
the next slide
How Nuclear Power Works
• A jar of uranium extracted from ordinary sea water
A jar of uranium
yellowcake (U3O8)
extracted from
ordinary sea water
How Nuclear Power Works
• In other words, this process just requires a
lot of membranes with a large surface area
located on the sea floor !
• Now let us examine how much this process
costs
How Nuclear Power Works
• The current cost of extracting natural uranium
from seawater turns out to be about $300 per
kilogram (according to the World Nuclear
Association).
• So if it ever comes to the point where all of the
uranium in the Earth’s crust runs out and we
have to get it from seawater, there is enough
uranium dissolved in the oceans of the world to
last millions of years, and the price of it will
never get higher than about $300 per kilogram !
How Nuclear Power Works
• Someday most of the world’s uranium may be
extracted from sea water !
Cost of electric power (cents per kwH)
16¢
15¢
14¢
13¢
12¢
Seawater
extraction
becomes
economically
viable
11¢
10¢
9¢
8¢
0
100
200
300
Cost of natural uranium (USD per kilogram)
400
How Nuclear Power Works
• This means that if the capital costs of
building nuclear power plants remain
about the same, the cost of generating
nuclear power from these plants will never
be more than 50% higher per kilowatt hour
than it is today – even a million years from
now (if we happen to last that long)
How Nuclear Power Works
• So based on the charts we have just presented,
it did not make economic sense for Vladimir
Putin (with Hillary Clinton’s help) to buy 20 % of
the domestic uranium production in the United
States
• The Japanese will put them out of business if it
ever gets down to getting uranium out of
seawater !
How Nuclear Power Works
• If fact, we can ask them to build a uranium
production plant for us in the Gulf of Mexico
using unemployed Mexican and American
workers to construct it
• We hope they didn’t pay a lot of money for
their high-powered investment advice
• We could have certainly told them what to do
for a lot less, and they probably would have
been a lot better off as the result of it !
How Nuclear Power Works
• This concludes our presentation for today
• Thank you for listening to our presentation
• Questions ?
How Nuclear Power Works
• Note: Our book that describes everything
we have presented in the talk is coming out
later this year.
• The name of the book name is “Nuclear
Engineering Fundamentals” by Dr. Robert
Masterson
• It’s retail price is projected to be about $150
• You can probably get a copy of it from
Amazon for about $100
How Nuclear Power Works
• The ISBN number is # 97814822214970
• We also do some energy consulting and
high level energy strategy for hedge funds
and people like the alternative energy
group at Goldman Sachs.
• If you think we can help you out, please let
us know
How Nuclear Power Works
• There are lots of different reactors in the
world today and a lot of people don’t know
what the best ones are to buy
• The nuclear utilities in the United States
are going to have to make a lot of tough
decisions in this area over the next couple
of years
How Nuclear Power Works
• Our email address is
• [email protected]
• Office and cell phones are
• (917)-965-5768 (Office)
• (917)-841-9799 (Cell)
• We hope you enjoyed the talk !
How Nuclear Power Works
• A copy of the talk is posted on the DMA
website
• Bob Smith can also get you in touch with me
directly if you want (we go back to the Stone
Age together)