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Averting The Danger of Catastrophic Climate Change: Is The Nuclear Renaissance Essential

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Patcharapit Promoppatum

The document summarizes the World Nuclear Association's (WNA) Nuclear Century Outlook, which projects nuclear power's potential growth worldwide through 2100. The Outlook estimates a need for 10,000 nuclear gigawatts of clean energy by 2050 to decarbonize energy systems enough to avoid catastrophic climate change. Even optimistic assumptions about renewables and carbon capture would still require a large contribution from nuclear power, potentially reaching 8,000 gigawatts, to close the clean energy gap. The Outlook implies nuclear power must significantly expand both in existing nuclear countries and through new countries adopting nuclear to help meet environmental goals.

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Averting The Danger of Catastrophic Climate Change: Is The Nuclear Renaissance Essential

Uploaded by

Patcharapit Promoppatum
40 views8 pages
The document summarizes the World Nuclear Association's (WNA) Nuclear Century Outlook, which projects nuclear power's potential growth worldwide through 2100. The Outlook estimates a need for 10,000 nuclear gigawatts of clean energy by 2050 to decarbonize energy systems enough to avoid catastrophic climate change. Even optimistic assumptions about renewables and carbon capture would still require a large contribution from nuclear power, potentially reaching 8,000 gigawatts, to close the clean energy gap. The Outlook implies nuclear power must significantly expand both in existing nuclear countries and through new countries adopting nuclear to help meet environmental goals.

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Averting the Danger of Catastrophic Climate Change: Is the Nuclear Renaissance Essential?

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The document summarizes the World Nuclear Association's (WNA) Nuclear Century Outlook, which projects nuclear power's potential growth worldwide through 2100. The Outlook estimates a need for 10,000 nuclear gigawatts of clean energy by 2050 to decarbonize energy systems enough to avoid catastrophic climate change. Even optimistic assumptions about renewables and carbon capture would still require a large contribution from nuclear power, potentially reaching 8,000 gigawatts, to close the clean energy gap. The Outlook implies nuclear power must significantly expand both in existing nuclear countries and through new countries adopting nuclear to help meet environmental goals.

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40 views8 pages

Averting The Danger of Catastrophic Climate Change: Is The Nuclear Renaissance Essential

Uploaded by

Patcharapit Promoppatum
The document summarizes the World Nuclear Association's (WNA) Nuclear Century Outlook, which projects nuclear power's potential growth worldwide through 2100. The Outlook estimates a need for 10,000 nuclear gigawatts of clean energy by 2050 to decarbonize energy systems enough to avoid catastrophic climate change. Even optimistic assumptions about renewables and carbon capture would still require a large contribution from nuclear power, potentially reaching 8,000 gigawatts, to close the clean energy gap. The Outlook implies nuclear power must significantly expand both in existing nuclear countries and through new countries adopting nuclear to help meet environmental goals.

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The WNA Nuclear Century Outlook

Averting the Danger of Catastrophic Climate Change: Is the Nuclear Renaissance Essential?

WNA Nuclear Century Outlook


The WNAs Nuclear Century Outlook is: A conceptualization of nuclear powers potential worldwide growth in the 21st Century; and An evaluation of nuclear energys environmental contribution. The Outlook is unique in nature and scope. Many nuclear projections extend just to 2030 and assume businessas-usual behaviour. The Outlook encompasses these scenarios but looks further into the future - with both optimistic and pessimistic assumptions. In gauging nuclear energys potential growth and environmental role, the Nuclear Century Outlook also offers perspective on two questions: Will nuclear energys contribution depend heavily on introducing nuclear power into new nations? In meeting global clean-energy need, what is the relationship between nuclear power and renewable energy technologies? The Outlook is built on country-by-country assessments of the growth potential of national nuclear programmes, based on estimates of need and capability, with projected population a key factor. For each country, the Outlook posits upper and lower growth trajectories, with the low reflecting the minimum nuclear capacity expected and the high assuming a full policy commitment to nuclear power. When summed globally, these trajectories yield boundaries within which the future is likely to fall.

The WNA secretariat maintains this analysis through an on-going dialogue with the WNAs worldwide industry membership and with experts in leading energy organizations, including IEA, WEC, IAEA and OECD-NEA. The secretariat welcomes advice from all quarters as it continues to update the Outlook analysis. The latest Outlook tabulation can be seen on the WNA website.
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Nuclear Capacity in Current and Future Nuclear Power Countries


Low Boundary High Boundary

~ 1725 GW (84%) ~ ~ 325 GW ~


(16%)

~ 9150 GW (83%) ~

~1900 GW ~
(17%)
Current Nuclear Power Countries Future Nuclear Power Countries

Please consult the WNA website for the latest Outlook numbers

These aspects of the Outlook bear emphasis: The low and high global trajectories are not growth scenarios as such, but rather the boundaries of a domain of likely nuclear growth. Even the low boundary of about 2,050 GW represents more than a five-fold increase over todays nuclear capacity of 370 GW. Growth within the Outlook boundaries is postulated on the assumption that fuel availability will pose no constraint in operating a much larger global nuclear fleet. Most experts support this view on the grounds that a combination of factors new ore discoveries, advanced mining techniques, use of uranium tailings, more reprocessing, introduction of the thorium fuel cycle and, ultimately, employment of breeder reactors will ensure ample and affordable nuclear fuel supplies into the distant future. The Outlook country projections are implicitly based on the assumption of global environmental stability. This assumption will be vitiated if and as the pace of worldwide conversion to clean-energy technologies proves insufficient to avert catastrophic climate disruption. The essential goal of the Nuclear Century Outlook is to assess and demonstrate the pace of global nuclear growth necessary to prevent that outcome.
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The Central Challenge: Decarbonizing Energy


How do the nuclear capabilities projected in the WNA Nuclear Century Outlook relate to the global environmental challenge? In short, how essential is the contribution from nuclear energy in the 21st Century? Today a global population of 6.6 billion is rising toward 9 billion by 2050, as energy demand grows explosively to meet human needs and aspirations worldwide. The current path is unsustainable. The UN panel composed of the worlds leading Earth scientists (IPCC) warns that global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions must, by 2050, be cut by 70% to avert catastrophic change in our planets climate system. Achieving emissions cuts on this scale will require sweeping technological change in the world economy. Emissions-reduction strategy must be comprehensive, embracing conservation and efficiency, plus pervasive changes in industrial processes, farming and forestry. But the central task must be a global transformation in energy - because most GHGs come from the use of fossil fuels. The crucial challenge in GHG curtailment is to decarbonize an ever-expanding worldwide energy system.

Components of a Clean-Energy Future


Fundamental questions remain about future clean-energy technologies:

? ? ?

Future Transport: What will be the comparative efficacy of advanced batteries vs. hydrogen fuel cells? Clean Fossil Fuel: Will large-scale Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) prove feasible, affordable and sustainable? Renewables Technology: Can New Renewables (wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, tidal) overcome obstacles of cost and intermittency to contribute on a major scale?

Despite these technological unknowns, the essential components of a global clean-energy economy are already well understood: 1) More and Cleaner Electricity: Full transformation of electricity to emissions-free technologies Greater use of electricity in industrial processes and heating Electrification of transport (trains & battery-powered cars). 2) New Elements (using clean electricity or clean heat): High-efficiency, zero-emission plants producing a combination of heat and power (CHP) Desalination of sea water to meet an intensifying world water crisis Hydrogen production for fuel cells. Future Global Clean-Energy Need can be projected as the combined output for clean EHDH: Clean Electricity (including battery power) Clean Heating (process and factory/office/home) Clean Desalination Clean Hydrogen production.
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Quantifying Clean-Energy Need


As a unit of measure in projecting global EHDH-Need and capability, the Outlook uses Nuclear Gigawatt - the energy delivery capacity of a 1,000 MW reactor. To project global clean-energy need, the Outlook: Takes as a numerical starting point for EHDH-Need the urgent necessity to de-carbonize world electricity consumption (which in 2000 equated to 2,000 Nuclear GW). Accepts energy analysts expectation that global energy use will double between 2000 and 2050, while electricity consumption triples or quadruples. On the additional assumption that clean Heating, Desalination and Hydrogen will become substantial, posits a five-fold increase in EHDH-Need by 2050. Assumes that growth in EHDH-Need then slows, growing 40% in 2050-2100, as global population stabilizes at about 9 billion while economic development continues. This approach yields an estimate of Clean-Energy Need at mid-century of about 10,000 Nuclear GW, rising by a further 40% in 2100. This means that our world will be chasing a clean-energy target that is receding - in effect, running away as we strive to reach it.

Global Clean-Energy Need


18000 14000
Nuclear GW

10000 6000 2000

Current World Electricity Capacity

2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050 2060 2070 2080 2090 2100

This order-of-magnitude estimate of future Clean-Energy Need gains credence from an alternative calculation. Today the IEA judges nuclear powers 370 GW to represent 6.3% of world primary energy consumption. If so, world energy consumption equates to 5,875 Nuclear GW. If total energy consumption doubles by 2050, 85% of energy must be supplied by clean technologies in order to attain a 70% GHG cut from 2000 levels. On that basis, Clean-Energy Need in 2050 would be 9,990 Nuclear GW.

Supplying Clean-Energy Need


To place nuclear projections into context, the Outlook makes these assumptions concerning overall cleanenergy delivery in the 21st Century: Hydropower growth stops at mid-century. New Renewables grow steadily and robustly, to a capacity by 2100 that is more than double the total of todays world electricity output. Fossil Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) makes a substantial contribution during the 21st Century, serving as a bridge technology, but does not grow indefinitely. Nuclear grows within the range defined by the WNA Outlook boundaries. These assumptions, which are incorporated into the following graph, are highly favourable to the prospects for New Renewables, which today contribute only negligibly, and CCS technologies, which today are still unproven.
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Even with roboust growth assumptions for Renewables and Clean-Fossil, the Clean-Energy Gap closes in the 21st Century only when nuclear growth rises significantly above its Low Boundary - to a capacity of about 8,000 GW.

Implications for Global Strategy


The WNA Nuclear Century Outlook, although speculative, is fair-minded in design, draws heavily on respected expert analysis, and serves to underscore the full magnitude and urgency of the global environmental challenge. The Outlook carries important implications for strategy and action:

While new countries can and should introduce nuclear energy, over 80% of nuclear growth and thus most of nuclear technologys environmental contribution will occur in nations already generating nuclear power. Even with expansive growth in nuclear power, renewables will also be needed on a large scale, despite their higher cost. In this sense, nuclear and renewables are not competitors but clean-energy partners. Conversely, even if renewable and clean-fossil technologies meet extremely optimistic assumptions, a global clean-energy revolution adequate to avert catastrophic climate change will require an enormous contribution from nuclear power and extensive realization of its worldwide growth potential.
5

The World Nuclear Association is the international private-sector organization supporting the people, technology, and enterprises that comprise the global
nuclear energy industry.

WNA members include the full range of enterprises involved in producing nuclear power from uranium miners to equipment
suppliers to generators of electricity. With a secretariat headquartered in London, the

WNA serves as a global forum for industry experts and as an authoritative


information resource on nuclear energy worldwide.

World Nuclear Association


Carlton House 22a St. Jamess Square London SW1Y 4JH UK tel: +44(0)20 7451 1520 fax: +44(0)20 7839 1501 www.world-nuclear.org info@world-nuclear.org

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