Page 141 - Managing Global Warming

106 Managing Global Warming

opposition to nuclear power in Germany, Taiwan, South Korea, Switzerland, Spain, and
other countries.
Stagnation of reactor development and deployment enabled the loss of expertise, and the
l
inability to complete the building of new nuclear facilities on time/schedule and within
the agreed budget. Meanwhile, two key developments took place: Cheap natural gas arrived,
with the United States quickly becoming a major energy exporter, and the rise of China as an
economic engine, requiring major investment in power sources. This shift in the global
energy scene coincided with postcommunist Russia consolidating its nuclear commercial
complex; and with China emerging as a global economic force, not only importing all of
the new designs to “digest” the technology, but aggressively moving forward indigenous
development of nearly every reactor type.
l The future is unfortunately unpredictable. The emergence of potential climate change, par-
tially driven by fossil-fuel (CO 2 ) emissions, is now of international concern and scale. How-
ever, individual markets do not allow so-called carbon credits or financial incentives for
NPPs, despite their low CO 2 emissions (for details, see Figs. 3.30 and 3.32). Major future
energy scenarios by international organizations see a role for nuclear, but usually focus
on alternatives like conservation or “renewables.” These projections and hopes avoid the
inevitability of the global drive for economic prosperity for all those presently without it,
meaning a manifold increase in energy use, and, hence, emissions of every kind. It has been
and can be calculated that literally thousands of reactors would need to be built and deployed
at a rate of a few per week over the next 20years to address or help to stabilize the rising
emissions. The world is not prepared, and neither are the nuclear and political establish-
ments, to undertake this task unless massive investments of capital and political will occur.
Limited additional deployment in Europe and the United States, but new builds are continu-
l
ing in Russia, China, India, South Korea, and the Middle East. The inability of modern
designs to compete or be built on schedule/within the agreed budget has led to major bank-
ruptcies and restructuring of the existing major commercial vendors. Major build programs
continue, where national investment and political support exist (China, Russia, and India),
and they are turning toward export markets in Argentina, Bangladesh, Egypt, Middle East,
Philippines, Turkey, and even toward gaining a foothold in the United Kingdom and
elsewhere in Europe (e.g., Romania).
l China is aggressively pushing its own design variants, using financial investment as a lever
in Argentina, Pakistan, United Kingdom, etc. to gain market entry. Russia, South Korea, and
Japan are also focused on export markets, because their own domestic markets are saturated.
Current statistics of all world nuclear power reactors connected to electrical grids are
listed in Tables 3.11–3.13, and Fig. 3.33. Analysis of the current statistical data on
nuclear power reactors shows that, currently, 31 countries in the world have operating
nuclear power reactors (within these countries: 17 plan to build new reactors and
14 don’t plan to build new reactors) and 4 countries without nuclear power reactors
(Bangladesh, Belarus, Turkey, and United Arab Emirates (UAE)) are working toward
introducing nuclear energy on their soils [32].
The largest group of nuclear reactors by type is Pressurized Water Reactors
(PWRs) (290 from 448 reactors or 65% of total), and quite significant number of
PWRs are planned to be built (about 77) (for details, see Table 3.11). The second larg-
est group of reactors is Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs)/Advanced BWRs (ABWRs)
(78 reactors or 17% of total). The third group is Pressurized Heavy Water Reactors
(PHWRs) (49 reactors or 11% of total). Considering the number of forthcoming