On 20 Jan 2009 14:55:22 GMT someone who may be "Bob Eager"
wrote this:-

And possibly none at all at all, if it's powered from nukular...

Nuclear electricity generation emits carbon dioxide, despite claims
to the contrary by the likes of Bernard Ingham. The debate is how
much it emits.

Even if the power station itself emits almost no carbon dioxide,
none of them has a hole in the ground nearby from which fuel rods
can be taken. Rather a lot of stuff has to be mined and separated,
be transported long distances [1] and go through several energy
intensive processes before it is turned into a fuel rod.

If it is to be "reprocessed" then a fuel rod then goes through a
number of energy intensive processes, including producing highly
radioactive nitric acid which must be kept cool using energy
intensive mechanical means in tanks [2] for a long time if it is not
to boil and the tanks possibly explode [3] before it goes through an
energy intensive process to turn it into glass blocks.


[1] no uranium mines in the UK, Australia and Canada are the largest
suppliers and are some way away.

[2] An article in the New Scientist in September 2001 estimated that
an attack on these tanks would release 44 times as much
radioactivity as the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, and would ultimately
cause 1.2 million cancers in Britain and Ireland.

[3] one of the Tomsk-7 explosions illustrated what happens if this
liquid is in an explosion. Fortunately Tomsk-7 is in a remote area.



--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00023--e.htm#54