Nuclear Energy Can’t Happen Without Fossil Fuels - Another reason fossil fuels remain relevant in Wyoming

by Wyoming Liberty Group

Here's a paradox to consider: You can't have nuclear energy without fossil fuels.

Why does this matter? Well, for one, some folks—and there are a lot of them, including in Wyoming—pushing the expansion of nuclear energy, and not all of them particularly like fossil fuels. That's because fossil fuels are competitors in the business of creating electricity and other kinds of power.

But you can't have one without the other. So, let's not dismiss the importance of fossil fuels. And let's not forget—Wyoming has a long and rich history and presence when it comes to fossil fuels, important materials like coal and gas.

Some folks backing nuclear energy look down on fossil fuels, saying nuclear is a cleaner form of energy; we can debate that point vigorously but, leaving that aside for the moment, there is a basic problem for those backers of nuclear: It requires fossil fuels just to get started.

To explain: Yes, it's true that nuclear energy doesn't require fossil fuels in the actual creation of that energy. But you first have to build the nuclear power plants, and that requires fossil fuels. Ever heard of a truck to transport stuff? Or lights to see what you're doing? Nuclear power plants also depend on fossil fuels for the maintenance of those facilities.

What's more, nuclear power plants require fossil fuels for various stages of the process of mining and refining uranium, a metal and the primary fuel that nuclear power plants employ to create electricity, in a process called fission. By the way, uranium is found in various parts of the United States, including in our very own Wyoming as well as in Colorado, Nebraska and Texas. Even the disposal of nuclear waste can be dependent on fossil fuels.

In the lingo of the industry, uranium has to be prepared at "the front end" for nuclear reactors, and this part of the process requires fossil fuels.

To begin with, uranium ore deposits are obtained from such sources as open pits, or underground mines. Sometimes, the material is pumped to the surface through oxygenated groundwater. A requirement for such processes? Yep, you got it: Fossil fuels.

It doesn't end there. Once the uranium is mined, it usually needs to be milled into a form referred to as "yellowcake." Which is to say the uranium is extracted in a process before the substance is packed up as a concentrate. More fossil fuels are involved.

The uranium is typically enriched at processing plants; suffice it to say, the process is complicated. But for our purposes, that process requires what's known as gas centrifuge technology. And then the enriched material is shipped to what are known as fuel fabrication plants, where they heat it up into a gas and convert into a powder. That powder, in turn, is pressed into ceramic pellets and baked at high temperatures. Those pellets are then placed in metal tubes, or fuel rods, to be prepared for a nuclear reactor.

What does this all require? You guessed it: More fossil fuels.

And we haven't even talked about what happens later—after the nuclear power plants create the electricity and they are left with spent nuclear fuel—or nuclear waste—that needs to be disposed of.

That nuclear waste needs to go somewhere and that somewhere is, at first, steel-lined concrete pools for cooling. Later, the nuclear waste is transferred to what are known as dry storage casks, which also are composed of concrete and steel, to protect human life from its powerful toxic effects, which can last for thousands of years. What does this all require? Yep. More fossil fuels.

Those dry storage casks, incidentally, can be found throughout the nation at dozens of nuclear power plants, some operational, others dormant. The long-term solution, experts say, is to bury the nuclear waste in deep geological repositories, or to put it plainly, in big holes. Which would require more fossil fuels. Over many years, it's been tough, to say the least, for the U.S. government to find a community willing to house that radioactive material in their proverbial backyard. That includes us in Wyoming. But that's another story.