Nuclear Power - not as green as they tell you

KnowYourPlanet researcher Joe Baylis, set out to calculate the true carbon footprint of a nuclear Power Plant by kWh. Here is what he found

"Several writers have referred to this technology as carbon emission free. This simply is not true. In fact, it is estimated that the process as a whole produces up to 140g of CO2 per kilowatt hour (kWh) of energy produced2. This is after taking into account the building of the power plant (a vast undertaking), the mining of uranium, transportation and processing of the ore and eventual radioactive waste, and the dismantling of the plant."

Taking into account that the second least CO2 intensive non renewable energy is gas at 340g CO2 pr kilowatt hour (kWh), one must wonder how this is being sold to us as a carbon free source of energy. Of course it is not carbon free. The Uranium must be dug up by heavy machinery in very low concentrations, typically 1 kg pr 1000 kg soil or less, refined in thousands og energy intensive centrifuges (which also produce a lot of radioactive waste), further refined and transported and then used in a very complicated Nuclear Power Plant, a place which itself to be built is quite a Carbon investment. If you take into consideration the de-commission and storage you end up with quite a headache.

Im sure most of us would not want this in our back yard.

Read the full article here:
http://www.knowyourplanet.com/news/the-nuclear-resurgence-1