The importance of facts in research: the IFR

After about a year and a half, a third of the fuel pins are removed for what is called pyroprocessing. The fuel is separated into the fission products (the relatively short-lived waste), the uranium, and the plutonium and other actinides. The process is good, but not too good, ensuring that the other actinides as well as some uranium and even traces of the highly radioactive fission products remain mixed with the plutonium. This makes it useless as weapons material, and that was the idea all along. Till and Chang say, “a processing technology that also separates a very pure product is exactly what is not wanted...there are basic scientific reasons that make any kind of pure product very difficult, and probably impossible, to obtain”.

Because the metal fuel is such a simple alloy, the cleansed product is simply melted, mixed, drawn towards electrodes, cast as a new fuel slug, and reloaded into the reactor upon the next refueling. It is so radioactive that it must be remotely handled, but also so simple to make that it can be remotely handled. Once in the environs of the power plant, fissile material could never leave the site except under the most deliberate and controlled (read “obvious and slow”) conditions. This reprocessing is not “close by” as Wauchope posits. It’s attached. Integrated. That’s why it’s called the Integral Fast Reactor. The IFR concept design does not produce weapons material at all. It produces a dog’s breakfast mix of plutonium, uranium and other actinides. Useless for bombs, great for fuel. This technology can dispose of practically every atom of fissile and fertile material we have accumulated, giving us electricity in return. It is a massive non-proliferation benefit, and cleans up a legacy of spent fuel and depleted uranium from half a century of nuclear power and weapons technology in the bargain.

The only thing leaving the site is the fission products; small in quantity, short in half-life (around 30 years). It can be turned to glass and stored until it is less radioactive than natural rocks within 300 years. Yet such vitrified waste won’t leach anything into the environment for thousands of years.  There are numerous buildings throughout the world that have been occupied for more than 300 years. Let’s face it; we can either use these reactors to deal with spent nuclear fuel, or bury it as it is and leave it radioactive for thousands of years. No decision is a decision for the status quo. No decision is not an option.

We are just as pleased as any climate-concerned individuals to see the progress and growth in renewable technologies, but let’s not kid ourselves. Quitting fossil fuels fast needs a viable replacement to do the heavy lifting. Nuclear is a high-capital option, just like (but much less so than) solar thermal. Unlike solar thermal, it gives lots of ‘always on’ electricity at a great price. Remember, all the fuel we’ll need to power the whole planet with IFRs for centuries is already out of the ground. It’s not free—it’s better than free. Nations pay to get rid of it. The financial assist nuclear needs is to overcome the capital hurdle and secure financing; from there it takes care of itself. Are we okay with that? You have a vote. You decide. Just understand that the alternative is fossil, not renewable.

Who knows? If we would actually talk about this with maturity, not flippancy, and give due respect to the likes of Barry Brook who have researched these topics intensely and really know their stuff, Wauchope’s “happy hurdles” of public acceptance and legislative blocking might be dealt with pretty quickly. Isn’t that what we want? Great science and deep thinking to help us solve intractable problems?

Till and Chang...these guys did their homework. They knew exactly the problems that nuclear power had, and worked with an all-star team of physicists and engineers to solve them. Wauchope’s piece distorts this picture using the type of wilful ignorance we often call denial. This is not environmentalism. It is anti-nuclear ideology, and its time is nearly up.