Nuclear power plants, advantage

It seems increasingly clear that the operating cost (operation and maintenance plus fuel costs) is very competitive with the same cost of its main competitors, coal-and gas fired plants. Therefore, the economic advantage of life extension is obvious, and also the clear trend to operate existing nuclear power plants on base load only. Even in France where there are too many nuclear plants to operate them all on base load, there is a trend to decrease the share of nuclear power in total production in view to operate eventually all... 

The primary advantage of nuclear energy is that enormous amounts of energy are liberated per unit mass of fuel. Also, the air pollution (oxides of S, N, C and particulate matter) caused by fossil fuel electric power plants is not a problem with nuclear energy plants. In European countries, where fossil fuel reserves are scarce, most of the electricity is generated by nuclear power plants for these reasons. 

Nuclear power plants are used to generate electricity. At present there are more than 400 nuclear power plants operating all around the world. About 100 of them are in the United States and 200 are in Europe. The advantage of nuclear power is that no carbon-based pollutants are emitted as with the burning of fossil fuels. Flowever, the disadvantage is that the process produces nuclear wastes. Some... 

The advantages of nuclear power plants include the fact that they operate at a 90% capacity factor (loading). Also, 1 kg of natural uranium generates about as much electricity as 20,000 kg of coal. In contrast to fossil fuels, nuclear power does not contribute to global warming. In the past, the cost of... 

Figure 5.43. Activity of radioactive waste from nuclear power plants after 40 years of continuous operation, indicating the advantage of accelerator-breeder concepts. The calculations are preliminary and do not correspond to expected final designs (based on Rubbia etal., 1995 Lung, 1997).

Karlin, Y. et al., Advantageous technology treatment of laundry waters. Proceedings of the International S3unposium on Technologies for the Management of Radioactive Waste for Nuclear Power Plants and Back End of Nuclear Fuel Cycle Activities, Daejon, 30.08.-03.09.1999. IAEA, Vienna 2001. C S Papers CD Series no. 6. 

One radioactive isotope of yttrium, yttrium-90, has some important practical applications. The isotope is combined with other substances to produce smart drugs. Smart drugs are drugs that detect, attack, and destroy only certain, very specific kinds of cells, such as those found in cancerous tissue. One advantage of using yttrium-90 is that it is easy to obtain. It is produced when another radioactive isotope (strontium-90) breaks down. Strontium-90 is a by-product of nuclear reactions that occur in nuclear power plants. 

Lyczkowski, R.W. and Ching, J.T. (1979) Safety consideration and economic advantage of a new underground nuclear power plant design . Nuclear Eng. Design, 53, pp. 257-261. 

Economically, cost-effective performance of valve maintenance means performing and bundling of all individual activities under the umbrella of an experienced service provider which act as a main contractor. The great advantage of such a contract for the customer is to order the complete maintenance service on a fixed price which is lower as the total cost obtained from a large number of individual services. Competent and reliable subcontractors which are familiar with special features of components are involved to ensure good quality of work. Under such conditions the mutual cooperation can preserve the maintenance competence and know-how to ensure the safety and availability as long as the nuclear power plant is in service. Effective improvements based on process analyses can also be implemented. 

From a theoretical point of view, it is unclear whether participation in such cooperative ventures will be reduced or maintained. On the one hand, companies in financial difficulty may not be able to spare either the ftmding or the personnel time to participate in collaborative industry programs such as safety bench-marking activities. Similarly, successful companies may choose not to participate in order to maintain their competitive advantage rather than share Imowledge with their competitors. Thus, NEI president Colvin (1997, pg. 35) reports, Some have suggested that in a competitive era, nuclear power plants will become reluctant to continue to share [safety and operating] information. ... 

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