First ‘Peak Oil,’ now ‘Peak Uranium’
Collapse, the new documentary starring investigative reporter and panic guru, Michael Ruppert, features — among other theories — the claim that oil resources will run out soon.
Ruppert is certainly not alone in that belief, and “peak oil” is a theory no longer held just by conspiracy theorists. Back in 2005, the French government issued a report on the global oil industry forecasting a possible peak in world production as early as 2013.
In the same year, a U.S. House energy subcommittee met to discuss the possibility of oil shortages. While the committee stated that the planet is unlikely to run out of oil any time soon (though this meeting occurred four years ago,) the government admitted oil was likely to become “very expensive” in the absence of lower-cost alternatives.
Interestingly, though many discuss oil shortages, few mention another finite resource — uranium. Technology Review recently published an article titled, “The Coming Nuclear Crisis” that basically states, while the world makes vast investments in nuclear technology, big questions (such as waste storage, safety, the proliferation of nuclear technology, and the limited supply of uranium) go unaddressed. (h/t Naked Capitalism)
Perhaps the most worrying problem is the misconception that uranium is plentiful. The world’s nuclear plants today eat through some 65,000 tons of uranium each year. Of this, the mining industry supplies about 40,000 tons. The rest comes from secondary sources such as civilian and military stockpiles, reprocessed fuel and re-enriched uranium. “But without access to the military stocks, the civilian western uranium stocks will be exhausted by 2013, concludes [Michael Dittmar, from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich].
It’s not clear how the shortfall can be made up since nobody seems to know where the mining industry can look for more. [emphasis mine]
Anyone ready to invest in solar panels yet?
When faced with uranium criticism, many energy industrialists bring up fission breeder reactors — a “solution” that doesn’t impress Dittmar because of “their huge construction costs, their poor safety records and their inefficient performance give little reason to believe that they will ever become commercially significant.” And nuclear fusion isn’t any better, says Dittmar:
No matter how far into the future we may look, nuclear fusion as an energy source is even less probable than large-scale breeder reactors.
A Technology Review commenter points out that peak uranium has entered the mainstream as illustrated by this Wall Street Journal article from last year.
Japan’s Kansai Electric Power — which accounts for nearly a third of the country’s total uranium demand — says it plans to buy uranium mines to ensure its long-term supply of the fuel. Its chief manager says he worries that in coming years he won’t be able to buy what he needs “no matter how much you are willing to pay.”
According to the WSJ, the IAEA and Nuclear Energy Agency report there’s enough uranium to power existing plants for 100 years. However, there are supply issues. About 40% of current uranium supplies come from stockpiles and old weapons—not from uranium mines—so new sources need to be developed soon to avoid “uranium supply shortfalls.”
Therein lies the potential good news. As Technology Review states, there’s a chance that the possibility of uranium shortages will force governments to release military stockpiles of weapons grade uranium and plutonium for civilian use.
Could it be possible that the coming nuclear energy crisis could rid the world of most of its nuclear weapons?
Let’s hope so.
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Ms. Kilkenny,
Just a technical note, predicting peak oil product from a particular field, country or even the world is nothing new or conspiratorial. There are well established methods for doing this. In 1956 M. K. Hubbert created a statistical model that quite accurately predicted US oil production would peak in the late 60 or early 70s. His approach with modifications and updates and now done on computers, are still in use to this day and continue to accurately predict peak production for a variety commodities.
From the article:
In response to another comment. See in context »Ms. Kilkenny,
“Peak Oil” was never a “conspiracy theory”, it is a well established principle of resource management. I studied in grad school almost 20 years ago. Having said that, there are people of the conspiratorial persuasion will tell you that someone or another is trying to “suppress” the knowledge of a predicted year for peak oil production (as opposed to peak oil demand, which different) or that there is no such thing as a peak oil production at all and somehow, magically, a end supply of new petroleum sources will be found.
However, the concept of “peak oil” production has never been some conspiracy theory any more than Newtons theory of gravity every was.
In response to another comment. See in context »Understood. I meant that the theory is now highly respected and well documented whereas before it could have been dismissed as conspiracy nonsense (admittedly by people who didn’t know what they were talking about). I probably could have worded that better.
I think you’re referring to the Alex Jones crew, who claim Peak Oil is a conspiracy started by the oil industry to keep up oil prices.
In response to another comment. See in context »I called out your comment since I think you make a valuable point (and also clarify my muddy wording).
In response to another comment. See in context »I always thought it odd that a gallon of milk, that can be produced by a cow every day and requires much less “refining”, is more expensive than a gallon of gas ,which is a non renewable resource. I understand why that is but like I said, it is just odd.
I am no expert but it seems as though there is a lot of coal around and shortages of oil could lead to a ramp up of coal generated power to run electric cars, which might cause more environmental damage before nuclear waste will.
Ms. Kilkenny,
A bit more on “peak oil”, which even the IEA is now pegging at an optimistic date of 2020.
http://www.economist.com/businessfinance/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15065719