Will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? #AskAFuturist

Tim Panton (@steely_glint) asks: “Will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? If so, will it be fission or fusion?”This is one of those questions that is hard to answer accurately without sounding like you are trying to fudge it. Because the answers are ‘yes, but only some’ and ‘both, but not at the same time’. And also, ‘it depends what application you’re talking about’, and ‘over what time frame?’

One of many

The first challenge in answering this question comes back to one of the five major trends I track that I see popping up in every domain I examine: choice. We live in an age of low-friction innovation, where building novel solutions to problems is easier than it ever has been. That does not mean it is easy, but it does mean that the turnover of new technologies is faster, and that the variety of technological solutions is wider.The adoption of these technologies is also easier and cheaper. With lower barriers to entry, people can afford to experiment more. And with lower innovation and production costs, suppliers can afford to support smaller niches.The result is that there is rarely one answer to any problem. It is impossible to say that nuclear will replace fossil fuels because LOTS of things will replace fossil fuels. Indeed, they already are. Check out this chart from the IEA’s 2019 World Energy Outlook report: https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/installed-power-generation-capacity-by-source-in-the-stated-policies-scenario-2000-2040This is specifically for the power generation market – electricity, in other words. What it shows is that coal consumption has flattened, and oil is down, while gas continues to grow. Meanwhile, solar and wind are on incredible growth trajectories. Hydro and other renewables are also growing. In the IEA’s projections, nuclear is fairly flat. This is all over a 20-year time frame with projected global energy consumption continuing to rise.

Fission flat

These projections seem plausible to me. We might hope to see a faster decline in gas and coal offset by even more dramatic shifts to solar and battery storage. This is possible with large infrastructure investment in those countries with highly centralised grids. Given the noises about economic stimulus investment in the UK and elsewhere, we might just see some of this. But it is hard to see the nuclear picture being anything other than (largely) flat.This is not because there will not be new nuclear. But lots of reactors in places like the UK and France are ageing and well beyond their original design life. So even large-scale development will only hit replacement levels. There is some hope for smaller scale nuclear systems that might fit well into a more distributed grid infrastructure as a back up to primarily renewable generation, or that could be clustered to replace coal or ageing nuclear plants. Certainly, lots of investors, including governments, think this idea has strong prospects. But it is hard to see it growing at a rate that makes it a serious candidate for replacing the majority of fossil fuel consumption, even just for energy generation.

Commercial fusion?

Meanwhile, fusion research continues to make slow progress. It is hard to see it hitting commercialisation at any real scale in the 20-year IEA time frame. Even if the model is proven, it is unlikely anyone in the west would be able to build out a reactor within another decade. China is a different matter and there, practical fusion power might be a valuable alternative to the country’s enormous reliance on coal. But still, it is hard to see it making a serious impact in the next twenty years.

Renewables

Meanwhile, solar, wind, hydro and tidal power advance apace. As does the storage technology to offset their intermittent feed. Done at very large scale, these projects require very large investment – the sort that takes years to assemble or that has to be underwritten by governments. But done at smaller scale, they can be rolled out relatively quickly and cheaply. This feels like the best bet for a lot of fossil fuel replacement.Roughly two thirds of grid energy consumption in the UK is in residential and commercial venues, where small scale renewables and storage might present an opportunity to shift away from grid power for at least a proportion of usage. The shift to electric vehicles means that these sources might also power a lot of our transport. Only in large scale industry like steel manufacturing does small scale renewables and storage feel less practical – though I would be delighted to be proven wrong on this. Perhaps here is the opportunity for small scale nuclear? Single or clustered plants could be used to provide consistent, clean(er) energy to major consumers and the surround areas.

Looking beyond

In the longer term, fission feels like a dead technology. It is cleaner than coal but still leaves a lot of radioactive mess behind that we don’t have a good solution for. I do believe we will one day crack the fusion challenge, allowing us to generate a lot of energy in a small space. But remember: however sophisticated the heat source, nuclear fusion would still be used to make steam to spin a turbine. This is the same way we have been generating power for 140 years or so. Even the Romans were using steam to make stuff spin. It feels a little old fashioned. The sci-fi nerd in me wants something solid-state, more like Iron Man’s arc reactor. But sadly no-one outside of the fictional universe knows how that might work.So, will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? Yes, but only some.

When recycled material is better than new

Can we really make recycled material that is better than its virgin equivalent?When you describe someone – perhaps a government minister right now – as a ‘chocolate teapot’, everyone knows what you mean. We know that chocolate melts at roughly the temperature of the human body. It would be a ridiculous material from which to make a teapot carrying boiling liquids. Fortunately, we have many other choices of material and we can select one that is appropriate to the task at hand.The material we choose for a particular task depends on its physical properties, as well as its cost, both financial and environmental. We can never select for just one property: it’s always about a compromise between a variety of characteristics, and our budget.

Recycled material for specific tasks

Imagine if we could design a material for each task. One that had the minimum amount of compromise because it was engineered for the task at hand. More, imagine we could reform recycled materials with new properties that make them greater than their virgin equivalents.I’ve shared my excitement about the new wave of materials science a few times on this blog. What thrills me is that new single layer and composite materials will change the way our world looks, just as the digital revolution changed the way it works. In fact, based on a conversation I had at the national Graphene institute recently, it might just do both.We all know plastics are bad, right? Bags, straws, packaging, all have to go because they consume fossil fuels in their production and take decades or more to biodegrade, choking the seas as they do. Some plastics are recyclable but the resulting product is typically inferior. This doesn’t have to be the case.

Pipeline plastics

Speaking to Dr Oana Istrate, a Graphene Applications Specialist at the new Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre, I learned that they are working on adding single layer materials to recycled plastics to create a variety of properties suited to different applications. For example, stopping the leakage of Hydrogen Sulphide gas from oil pipelines.H2S is a colourless gas with a distinctive smell of rotten eggs. It is highly poisonous, flammable, and corrosive, presenting a real challenge for the oil and gas industry. H2S corrodes pipelines shortens their lifespan and increases the risk from leaks, creating a serious safety issue, as well as one of maintenance costs.Combining graphene with plastic can create a material that is impenetrable to H2S. Line a pipeline with this and you can extend its lifespan and improve safety.Other applications abound: imagine a contact lens that better retains moisture, or a wetsuit that better retains heat. This is before we get into improved mechanical properties. Researchers have already used Graphene to increase the wear properties of trainer soles, and make racing bikes and cars stiffer, improving the transfer of power to the track.If we combine single layer materials with recycled plastics, we see the promise of a new range of materials. Materials with which we can construct tomorrow’s world. Materials that are greener but also more particularly suited to the applications at hand.

The manipulation of nature

One of the primary objectives of the proto-science of alchemy was to turn lead into gold. It seems a rather base goal (forgive the pun), and more in the realm of magic than technology. Nonetheless, alchemists around the world laid down some of the foundations of modern science.The alchemists never succeeded, but as it turns out, you can turn lead into gold. Since every element is merely a collection of protons, neutrons and electrons, if you can manipulate the content of a nucleus you can change lead into gold. People have done so. Unfortunately, the process isn’t exactly practical, requiring huge amounts of energy from a particle accelerator, or depositing the lead in nuclear reactor.Selling that might be even harder than selling Ratner’s jewellery.

Coding DNA

Early in 2017 a team of scientists took the next step in creating truly programmable organisms. We may look back on this as synthetic biology’s 'Turing moment’, the point at which an expensive specialist machine starts to become an affordable generalist platform.Imagine being able to program a bacterium to produce materials, biofuel, cotton or spider silk. Imagine being able to program it to make medicines. Program one, feed it and watch it divide, exponentially increasing your production capacity.The potential is endless, as are the pitfalls. Such power needs careful constraint. And yet, it is following the same path of all technologies: it is becoming cheaper and more accessible all the time.Basic genetic engineering is already at the point of being a toy, in terms of its cost and ease. How long before I can buy a genetic programming platform as readily as a 3D printer?

Technology is the tools by which we manipulate nature

I have rather pigeonholed myself as a ‘tech expert’ over the years. Occasionally I struggle against this self-applied categorisation, worried that it limits my scope and people’s faith in my advice.But then I follow little rabbit holes of research into alchemy (inspired by a throwaway comment on a recent episode of The Infinite Monkey Cage) and synthetic biology, and realise that technology — properly defined — is barely a pigeonhole. It represents the grand scope of our ability to affect our environment, an endeavour that I believe defines us as a species.This is why I start with technology — in the broadest sense — when looking to the future. Technology is the means by which we make change, whether intended, or unintended.