Safety and economics of uranium utilization for nuclear power generation

Fukaya, Yuji   

Safety and economics of uranium utilization for nuclear power generation were investigated and discussed. In order to sustain energy supply with nuclear power generation, uranium resources should be abundant. From the viewpoint of depletion of the resources, FBR, which is breeder reactor of plutonium, has been developed, but that has been not diffused as a commercial reactor yet. Instead of obtaining inexhaustible resources by breeding plutonium, it is known that the inherent safety feature becomes weak in the fast neutron spectrum. As the result of the investigation, it is confirmed with concrete FBR designs that the inherent safety feature and breeding ability are related to the transactions. The amount of uranium resources and electricity generation cost with the resources were investigated. It is concluded that the semi-permanently sustainable energy supply can be established with reasonable cost by using seawater uranium. In addition, the significance of P&T, which is one of the advantages of FBR, was also discussed from the viewpoint of environmental burden from radioactive waste.