Nuclear Power Development the Challenge of the 1980S by Sigvard Eklund*
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Nuclear power Nuclear power development the challenge of the 1980s by Sigvard Eklund* In pursuing my theme of Nuclear power development industrialized countries. In the Federal Republic of - the challenge of the 1980s I will analyse the data that Germany sales of heat pumps increased from 36 000 units is available, mainly that stored in the International in 1979 to some 100000 in 1980. In my own country, Atomic Energy Agency's computer, to forecast what Sweden, they have been doubling every year over the will happen in the nuclear field during the decade which past few years. When man's ingenuity has enabled him has just started. By the word challenge I want to under- to produce almost unlimited amounts of cheap energy, line the potential which nuclear energy possesses to it is a pity not to make full use of that achievement in contribute to the solution of the world's energy order to improve his living conditions. problems. Consequently, I do not agree with those who, in Existing energy systems have a remarkable inertia Sweden, say that although surplus electricity is available and the fact that nuclear power now provides 8% of the and electricity is a very convenient form of energy for world's generation of electricity is in itself proof of the heating apartments and houses, it should not be used potential that nuclear energy has already realized, and for such purposes because it requires large power stations the inroads it has made in domains which earlier were which do not fit the philosophy of the "green wave". reserved for conventional sources of power. This means In other words, I believe that reason will return again also that nuclear energy itself already possesses a sub- when people appreciate that there is energy to be used stantial amount of inertia and will be with us for a and, at the same time, they will understand and approve, considerable time, even if its further growth is not by democratic means, its production. actively promoted by decision-makers. Although we like to think that the future is ours and Present position and future prospects for power reactors can be formed according to our wishes and intentions, The actual situation of nuclear power and the most it is a fact that the next few, say five, years are already probable forecast of its development up to the year 1990 committed to developments decided upon by people in are best demonstrated graphically. charge before today. As a consequence, the developments in nuclear energy within our societies in the next five Figure 1 presents the number and power of reactors years can be foreseen with a rather high degree of now operating or under construction, and their distri- accuracy, on the assumption, of course, that peace will bution over different geographical areas*. In spite of the prevail and the need for energy will develop along the current situation in the USA, the installed capacity of same pattern as in the past. It is unfortunately much the nuclear power plants under construction there will more difficult to interpret what the crystal ball indicates almost treble by 1990. The same will be true for may happen in the energy field five to ten years Canada. The only other industrialized countries which from now. have large rates of increase are France, Japan and the USSR. At last year's IAEA General Conference in Energy conservation Vienna Minister Nakagawa indicated that Japan will try to install 53 GW of nuclear power by 1990. It is obvious that waste of energy should be avoided whenever possible, and remarkable results have already On the other hand, the developing countries** have been achieved in a number of countries by different limited plans, and no great increase is foreseen in the conservation measures. I would here especially mention * The term OECD countries refers to the 24 countries the promising development of heat pumps driven by members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and electricity from, for example, a nuclear power station. Development (OECD), including Japan. OECD Pacific is They seem to offer tremendous possibilities for energy composed of Australia, Japan and New Zealand. CPE stands for conservation for individual house or distnct heating. countries with a centrally planned economy and comprises the 13 socialist countries. Heat pumps of 10MW will soon be common in several ** The exact definition of a developing country is a matter of some difficulty. For the purpose of this article, the term * Dr Eklund is the Director General of the IAEA. This applies only to those countries which qualify for technical article is adapted from a speech Dr Eklund gave earlier this year assistance from the United Nations and which do not belong to the fourteenth annual conference of the Japan Atomic either to the group of OECD countries or to the group of Industrial Forum. centrally planned economy countries of Europe. 8 IAEA BULLETIN, VOL 23, no 3 Nuclear power Table 1. Estimates of total and nuclear electrical generating capacity by main country groups (GWe) 1980 1985 1990 Country group Total Nuclear Total Nuclear Total Nuclear % (average) (average) OECD North America 710 57 8 890 130 15 1065 150 14 OECD Europe 440 45 10 580 105 18 735 150 20 OECD Pacific 180 15 8 255 25 10 340 50 15 Centrally Planned Europe 370 16 4 545 35 6 745 75 10 Total for industrialized countries 1700 133 8 2270 295 13 2885 425 15 Asia 130 3 2 235 10 4 400 20 5 Latin America 100 03 03 130 3 2 180 10 6 Africa and Middle East 65 — _ 80 2 3 120 3 3 Total for developing countries 295 3 1 445 15 3 700 33 5 World total 1995 136 7 2715 310 11 3585 458 13 number of developing countries committed to nuclear its distribution among industrialized and developing power in the 1980s, above the eight countnes already countries and among country groups. In 1980, nuclear having nuclear power plants in operation or under capacity in the world amounted to 136GWe or 7% of the construction. Some four to five additional countries are nearly 2000GWe total installed electrical capacity. now considering nuclear power, like Egypt, but not all Industrialized OECD and centrally planned European are likely to make a commitment. countries have almost 98% of the nuclear capacity in the The first table presents the estimates of total and world, whereas developing countries have only around 2%. nuclear electricity generating capacity in the world and In 1990 nuclear generating capacity will be about 458GWe Figure 1. Reactors in operation or under construction throughout the world as of 1 February 1981. GW World Total under construction 207 GWe 203 Units ;•• .'.•.• .'••'"] in operation 138 GWe 102« ' ' ' - 256 Units (98)" • Power (GWe) •• No of units 62* (65)" . 58* • • .(82)" 19* 45* • (28)~ (97)" 7» (8)** 15* • . : .17 (24)" .:.'•• (44)~ s» <rr (21- OECD OECD OECD CPE Latin Africa & North America Europe Pacific Europe America Middle East IAEA BULLETIN, VOL. 23, no 3 Nuclear power Table 2. Estimates of total and nuclear electricity generation by main country groups (TWh) 1980 1985 1990 Country group Total Nuclear % Total Nuclear % Total Nuclear % (average) (average) OECD North America 2760 290 11 3455 800 23 4230 885 21 OECD Europe 1780 215 12 2280 640 28 2890 885 31 OECD Pacific 725 60 8 1070 150 14 1430 315 22 Centrally Planned Europe 1780 80 5 2620 225 9 3575 450 13 Total for industrialized countries 7045 645 9 9425 1815 19 12 125 2535 21 Asia 665 15 2 1060 65 6 1815 100 6 Latin America 375 2 0.5 485 15 3 695 50 7 Africa and Middle East 225 - _ 320 10 3 480 15 3 Total for developing countries 1295 17 1 1865 90 5 2990 165 6 World total 8340 662 8 11 290 1905 17 15115 2700 18 or about 13% of the world's estimated total generating It is interesting to note that since 1975 there has been capacity. a slow increase in both factors until 1979 when both dropped significantly. We still have to confirm this by The next table presents estimates of total electricity analysis of data but it appears that the drop is due to generation and the share of nuclear power on a world- regulatory action after the TMI accident. As the 1978 wide basis and by the main country groups up to the and 1979 data are based on 156 and 176 reactor units year 1990 (Table 2). The percentage of electricity respectively, there is no doubt about the significance of generated by nuclear power stations is slightly higher the drop. In this context it should be mentioned that than the percentage of nuclear capacity depicted in data from the last World Energy Conference indicate that Table 1, since nuclear power plants are normally used for the unavailability of nuclear units has generally been base-load generation. It shows again that OECD and similar to that of fossil-fuel plants of a comparable size centrally planned European countries will continue to - about 30 to 35%. be the countries with the largest share of nuclear generation in the next 10 years. It also shows that Latin Referring to Table 3, the year 1980 was again not America and Asia — without Japan — will start to acquire promising in terms of newarders. Only 19 reactors with substantial electricity generation by nuclear power at a total capacity of 18GWe were ordered in France, the the end of this decade. Federal Republic of Germany, Japan, the Republic of Figure 2 depicts the age distribution of operational Korea, Romania and the UK.