WEBVTT - Is nuclear power worth the risks? 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:11.119 A. Kelly. Do you guys have solar panels out on 0:00:11.160 --> 0:00:14.840 the science farm yet? Yes, we do, but they don't 0:00:14.880 --> 0:00:17.040 always help when you need them the most. What do 0:00:17.040 --> 0:00:19.759 you mean what happened? Well, there was that snowstorm that 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:22.799 slammed the East Coast a few weeks back, and that 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.159 knocked out the whole electrical grid. It would have been 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:27.920 nice to have solar, but solar panels don't work super 0:00:27.960 --> 0:00:31.200 great when it's snowing, and I guess they also don't 0:00:31.200 --> 0:00:33.560 work that well when they're covered in snow. Right. I 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:35.839 never thought about that. Do people who live in snowy 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:39.400 places need to get like solar panel wipers like windshield 0:00:39.400 --> 0:00:42.360 wipers for your car? Not quite? Uh? And ours are 0:00:42.440 --> 0:00:44.520 up on a roof, so we can't just sort of, like, 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:46.640 you know, wipe it off with our hands or something. 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:48.880 And I think most people just wait for the snow 0:00:48.920 --> 0:00:50.960 to milk. I don't know. Didn't you create like some 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:53.199 mini humans out there you could send up on your 0:00:53.280 --> 0:00:55.520 roof to wipe them off? I assume you're talking about 0:00:55.840 --> 0:00:58.800 my children were not so desperate for power that we're 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.000 willing to risk their lives for it. I don't know 0:01:01.160 --> 0:01:03.800 when my kids iPads run out of charge. I am 0:01:03.920 --> 0:01:06.840 very desperate for power. I can't parent without them anymore, 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:11.080 so I might even climb up there myself. I see 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:13.480 where you're coming from. We were. Fortunately we're able to 0:01:13.560 --> 0:01:24.119 charge our iPads in the car, so we were okay. Hi, 0:01:24.319 --> 0:01:27.560 I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist and a professor at 0:01:27.680 --> 0:01:30.240 U C Irvine, and I find myself needing more and 0:01:30.319 --> 0:01:33.440 more energy every day. And I'm Kelly waen Or Smith. 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:37.120 I'm a parasitologist who's adjunct with Rice University, And I 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:40.720 also like power. Do you ever wish that you could 0:01:40.760 --> 0:01:43.360 just plug yourself into solar power? Like? Why do we 0:01:43.400 --> 0:01:45.880 still need to sleep? Why can't we just recharge the 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:48.200 way all of our devices do. Yeah? Right, that would 0:01:48.200 --> 0:01:52.000 be like an upgrade of coffee. I like it electrified 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:54.880 coffee exactly. It just seems so much more reliable, you know, 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:56.840 those days you have, like insomnia or whatever you like. 0:01:56.920 --> 0:01:59.240 I wish I could just plug in and charge up. 0:01:59.320 --> 0:02:02.040 Today we did the coffee, and I'm feeling kind of jittery. 0:02:02.120 --> 0:02:04.280 So if I could just plug into a solar panel 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:08.120 and get nice, steady power without overdoing it, that would 0:02:08.160 --> 0:02:10.720 be pretty solid. Well maybe someday in the future. Well, 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:14.080 welcome to the podcast Daniel and Jorge explain the Universe, 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:16.200 in which we try to plug your brain into all 0:02:16.280 --> 0:02:19.840 the crazy ideas of the universe. We like to explore 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:23.720 the deepest, darkest questions about black holes, the biggest, hottest 0:02:23.800 --> 0:02:27.040 questions about neutron stars and what's going on inside the sun, 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:30.120 all the way down to the tiniest little particles that 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:33.800 make up me and you and your coffee. We explore 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:35.560 all of it. We don't shy away from any of it, 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:38.280 and we break it all down for you. My friend 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:40.240 and co host Orgy can't be with us today, so 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:42.040 we're very happy to be joined by one of our 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.240 regular co hosts Kelly. Thanks again for joining us today. Hey, 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:47.440 thanks for having me here. I love being on the 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:50.280 show and I am particularly excited about this topic. It's 0:02:50.280 --> 0:02:54.000 a super fascinating interface between human behavior and technology, which 0:02:54.040 --> 0:02:56.880 I just love. You wish that humans sometimes were easier 0:02:56.880 --> 0:02:59.880 to predict and control like technology, Well, yeah, that would 0:02:59.880 --> 0:03:02.200 be boring, but but but yes, it would be nice. 0:03:02.360 --> 0:03:04.360 But one thing that we can rely on humans for 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:07.600 is that we seem to always need more and more 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:11.040 energy our lives. Have more and more devices in them. 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:14.160 We rely on expensive devices to do things for us. 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:16.720 It seems like the future of our civilization is one 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:19.840 that consumes more and more power. Yes, and people in 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:23.560 other countries would like to approach Western levels of energy usage, 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:25.560 and if that happens, we're going to be in a 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:28.440 bit of trouble. We're already in a good bit of trouble. 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:31.280 As we look around on this planet, we notice that 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:34.080 it can't really sustain our lifestyle at this level for 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:37.520 much longer. I was reading the UN Climate Change Report, 0:03:37.680 --> 0:03:41.160 and it's pretty alarming stuff. That's not light reading. It's 0:03:41.200 --> 0:03:44.240 not light reading exactly. According to that report, a lot 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.080 of the changes we've already seen in the climate are 0:03:47.320 --> 0:03:51.000 unprecedented in the last thousands or a few hundreds of 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:54.440 thousands of years. So the Earth is heating up, the 0:03:54.520 --> 0:03:58.120 sea levels are rising, things are going bonkers. We just 0:03:58.200 --> 0:04:01.240 can't continue in this direct. Yeah. The more you watch 0:04:01.320 --> 0:04:03.320 the news or pay attention to the weather channel, the 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:06.080 more depressing this stuff gets as time goes on. And 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:07.800 if we're going to slow it down, we're gonna have 0:04:07.840 --> 0:04:10.839 to make some pretty big changes to our behavior. Yeah. 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:14.400 I think one goal is to keep the Earth from overheating. 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:16.839 You know, as we pump more c O two into 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.680 the atmosphere, it acts as this global blanket, keeping the 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:24.520 Sun's energy inside rather than letting the Earth radiated out 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:27.159 into space. So the more CEO two that we pump 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:30.400 into our atmosphere, the warmer the Earth gets. It's already 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:34.400 risen by almost a degree relative to historical levels as 0:04:34.440 --> 0:04:37.520 of twenty twelve, and there was this prediction that if 0:04:37.560 --> 0:04:40.320 we wanted to keep it from rising another degree up 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:43.320 to two degrees above typical levels, and there was a 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:46.120 certain amount of CEO two that we could afford to 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:50.279 pump into the atmosphere. Unfortunately, we've already pumped more than 0:04:50.360 --> 0:04:53.200 half of that into the atmosphere. So we have this 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:58.040 like shrinking window to avoid basically total disaster. And I 0:04:58.080 --> 0:05:00.479 wonder sometimes if we're going to be able to pull 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:03.040 it off, if we sort of as a species, are 0:05:03.040 --> 0:05:05.200 going to be able to stand together and say like, hey, 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:08.200 let's solve this problem. Let's do something about it. Yeah, 0:05:08.440 --> 0:05:10.080 you know, we're gonna have to do something drastic. And 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:12.280 the longer we wait, the more drastic that thing is 0:05:12.320 --> 0:05:14.720 going to have to be. And so we got to 0:05:14.760 --> 0:05:17.000 get moving on that. We definitely do have to get 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:19.840 moving on that. And of course science and technology seems 0:05:19.880 --> 0:05:22.760 like an excellent direction, like we're developing new technologies, we're 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:24.680 pushing this kind of stuff. It's the kind of thing 0:05:24.720 --> 0:05:27.360 that humans only seem to respond to when it's like 0:05:27.520 --> 0:05:30.200 really in crisis. You know, I wish that we could 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:33.200 like look at these things further in advance and prioritize 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:36.159 these things before we're in crisis mode. But it's sort 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:38.400 of like the professor with a thousand things going off 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:40.719 at once. We only seem to have the attention span 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:44.240 for the most urgent crisis. Foresight seems to be a 0:05:44.240 --> 0:05:47.839 pretty massive weak point for humanity as a whole, exactly. 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:51.760 And one crucial area, of course, is production of that energy. 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.360 We want to keep consuming this much energy to power 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:57.440 our iPads and our phones and to watch our screens, 0:05:57.520 --> 0:05:59.040 and we need to figure out a way to generate 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:02.440 that energy that doesn't further heat up our planet, that 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.240 doesn't cause like wildfires and see ocean rises and all 0:06:06.279 --> 0:06:08.120 this sort of stuff. And one of the great things 0:06:08.160 --> 0:06:11.359 about the you know, possible solutions to this problem is 0:06:11.400 --> 0:06:14.440 that there's technologies we already have that we could use, 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:18.200 so it doesn't even necessarily require some like world changing 0:06:18.240 --> 0:06:21.279 fundamental new technology. We have some of the tools now, 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:24.200 we just need to commit to implementing them. Does that 0:06:24.240 --> 0:06:27.360 make you more optimistic that we're going to solve this problem, 0:06:27.400 --> 0:06:29.680 like because you can see the solutions ahead of us, 0:06:30.080 --> 0:06:33.240 or less optimistic because now it's like a political question. 0:06:33.240 --> 0:06:35.640 It's just a question of whether humans will stand together 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:37.719 and do this. I always find it hard to be 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:41.320 optimistic in the face of politics, but but I think 0:06:41.320 --> 0:06:43.680 if you give up hope, then you really don't get anywhere. 0:06:43.720 --> 0:06:47.200 So yes, I'm optimistic. We need to make better use 0:06:47.200 --> 0:06:49.880 of these technologies. And a lot of the technologies you're 0:06:49.880 --> 0:06:52.640 talking about have been ramping up quickly, things like wind 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:56.839 and solar, which are clean and renewable and excellent sources 0:06:56.839 --> 0:06:59.760 of power. But there's another technology which has been around 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:04.080 for or decades, which produces reliable electricity and doesn't emit 0:07:04.240 --> 0:07:08.040 any carbon, and for which there's huge amounts of fuel 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:11.560 readily available. But it's not one that people typically think 0:07:11.600 --> 0:07:15.720 of when they think of like clean energy or green energy. 0:07:15.920 --> 0:07:18.720 And of course I'm talking about nuclear power. And so 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:26.320 today on the podcast, we'll be tackling the question is 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:30.600 nuclear power worth the risks? Yeah, and it's a particularly 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:34.360 complicated form of energy. There are definitely environmental groups who, 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:37.520 despite the fact that it produces zero carbon, are still 0:07:37.560 --> 0:07:40.679 completely against it because of some of the other side 0:07:40.680 --> 0:07:42.440 effects like what do you do with the waste and 0:07:42.480 --> 0:07:44.960 how is that going to contaminate the environment. So it's 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:50.160 a particularly complicated but promising technology. Yeah. I think it's 0:07:50.200 --> 0:07:53.280 really fascinating how it's sort of splits the politics, like 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:56.600 if you are a pro environment are you against nuclear 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:59.160 because of the potential waste and risks or are you 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:03.200 pro nuclear because it is zero carbon. It's really fascinatingly 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:06.920 skewers all of these questions. And what's interesting is most people, 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:09.200 when you ask them, don't sort of kind of feel 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.760 one way or another. They feel very strongly pro or 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:14.680 very strongly against. It's a technology that doesn't have a 0:08:14.720 --> 0:08:16.880 lot of people in the middle. Yeah, and I think 0:08:16.880 --> 0:08:19.680 that the general sense out there is that nuclear power 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:22.280 is risky, that it's dangerous. People have seen Home or 0:08:22.320 --> 0:08:25.200 Simpson operating that nuclear power plant on The Simpsons. It 0:08:25.320 --> 0:08:27.840 seemed blinky the Three Eyed Fish. They just get the 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:30.239 sense that nuclear power is like out of our control. 0:08:30.280 --> 0:08:33.160 It's something maybe humans shouldn't dabble with, and of course 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:36.000 it's connected with nuclear weapons, which you know, might end 0:08:36.080 --> 0:08:39.400 humanity and ruin the planet. So in general, I guess 0:08:39.440 --> 0:08:42.400 that people are uneasy with the idea of nuclear power. 0:08:42.520 --> 0:08:44.800 And I've also concluded that The Simpsons are partly to 0:08:44.840 --> 0:08:49.320 blame for our current climate change issues because so many 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:53.480 people are watching it on their screens. Well I did 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:55.280 when I was a kid. I guess I haven't recently, 0:08:55.320 --> 0:08:57.440 But anyway, maybe we should talk to Matt Groening about 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:02.040 a PR overhaul, although maybe he's not in charge anymore. Yeah. Well, 0:09:02.120 --> 0:09:05.080 it's true that Monty Burns is not the most sympathetic 0:09:05.120 --> 0:09:08.120 figure when it comes to running a power plant. But 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:10.880 I was wondering what our listeners thought about this question 0:09:10.960 --> 0:09:14.320 about whether nuclear power is an excellent source of fuel 0:09:14.400 --> 0:09:17.960 for the future because of its zero carbon output, or 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:21.040 whether it's something risky and dangerous that humans should shy 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:24.839 away from to avoid polluting our planet with radioactive waste 0:09:24.840 --> 0:09:27.640 that would last for tens of thousands of years. So, 0:09:27.679 --> 0:09:30.960 as usual, I ask people to volunteer to answer difficult 0:09:31.080 --> 0:09:35.240 questions without any preparation. So thanks to everybody who volunteered, 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:37.600 and if you would like to participate for a future 0:09:37.640 --> 0:09:40.640 episode of the podcast, please don't be shy. All you 0:09:40.640 --> 0:09:43.000 have to do is write to us two questions at 0:09:43.120 --> 0:09:46.360 Daniel and Jorge dot com. So think about it for 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:49.199 a moment before you hear these answers. Do you think 0:09:49.400 --> 0:09:52.640 nuclear power is worth the risks? Here's what people had 0:09:52.640 --> 0:09:56.280 to say, Well, we certainly are aware of several high 0:09:56.360 --> 0:10:01.880 profile incidents that have happened with nuclear power stations, including 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:05.559 journal Bill, which caused the public to give pause in 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:08.680 supporting nuclear power. But I believe we can't rule it 0:10:08.760 --> 0:10:12.320 out as a source of energy given the rising demand 0:10:12.360 --> 0:10:15.920 for energy of humans and the increasing need for us 0:10:15.920 --> 0:10:20.080 to stop using fossil fuel. It's too about climate change disaster. 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:24.760 Nuclear power is definitely worth the risk, especially fusion reactors 0:10:25.160 --> 0:10:28.880 as they produce only neutrons in some gamma radiation. Nuclear 0:10:28.960 --> 0:10:33.520 power has benefits of producing large amount of electricity, and 0:10:33.559 --> 0:10:37.440 the risks are the safety hazards, which I think can 0:10:37.480 --> 0:10:39.679 be taken care of as long as the party is 0:10:39.720 --> 0:10:45.200 involved take the precautions, and the waste, the radioactive waste 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:47.400 is the reason why we need to be moving towards 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:52.040 more sustainable powers, but are the current limitations of resources 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:54.240 we cannot so I think it's what there is gonna 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:57.600 But if you're talking about nukes, no, I think nuclear 0:10:57.800 --> 0:11:00.040 power is for sure worth the risk. I haven't it 0:11:00.160 --> 0:11:02.120 into this much, but from what I've seen, I think 0:11:02.160 --> 0:11:06.240 nuclear power is definitely worth the risk. It's clean as 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:09.320 far as I really just have to worry about waste. Definitely, Yes, 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:14.200 I am a big deliver in nuclear power because it's 0:11:14.240 --> 0:11:18.520 a clean source of energy, and history shows that we 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:22.920 haven't figured out yet how to don't have accidents with that. 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:27.280 But we did that in aviation, for example. We have 0:11:27.480 --> 0:11:33.360 a very safe commercial aviation and market. So I'm very 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:37.400 confident that we'll get there on the nuclear as well. 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:41.040 I think so because it's better than getting the planet 0:11:41.040 --> 0:11:43.520 with fossil fuels. And I don't say there's a lot 0:11:43.559 --> 0:11:49.840 of option to generate constant power without nuclear until fusion 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.640 takes hole. Anyway, I'd imagine that it certainly is worth 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:58.840 the risks. I mean if by risks you mean like 0:11:59.120 --> 0:12:05.000 natural desa masters like earthquakes and tsunamis, then I don't 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:09.160 see those happening too frequently. Um, I think they could 0:12:09.160 --> 0:12:12.480 be you know, I have some preventative measures put in 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:16.080 place for those, and I think it's definitely worth the risks. 0:12:16.480 --> 0:12:19.920 So I actually found these responses to be pretty uplifting. 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:21.760 A lot of people seem like they were generally in 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:24.680 support of nuclear power, although maybe your audience is a 0:12:24.679 --> 0:12:27.640 particular subset of the world, so maybe it's not the 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:31.960 representative of the general public. There was one in there. 0:12:32.760 --> 0:12:34.960 There were a fair number of optimistic responses. There was 0:12:35.040 --> 0:12:39.800 one person who said, especially fusion reactors, and so we 0:12:39.840 --> 0:12:42.800 had meant vision, but let's go ahead and talk about 0:12:42.840 --> 0:12:44.360 what is the difference between the two of those. What 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:46.199 kind of nuclear power is running a lot of the 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:48.600 power plants that are going today. Yeah, I was also 0:12:48.600 --> 0:12:51.080 a little surprised that our listeners are so pro nuclear, 0:12:51.240 --> 0:12:53.880 but maybe that comes from their faith in science and 0:12:53.880 --> 0:12:56.840 their fascination with technology. But you're right, there's a huge 0:12:56.880 --> 0:13:01.160 difference between fusion and vision. Specifically, fission is something we 0:13:01.200 --> 0:13:04.360 can do today. It powers the world partly we're able 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:07.040 to harness this nuclear process and use it to pull 0:13:07.200 --> 0:13:10.720 electricity out of the hearts of atoms. But fusion is 0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:13.160 something in the future. Fusion is something we have not 0:13:13.280 --> 0:13:16.199 yet tackled, and speaking of the core physics of it, 0:13:16.400 --> 0:13:19.480 remember that fission is when you take a big, heavy, 0:13:19.640 --> 0:13:23.240 unstable nucleus like a uranium, atom or plutonium, and you 0:13:23.360 --> 0:13:26.640 split it apart into two smaller nuclei, and when you 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:30.439 do that, you release energy. Conversely, fusion is the opposite. 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:33.680 You take light nuclei like hydrogen or helium and you 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:36.880 push them together, and when they fuse together to make 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:40.520 something heavier, they also release energy. And that seems kind 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:43.880 of confusing because you might think, well, what releases energy? 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:46.600 Is it breaking things up or is it pushing things together? 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:50.080 The answer for complicated nuclear physics reasons is that it 0:13:50.120 --> 0:13:53.240 depends on what you're pushing or what you're splitting. If 0:13:53.240 --> 0:13:56.439 you're taking really light elements like hydrogen or helium, then 0:13:56.520 --> 0:14:00.360 pushing them together fusing them releases energy. You're taking really 0:14:00.440 --> 0:14:04.280 heavy elements anything heavier than iron, than splitting them up 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:09.559 releases energy. Funny story, I memorized those definitions in reverse 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:12.880 once and it took a lot of work to get 0:14:12.920 --> 0:14:15.760 them straight in my head afterwards, which was really important 0:14:15.840 --> 0:14:19.520 because soon Ish included chapters originally on both of these topics, 0:14:19.800 --> 0:14:22.240 so I had to get it right before the interviews started. 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:24.240 So I'd walk around the house and Zach would be like, 0:14:24.520 --> 0:14:27.120 fusion go, and I would define it, and then later 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:29.520 in the day he'd be like, fission go. And eventually 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:32.480 we got it right. But actually, to this day, I 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:34.560 try to avoid using those terms because I'm worried I'm 0:14:34.560 --> 0:14:37.840 going to blow it again. But we all have our things. Yeah, well, 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:41.000 I actually worked on fusion research myself back in the 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:44.200 nineties when I was a young future scientist and I 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:46.080 was trying to figure out what kind of physics I 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:50.000 wanted to do with my life. I thought, fusion seems promising. 0:14:50.040 --> 0:14:52.680 It's around the corner. It's going to save the world 0:14:52.720 --> 0:14:56.040 by providing abundant energy so cheap you wouldn't even have 0:14:56.120 --> 0:14:58.240 to charge for it. That was back in the nineties, 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:01.320 and you know, thirty year years later, so fusion is 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:05.040 sort of still around the corner. It's something that's been 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:09.040 promising and maybe been thirty years away for fifty years now. 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:11.440 So it's a little bit frustrating that we don't yet 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:14.880 have an ability to harness this incredible source of power, 0:15:15.040 --> 0:15:17.280 the thing that fuels our sun and all the stars 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:19.880 out there. It would provide cheap energy. The fuel for 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:24.400 it is just water, produces almost no dangerous radioactive elements. 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:26.760 It would be wonderful, but unfortunately it's not something we 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:29.240 know yet how to get to work. And if you 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:30.680 want to hear more about it, we have a couple 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:34.280 of episodes about that, including ones about the huge reactor 0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:36.720 in France eater I t e R that they are 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:40.000 currently building and they are hoping will provide energy. That 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:45.240 the thing costs about ten bajillion dollars. I think there 0:15:45.280 --> 0:15:47.680 are some private companies that have recently made some pretty 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:51.840 exciting strides, also in far more compact and therefore more 0:15:51.880 --> 0:15:55.760 affordable models. But but yeah, as as you suggested, it's 0:15:55.800 --> 0:16:00.440 the technology of the future and may always be thus exactly, 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:02.760 And there's some companies here in southern California, some of 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:06.200 them who have spinoffs from U s I faculty who 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:08.920 has some really clever ideas that might make fusion work. 0:16:09.040 --> 0:16:11.440 The problem we're facing with the environment, though, is that 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:13.840 we don't need a solution that's twenty years from now. 0:16:14.160 --> 0:16:17.240 The crisis is so imminent that we really need something 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:20.480 very very soon to help us draw down our use 0:16:20.560 --> 0:16:24.640 of energy sources which produce more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. 0:16:24.720 --> 0:16:26.480 So really we need to focus on things that we 0:16:26.480 --> 0:16:29.800 can turn on almost immediately, and fission, of course, is 0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:31.800 something we know how to do. We've been doing it 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:36.040 for something like fifty years. The typical process, and most 0:16:36.080 --> 0:16:38.760 of the reactors in the United States comes from fission 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:42.840 of uranium. Uranium is something which is like exists all 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:45.720 over the world. We had an episode recently about uranium. 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:48.720 Is it on Urineus? And we talked about how uranium 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:50.960 is actually all over the Solar System. It's one of 0:16:51.000 --> 0:16:54.200 the more prevalent elements in our Solar system. It's in 0:16:54.240 --> 0:16:56.720 the ground, it's in the water, it's in the moon, 0:16:56.880 --> 0:16:59.840 it's in asteroids, and it's also on Urinus. And we 0:17:00.040 --> 0:17:04.800 only giggled a little episode. We were so good. We 0:17:04.800 --> 0:17:07.159 were very much like adults. But of course there are 0:17:07.240 --> 0:17:11.280 challenges with fission. The uranium that we find in our planet, 0:17:11.320 --> 0:17:14.520 the stuff that we dig up and purify is mostly uranium. 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:18.160 Two thirty eight. Two thirty eight there tells you how 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:21.760 many protons and neutrons together are in the nucleus, and 0:17:21.800 --> 0:17:24.200 you two thirty eight is fine, but it's not really 0:17:24.240 --> 0:17:27.280 great for fission. It doesn't really like to split apart 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:30.080 and release energy the way other versions of uranium do, 0:17:30.240 --> 0:17:34.560 specifically uranium two thirty five, which has three fewer neutrons, 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:37.040 but of course the same number of protons, so it's 0:17:37.040 --> 0:17:40.280 still uranium. You two thirty five is great for fission, 0:17:40.280 --> 0:17:44.280 It splits apart nicely, produces more neutrons. It's excellent, but 0:17:44.400 --> 0:17:47.280 it's like, less than one percent of the uranium you 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:50.480 find naturally is you two thirty five. And here in 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:55.240 lies in my mind, the biggest concern with this technology 0:17:55.280 --> 0:17:57.639 is that enriching the uranium to get more of that 0:17:57.720 --> 0:18:00.960 two thirty five. A little bit of a process gives 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:04.560 you great fuel for reactions. A lot of that process 0:18:04.760 --> 0:18:06.880 gives you the stuff that you need for nuclear bomb 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:09.120 and it's hard to know if a country is doing 0:18:09.160 --> 0:18:11.520 just a little bit of enrichment or a whole lot 0:18:11.560 --> 0:18:14.200 of the enrichment. And that's one of the big problems 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:17.040 with nuclear power in my opinion, because you're not in 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:19.240 favor of every country out there getting nuclear bombs and 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:21.000 tossing them at each other. You know, it makes me 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:24.919 a little uncomfortable me as well. And you bring up 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:27.000 a really interesting point which I think we should dig into, 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.080 which is the difference between a nuclear reactor and a 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:33.120 nuclear bomb, or a nuclear reactor or a nuclear chain 0:18:33.200 --> 0:18:36.760 reaction is when you have a uranium atom which splits, 0:18:36.880 --> 0:18:40.280 sends off more neutrons, which then triggers other uranium atoms 0:18:40.359 --> 0:18:44.200 nearby to split and produce more neutrons. And the crucial 0:18:44.240 --> 0:18:47.159 thing there is nearby you need enough uranium in a 0:18:47.240 --> 0:18:49.560 sort of a dense enough package, and when these neutrons 0:18:49.600 --> 0:18:52.560 fly out, they hit more uranium and they can trigger 0:18:52.600 --> 0:18:55.520 more reactions. So if you have enriched your fuel to 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:58.520 like five per cent uranium two thirty five, then you 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:01.080 could have this sort of self sustain Any nuclear reaction 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:04.600 that produces energy and keeps going is sort of like ignition, 0:19:04.960 --> 0:19:06.600 you know, like when you start a fire and then 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:08.840 it's hot enough that it burns the wood next to it, 0:19:08.880 --> 0:19:10.680 which is then hot enough to burn the wood next 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:12.440 to it. You don't have to keep starting the fire. 0:19:12.640 --> 0:19:15.440 So that's the nice thing about a self sustaining nuclear reaction. 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.879 A nuclear bomb, however, is something much more dramatic. Yes, 0:19:18.960 --> 0:19:20.919 so I think, with the way I understand it, if 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:24.119 everything goes wrong in your nuclear reaction at a power plant, 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:27.560 it might blow apart. And you'd get an explosion, but 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:29.760 very quickly that would end the reaction. But in a 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:32.880 nuclear bomb, you've got so much of the right kind 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.200 of fuel in such a compact area that it has 0:19:36.320 --> 0:19:40.080 time to undergo a lot more reactions before it blows 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:43.239 far enough apart that it can't react anymore. And so 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:46.359 you can get like an explosion at a nuclear power plant, 0:19:46.440 --> 0:19:50.560 but never anything like a nuclear bomb explosion. Is that 0:19:50.600 --> 0:19:52.920 would that be fair to say, Yeah, exactly, you can't 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:55.359 really make a nuclear power plant blow up with like 0:19:55.400 --> 0:19:57.600 a mushroom cloud. You can do a lot of damage, 0:19:57.680 --> 0:19:59.000 and you can get a lot of people, and you 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:01.320 can spread radiation everywhere, but you're not going to get 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:04.000 an actual nuclear explosion the way we get them in 0:20:04.080 --> 0:20:05.959 nuclear weapons. And you're right. In order to do that, 0:20:06.000 --> 0:20:08.520 you have to enrich your fuel much much further, so 0:20:08.600 --> 0:20:11.840 you get much more fission going on much more rapidly, 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:14.320 because that's really what an explosion is. It's a very 0:20:14.480 --> 0:20:17.960 rapid release of energy, so rapid that the energy release 0:20:18.000 --> 0:20:20.160 sort of takes over and you get these like supersonic 0:20:20.200 --> 0:20:22.720 shock waves through the material. So that's how fission work. 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:25.600 We're harnessing the power of the atom. We're breaking it 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:28.199 apart and releasing some of the energy that's stored inside 0:20:28.200 --> 0:20:29.520 of it. If you like, you can think of the 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:32.440 atom is sort of like held together by springs, and 0:20:32.560 --> 0:20:34.800 what you're doing is like unhooking those springs, so then 0:20:34.800 --> 0:20:36.919 the bits like fly off and have a lot of 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:39.199 energy when they come out. One of the problems with 0:20:39.280 --> 0:20:41.840 uranium two thirty five, though, is that when the neutrons 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:44.720 fly out, they're going a little bit too fast. Like 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:47.359 uranium two thirty five likes to get split at half 0:20:47.400 --> 0:20:49.119 by a neutron, but it likes to get split in 0:20:49.160 --> 0:20:51.719 half by neutrons that are not going too fast. So 0:20:51.880 --> 0:20:54.800