Sir, Papers delivered to the World Nuclear Association’s annual symposiums show an industry in crisis in that primary supplies of uranium provide only 55 per cent of the current demand, the balance coming from the so-called secondary sources of ex-weapons material, inventories and reworked mine tailings. The papers indicate that the secondary sources are running down.

The 36 reactors under construction (letter, February 17) can only be supplied by the scheduled closing of many of the 430 existing reactors, whose life is in some cases being extended by ignoring the safety implications associated with the deterioration in the materials of their construction as a result of irradiation.

Even if nuclear power is “carbon dioxide clean”, which it is not, the contribution it makes to global energy supplies is a mere 2½ per cent. Using the lower grades of uranium ore as the higher grades are depleted leads to even more carbon dioxide being released from the less efficient mining, milling and enrichment involved.

Nuclear power offers neither sustainability nor a “clean” overall fuel cycle and cannot contribute to an alleviation of global warming. There is no “nuclear option”.

Yours faithfully,
JOHN BUSBY,
Oakwood,
Melford Road, Lawshall,
Bury St Edmunds IP29 4PY.
February 17.

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