IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v15y2022i12p4275-d836195.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Investigation into the Current State of Nuclear Energy and Nuclear Waste Management—A State-of-the-Art Review

Author

Listed:
  • Mohamed Alwaeli

    (Department of Technologies and Installations for Waste Management, Faculty of Energy and Environmental Engineering, Silesian University of Technology, 44-100 Gliwice, Poland)

  • Viktoria Mannheim

    (Institute of Energy Engineering and Chemical Machinery, University of Miskolc, 3515 Miskolc-Egyetemváros, Hungary)

Abstract

Nuclear power can replace fossil fuels and will have a decisive impact on the change in the approach to conventional energy. However, nuclear (or radioactive) wastes are produced by the operation of the nuclear reactors should be safely and properly disposed of. This paper assesses the uranium resources and the global state of nuclear power plants and determines the energy mixes in different countries using the most nuclear energy. Furthermore, this paper analysed the nuclear waste management and disposal and the depletion of abiotic resources, and the primary energy sources of a basic production process using electricity mix and nuclear electricity for a basic production (PET bottle manufacturing) process. The life cycle assessment was completed by applying the GaBi 8.0 (version 10.6) software and the CML method. In this study, we limit our discussion to high-level nuclear waste (HLW) and spent nuclear fuel (SNF) waste. We do not consider waste generated from uranium mining and milling, which is usually disposed of in near-surface impoundments close to the mine or the mill. The investigation of waste management methods is limited to European countries. This research work is relevant because determining abiotic resources is important in a life cycle assessment and current literature available on LCA analysis for nuclear powers remains under-developed. These results can guide and compare manufacturing processes involving a nuclear electricity and electricity grid mix input. The results of this research can be used to develop production processes using nuclear energy with lower abiotic depletion impacts. This research work facilitates the industry in making predictions for a production-scale plant using an LCA of production processes with nuclear energy consumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Mohamed Alwaeli & Viktoria Mannheim, 2022. "Investigation into the Current State of Nuclear Energy and Nuclear Waste Management—A State-of-the-Art Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-22, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:15:y:2022:i:12:p:4275-:d:836195
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/12/4275/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/12/4275/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Szamosi, Zoltán & Bodnár, István & Szepesi, Gábor L. & Rosas-Casals, Martí & Berényi, László, 2020. "Improved environmental impact in the architecture industry: LCA analysis of an alternative masonry element," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 147(P1), pages 1718-1727.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Viktoria Mannheim & Weronika Kruszelnicka, 2023. "Relation between Scale-Up and Life Cycle Assessment for Wet Grinding Process of Pumice," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(11), pages 1-16, June.
    2. Viktoria Mannheim & Károly Nehéz & Salman Brbhan & Péter Bencs, 2023. "Primary Energy Resources and Environmental Impacts of Various Heating Systems Based on Life Cycle Assessment," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(19), pages 1-23, October.
    3. Viktoria Mannheim & Judit Lovasné Avató, 2023. "Life-Cycle Assessments of Meat-Free and Meat-Containing Diets by Integrating Sustainability and Lean: Meat-Free Dishes Are Sustainable," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-24, August.
    4. Da-Woon Jung & Chung-Won Seo & Young-Chan Lim & Dong-Sun Kim & Seung-Yul Lee & Hyun-Kyu Suh, 2023. "Analysis of Flow Characteristics of a Debris Filter in a Condenser Tube Cleaning System," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(11), pages 1-15, June.
    5. Chien, Fengsheng & Sadiq, Muhammad & Li, Li & Sharif, Arshian, 2023. "The role of sustainable energy utility, natural resource utilization and waste management in reducing energy poverty: Evidence from South Asian countries," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    6. Hind Barghash & Zuhoor AlRashdi & Kenneth E. Okedu & Peter Desmond, 2022. "Life-Cycle Assessment Study for Bio-Hydrogen Gas Production from Sewage Treatment Plants Using Solar PVs," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(21), pages 1-17, October.
    7. Yue Tong & Yao Yue & Zhongkai Huang & Liping Zhu & Zhihou Li & Wei Zhang, 2022. "Modified RMR Rock Mass Classification System for Preliminary Selection of Potential Sites of High-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Engineering," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-17, November.
    8. Judit Lovasné Avató & Viktoria Mannheim, 2022. "Life Cycle Assessment Model of a Catering Product: Comparing Environmental Impacts for Different End-of-Life Scenarios," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-20, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yang, Junqin & Zhao, Hui & Li, Chenchen & Li, Xiuwei, 2021. "A direct energy reuse strategy for absorption air-conditioning system based on electrode regeneration method," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 353-364.
    2. Anh-Duc Pham & Quang Trung Nguyen & Duc Long Luong & Quynh Chau Truong, 2020. "The Development of a Decision Support Model for Eco-Friendly Material Selection in Vietnam," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(7), pages 1-19, April.
    3. Daniel González-Prieto & Yolanda Fernández-Nava & Elena Marañón & Maria Manuela Prieto, 2020. "Effect of Decarbonisation Policies and Climate Change on Environmental Impacts due to Heating and Cooling in a Single-Family House," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-22, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:15:y:2022:i:12:p:4275-:d:836195. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.