CO2 data in Domenici's book

One of the basic themes of Domenici's book, and of almost all proponents of a renaissance of nuclear energy, is that nuclear energy is environmentally sustainable because it "has a very low life-cycle carbon emissions when compared to other energy sources" (p.204). In fact, it explicitely says that "nuclear energy is essentially emission free" (p.205).

The only evidence provided in support of these statements is contained in p.204. The reference provided (note 50, chp. 10) is to a report of the Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI) of March 1995 titled "Life-Cycle Analysis of Power Generation Systems". Figure 10.5 in pag. 204 also refers to the same report. The CRIEPI is a japanese research institute working for the japanase electrical utilities.

Such a report can not be located using Google and it is not available at the CRIEPI web site: may be it is available only in japanese.

In Note 50 chp. 10 of the book an internet address is given, suposedly, for the report:

http://www.nei.org/index.asp?catnum=2&catid=260

This link points to a short section of the Nuclear Energy Institute site where the results - but no assumptions nor calculations - of three comparative studies of CO2 emissions are presented. Only a graph form the CRIEPI report is provided. This graph is reproduced in the book but without its title, that reads: Comparison of CO2 Emissions Intensity by Power Source in Japan.

In the NEI page, the graph is attributed to the CRIEPI report, and other. These "other" is unspecified.

Therefore, it is not possible to check the only concrete reference given.

We have contacted CRIEPI asking for how to get this report.

It is amazing that this book and also the MIT study take it as a given that the generation of nuclear energy does not produce significant CO2 emissions, i.e. that it does not consume energy, for example for mining uranium ore.

It is obvious that some energy is used to mine and fabricate nuclear fuel and that today most of this energy comes from fossil fuels. Therefore, one would need to conduct a net energy analysis to find out how large are uranium resources that can be extracted to provide a net energy balance, and at which point more CO2 is generated in the mining and manufacturing process than it is then saved.

None of the proponents of nuclear energy refers to any such study. The MIT study "assumes" there is enough uranium for their program with an open cycle, even though known reserves are not enough. Domenici's is concerned about low uranium resources and therefore argues for closed fuel cycles and breeder reactors. All of them simply use uranium price as the only variable determining supply, no energy costs: a fundamental mistake.