What Makes Nuclear Energy An Outstanding Game Changer

Nuclear energy, a remarkable game changer in the 20th century, is an important energy source in people’s daily life nowadays. It is the newest method to generate electricity through nuclear reactions in power plants. What makes nuclear energy an outstanding game changer? It is believed that nuclear energy has its influential breakthroughs and right timing for it to succeed. Until now, nuclear energy is still developing to a higher status, likely to become the dominating energy source in the future. And these ideas will be covered in the following paragraphs.

The development of nuclear energy has made changes to the world tremendously, especially having a breakthrough on modern energy’s characteristics and changing the energy mix of the

People are having a better understanding of nuclear reaction, leading to the success of nuclear energy. After the atomic structure was found in 1905, scientists have been conducting researches and experiments on nuclear activity in immense interest and enthusiasm. Their studies have contributed to the improved understanding of nuclear reaction, which eventually became the foundation of nuclear power generation. With comprehensive knowledge of nuclear reaction, people are able to produce components of nuclear power plants and keep advancing its efficiency. For instance, isotope separation process is discovered that enables the extraction and enrichment of uranium fuel from its ore. (Heriot, 1988) Various nuclear reactors, like pressurized water reactor and boiling water reactor, are invented in the 1960s to boost the energy efficiency of power generation. These discoveries have made mass production of nuclear energy possible, and with the favorable characteristics of nuclear energy, nuclear energy succeeds largely since then. Another reason for its success is the growing demand for electricity. The demand for electricity has risen vastly after World War II, where baby boom resulted in crazed population growth, and citizens resumed to their normal lives leading to the growth of industrial activities. (K.

The aggravating global warming has made nuclear energy getting the spotlight from the world. Recently, global warming intensified and gave severe impact to countries. This is possibly due to the combustion of fossil fuels for human activities, producing tons of greenhouse gasses that result in a rise in global temperature. In this century, the global temperature has already risen by 0.74°C , which results in serious climatic change and a rise in sea level. (IPCC, 2007) Consequently, finding a pollution-free energy is of paramount importance for all countries to alleviate these serious impacts, and nuclear energy is the best choice for them. With the support of governments, more nuclear plants will be gradually constructed and the nuclear industry will keep on growing. In addition, nuclear energy generation is getting better and better with the advancement and eradication of problems. One perplexing issue is nuclear leakage, that is what most people are afraid of, such as the terrible Chernobyl disaster in 1985 and Fukushima accident in Japan recently, which bring on long-lasting aftermath. This has drawn increasing attention from people about the safeness of nuclear power. Nonetheless, scientists have made nuclear energy safer, powerful and efficient. For instance,