HARNESSING THE ATOM

Press, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 26856, 8 October 1952, Page 9

HARNESSING THE ATOM

Possible Use For

Electric Power (Special Correspondent N2.P A.) (Rec. 8 p.m.) LONDON, October 7. The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe in a special report on atomic energy prospects released in Geneva, said that it would be years before atomic energy could be harnessed for the commercial production of electric power. The report expressed the view that the economic effects of the use of nuclear fuels would be greater than those of any other new method of production. It emphasised that the first industrial application of heat released by nuclear fission would be to generate electricity, but added that formidable technical problems remained to be overcome. “Any influence exerted by the production of power from nuclear heat will be more fundamental than the technical advances which may be made in existing types of power plants, or in the realisation of any other known scheme for wringing electric energy from the elements. “Economic factors will not hold up the application of atomic energy to the production of commercial electric power. - “Increased capital costs for nuclear reactor equipment are approximately balanced, or somewhat more than balanced, by much lower specific costs for fuel and operations. “Low interest rates and high fuel prices, and the probability of depreciation charges comparable with those of normal steam plant, may therefore tend to encourage the speedy application of atomic energy for baseload supply without suggesting that the economic gain will be sufficiently great to justify the premature scrapping of conventional plants already in service.”