This is the second part of a four-part guest post by Dr. Michael Dittmar. Dr. Dittmar is a researcher with the Institute of Particle Physics of ETH Zurich, and he also works at CERN in Geneva.

During 2009, nuclear power plants, with a capacity of 370 GWe, will produce roughly 14% of the world-wide electric energy. About 65,000 tons of natural uranium equivalent are required to operate these reactors. For the last 15 years, only 2/3 of this fuel has on average been provided by uranium mines, whereas 1/3 has come from secondary resources. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the secondary uranium resources will be essentially exhausted during the next 5-10 years. In this paper, the situation concerning the secondary resources at the beginning of the year 2009 is presented. The data used are from the IAEA/NEA 2007 Red Book, "Uranium Resources, Production and Demand," and from the World Nuclear Association (WNA).

Our analysis shows that, at the beginning of 2009, the remaining world-wide civilian uranium stocks amount to roughly 50,000 tons. With the almost inevitable yearly draw-down of 10,000 tons, these civilian stocks will be essentially exhausted within the next 5 years. This coincides roughly with the year 2013, when the annual delivery of 10,000 tons of natural uranium equivalent from Russian military stocks to the USA will end. As the majority of the remaining civilian stocks, about 30,000 tons, are believed to be under the control of the US government and American companies, it seems rather unlikely that the USA will share their own strategic uranium reserves with other large nuclear energy users. In summary, all data indicate that a uranium supply shortage in many OECD countries can only be avoided, if the remaining military uranium stocks from Russia and the USA, estimated to be roughly 500,000 tons, are made available to the other countries.

(Link to 1^st part)

Vinod Khosla (VK) recently did a lengthy interview at the Milken Institute 2009 Global Conference. The interview was conducted by Elizabeth Corcoran (EC) of Forbes. You can see the video of the interview here:

Milken: Khosla on the Shift to Renewable Energy

These are excerpts from a transcript I put together from the recording. You can read the entire transcript (in three segments) on my R-Squared Energy Blog. I have labeled my comments with RR.

EC (13:40): In the past 90 days we have seen something like a billion dollars being put into solar investments - whether in the form of equity or debt. Is that stupid money?

This is a guest post by Eugenio Saraceno, member of ASPO-Italy and consultant for energy sources management.

France's nuclear power plants produce almost 80% of the nation's electricity. In contrast, nearby Italy has no nuclear plant in operation.

We on The Oil Drum spend so much time worrying about oil supply that we tend to think that electrical supply is relatively safe in comparison. If we stop to think about the issues, I think that we will find that the electrical situation is not much better than the oil situation. The likelihood of widespread electrical outages in next five to ten years is uncomfortably high.

We may already be starting to see some beginning examples of electrical shortages, such as this recent story regarding Maine. Residents were being asked to conserve electricity because of a natural gas shortage related to supply disruption and cold weather. Maine has a relatively tight electrical supply and heavy dependence on natural gas, so it is at high risk for this type of disruption. I expect to see more outages like this in the coming months and years, especially in high-risk areas.

In this post, we will look at some areas of vulnerability for the US electrical supply. While this analysis is restricted to the United States, some of the issues discussed may also be relevant to other countries.

(More beneath the fold)