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p A considerable amount of attention is paid to this problem in Western literature on scientific forecasting. Here one 287 finds a collision between two contradictory conceptions, which take different views of the state of mineral resources and the corresponding outlook for the development of the fuel and raw material base of the world economy.

p In this respect George Thomson may be classed among the pessimists. He believes that basic fuel resources (with the exception of coal) will be used up by 1980.  [287•1  Less pessimistic are the estimates of the First International Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy in Geneva in 1955, that the remaining reserves will last for not less than 100- 150 years.  [287•2  With regard to coal reserves, even Thomson agrees that they should last for at least another 4,000 years ( given the 1955 scale of extraction).  [287•3  Since then substantial new deposits of these useful ores have been discovered and, although the rate of extracting coal, and especially oil, is growing from year to year, new deposits are being found almost annually.

p According to P. Putnam and the US Atomic Energy Commission, by the year 2000 a world population twice that of 1960 will be consuming about five times more energy and by 2050 consumption will be approximately thirty times the 1950 level.  [287•4  Will there be enough fuel resources to keep up these rates?

p Fritz Baade gives an optimistic forecast. According to his calculations, even if atomic energy does not reach any considerable proportions by 2000, the traditional sources of energy will ensure the growth of its consumption by four or five times.  [287•5  Arthur Clarke believes that it will prove technically possible in the near future to work deep-lying coal, oil and ore deposits. “When we consider,” he writes, “that our deepest mines (now passing the 7,000 foot level) are mere pinpricks on the surface of our 8,000-mile diameter planet, it is obviously absurd to talk about fundamental 288 shortages of any element or mineral.” True, a few pages later he makes the reservation: “Whatever new reserves may be discovered, fossil fuels such as coal and oil can last for only a few more centuries; then (hey will be gone forever".  [288•1  Like many other scientists, Clarke places great hopes on the tremendous possibilities for extracting fossil ores from the ocean bed, and also on using mineral resources from other planets and asteroids as soon as the 21st century.  [288•2 

p But in relation to the 21st century pessimistic forecasts predominate. The US governmental expert Paul Averit maintains that world coal reserves (to say nothing of oil) will be totally exhausted by 2100.  [288•3  The Indian physicist J. J. Bhabha announced at the 1964 Geneva Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy that given an annual increase of only 5 per cent in consumption of electric energy world coal reserves will be exhausted in about 75 years, that is, by 2040.

p The same applies more or less to forecasts about the use of other minerals. In this respect the estimates by W. S. Woytinsky and E. S. Woytinsky (USA), for the most part unjustified,  [288•4  are of interest in illustrating the “pessimistic” conceptions (see Table 1).

p On the other hand, Dennis Gabor states, not without good reason, that by 1985-1990 mankind will probably embark on a new, higher stage of scientific and technological development, making it necessary to radically reassess our present estimates of minerals. It is likely, he continues, that in the next fifty years it will be difficult to expect any large-scale use of the energy of the sun, wind, tides, earth’s inner heat, geothermal waters, etc. But the potential possibilities of these sources of energy are colossal.

p Important amendments to forecasts on the outlook for world energy development have been made by the fact that in 1967 there were already 67 atomic electric stations with a total capacity of 12,226 megawatts operating in the world. In 1971, another 42 atomic electric stations with a capacity of 20,047 megawatts were in operation. The 289 growth rates of these stations are so high that they compel one to think of nuclear fuel reserves.  [289•1 

At present nuclear reactors are burning only uranium 235. According to the latest estimates, all the prospected uranium reserves would hardly be sufficient to supply the world with electric power at the present rate for two hundred years.  [289•2 

Table 1 Minerals: Probable Length of Life of Known Reserves, Under Specified Rates of Consumption Assumed Per Capita Consumption In the United States Minerals In All Countries as in 1948; in Other Countries as in 1947-1948 as in Europe (excluding the USSR In 1948) Oil (proved and indi- 22 20 cated reserves) Oil (ultimate re- 160 150 serves) Coal (all types) Iron ore (proved and 2200 200 985 66 indicated reserves) Iron ore (potential 625 200 reserves) Copper 45 20 Lead 33 11 Zinc 39 18 Tin 38 17 Bauxite 200 165

p Scientists are placing great hopes on reactors using fast neutrons which are capable of using uranium 238 and thorium 232, turning them into plutonium and uranium 233.  [289•3  With widespread use of nuclear power stations of this type the uranium and thorium reserves would last for several thousand years.

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p According to the forecasts of the US Atomic Energy Commission, 25 per cent of electric energy in the United States will be produced in nuclear power stations by 1980 and 50 per cent by 2000.  [290•1 

p Scientists regard the possibility of improving modern cycles of energy transformation as an important energy reserve. In particular, they are devoting considerable attention to the problem of direct transformation of heat energy into electric energy by magneto-hydrodynamic means.

p Powerful electric power stations with MHD generators are capable of raising the efficiency coefficient to 50-55 per cent, and with further improvement to 60 per cent. At the present time an experimental industrial plant with an MHD generator with a capacity of several dozen megawatts has been set up in the USSR. Preliminary calculations have been made for a powerful (2,400,000 kw) electric power station with MHD generators.

p The role of atomic power stations is growing very quickly. In the opinion of Soviet scientists, atomic energy by 1980 will become “a most important factor of further large structural advances in the world fuel balance. One may assume that by 2000 atomic energy will account for 25-30 per cent of all energy produced, which will be equivalent to approximately 20,000 million tons of fuel".  [290•2  But the possibility of a practical solution of the problem of controlled thermonuclear reaction for the requirements of world energy is still a remote one. “The size of a nuclear reactor using a mixture of deuterium and tritium and the requirements made of its elements are such that they go beyond the framework of the present level of technology. This will be the level of the next 10 to 20 years.... With regard to reaction using pure deuterium, this requires such large magnetic fields and in such a vast volume, that it is difficult to envisage the creation of such a reactor within the next twenty years."  [290•3 

p Research is also being carried on in the Soviet Union on 291 the use of solar energy for economic purposes. As a result helio plants have been installed, the use of which is producing a considerable saving of fuel in the southern regions of the USSR. A project was recently drawn up for a helio power station with a capacity of 10,000 kw for Central Asia, in which the boiler is replaced by a thermo-electric generator using semi-conductors. The solar energy at such a station is transformed directly into electric energy. The use of these plants will make it possible to find the best technical methods for developing helio power in the future.

p Underground thermal waters contain a great deal of heat energy which could be used for water supply, heating or transformation into electrical energy in a normal steam turbine cycle. A geo-thermal power station with a capacity of 5,000 kw in Kamchatka has already begun operation.

p It is planned to build powerful tidal power stations which are particularly effective in conjunction with river hydroelectric stations. The potential reserve of tidal energy is about 200,000 million kw.

p Many wind turbines are already in operation in the USSR, providing electricity for inhabitants of the tundra, farm workers in the virgin lands and shepherds in Kirghizia. The scale of wind power is increasing annually. The construction of wind power stations is particularly effective in the polar regions and many parts of Central Asia and Siberia, where the average annual wind speed varies from 4 to 9 metres per second.

p A great deal of importance is attached to producing electricity with the help of fuel elements which make it possible to transform fuel energy directly into electric energy. The ideal efficiency coefficient in the direct transformation of chemical energy into electrical is close on 100 per cent, but in practice it can reach 80 per cent.

p The prospects for the use of “traditional” and new sources of electric energy show that the energy potential in nature is far from being fully exploited. It should be added that existing estimates of the world’s energy resources are extremely incomplete due to the fact that this problem has not been fully studied. At present only a small part of the deposits of fossil fuel on dry land has been relatively well investigated. Fuel resources on the sea bed remain practically unstudied. Moreover, with the improvement of methods of surveying 292 and extraction technology our ideas about the degree to which the earth’s depths have been studied are also changing.  [292•1 

p All this justifies Soviet scientists in making optimistic assessments of the fuel balance of the future.

p This gives rise to another problem, namely, how to dispose of radioactive waste from atomic energy. So far this problem (in respect to long-term prospects) has not been satisfactorily solved.

p Isaac Asimov suggests that these wastes should be transported in rockets to certain areas in outer space where, in accordance with the law of gravitation, they will remain there, as it were, trapped, for example, at a point a quarter of a million miles from the Moon and a quarter of a million miles from the Earth.  [292•2 

p Nearly all the Western scientists we have mentioned take an extremely optimistic view of the prospects for mastering the secret of controlled thermonuclear reactions. A. C. Clarke is even convinced that energy from the synthesis of hydrogen nuclei will be obtained not later than 1990.  [292•3  However, the famous English physicist John Gockroft reminds us that we shall have to increase our knowledge considerably before we can produce an effective nuclear synthesis reactor and, therefore, in his opinion, it is impossible to say whether this will be achieved in the next twenty years. Hoyle even thinks that mankind may be faced with the problem of exhausted energy resources in the next century, if the pace of scientific research is not speeded up considerably. He is highly sceptical about the prospects of using the energy resources of other planets in our galaxy. “We already know what will have to be done about that,” he writes. “We must change our energy source to nuclear reactions, uranium and thorium, or perhaps the fusion of deuterium.”  [292•4 

The optimism of most Western scientists in forecasting the potentialities of nuclear power can be seen clearly in 293 their assessment of the outlook for the development of power on a cosmic scale. In this connection one need only recall Dyson’s project, which envisages the full use of the energy of solar radiation, references to the possibility of using the masses of large planets in the solar system for nuclear fuel, etc. In general, as A. C. Clarke concludes, not missing the opportunity to have a dig at his society, “we can never run out of energy or matter. But we can all too easily run out of brains".  [293•1