All the high-level radioactive waste that has been produced since the beginning of the French nuclear programme 50 years ago amounts to 3000 m³, which is equivalent to the volume of an Olympic swimming pool. Source: French Nuclear Society (SFEN)

Solar capacity required to replace Japan’s current nuclear fleet would cover roughly 1.3 million acres … roughly 52% of Japan’s total land area. Wind turbines would require … 1.3 million acres for the entire wind farm. This represents over 50 percent of Japan’s total land area.

Source: Breakthrough Institute

According to Cambridge physicist, David Mackay, it would require 2000 wind turbines to replace a reactor like Sizewell B in the UK, which capacity is 1188 MWe. The capacity of all nuclear reactors in the EU amounts to 133.191 MWe, it means that we would need around 112 Sizewell B reactors to produce the same amount of electricity. Thus, if you multiply those 112 Sizewell B reactors by 2000 wind turbines, you can deduce that the EU would need 224 000 wind turbines to generate the same amount of electricity as the current European nuclear fleet.

Electricity generated by nuclear power costs 4.3 € cents per KWh. Among the 16 energy sources that have been tested, nuclear energy ranks fourth after lignite (3.7 € cents/KWh), hydropower and coal (4.1 € cents/KWh). (European Nuclear Energy Forum report, May 2010)

Natural uranium contains 99.3% of the uranium isotope U-238 and 0.7% of U-235. Only U-235 can easily undergo spontaneous fission, which is the origin of the energy produced in the core of a nuclear reactor. Water reactors (technology employed by 85% of the world’s reactors) need uranium with a higher U-235 content. Enrichment thus consists of increasing the proportion of U-235 until its concentration reaches between 3 and 5%. Military applications require a far higher concentration of U-235, over 93%. Source: AREVA

1 pellet of Uranium (UO₂ – 5g) = 13 500 MJ (thermal energy extracted from 1 pellet)

The amount of fossil fuel necessary to produce an equivalent quantity of thermal energy is: 640 kg of wood, 360 m³ of natural gas, 400 kg of charcoal and 350 kg of mineral oil.

Source: Slovenské Elektrárne

“Between 1969 and 2000, there were 2259 and 3713 fatalities in the coal and oil energy chains respectively in OECD countries and 18017 and 16505 fatalities in non-OECD countries. Hydropower was responsible for 29924 deaths in one incident in china. In contrast, there has only been one severe accident (defined as resulting in 5 or more prompt fatalities) in nuclear power plants over this period of time, Chernobyl, which resulted in 31 fatalities.” Source: OECD / Nuclear Energy Agency, Comparing Nuclear Accident Risks with Those from Other Energy Sources

One gram of plutonium or 100 grams of uranium can produce as much electricity as 1 ton of oil. (source: AREVA)

According to the results of the Eurobarometer on nuclear safety, 56% of EU citizens believe that the current level of nuclear energy should be maintained the same or increased (it is up 8 points compared to the previous Eurobarometer published in 2007) and 68% think that nuclear helps increase the energy independence.