by Joshua Curtis
Daily Lobo
UNM professor Mohamed El-Genk said it is important to diversify power sources.
"We can not afford to exclude any options, because we have a diverse environment and circumstances in which we need different energy," he said. "If I say nuclear can do it and go and ignore the others, it is very stupid, very irresponsible."
He is working on a project that will use the waste heat from a nuclear plant, or any other power plant, to heat homes or send it to factories to use, he said.
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He would like to see communities planned around the power sources, so they can use this excess heat instead of spending to dispose of it, he said.
"You pay twice. It doesn't make any sense," he said. "Planned cities never think of where the energy comes from."
He also wants to make nuclear plants more efficient by using thermo-chemical processes to produce hydrogen, he said. Usually 30 percent of energy is used to produce electricity, and the rest goes to waste, he said.
"You don't have to lose this 70 percent as heat is converted to electricity," he said. "It is a very inefficient way."
El-Genk said it doesn't make sense to throw away that energy. The heat can be used to heat up water and produce hydrogen, he said.
Another way to streamline a nuclear plant is to burn heavy metal wastes called actinides, he said. These heavy metal wastes from the fission processes are a main concern in storing nuclear waste, but they are harmless if burned, he said.
El-Genk is working on portable, self-contained nuclear generators that can be delivered to rural areas in underdeveloped countries and would provide power for up to 10 years, then would be replaced and serviced, he said.
The devices can then be reused, he said.
He had a hand in developing nuclear-powered satellites, he said.
After they are put into orbit, a nuclear reactor about the size of a small garbage can is used to accelerate hydrogen from tanks and propel the satellite, he said.
Another more advanced propulsion form is to use superheated plasma that would propel the satellite at extremely high speeds, a propulsion form considered for sending a probe to the planet Pluto, he said.
"It is subject to very stringent design operational qualities, because you can't send the Maytag man to fix it," he said. "You want to be sure that if you have a launch abort, and this reactor falls in the white sand or seawater, it doesn't become critical."
El-Genk is the regents professor of the chemical and nuclear engineering department and the director of the Institute for Space and Nuclear Power Studies. He has been at UNM for 25 years. He has a Ph.D. from UNM and a master's and bachelor's from Alexandria University-Egypt.
