What is the difference between nuclear power plants and fossil fuel plants?
All power plants – including nuclear – work pretty much alike. Basically, the fuel (whether that be coal, gas or uranium) heats water and turns it into steam. The steam turns the propeller-like blades of a giant turbine. That turbine drives the shaft of a huge generator. Inside the generator, coils of wire and magnetic fields interact – and electricity is produced. The biggest difference is that nuclear power plants don’t burn fossil fuels – or anything else. Instead, they split uranium atoms. That means they don’t create acid rain, soot, urban smog or carbon dioxide (the principal greenhouse gas). Nuclear power plants avoid more than 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually.
