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> I'm not aware of anything that turns radioactive waste into non-radioactive waste. You use a breeder reactor. Some of the designs for thorium breeders, for e
by pdkl95 11y ago
> I'm not aware of anything that turns radioactive waste into non-radioactive waste.
You use a breeder reactor. Some of the designs for thorium breeders, for example, can be used to process existing waste from other reactors.
> guaranteed to be a problem for thousands of years?
Note that it gets safer over time as it decays, and in general the radiation danger of an isotope goes down the longer the half-life. Once you get into the particularly long lived isotopes, the radiation danger becomes very small. Also, the amount of waste is trivial; nuclear power only makes a millionth the waste as traditional power, because of the vast difference in usable energy density.
Even if you consider the waste that stays around for "thousands of years", that's a short time compared to some types of chemical waste that doesn't decay. How many Superfund sites already exist?[1] There are quite a few in Silicon Valley[2].
[1] http://toxmap-classic.nlm.nih.gov/toxmap/combo/mapControls.do http://toxmap-classic.nlm.nih.gov/toxmap/combo/mapControls.d...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Superfund_sites_in_California https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Superfund_sites_in_Cal...
- nickpsecurity 11y ago"Even if you consider the waste that stays around for "thousands of years", that's a short time compared to some types of chemical waste that doesn't decay." I did mention a plasma converter and the possibility of chemical options coming up down the line. Not many possibilities like that for nuclear.
- pdkl95 11y ago> I did mention a plasma converter and the possibility of chemical options coming up down the line. Yes, you did. You also (correctly) suggest we aren't actually going to solve all chemical pollutant problems with plasma converters. That's an interesting tech that should be useful in some areas, but even then chemical pollution is still a far bigger problem than the nuclear power industry ever will be. > Not many possibilities like that for nuclear. I did mention a breeder reactor and that nuclear power converts a microscopic[1] amount of fuel into waster for the same energy. Not only is nuclear waste a solved problem, it's utterly ridiculous to compare such trivial amounts of waste to what other industries produce. [1] literally micro- as in 1/1,000,000 (because we get much more energy[2] from U or Th) [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density#Energy_densities_of_common_energy_storage_materials https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density#Energy_densitie...
- nickpsecurity 11y agoSo, breeders solve waste problem. Reactors are producing microscopic amounts. One person's basement worth of space should handle US's waste storage needs. So, what was the Yucca Mountain proposal for again? I seem to have got the wrong impression they needed space for tons of hot waste.
- DennisP 11y agoWe needed Yucca Mountain because: - Carter put a moratorium on conventional fuel reprocessing, like France uses. - The Clinton administration shut down the Integral Fast Reactor project. - The NRC created a very difficult regulatory environment for anyone attempting to develop more advanced types of reactors, including the fast reactors and molten salt reactors that would produce far less waste and consume most of our existing waste as fuel.
- nickpsecurity 11y agoThere we go. I appreciate some specifics to look into on top of breeder reactors.