5 ms·
You might be surprised how much nuclear waste is out there. A bunch of estimates on this thread put it in the "millions of cubic feet" range, which is considera
by mikepurvis 8y ago
You might be surprised how much nuclear waste is out there. A bunch of estimates on this thread put it in the "millions of cubic feet" range, which is considerably more than what could fit in a single underground site:
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-total-mass-and-volume-of-all-the-stored-nuclear-waste-in-the-world https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-total-mass-and-volume-of-a...
Note also that this is mostly just considering high level waste (like, the actual spend fuel rods and reactor parts), and not all low- and intermediate-level waste, of which there is a lot more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Classification https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Classificati...
- youngtaff 8y agoUK estimates that the amount of nuclear wast we'll have (both high and low-level) will be smaller than the volume of one of the UK's national sports stadiums https://nda.blog.gov.uk/2017/04/03/how-much-radioactive-waste-is-there/ https://nda.blog.gov.uk/2017/04/03/how-much-radioactive-wast...
- mrpopo 8y agoYou are being misleading here. If I follow your link, I read this: Over the past four decades, the entire industry has produced about 62,500 metric tons of used nuclear fuel. That's the high-level waste. The rest of the comment goes on to explain that including all low- and intermediate-level waste, plus legacy waste from military activities, then it may reach the millions of cubic feet you're citing. Low-level waste is not much more dangerous than the extra natural radiation you receive from a plane trip, so the real danger is high-level waste. And that can fit in a fraction of the space required for a single solar park.