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Bury nuclear waste underground in an area with no aquifer. The scenarios where this results in contamination are borderline hyperbole, usually entailing the los

Bury nuclear waste underground in an area with no aquifer. The scenarios where this results in contamination are borderline hyperbole, usually entailing the loss of all records of the waste's locations due to some sort of societal collapse followed by a future civilization digging up the waste for an inexplicable reason. By comparison, what is the long term storage plan for fossil fuel emissions?

afiori 6y ago
If we allow similar levels of hand-waving for both problems then: Q: what is the long term storage plan for fossil fuel emissions? A: Trees
- manfredo 6y ago
  Great, now come back to me with a plan to plant the trees required to offset carbon emissions. This is going to be challenging, because you'll need to reforest an area roughly the size of the continental United States to reduce atmospheric CO2 to levels from a century ago [1]. In order to actually do this, you'd need to desalinate massive amounts of water to feed trees in areas without vegetation. Generating the energy for desalination and pumping it inland would release massive amounts of carbon back into the atmosphere, necessitating more tress, necessitating more water, and so on. You'd probably have better chances sequestering carbon through an algae bloom in the oceans, but that too has drawbacks (namely, when the algae dies off it'll just release the carbon again). By comparison we already have a nuclear waste facility built in the US, though it's use was cancelled by Congress (and it wouldn't make sense to put spent fuel there yet, since we would want it for reprocessing), and another site is under construction in Finland [3]. "Bury it underground, in an area with no aquifer" isn't hand wave. Storing nuclear waste really is that simple. The main concern for uranium is water contamination. It's actually a prevalent due to naturally occurring uranium [4]. Place the waste in an area with no aquifer and there is no risk of contamination even in the event that the containment vessels deteriorate. 1. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/07/how-to-erase-100-years-carbon-emissions-plant-trees/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/07/how-t... 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_r... 3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repository https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repo... 4. https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/120396/uranium-contaminates-water-california-central-valley#:~:text=Fram%20and%20her%20colleagues%20believe,is%20used%20to%20irrigate%20crops https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/120396/uranium-contaminat....
spfzero 6y ago
To store it in our atmosphere.
imtringued 6y ago
What prevents nuclear waste from being brought to were it came from? Can't you just grind up the nuclear waste and mix it up with the excess rock to obtain a material mixture that has background radiation than the mine it came from?
- manfredo 6y ago
  Well, at a high level that's what's being done. Nuclear fuel is mined from underground and the spent fuel is put back underground. But it's much better to put it in a known location where it's away from water sources. Naturally occurring uranium is actually a fairly common pollutant in drinking water, putting the uranium back where it came from isn't always a good choice when there are better alternatives.

afiori 6y ago

If we allow similar levels of hand-waving for both problems then: Q: what is the long term storage plan for fossil fuel emissions? A: Trees

manfredo 6y ago
Great, now come back to me with a plan to plant the trees required to offset carbon emissions. This is going to be challenging, because you'll need to reforest an area roughly the size of the continental United States to reduce atmospheric CO2 to levels from a century ago [1]. In order to actually do this, you'd need to desalinate massive amounts of water to feed trees in areas without vegetation. Generating the energy for desalination and pumping it inland would release massive amounts of carbon back into the atmosphere, necessitating more tress, necessitating more water, and so on. You'd probably have better chances sequestering carbon through an algae bloom in the oceans, but that too has drawbacks (namely, when the algae dies off it'll just release the carbon again). By comparison we already have a nuclear waste facility built in the US, though it's use was cancelled by Congress (and it wouldn't make sense to put spent fuel there yet, since we would want it for reprocessing), and another site is under construction in Finland [3]. "Bury it underground, in an area with no aquifer" isn't hand wave. Storing nuclear waste really is that simple. The main concern for uranium is water contamination. It's actually a prevalent due to naturally occurring uranium [4]. Place the waste in an area with no aquifer and there is no risk of contamination even in the event that the containment vessels deteriorate. 1. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/07/how-to-erase-100-years-carbon-emissions-plant-trees/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/07/how-t... 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_r... 3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repository https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repo... 4. https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/120396/uranium-contaminates-water-california-central-valley#:~:text=Fram%20and%20her%20colleagues%20believe,is%20used%20to%20irrigate%20crops https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/120396/uranium-contaminat....

spfzero 6y ago

To store it in our atmosphere.

imtringued 6y ago

What prevents nuclear waste from being brought to were it came from? Can't you just grind up the nuclear waste and mix it up with the excess rock to obtain a material mixture that has background radiation than the mine it came from?

manfredo 6y ago
Well, at a high level that's what's being done. Nuclear fuel is mined from underground and the spent fuel is put back underground. But it's much better to put it in a known location where it's away from water sources. Naturally occurring uranium is actually a fairly common pollutant in drinking water, putting the uranium back where it came from isn't always a good choice when there are better alternatives.