4 ms·

Yucca Mountain waste depot doesn't actually exist. You put it in holding pools indefinitely and wait for the DoE to superfund the site. Nuclear fuel does not h

by Klinky 6y ago

Yucca Mountain waste depot doesn't actually exist. You put it in holding pools indefinitely and wait for the DoE to superfund the site. Nuclear fuel does not have to be mined or go through costly and toxic refinement processes? Reprocessing waste creates even larger amounts of radioactive and toxic wastes. Nuclear is far far far away from being clean. It does allow for potentially better containment and concentration of the waste, but then you have the eternal political problem of where to put that waste.

arcticbull 6y ago
Well sure, so long as anti-nuclear campaigners continue to prevent the construction of Yucca Mountain, they can then continue to point to why we can't have nuclear because "where would we put the waste?" The only reason Yucca Mountain doesn't exist is because of anti-nuclear campaigners. It was funded and shovel-ready until 2010. Of course nuclear fuel has to be refined and mined, however the ecological impact is relatively minuscule because of the sheer energy density of uranium as compared to the neodymium magnets used in wind generation. Nuclear power plants last 40+ years, while wind turbines have to be replaced every 20 or when damaged.
- ebalit 6y ago
  There are research on extracting uranium from seawater instead of mining it [0]. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6g5pj9QfMg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6g5pj9QfMg
- Klinky 6y ago
  NIMBYism is everywhere, even for solar and wind. Maybe it's a flaw of Nuclear that you have to stuff its waste in a giant pit inside a mountain. Uranium mining often uses leeching techniques, similar concerns to fracking and groundwater contamination, along with general mining hazards. Additionally rare-earth minerals are needed for a variety of things, even including components within a nuclear plant. I highly doubt a Nuclear plant could be built "rare earth metals free". Fuel rods also may contain a mix of rare earth metals. Rare-earth metal mining and refinement practices need to improve, but they will never go away.
  - umvi 6y ago
    > Maybe it's a flaw of Nuclear that you have to stuff its waste in a giant pit inside a mountain. Every type of energy plant has wastes. Even wind turbine blades wear out and are dumped in landfills.[0] The difference is that the nuclear waste eventually decays into nothing, while the fiberglass/plastic blades will stay around for thousands of years... [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-02-05/wind-turbine-blades-can-t-be-recycled-so-they-re-piling-up-in-landfills https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-02-05/wind-turb...
    - audunw 6y ago
      But fiberglass is just silicon and hydrocarbons. The same stuff soil and sand is made of. It's not really a huge problem to bury them. There's also huge developments in fiberglass recycling/repurposing these days. Solving this issue will be extremely helpful as wind power is not the only use of fiberglass as I'm sure you know. In fact, wind power could be instrumental in setting up a supply-chain for recycling of fiberglass, since you get such huge quantities of uniform and clean fiberglass from one source. > The difference is that the nuclear waste eventually decays into nothing, while the fiberglass/plastic blades will stay around for thousands of years... This is just a ridiculously skewed perspective, and wrong - nuclear waste does not decay into nothing, though I suppose you didn't meant it very literally. And saying anything about what will happen to plastic composites over thousands of years is futile. We are already finding bacteria that break down plastic, and we've already accelerated that process by genetically modifying them to make the enzymes more efficient. Did you know that for a long time, trees did not decay? That's why we have coal. They were essentially like plastics. Bacteria and fungi didn't have the enzymes to break them down. I'm willing to bet that it'll take way less time for life to develop the ability to break down plastics. Evolution has more genetic material to draw from now, organism now spread across the globe faster, and humans can transfer genes between species and improve genes in the lab.
      - arcticbull 6y ago
        For balance, consider that nuclear waste is high-energy and can be recycled with modern approaches, also. Fast neutron breeder reactors produce orders of magnitude less waste to begin with, consuming almost all their input fuel, and breeder reactors can take as input nuclear waste also. [1,2,3] > We are already finding bacteria that break down plastic, and we've already accelerated that process by genetically modifying them to make the enzymes more efficient. Interestingly enough (and I'm not pointing to this as a solution by any means - just that it's pretty cool), we've found radiotrophic fungi at the elephant foot in Chernobyl. [4] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast-neutron_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast-neutron_reactor [3] https://nationalcenter.org/NuclearFastReactorsSA1205.pdf https://nationalcenter.org/NuclearFastReactorsSA1205.pdf [4] https://www.cnet.com/news/fungi-found-in-chernobyl-feeds-on-radiation-report-says/ https://www.cnet.com/news/fungi-found-in-chernobyl-feeds-on-...
- rocqua 6y ago
  > Well sure, so long as anti-nuclear campaigners continue to prevent the construction of Yucca Mountain, they can then continue to point to why we can't have nuclear because "where would we put the waste?" These need not be the same people! I generally doubt they are.
manfredo 6y ago
Yucca mountain a actually does exist. The tunnels have been bored out. It's just that congress blocked using the site. There wasn't much pushback, because this waste can be used as fuel for nuclear plants currently being built. Even if it were open it'd be a waste to put existing nuclear waste there at the moment.

by Klinky 6y ago

arcticbull 6y ago

Well sure, so long as anti-nuclear campaigners continue to prevent the construction of Yucca Mountain, they can then continue to point to why we can't have nuclear because "where would we put the waste?" The only reason Yucca Mountain doesn't exist is because of anti-nuclear campaigners. It was funded and shovel-ready until 2010. Of course nuclear fuel has to be refined and mined, however the ecological impact is relatively minuscule because of the sheer energy density of uranium as compared to the neodymium magnets used in wind generation. Nuclear power plants last 40+ years, while wind turbines have to be replaced every 20 or when damaged.

ebalit 6y ago
There are research on extracting uranium from seawater instead of mining it [0]. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6g5pj9QfMg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6g5pj9QfMg
Klinky 6y ago
NIMBYism is everywhere, even for solar and wind. Maybe it's a flaw of Nuclear that you have to stuff its waste in a giant pit inside a mountain. Uranium mining often uses leeching techniques, similar concerns to fracking and groundwater contamination, along with general mining hazards. Additionally rare-earth minerals are needed for a variety of things, even including components within a nuclear plant. I highly doubt a Nuclear plant could be built "rare earth metals free". Fuel rods also may contain a mix of rare earth metals. Rare-earth metal mining and refinement practices need to improve, but they will never go away.
- umvi 6y ago
  > Maybe it's a flaw of Nuclear that you have to stuff its waste in a giant pit inside a mountain. Every type of energy plant has wastes. Even wind turbine blades wear out and are dumped in landfills.[0] The difference is that the nuclear waste eventually decays into nothing, while the fiberglass/plastic blades will stay around for thousands of years... [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-02-05/wind-turbine-blades-can-t-be-recycled-so-they-re-piling-up-in-landfills https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-02-05/wind-turb...
  - audunw 6y ago
    But fiberglass is just silicon and hydrocarbons. The same stuff soil and sand is made of. It's not really a huge problem to bury them. There's also huge developments in fiberglass recycling/repurposing these days. Solving this issue will be extremely helpful as wind power is not the only use of fiberglass as I'm sure you know. In fact, wind power could be instrumental in setting up a supply-chain for recycling of fiberglass, since you get such huge quantities of uniform and clean fiberglass from one source. > The difference is that the nuclear waste eventually decays into nothing, while the fiberglass/plastic blades will stay around for thousands of years... This is just a ridiculously skewed perspective, and wrong - nuclear waste does not decay into nothing, though I suppose you didn't meant it very literally. And saying anything about what will happen to plastic composites over thousands of years is futile. We are already finding bacteria that break down plastic, and we've already accelerated that process by genetically modifying them to make the enzymes more efficient. Did you know that for a long time, trees did not decay? That's why we have coal. They were essentially like plastics. Bacteria and fungi didn't have the enzymes to break them down. I'm willing to bet that it'll take way less time for life to develop the ability to break down plastics. Evolution has more genetic material to draw from now, organism now spread across the globe faster, and humans can transfer genes between species and improve genes in the lab.
    - arcticbull 6y ago
      For balance, consider that nuclear waste is high-energy and can be recycled with modern approaches, also. Fast neutron breeder reactors produce orders of magnitude less waste to begin with, consuming almost all their input fuel, and breeder reactors can take as input nuclear waste also. [1,2,3] > We are already finding bacteria that break down plastic, and we've already accelerated that process by genetically modifying them to make the enzymes more efficient. Interestingly enough (and I'm not pointing to this as a solution by any means - just that it's pretty cool), we've found radiotrophic fungi at the elephant foot in Chernobyl. [4] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast-neutron_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast-neutron_reactor [3] https://nationalcenter.org/NuclearFastReactorsSA1205.pdf https://nationalcenter.org/NuclearFastReactorsSA1205.pdf [4] https://www.cnet.com/news/fungi-found-in-chernobyl-feeds-on-radiation-report-says/ https://www.cnet.com/news/fungi-found-in-chernobyl-feeds-on-...
rocqua 6y ago
> Well sure, so long as anti-nuclear campaigners continue to prevent the construction of Yucca Mountain, they can then continue to point to why we can't have nuclear because "where would we put the waste?" These need not be the same people! I generally doubt they are.

manfredo 6y ago

Yucca mountain a actually does exist. The tunnels have been bored out. It's just that congress blocked using the site. There wasn't much pushback, because this waste can be used as fuel for nuclear plants currently being built. Even if it were open it'd be a waste to put existing nuclear waste there at the moment.