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Great video. I am glad that we are still making serious strides in nuclear energy research. Nuclear is the way to reduce carbon emissions in a substantially sig

by anonu 6y ago

Great video. I am glad that we are still making serious strides in nuclear energy research. Nuclear is the way to reduce carbon emissions in a substantially significant to turn back adverse climate change.

forgotmysn 6y ago
i agree that nuclear can help reduce carbon emissions, but that doesn't mean that nuclear waste is less harmful to the planet than carbon emissions are. nuclear isn't any more sustainable than coal or fossil fuels.
- biolurker1 6y ago
  There is the off chance we will discover a way to deactivate them before they pollute
  - dmos62 6y ago
    And it's even more likely that we'll end up reusing them, increasing economic efficiency of nuclear fuel.
    - m4rtink 6y ago
      Exactly this - today's nuclear waste is tomorrow's nuclear fuel (+ some other useful and expensive materials mixed in). Actually in some countries nuclear waste is already (part of) today's fuel using existing reprocessing technology.
- OnACoffeeBreak 6y ago
  Could you explain how properly sequestered nuclear waste is not less harmful to the planet as carbon in the atmosphere? I'm my current view, nuclear waste can be sequestered and stored effecting only a tiny fraction of the planet while greenhouse gases effect the whole planet.
  - forgotmysn 6y ago
    i just feel like sticking nuclear waste in the ground and pretending that it's not a problem or won't impact the health of the planet is not a solution
    - godelski 6y ago
      Can you explain why sticking it in the ground is not an acceptable solution? To be clear, sticking it in the ground that is neither seismically active nor near water sources. The areas people want to stick them in the ground are thousands of miles from civilizations and meet the other criteria. It isn't like the rest of the waste that we just stick in the ground (like coal, plastics, etc that DO enter our water supply).
      - purerandomness 6y ago
        Very good question! We could totally stick it in the ground, given: "(1) stable geological formations, and (2) stable human institutions over hundreds of thousands of years." Easy, right? Problem: "no known human civilization has ever endured for so long, and no geologic formation of adequate size for a permanent radioactive waste repository has yet been discovered that has been stable for so long a period" [0] The problem isn't the "sticking into the ground" part. It's the finding of that place that will stay geologically inactive, uncivilized, and not near water sources for the next 100000 years. And then taking that bet. It's literally like saying "Fuck other people who are born after me". Plastic stuck into the ground is not radioactive. Plastic stuck into the ground also degrades in a fraction of a fraction of the half-life of Plutonium. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_radioactive_waste_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_radioactive_waste_m...
        glogla 6y ago
        > It's literally like saying "Fuck other people who are born after me". Possibly, but unless there is other realistic low-carbon energy source (and it seems there isn't - hydro is already built everywhere where it can be, and solar and wind are intermittent with large-scale storage being unsolved problem) there won't be any people born after you.
- boogies 6y ago
  It’s arguably misleading to even call it “waste” — it’s recyclable. Even if you don’t recycle it, the little ceramic pellets weigh two hundred fifty-three thousand, one hundred and sixty-four (.55696202531645569620 ±) times less per person than gas and coal (and the difference in volume is presumably many times larger): https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html#howmuch https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html#howmuch > If all the electricity use of the USA was distributed evenly among its population, and all of it came from nuclear power, then the amount of nuclear waste each person would generate per year would be 39.5 grams. That’s the weight of seven U. S. quarters of waste, per year! A detailed description of this result can be found here [https://whatisnuclear.com/assets/waste_per_person.pdf https://whatisnuclear.com/assets/waste_per_person.pdf]. If we got all our electricity from coal and natural gas, expect to have over 10,000 kilograms of CO2/yr attributed to each person, not to mention other poisonous emissions directly to the biosphere (based on EIA emissions data [https://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/ghg_report/ghg_carbon.php https://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/ghg_report/ghg_car...]). > If you want raw numbers: in 2018, there were just over 80,000 metric tonnes of high-level waste in the USA. Between 1971 and 2018, nuclear reactors in the USA generated 3000 GW-years of electricity to make this waste. > For comparison, in 2007 alone the US burned 948,000,000 metric tonnes of coal. This means that coal plants made 32 times more waste every single day than the US nuclear fleet has made in the past 45 years! Granted, coal made a higher fraction of the country’s electricity, but the numbers are still crazy impressive for nuclear. > The astoundingly low amount of nuclear waste is thanks to the near magical energy density of the atom. More: https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html Edit: replaced “containable” in second sentence with numbers
  - donarb 6y ago
    Coal plants also create nuclear waste. Trace amounts of uranium and thorium in coal become concentrated after the coal is burned away, leaving high concentrations of nuclear waste.
    - oddmiral 6y ago
      So, you say, coal waste can be source of uranium for nuclear plants, right? How many tonnes of Uranium we can extract from coal ashes?
- lm28469 6y ago
  Your life expectancy is reduced right now because the air you breath is polluted by all kind of carbon related emissions. Nuclear waste is easy to manage in comparison Carbon's best case scenarios is worst than nuclear's worst case scenario.
- anonu 6y ago
  > All of the used fuel ever produced by the commercial nuclear industry since the late 1950s would cover a football field to a depth of less than 10 yards Source: https://www.nei.org/fundamentals/nuclear-waste https://www.nei.org/fundamentals/nuclear-waste
IngoBlechschmid 6y ago
I too am happy about advances in nuclear energy research, and would like to make a remark regarding its suitability for fighting the climate crisis. In 2019, just 4 % of the global primary energy came from nuclear power (the figure is about 10 % if we restrict to electricity). Hence replacing fossil sources by nuclear would entail large-scale construction of new nuclear reactors. By the time we're done building these, we will already have exceeded our CO₂ budget for keeping below 1.5 °C at a reasonable certainty. Also, at the current rate, the Uranium reserves last for approximately 140 years; if all fossil sources were switched for nuclear, it would last for 10 years. This problem can in principle be alleviated by innovative reactor types, but realistically they won't be available for large-scale production in the next couple years. Luckily, we do have all the technology for phasing out fossil energy while staying within our CO₂ budget: water, wind, solar, storage of synthetic gas, gas-fueled power plants (fueled by synthetic gas obtained using renewable energy). Energy production with these alternatives is cheaper than with nuclear; this fact is an additional issue for expanding nuclear power -- it's not economically viable.
- glogla 6y ago
  > Also, at the current rate, the Uranium reserves last for approximately 140 years; if all fossil sources were switched for nuclear, it would last for 10 years. This is a so well known misconception that it is hard to not consider it propaganda by this point. Known reservers of Uranium are of that size, yes. That's because with nobody bothers to look for more, because not only is there enough known for now, but finding more would actually increase competition and lower the prices - losing those who own the reserves the money. There is way more Uranium just in the ocean water. Meanwhile, all the technologies you're listing are either already maxed out (hydro), intermittent with unsolved storage (solar and wind), or vapourware (power to gas, etc).
  - p_l 6y ago
    The 140 years number is also for the very inefficient reactors that are mostly used now, where majority of the "spent" fuel could be reused in different design - but reprocessing is dead for political reasons.
Apofis 6y ago
Hopefully, MSR's come soon.

by anonu 6y ago

forgotmysn 6y ago

i agree that nuclear can help reduce carbon emissions, but that doesn't mean that nuclear waste is less harmful to the planet than carbon emissions are. nuclear isn't any more sustainable than coal or fossil fuels.

biolurker1 6y ago
There is the off chance we will discover a way to deactivate them before they pollute
- dmos62 6y ago
  And it's even more likely that we'll end up reusing them, increasing economic efficiency of nuclear fuel.
  - m4rtink 6y ago
    Exactly this - today's nuclear waste is tomorrow's nuclear fuel (+ some other useful and expensive materials mixed in). Actually in some countries nuclear waste is already (part of) today's fuel using existing reprocessing technology.
OnACoffeeBreak 6y ago
Could you explain how properly sequestered nuclear waste is not less harmful to the planet as carbon in the atmosphere? I'm my current view, nuclear waste can be sequestered and stored effecting only a tiny fraction of the planet while greenhouse gases effect the whole planet.
- forgotmysn 6y ago
  i just feel like sticking nuclear waste in the ground and pretending that it's not a problem or won't impact the health of the planet is not a solution
  - godelski 6y ago
    Can you explain why sticking it in the ground is not an acceptable solution? To be clear, sticking it in the ground that is neither seismically active nor near water sources. The areas people want to stick them in the ground are thousands of miles from civilizations and meet the other criteria. It isn't like the rest of the waste that we just stick in the ground (like coal, plastics, etc that DO enter our water supply).
    - purerandomness 6y ago
      Very good question! We could totally stick it in the ground, given: "(1) stable geological formations, and (2) stable human institutions over hundreds of thousands of years." Easy, right? Problem: "no known human civilization has ever endured for so long, and no geologic formation of adequate size for a permanent radioactive waste repository has yet been discovered that has been stable for so long a period" [0] The problem isn't the "sticking into the ground" part. It's the finding of that place that will stay geologically inactive, uncivilized, and not near water sources for the next 100000 years. And then taking that bet. It's literally like saying "Fuck other people who are born after me". Plastic stuck into the ground is not radioactive. Plastic stuck into the ground also degrades in a fraction of a fraction of the half-life of Plutonium. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_radioactive_waste_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_radioactive_waste_m...
      - glogla 6y ago
        > It's literally like saying "Fuck other people who are born after me". Possibly, but unless there is other realistic low-carbon energy source (and it seems there isn't - hydro is already built everywhere where it can be, and solar and wind are intermittent with large-scale storage being unsolved problem) there won't be any people born after you.
boogies 6y ago
It’s arguably misleading to even call it “waste” — it’s recyclable. Even if you don’t recycle it, the little ceramic pellets weigh two hundred fifty-three thousand, one hundred and sixty-four (.55696202531645569620 ±) times less per person than gas and coal (and the difference in volume is presumably many times larger): https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html#howmuch https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html#howmuch > If all the electricity use of the USA was distributed evenly among its population, and all of it came from nuclear power, then the amount of nuclear waste each person would generate per year would be 39.5 grams. That’s the weight of seven U. S. quarters of waste, per year! A detailed description of this result can be found here [https://whatisnuclear.com/assets/waste_per_person.pdf https://whatisnuclear.com/assets/waste_per_person.pdf]. If we got all our electricity from coal and natural gas, expect to have over 10,000 kilograms of CO2/yr attributed to each person, not to mention other poisonous emissions directly to the biosphere (based on EIA emissions data [https://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/ghg_report/ghg_carbon.php https://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/ghg_report/ghg_car...]). > If you want raw numbers: in 2018, there were just over 80,000 metric tonnes of high-level waste in the USA. Between 1971 and 2018, nuclear reactors in the USA generated 3000 GW-years of electricity to make this waste. > For comparison, in 2007 alone the US burned 948,000,000 metric tonnes of coal. This means that coal plants made 32 times more waste every single day than the US nuclear fleet has made in the past 45 years! Granted, coal made a higher fraction of the country’s electricity, but the numbers are still crazy impressive for nuclear. > The astoundingly low amount of nuclear waste is thanks to the near magical energy density of the atom. More: https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html Edit: replaced “containable” in second sentence with numbers
- donarb 6y ago
  Coal plants also create nuclear waste. Trace amounts of uranium and thorium in coal become concentrated after the coal is burned away, leaving high concentrations of nuclear waste.
  - oddmiral 6y ago
    So, you say, coal waste can be source of uranium for nuclear plants, right? How many tonnes of Uranium we can extract from coal ashes?
lm28469 6y ago
Your life expectancy is reduced right now because the air you breath is polluted by all kind of carbon related emissions. Nuclear waste is easy to manage in comparison Carbon's best case scenarios is worst than nuclear's worst case scenario.
anonu 6y ago
> All of the used fuel ever produced by the commercial nuclear industry since the late 1950s would cover a football field to a depth of less than 10 yards Source: https://www.nei.org/fundamentals/nuclear-waste https://www.nei.org/fundamentals/nuclear-waste

IngoBlechschmid 6y ago

I too am happy about advances in nuclear energy research, and would like to make a remark regarding its suitability for fighting the climate crisis. In 2019, just 4 % of the global primary energy came from nuclear power (the figure is about 10 % if we restrict to electricity). Hence replacing fossil sources by nuclear would entail large-scale construction of new nuclear reactors. By the time we're done building these, we will already have exceeded our CO₂ budget for keeping below 1.5 °C at a reasonable certainty. Also, at the current rate, the Uranium reserves last for approximately 140 years; if all fossil sources were switched for nuclear, it would last for 10 years. This problem can in principle be alleviated by innovative reactor types, but realistically they won't be available for large-scale production in the next couple years. Luckily, we do have all the technology for phasing out fossil energy while staying within our CO₂ budget: water, wind, solar, storage of synthetic gas, gas-fueled power plants (fueled by synthetic gas obtained using renewable energy). Energy production with these alternatives is cheaper than with nuclear; this fact is an additional issue for expanding nuclear power -- it's not economically viable.

glogla 6y ago
> Also, at the current rate, the Uranium reserves last for approximately 140 years; if all fossil sources were switched for nuclear, it would last for 10 years. This is a so well known misconception that it is hard to not consider it propaganda by this point. Known reservers of Uranium are of that size, yes. That's because with nobody bothers to look for more, because not only is there enough known for now, but finding more would actually increase competition and lower the prices - losing those who own the reserves the money. There is way more Uranium just in the ocean water. Meanwhile, all the technologies you're listing are either already maxed out (hydro), intermittent with unsolved storage (solar and wind), or vapourware (power to gas, etc).
- p_l 6y ago
  The 140 years number is also for the very inefficient reactors that are mostly used now, where majority of the "spent" fuel could be reused in different design - but reprocessing is dead for political reasons.

Apofis 6y ago

Hopefully, MSR's come soon.