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If you include the deaths that nuclear waste will cause during the tens of thousands of years it remains radioactive it wouldn't be so positive. But of course

If you include the deaths that nuclear waste will cause during the tens of thousands of years it remains radioactive it wouldn't be so positive. But of course we can't look into the future. But we do know safe storage for such durations is not yet figured out. It's externalising the problem to the future. Just like CO2, but on a much longer timeframe. Still not very ethical though IMO.

tsimionescu 5y ago
Given that we have maybe 10 years at best to make sure there will still be livable conditions for humans on most of the world's land area 100 years from now, worrying about radiation that could kill people thousands of years from now is simply absurd.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  What led us to climate change is going for short-term benefit and leaving the problems to the future. We shouldn't repeat that mistake even though we'll be long gone by the time the problems come to light. And really we're already too late to prevent most of climate change. Especially because we won't replace fossil with nuclear in 10 years time.
  - heartbeats 5y ago
    > What led us to climate change is going for short-term benefit and leaving the problems to the future. We shouldn't repeat that mistake even though we'll be long gone by the time the problems come to light. That's how anything works, though. You replace the giant bleeding wound with a bandaid, and then you take it off and there's a scab, and then the scab goes away and you have a scar. It's always about replacing something with a lesser problem. For the past few years people have been trying to replace fossils with imaginary clean power, and it hasn't exactly gone great.
warble 5y ago
Nuclear is on par with solar as far as safety. https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy
- drran 5y ago
  Very few people are bitten by sharks in comparison to car incidents, so it's safer to ride a shark than to ride a car. Right? Risks and long term effects of nuclear is few order of magnitude larger than solar.
wraptile 5y ago
> If you include the deaths that nuclear waste will cause during the tens of thousands of years it remains radioactive it wouldn't be so positive. isn't that a common misconception though? Relatively the waste amount by volume is incredibly miniscule. I'm sure by 3022 we can figure out how to shoot it into space or something - that's a very very long time.
heartbeats 5y ago
Who are all of these people who will be hurt by it? There's nothing interesting (e.g. terrorism, bombs) you can do with nuclear waste, and it's not especially poisonous. If you just loaded it up in barrels and dropped it at the bottom of the ocean, what's the worst that could happen? Sure, some fish would die, but where are the millions of deaths?
- drran 5y ago
  > There's nothing interesting (e.g. terrorism, bombs) you can do with nuclear waste, and it's not especially poisonous. LOL. Nuclear materials, including waste, are extremely dangerous in evil hands. It regularly kills people by accident or due to negligence. Chornobyl was an accident. Just imagine what a team of motivated people with evil intent can do with a nuclear station or nuclear waste. Last attempt to use nuclear waste in war was in 2015: Russia-backed terrorist planed to use radioactive waste (Kyshtym) to throw a dirty bomb at Kyiv.
  - heartbeats 5y ago
    Nuclear materials yes, waste no. Chernobyl was an active reactor, for example. There's an inverse relationship here with the half-life. The most dangerous waste is stuff that burns up in a few decades, the type that lasts for millions will emit very little radiation per unit time.
    - drran 5y ago
      You clearly have no idea what we are talking about, but I will not write about the issue with nuclear waste on a public forum. I don't want to inspire somebody.
  - onphonenow 5y ago
    This is really not true at all. One risk is actually the overreaction folks might have. Ie, a big focus of the "dirty bomb" type plots are really around trying to drive big reactions. Chornobyl was a worst case scenario. My guess is someoen could go to the area they have closed off and find plenty of plant / animal life thriving in the "nuclear wasteland". Most waste is processed so its for example sealed into some kind of material prior to burial. So recovery of the radioactive portion, concentrating and refining it etc would be a pretty major undertaking. You may also be confusing the long radiation stuff with high radiation stuff.
yongjik 5y ago
Those "millions of years" comments always seem rather out of place, considering that the Earth naturally contains enough radioactive elements that literally kept it warm for 4.6 billion years. (And they come with several billion years of half-lives.) When you see volcanoes, earthquakes, and hot springs in action, that's the power of radiation. All of it.
- fsh 5y ago
  This is a very bad comparison. Radioactive heating is only significant because the earth is very large. Soil has a very low background activity of a few hundred Bq/kg. High-level nuclear waste has 2 TBq/kg after 100 years.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  It's only radiation power in the way of the sun being our main heat source which slows our planet's cooling. Which is of course one huge fusion reactor. And if you were outside the protection of our magnetosphere and atmosphere its radiation would actually be pretty dangerous even at this distance. The earth's core is just still hot from when it was formed. It's not being heated by an internal nuclear reaction.
Paradigma11 5y ago
How about we use the same principles that we use for lead, arsen... Those have to be stored indefinetly, so an infinitly more difficult problem.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  Not really. A single dust particle of lead in your lungs isn't going to kill you. A particle of plutonium is. It's not comparable to lead on terms of dangers. Also, the problem with radioactive materials is that they damage the containers they're stored in over time. It's called radiation embrittlement.

tsimionescu 5y ago

Given that we have maybe 10 years at best to make sure there will still be livable conditions for humans on most of the world's land area 100 years from now, worrying about radiation that could kill people thousands of years from now is simply absurd.

GekkePrutser 5y ago
What led us to climate change is going for short-term benefit and leaving the problems to the future. We shouldn't repeat that mistake even though we'll be long gone by the time the problems come to light. And really we're already too late to prevent most of climate change. Especially because we won't replace fossil with nuclear in 10 years time.
- heartbeats 5y ago
  > What led us to climate change is going for short-term benefit and leaving the problems to the future. We shouldn't repeat that mistake even though we'll be long gone by the time the problems come to light. That's how anything works, though. You replace the giant bleeding wound with a bandaid, and then you take it off and there's a scab, and then the scab goes away and you have a scar. It's always about replacing something with a lesser problem. For the past few years people have been trying to replace fossils with imaginary clean power, and it hasn't exactly gone great.

warble 5y ago

Nuclear is on par with solar as far as safety. https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy

drran 5y ago
Very few people are bitten by sharks in comparison to car incidents, so it's safer to ride a shark than to ride a car. Right? Risks and long term effects of nuclear is few order of magnitude larger than solar.

wraptile 5y ago

> If you include the deaths that nuclear waste will cause during the tens of thousands of years it remains radioactive it wouldn't be so positive. isn't that a common misconception though? Relatively the waste amount by volume is incredibly miniscule. I'm sure by 3022 we can figure out how to shoot it into space or something - that's a very very long time.

heartbeats 5y ago

Who are all of these people who will be hurt by it? There's nothing interesting (e.g. terrorism, bombs) you can do with nuclear waste, and it's not especially poisonous. If you just loaded it up in barrels and dropped it at the bottom of the ocean, what's the worst that could happen? Sure, some fish would die, but where are the millions of deaths?

drran 5y ago
> There's nothing interesting (e.g. terrorism, bombs) you can do with nuclear waste, and it's not especially poisonous. LOL. Nuclear materials, including waste, are extremely dangerous in evil hands. It regularly kills people by accident or due to negligence. Chornobyl was an accident. Just imagine what a team of motivated people with evil intent can do with a nuclear station or nuclear waste. Last attempt to use nuclear waste in war was in 2015: Russia-backed terrorist planed to use radioactive waste (Kyshtym) to throw a dirty bomb at Kyiv.
- heartbeats 5y ago
  Nuclear materials yes, waste no. Chernobyl was an active reactor, for example. There's an inverse relationship here with the half-life. The most dangerous waste is stuff that burns up in a few decades, the type that lasts for millions will emit very little radiation per unit time.
  - drran 5y ago
    You clearly have no idea what we are talking about, but I will not write about the issue with nuclear waste on a public forum. I don't want to inspire somebody.
- onphonenow 5y ago
  This is really not true at all. One risk is actually the overreaction folks might have. Ie, a big focus of the "dirty bomb" type plots are really around trying to drive big reactions. Chornobyl was a worst case scenario. My guess is someoen could go to the area they have closed off and find plenty of plant / animal life thriving in the "nuclear wasteland". Most waste is processed so its for example sealed into some kind of material prior to burial. So recovery of the radioactive portion, concentrating and refining it etc would be a pretty major undertaking. You may also be confusing the long radiation stuff with high radiation stuff.

yongjik 5y ago

Those "millions of years" comments always seem rather out of place, considering that the Earth naturally contains enough radioactive elements that literally kept it warm for 4.6 billion years. (And they come with several billion years of half-lives.) When you see volcanoes, earthquakes, and hot springs in action, that's the power of radiation. All of it.

fsh 5y ago
This is a very bad comparison. Radioactive heating is only significant because the earth is very large. Soil has a very low background activity of a few hundred Bq/kg. High-level nuclear waste has 2 TBq/kg after 100 years.
GekkePrutser 5y ago
It's only radiation power in the way of the sun being our main heat source which slows our planet's cooling. Which is of course one huge fusion reactor. And if you were outside the protection of our magnetosphere and atmosphere its radiation would actually be pretty dangerous even at this distance. The earth's core is just still hot from when it was formed. It's not being heated by an internal nuclear reaction.

Paradigma11 5y ago

How about we use the same principles that we use for lead, arsen... Those have to be stored indefinetly, so an infinitly more difficult problem.

GekkePrutser 5y ago
Not really. A single dust particle of lead in your lungs isn't going to kill you. A particle of plutonium is. It's not comparable to lead on terms of dangers. Also, the problem with radioactive materials is that they damage the containers they're stored in over time. It's called radiation embrittlement.