3 ms·
> French govt estimated that it would reach the surface 400 years after burial (so, 100 years for a breach and 300 years to swim down and up), diffused enough n
by pyrale 5y ago
> French govt estimated that it would reach the surface 400 years after burial (so, 100 years for a breach and 300 years to swim down and up), diffused enough not to cause harm.
What kind of waste are you talking about? Long-term stored high-activity radioactive waste is certainly not going to leak its way to the surface in 400 years.
- godelski 5y agoHigh activity materials decay much faster than low activity materials. There's only so many protons and electrons you can shed.
- pyrale 5y agoRegardless of their activity, long-term stored waste is expected to be vitrified and stored in rock formations that are water-tight (in France's case a specific type of clay) and have not moved for millions of years. It's hard to imagine anything that would lead to radioactive material leeching to the surface or an aquifer in hundreds of years.
- godelski 5y agoActivity matters a lot actually. And predicting long term geological events is the difficult part. Hundreds of years, yeah, not a problem. Thousands and we start getting fuzzy. But this is why I suggested we "pass the buck" in another comment. Meaning to develop better solutions and let our science advance and take advantage of the fact that we can safely store, with modern methods, for several hundred years.