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I'm excited that Onkalo will be coming onine soon, so we don't have to hear the myth that there's no solution for spent nuclear fuel anymore. The solution that
by acidburnNSA 3y ago
I'm excited that Onkalo will be coming onine soon, so we don't have to hear the myth that there's no solution for spent nuclear fuel anymore. The solution that enjoys a solid scientific consensus is the deep geologic repository.
Another thing that is weird to me is that everyone says nuclear waste is hazardous for a uniquely long time, but it become less hazardous over time. Many non-radioactive materials, like arsenic and mercury, are toxic forever.
In the US we have WIPP operating, but it stores weapons-related radioactive material rather than commercial spent fuel, so I guess it doesn't count.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant
- PinguTS 3y agoBurying things in the ground is not a solution. It's more an Ostrich policy.
- linksnapzz 3y agoBurying things securely until a better solution can be found is a better than letting them sit onsite in storage pools...
- phkahler 3y agoBut may not be better than shutting it all down.
- linksnapzz 3y agoSorry, I like reliable electricity, I don't live near a hydro plant, and I'd prefer not to burn coal. Nuclear does what I want, and if the desire for a perfect solution for waste handling gets in the way of a good method for keeping the lights on while we work towards improving the isolation and transmutation of waste-that desire needs to be set aside.
- PinguTS 3y agoI agree to in way that this is currently the only viable way to handle the situation. But it is not a solution.
- linksnapzz 3y ago"Live in Idaho" isn't THE solution to deaths from tropical diseases; but let's not pretend that it isn't A solution...
- this_user 3y ago"Securely" being the key term here. Something that is buried securely today may not be buried securely tomorrow, or in 100 or a 1000 years, because the geology of the planet is not static. This can become even more of a problem if the knowledge should be lost what was buried where.
- linksnapzz 3y agoThe subterranean geology of granitic shield provinces doesn't change much over the course of ...human-accessible timescales.
- acidburnNSA 3y agoLots of scientists disagree strongly with your statement. "The conclusion that disposal is needed and that deep geologic disposal is the scientifically preferred approach has been reached by every expert panel that has looked at the issue and by every other country that is pursuing a nuclear waste management program." https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/blue-ribbon-commission-americas-nuclear-future-report-secretary-energy https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/blue-ribbon-commission-am... One thing that drives me craziest of all is when people simultaneously claim that nuclear waste is among the most hazardous things out there while also blocking any progress to get it safely out of the biosphere.
- PinguTS 3y agoThe thing is, that to human knowledge it is currently the only viable way to handle the situation. But still it is not a solution. A solution would be to make it non-hazardous. But there is no viable way to do it right now.
- pdonis 3y ago> to human knowledge it is currently the only viable way to handle the situation. No, it's not. See comments elsewhere in the thread about reprocessing.
- aPoCoMiLogin 3y agohighly recommended to watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aUODXeAM-k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aUODXeAM-k
- phkahler 3y agoHow about we reprocess it and use it as nuclear fuel. IIRC France is the only country that does this. We just don't like the kind of reactor needed.
- pdonis 3y ago> IIRC France is the only country that does this No, many countries do: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing#List_of_sites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing#List_of_s...
- sofixa 3y agoBetter in the ground that the air.
- lesuorac 3y agoI mean we could treat it like a coal power plant and just dilute the radioactive material into the air instead.
- iso1631 3y agoAs Ostrich policy is ignoring the problem -- specifically not looking at the problem. Burying the Geiger counters would be an Ostrich policy
- acidburnNSA 3y agoExactly.
- PinguTS 3y agoIt is exactly that. We are putting it deep into the ground and ignoring the problem.
- iso1631 3y agoMy guniea pigs hide from predators by burying themselves in hay. It's fairly effective. That's not what as Ostrich does. An Ostrich leaves itself exposed and just closes its eyes. Mankinds attitude to all sorts of threats is an ostrich policy, but burying nuclear waste is not one of those. Leaving it in a barrel and saying "nothing to see here" would be.
- circuit10 3y agoIf it doesn’t cause any problems when it’s underground then that’s just called solving the problem
- wkat4242 3y agoYeah exactly like us not worrying about all the CO2 30 years ago "because the atmosphere is so big mankind couldn't possibly make a change" We should balance ourselves with nature now instead of dumping it on the future. This way we're solving the CO2 problem the way a gambler solves their debt by borrowing more money to pay off loans.
- shawabawa3 3y agoburying is absolutely a solution, especially when nuclear fuel is so dense you can store all the waste of humanity's power needs in a relatively small area
- mastax 3y agoWhy not? What specific problems does it not solve?
- omginternets 3y agoDo you prefer venting it to the atmosphere? That's the alternative for producing substantial amounts of energy reliably.
- SoftTalker 3y agoArsenic and mercury came out of the ground, originally. It's not like we can make those elements from scratch. Diluting them and putting them back where we got them is probably fine. Nuclear waste is something new we are creating, but I'd rather have it deep underground in a geologically stable place, than sitting in casks on the surface.
- belorn 3y agoMining is not exactly a natural process. We can't dilute the toxic byproducts and putting them back where we got them, since that would require rebuilding the mountain. In cases of open mines, all that is left is a lake size hole where solid land once where. What the mining industry do is to fence it up (including pools used for waste), put up a sign to warn people, and then let nature fill it up with water. The best we can hope for is that they did their research properly and made sure that it doesn't leak into the groundwater. In the past there were people who tried diluting stuff like this by dumping it into the ocean, but that isn't the best idea.
- bluGill 3y agoUranium came out of the ground as well, and there were natural reactors.
- fsh 3y agoNuclear waste does not consist of Uranium, but of the much more radioactive fission products. The Okla natural reactor went critical for the last time around 2 billion years ago. Indeed, nuclear waste is not a problem if you can wait for 2 billion years.
- legulere 3y agoThere were some discussions about the safety of the encasing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KBS-3#Criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KBS-3#Criticism
- dminuoso 3y agoWhat is even more interesting: At a given power rating, coal plants produce up to 3 times more radioactivity than nuclear power plants directly in leftover ash because coal contains large numbers of radioactive isotopes. It might not seem like much, but when you consider that a 1TWe coal plant burns 3.2Mt of coal a year compared to 27t of uranium for an equivalent nuclear power plant, this might become more apparent. Most of that waste is captured in ash via particle filters and has to be treated like any highly toxic and radioactive waste, but as far as I know this waste it not destined for secured long term nuclear disposal where it would be kept safe from interacting with the environment. We don’t seem to have a problem with that… Further, some low percentage (literature tends to point at .5%) of it is in gaseous form or cannot be filtered, so it gets vented into the atmosphere. That’s assuming modern and intact particle filters. And we aren’t even talking about CO2 here. It’s somewhat absurd we have to have discussions about nuclear power plant waste in this reality.
- fsh 3y agoNuclear power plants produce many many orders of magnitude more radioactivity than coal power plants for a given amount of energy produced. You are probably misinterpreting the famous 1978 study [1] where the radioactive emissions of nuclear and coal power plants were estimated to be roughly the same. This does not include the solid and liquid nuclear waste, only the radioactive gases that are inadvertently leaked from nuclear reactors. Coal ash is barely radioactive at all, and the radioactivity is completely negligible compared to the chemical toxicity. [1] https://doi.org/10.1126/science.202.4372.1045 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.202.4372.1045