In the US, spent fuel sits on site in cooling ponds, and has for decades. Spent fuel isn't much, about three cubic meters per year for a big plant. The larger v

In the US, spent fuel sits on site in cooling ponds, and has for decades. Spent fuel isn't much, about three cubic meters per year for a big plant. The larger volumes of nuclear waste are from contamination, like accidents, or just things that come into contact with radioactive substances. Low-level waste is more voluminous and generally less dangerous. It mostly does not come from nuclear plants, which are designed to not produce much waste other than the spent fuel. This issue is pretty much a red herring. A coal-fired power plant produces thousands of times more radiation--in the form of radioactive fly ash--than nuclear plants do. Where is that stored? The air. In your lungs. People die from cancer by the hundreds of thousands because of it. Switching to nuclear would reduce the amount of radioactive waste humanity produces, by a lot, and concentrate it in liquid and solid forms, that actually can be managed. So there's your answer. Nuclear waste is solid, and it's not much. We can manage it. Is there an answer for the radiation from coal? Nope.