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>If Sellafield handles both civilian and military waste, and Sellafield is bad, it follows that civilian nuclear waste is bad? That's your argument, right? No

>If Sellafield handles both civilian and military waste, and Sellafield is bad, it follows that civilian nuclear waste is bad? That's your argument, right? No my point is not about waste it's about cost. Every country that operates nuclear power hides costs from nuclear plants in other parts of their budget. Sellafield is just one example from the UK where we actually have numbers. Countries that don't have a site like Sellafield must instead operate other storage facilities and handle unexpected costs related to them. Like Asse II in Germany or the 60 billion bailout of EDF in France or the underfinanced nuclear fund in Sweden, Rancho Seco in the US and so on. Charting the actual true cost of nuclear power is difficult, but it's easy to see that there are large costs that are in fact hidden. IMO this is very important to reveal, because many initiatives that could solve our problems are held back by the idea that they are "more expensive than nuclear", based on a fictional cost for nuclear. Synthesized gas from renewables is an example that is very likely cheaper than nuclear as of 2023, even short-term.

credit_guy 3y ago
You mention underfunded, but not overfunded. The civilian nuclear reactor operators in the US used to have to pay to a waste disposal fund, that currently has more than $44 BN [1]. This is well above what one would need to do the job: the total cost of the WIPP, which is the disposal site for the military waste in the US [2] was/is $19 BN, and there's twice as much military waste as civilian waste. > Countries that don't have a site like Sellafield must instead operate other storage facilities and handle unexpected costs related to them Why? It's like saying that every state in the US needs to have a waste facility. One is enough. I don't see why every country in the EU that has nuclear power reactors needs its own long term disposal place. Finland built one, other countries could use it. Plus, in the not so distant future we'll be able to significantly reduce the amount of high level waste by burning the actinides in it, and separating the unburned uranium (mainly U-238). This is not just pie in the sky, about 2 weeks ago Russia announced they have started manufacturing nuclear fuel with actinides extracted from waste [3]. [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/18/nuclear-waste-why-theres-no-permanent-nuclear-waste-dump-in-us.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/18/nuclear-waste-why-theres-no-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant [3] https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Mixed-oxide-fuel-with-minor-actinides-produced-for https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Mixed-oxide-fuel-wit...
- Kon5ole 3y ago
  >You mention underfunded, but not overfunded. >The civilian nuclear reactor operators in the US used to have to pay to a waste disposal fund, that currently has more than $44 BN The fund is supposed to finance Yucca Mountain but the current estimated cost of Yucca Mountain is over twice that at 96 bn: https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/wr-yucca_mountain_cost_estimate_rises_to_96_billion_dollars-0608085.html#:~:text=The%20US%20Department%20of%20Energy,repository%20at%20Yucca%20Mountain%2C%20Nevada https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/wr-yucca_mountain_cost_es.... Furthermore, those 44 billion won't even cover 10 years of the current running costs of handling waste, even accounting for interests. https://sustainability.stanford.edu/news/steep-costs-nuclear-waste-us https://sustainability.stanford.edu/news/steep-costs-nuclear... So it seems the US fund is in fact massively underfunded, not overfunded, do you agree or am I missing something? >It's like saying that every state in the US needs to have a waste facility. One is enough. Every country that operates nuclear plants needs to manage the waste for at least a while. Currently most of them do so for the foreseeable future at the site where there is, or has ever been, a nuclear plant. >Plus, in the not so distant future we'll be able to significantly reduce the amount of high level waste by burning the actinides in it But if we can already now generate gas from solar panels cheaper than we can operate nuclear plants, why can't we put our efforts into that instead? Why does it HAVE to be nuclear at any cost? An infrastructure that is massively overprovisioned from solar and other green sources and converts overproduction to gas whenever there is overproduction will be a gift to the future like hydropower dams have been (electricity-wise anyway). Once the investment is paid off it will keep giving cheap, reliable, distributed, failsafe electricity forever. That's better than even the most optimistic speculation for what can be done with nuclear.
  - credit_guy 3y ago
    > So it seems the US fund is in fact massively underfunded, not overfunded, do you agree or am I missing something? Let's take that 96 billion at face value. I don't see why it needs to be so many times higher than WIPP, that handles more waste, but whatever, it's the official estimate of the DOE, from 2008. Here's another statement from the DOE in 2011, stating that they find the current fee (0.1 cents per kWh) to be adequate. The fee put on hold in 2017 due to a Federal Court ruling that the Government can't collect that fee and do nothing with it. If the Yuca Montain repository project is restarted, then one can see the fee being reinstated, and there's a good chance the fee that was uncollected over the last 7 years will be collected in arrears. > Why does it HAVE to be nuclear at any cost? It looks to me it's the other way round. I never heard a pro-nuclear guy (I'm one) saying don't build solar or wind. It's the anti-nuclear guys (presumaby you're one) that say "DO NOT BUILD NUCLEAR". Or am I missing something?

credit_guy 3y ago

You mention underfunded, but not overfunded. The civilian nuclear reactor operators in the US used to have to pay to a waste disposal fund, that currently has more than $44 BN [1]. This is well above what one would need to do the job: the total cost of the WIPP, which is the disposal site for the military waste in the US [2] was/is $19 BN, and there's twice as much military waste as civilian waste. > Countries that don't have a site like Sellafield must instead operate other storage facilities and handle unexpected costs related to them Why? It's like saying that every state in the US needs to have a waste facility. One is enough. I don't see why every country in the EU that has nuclear power reactors needs its own long term disposal place. Finland built one, other countries could use it. Plus, in the not so distant future we'll be able to significantly reduce the amount of high level waste by burning the actinides in it, and separating the unburned uranium (mainly U-238). This is not just pie in the sky, about 2 weeks ago Russia announced they have started manufacturing nuclear fuel with actinides extracted from waste [3]. [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/18/nuclear-waste-why-theres-no-permanent-nuclear-waste-dump-in-us.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/18/nuclear-waste-why-theres-no-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant [3] https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Mixed-oxide-fuel-with-minor-actinides-produced-for https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Mixed-oxide-fuel-wit...

Kon5ole 3y ago
>You mention underfunded, but not overfunded. >The civilian nuclear reactor operators in the US used to have to pay to a waste disposal fund, that currently has more than $44 BN The fund is supposed to finance Yucca Mountain but the current estimated cost of Yucca Mountain is over twice that at 96 bn: https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/wr-yucca_mountain_cost_estimate_rises_to_96_billion_dollars-0608085.html#:~:text=The%20US%20Department%20of%20Energy,repository%20at%20Yucca%20Mountain%2C%20Nevada https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/wr-yucca_mountain_cost_es.... Furthermore, those 44 billion won't even cover 10 years of the current running costs of handling waste, even accounting for interests. https://sustainability.stanford.edu/news/steep-costs-nuclear-waste-us https://sustainability.stanford.edu/news/steep-costs-nuclear... So it seems the US fund is in fact massively underfunded, not overfunded, do you agree or am I missing something? >It's like saying that every state in the US needs to have a waste facility. One is enough. Every country that operates nuclear plants needs to manage the waste for at least a while. Currently most of them do so for the foreseeable future at the site where there is, or has ever been, a nuclear plant. >Plus, in the not so distant future we'll be able to significantly reduce the amount of high level waste by burning the actinides in it But if we can already now generate gas from solar panels cheaper than we can operate nuclear plants, why can't we put our efforts into that instead? Why does it HAVE to be nuclear at any cost? An infrastructure that is massively overprovisioned from solar and other green sources and converts overproduction to gas whenever there is overproduction will be a gift to the future like hydropower dams have been (electricity-wise anyway). Once the investment is paid off it will keep giving cheap, reliable, distributed, failsafe electricity forever. That's better than even the most optimistic speculation for what can be done with nuclear.
- credit_guy 3y ago
  > So it seems the US fund is in fact massively underfunded, not overfunded, do you agree or am I missing something? Let's take that 96 billion at face value. I don't see why it needs to be so many times higher than WIPP, that handles more waste, but whatever, it's the official estimate of the DOE, from 2008. Here's another statement from the DOE in 2011, stating that they find the current fee (0.1 cents per kWh) to be adequate. The fee put on hold in 2017 due to a Federal Court ruling that the Government can't collect that fee and do nothing with it. If the Yuca Montain repository project is restarted, then one can see the fee being reinstated, and there's a good chance the fee that was uncollected over the last 7 years will be collected in arrears. > Why does it HAVE to be nuclear at any cost? It looks to me it's the other way round. I never heard a pro-nuclear guy (I'm one) saying don't build solar or wind. It's the anti-nuclear guys (presumaby you're one) that say "DO NOT BUILD NUCLEAR". Or am I missing something?