Remember when that nut-case Moonbeam warned you about the problem of Nuclear Waste?

[alphatarget1]

This has been proposed but can you imagine the uproar from somebody like Moonbeam if we dumped it in the mariana's trench?

I'm not comfortable dumping nuke waste into a seismically active zone at such high hydrostatic pressures on the bottom of the ocean floor, but that's just me

Humans can probably find a way to maybe reuse the spent fuel and then make it less radioactive. Money needs to be dumped into research and education for the next generation of scientists and engineers, instead of educating liberal art retards and a bunch of lawyers who don't produce anything.

 

[Jaskalas]

We have a topic like this, on the disaster of nuclear waste, and yet there is STILL a push for more nuclear power plants?

 

[Linflas]

We have a topic like this, on the disaster of nuclear waste, and yet there is STILL a push for more nuclear power plants?

The only "disaster" here is in not dealing with the waste in a rational manner. Instead the policy is stalemated by NIMBY's and political hacks.

 

[Jaskalas]

The only "disaster" here is in not dealing with the waste in a rational manner. Instead the policy is stalemated by NIMBY's and political hacks.

Well that is not likely to change. So the point still stands.

 

[K1052]

I'm not comfortable dumping nuke waste into a seismically active zone at such high hydrostatic pressures on the bottom of the ocean floor, but that's just me

Humans can probably find a way to maybe reuse the spent fuel and then make it less radioactive. Money needs to be dumped into research and education for the next generation of scientists and engineers, instead of educating liberal art retards and a bunch of lawyers who don't produce anything.

Solutions abound but there is no political will to actually utilize any of them.

 

[Genx87]

I'm not comfortable dumping nuke waste into a seismically active zone at such high hydrostatic pressures on the bottom of the ocean floor, but that's just me

Humans can probably find a way to maybe reuse the spent fuel and then make it less radioactive. Money needs to be dumped into research and education for the next generation of scientists and engineers, instead of educating liberal art retards and a bunch of lawyers who don't produce anything.

I was thinking it could be churned up by the crust. Not a bad way to get rid of it

 

[K1052]

I was thinking it could be churned up by the crust. Not a bad way to get rid of it

You'd have to drill into the plate near the subduction zone. Not a cheap way to get rid of it but certainly effective.

 

[Cogman]

I'm not comfortable dumping nuke waste into a seismically active zone at such high hydrostatic pressures on the bottom of the ocean floor, but that's just me

Humans can probably find a way to maybe reuse the spent fuel and then make it less radioactive. Money needs to be dumped into research and education for the next generation of scientists and engineers, instead of educating liberal art retards and a bunch of lawyers who don't produce anything.

I was just putting it out as a suggestion for all the "Oh, we can't get rid of it" folks. Truth be told, I don't view nuclear waste as waste, I view it as "Materials yet to be used." I find it hard to believe that there is no application for radio-active materials beyond being dumped.

 

[K1052]

I was just putting it out as a suggestion for all the "Oh, we can't get rid of it" folks. Truth be told, I don't view nuclear waste as waste, I view it as "Materials yet to be used." I find it hard to believe that there is no application for radio-active materials beyond being dumped.

LWR spent fuel can be reused in a variety of ways, the most effective being the production of more energy using dry reprocessing + heavy water reactors or wet reprocessing back into a suitable LWR fuel.

 

[CPA]

send it out into space. And no, I'm not joking.

 

[K1052]

send it out into space. And no, I'm not joking.

Cost and launch vehicle failure rates make that an unacceptable solution at present.

 

[StageLeft]

Well that is not likely to change. So the point still stands.

What is a valid alternative? Valid meaning within current tech and reasonable cost.

 

[nobodyknows]

All nuclear waste should be stored In Washington, D.C. That way if there were an accident it wouldn't be a total waste.

 

[werepossum]

All nuclear waste should be stored In Washington, D.C. That way if there were an accident it wouldn't be a total waste.

LOL! That way we'd know that no shortcuts had been taken either.

I agree with Cogman and K1052, nuclear waste is chock full of potential energy and needs to be reused. Besides the problem of no one wanting a nuclear waste reprocessing plant in his own back yard, there's also all those decommissioned nuclear warheads which compete with nuclear fuel waste for fuel production.

 

[Moonbeam]

LOL! That way we'd know that no shortcuts had been taken either.

I agree with Cogman and K1052, nuclear waste is chock full of potential energy and needs to be reused. Besides the problem of no one wanting a nuclear waste reprocessing plant in his own back yard, there's also all those decommissioned nuclear warheads which compete with nuclear fuel waste for fuel production.

That is only the tip of the warhead:

MIT Review
Physics > Physics and Society
Title: The Future of Nuclear Energy: Facts and Fiction Chapter IV: Energy from Breeder Reactors and from Fusion?
Authors: Michael Dittmar (ETH Zurich)
(Submitted on 13 Nov 2009)
Abstract: The accumulated knowledge and the prospects for commercial energy production from fission breeder and fusion reactors are analyzed in this report.
The publicly available data from past experimental breeder reactors indicate that a large number of unsolved technological problems exist and that the amount of "created" fissile material, either from the U238 --> Pu239 or from the Th232 --> U233 cycle, is still far below the breeder requirements and optimistic theoretical expectations. Thus huge efforts, including many basic research questions with an uncertain outcome, are needed before a large commercial breeder prototype can be designed. Even if such efforts are undertaken by the technologically most advanced countries, it will take several decades before such a prototype can be constructed. We conclude therefore, that ideas about near-future commercial fission breeder reactors are nothing but wishful thinking.
We further conclude that, no matter how far into the future we may look, nuclear fusion as an energy source is even less probable than large-scale breeder reactors, for the accumulated knowledge on this subject is already sufficient to say that commercial fusion power will never become a reality.

 

[Moonbeam]

Thomas Saporito has been a very busy man in the State of Florida. Saporito has sued in Florida Courts to shut down an aging nuclear facility that he believes is no longer safe.

http://www.moneyteachers.org/Florida.htm

" Pictured above is the Florida Power and Light Company - Turkey Point Nuclear Plant located in south Florida. The twin nuclear reactors were licensed for operation in the early 70s just like the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant that is the center of controversy due to radioactive tritium leaking into the environment. The Vermont legislature last week voted down the Entergy's request to operate the nuclear plant for an additional 20-years. Similarly, the State of Florida should seek to shut-down the FPL Turkey Point Nuclear facility. These aged nuclear power plants were only designed to operate safely for a 40-year life-span. However, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has been rubber-stamping licenses to extend operation of aging nuclear plants for an additional 20-years and well-beyond the safety parameters of the original licenses. The government remains unaccountable for the tons and tons of high-level nuclear waste which is currently stored at 104 nuclear power plants.


The reactor vessels are made of stainless steel that is bombarded by high-level radioactive particles day-in and day-out which embrittles the reactor vessel making the vessel very susceptible to cracking . Should the vessel crack, a loss-of-coolant accident would result causing an uncontrolled meltdown of the entire plant releasing unwanted high-level radioactive particles into the environment - much like the Chernobyl melt down years back. Notably, the NRC cannot guarantee that anyone would be able to timely evacuate the area during a general alert at the plant. Fact is, the NRC cannot guarantee anything related to commercial nuclear power generation."


So my thoughts on this situation would be, what happens to a site like this if a worst case scenario occurred, like a Chernobyl or worse, and they also had all this spent radioactive waste sitting around waiting to add to the environmental calamity? We would be talking 100s or 1000s of times more radiation spread into the environment than a simple containment spill or a cracked vessel could ever produce.

We need this radioactive crap cleaned up at these sites IMMEDIATELY. Even old shut down reactors still store this deadly toxic waste on site. Yucca Mountain should be used IMMEDIATELY to possibly mitigate a future disaster at one of these aging power plants. Even if it is only used as a more temporary facility until something more secure is decided on, it's the best we have ATM and we can't afford to wait until some accident happens at one of these old sites.

Don't be an idiot. The nuclear folk can afford an accident; the government is going to wave their liability. They are going to get to fuck up for free. And as all us good conservatives of personal responsibility fervor know, if you can fuck up for free, you will.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Moonbeam, thank you for the link to the archive of the broadcast. I'm going to listen to it.

 

[werepossum]

That is only the tip of the warhead:

MIT Review
Physics > Physics and Society
Title: The Future of Nuclear Energy: Facts and Fiction Chapter IV: Energy from Breeder Reactors and from Fusion?
Authors: Michael Dittmar (ETH Zurich)
(Submitted on 13 Nov 2009)
Abstract: The accumulated knowledge and the prospects for commercial energy production from fission breeder and fusion reactors are analyzed in this report.
The publicly available data from past experimental breeder reactors indicate that a large number of unsolved technological problems exist and that the amount of "created" fissile material, either from the U238 --> Pu239 or from the Th232 --> U233 cycle, is still far below the breeder requirements and optimistic theoretical expectations. Thus huge efforts, including many basic research questions with an uncertain outcome, are needed before a large commercial breeder prototype can be designed. Even if such efforts are undertaken by the technologically most advanced countries, it will take several decades before such a prototype can be constructed. We conclude therefore, that ideas about near-future commercial fission breeder reactors are nothing but wishful thinking.
We further conclude that, no matter how far into the future we may look, nuclear fusion as an energy source is even less probable than large-scale breeder reactors, for the accumulated knowledge on this subject is already sufficient to say that commercial fusion power will never become a reality.

About 10% of the USA's electricity today is generated from decommissioned nuclear weapons. This is huge compared to all alternative fuels (it's almost half of all nuclear power generated in our country) and is very significant since unlike other nuclear powers the USA does not operate piles. This is one reason the Pubbies support Obama's new initiative to lower nuclear stockpiles - it will keep nuclear-generated electricity prices from jumping in the 2014 - 2016 window. Then there's also the hundreds of tons of Saddam's yellow cake uranium we seized in Iraq and allowed Iraq to sell to Canada. And of course what we really need to be doing is recycling nuclear waste to make new fuel. I agree that fusion power probably won't be commercially viable within the next two or three decades, and probably the same for breeder reactors, though.

I am curious, since you're a huge CAGW proponent, how you would propose handling our energy needs. You don't like nuclear and you don't like fossil, the only two really practical forms of energy generation currently. I like solar, especially point of use, but it cannot replace fossil or even nuclear; the energy requirements to produce are far too high for this. Wind is having problems being a net energy source rather than a sink, not to mention that practical sites always seem to be too near rich liberals to get built. So where do we go?

http://www.nextgenpe.com/news/russian-nuclear-bombs-us-electricity/

 

[daniel49]

I told you it was a lie that we would ever clean up, that we are pigs and you can see it by looking at the fact that in everything we do we create a sty and it is in the nature of pigs to promise to be neat as a pin, tomorrow, with tomorrow always a day away?

This should cheer up that that fool has had to say:

http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.htm?programID=10-P13-00010&segmentID=3

even a broken clock is right twice a day.

 

[Zorkorist]

There is nothing to clean.

Nuclear Energy is totally clean.

It's waste, with it's huge and scary half-life, can be stored in that salt-mountain they have designated.

It's just such a no-brainer., and those liberals that oppose it illustrate the fact they don't really care about people.

-John

 

[Moonbeam]

So where do we go?

When one door closes another opens. Where are bronze age people when they run out of copper and tin?

 

[werepossum]

So where do we go?

When one door closes another opens. Where are bronze age people when they run out of copper and tin?

That's not necessarily true. I'd argue that it is in fact the converse, that we close one door because a better door has been opened. The bronze age people became the iron age people because they discovered a way to make better, cheaper tools and weapons, not because someone decided copper was icky or because the tin ran out. In fact copper and tin continued to be mined (and still are) for those uses where they were the best solutions.

I'm all for pouring money into research and adopting better technologies as they become available, but I can't support destroying our most efficient means of energy production on the hope that doing so will make another, better form of energy production magically appear.

 

[Linflas]

So where do we go?

When one door closes another opens. Where are bronze age people when they run out of copper and tin?

They became iron age people and it had nothing to do with lack of copper and tin. In fact one might say they evolved.

 

[Moonbeam]

So where do we go?


That's not necessarily true. I'd argue that it is in fact the converse, that we close one door because a better door has been opened. The bronze age people became the iron age people because they discovered a way to make better, cheaper tools and weapons, not because someone decided copper was icky or because the tin ran out. In fact copper and tin continued to be mined (and still are) for those uses where they were the best solutions.

I'm all for pouring money into research and adopting better technologies as they become available, but I can't support destroying our most efficient means of energy production on the hope that doing so will make another, better form of energy production magically appear.

It isn't necessarily true that the sun will rise tomarrow, too. When one door closes another opens, as it has always been so it will likely be.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Moonbeam has a point. That a thing can or ought to be done doesn't mean it will, and if it is, there is no guarantee that it will be done properly.

The only safe way to get rid of the nasty stuff has already been mentioned. Drill into a subduction zone and it's gone.

The problem with people pushing nuclear power is that they tend to disregard the problems and associated costs.

I hammer away at health care not being properly considered before legislation, and this is much the same. Before a nuclear energy program is launched the issue of a permanent solution waste needs to be properly addressed.

Ill considered expediency is foolishness.