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This is not a place of honor

wipp.energy.gov

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Re: This is not a place of honor

#181

Post by andreasvc »

Bromskloss wrote: post #178
antihero wrote: post #158

Surely written warnings, if some future society discovers them, they might be curious enough to have decrypted at least one of our present day languages/methods of communication. Just have the same concepts relayed in as many languages/ways as possible, and then make the site sufficiently difficult to infiltrate that it would take a sufficiently advanced civilisation to break into it. You could even tier the messages…

> THE THINGS HERE MAKE DEATH. I wouldn't be sure what that meant. They make death what? Great again?

It sounds like a powerful weapon, actually.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#182

Post by wtbob »

orbitingpluto wrote: post #105

I'm never understood this marker system. Graves have been marked in a threatening manner so that they would not be plundered. It doesn't work. The point is to hide the waste. The system should be designed to progressively unveil warnings if some future man starts digging. Otherwise, you're just asking for them to dig it up. Another thing not mentioned is to design the container so that anyone who plans to excavate wi…

> The point is to hide the waste.

The problem is that this was during the Cold War, and the site needed to operate on an ongoing basis, not just be used once and then hidden. They had to prepare for the possibility of a Soviet nuclear attack killing everyone responsible for the site, thus had to design a site which would still serve even if its operators disappeared.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#183

Post by wtbob »

Hondor wrote: post #115
krkoch wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not so sure. Primitive mining in e.g. Røros, Norway goes back to 1740. Dynamite were introduced to the mine in 1870. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B8ros

Only 40 years before the invention of the Geiger counter. If future primitive people have dynamite, it probably won't be long before the know about radiation too. This whole project seems to be being treated as far more important than it really is. It's only to protect a very small group of people in a very narrow window of technological advancement and only if civilization had somehow already been destroyed yet ther…

> This whole project seems to be being treated as far more important than it really is.

That's an excellent point. It does seem to have been a component of the overall exaggeration of the cost of nuclear power.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#185

Post by kbart »

cturner wrote: post #142
kbart wrote: post #101

Any marks would only attract people's attention. I can't come up with a single historical example where some marks would successfully keep people away. Even now we keep digging once forbidden and sacred places like pyramids, graves, temples, plague victims' burial grounds. Furthermore, a "menacing earthworks" example from the article looks like a treasure is buried inside that square. Why not bury it deep enough in a…

The primary requirements for waste disposal are geological stability and political expediency. These factors are hard and determine the site. Ability-to-mark doesn't influence the site choice.

Geological and political stability are concerns for both marked and un-marked sites, I don't see how marking would solve any of these.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#186

Post by cturner »

kbart wrote: post #185
cturner wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The primary requirements for waste disposal are geological stability and political expediency. These factors are hard and determine the site. Ability-to-mark doesn't influence the site choice.

Geological and political stability are concerns for both marked and un-marked sites, I don't see how marking would solve any of these.

Sure. I should have been clearer in what I wrote. From your earlier post, "put it in the tunnels inside a mountain then blow all entrances up".

With the geology, you want a place where you can firmly reason about what's going to happen over a long period of time. Maybe there would be sites where you can do the thing of putting it into mountains. But mountain geology is not necessarily stable. Consider how mountains are formed.

Your limited choice of sites is more likely to be flat country. (And it'll be desert, in order for the politics to work.)

Re: This is not a place of honor

#187

Post by pimlottc »

patrickk wrote: post #159
neltnerb wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought it was pretty interesting that they weren't really talking about making the site "threatening", but making it "repulsive". Poor craftsmanship, ugly terrain, uncomfortable heat, low value materials, etc. Some of their design photos were very different from what I'd assumed, and pretty much immediately triggered my "eww" response. Not intimidating exactly, just uncomfortable.

They attempted to go with "repulsive" for a nuclear waste disposal site in Finland, there's a really cool documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmWadizC8AQ

Another recommendation, it's quite a lovely film.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#188

Post by Zelmor »

It is very optimistic of them to presume that there will be any kind of civilization here in ten thousand years. By then. either humanity moves to the stars, or moves back to fighting with sticks and stones.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#189

Post by jacquesm »

vectorjohn wrote: post #162
krkoch wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not so sure. Primitive mining in e.g. Røros, Norway goes back to 1740. Dynamite were introduced to the mine in 1870. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B8ros

Mining, dynamite or otherwise, has to be for something. So why would people dig super far down in the desert through sand and worthless rocks?

To get at the radioactive materials.

Re: This is not a place of honor

#190

Post by turbohedgehog »

kbart wrote: post #101

Any marks would only attract people's attention. I can't come up with a single historical example where some marks would successfully keep people away. Even now we keep digging once forbidden and sacred places like pyramids, graves, temples, plague victims' burial grounds. Furthermore, a "menacing earthworks" example from the article looks like a treasure is buried inside that square. Why not bury it deep enough in a…

I wonder if we can develop some kind of system that continually emits foul odors for 10000 years - it's not likely our sense of smell will evolve away in that time.
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