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I changed my mind about nuclear waste

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Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#271

Post by Accujack »

Animats wrote: post #3

Once waste has made it to dry cask storage, it's not much of a problem. But there are still too many spent fuel rods in cooling pools at power stations. That stuff was supposed to go to Yucca Mountain, but for political reasons, that didn't happen.

No, Yucca mountain (burial site) was mostly for non fuel waste, scientific, and weapons waste. The spent fuel rods were supposed to be moved to above ground storage at the same site until they could be reprocessed or became inert.

Most waste in cooling pools is there to cool, not for storage.. if it is able be moved, then it is moved to a cask.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#272

Post by godelski »

whatshisface wrote: post #139
LarryMullins wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minuscule tritium emissions are detected around nuclear power plants all the time, far below the level at which anybody should be concerned. There was even a case where alarms were sounded when a power plant worker was found to be radioactive due to radon in his home, which triggered detectors at work. The general chemical industry doesn't operate with anything even remotely close to this degree of care.

That's a gas, making it the easiest possible case. I think a more plausible threat are the decaying temporary storage containers that a lot of low-grade waste is sitting in because nobody can find a permanent location for it. (Yes, that's largely due to political reasons, but political reasons are real!)

A gas is quite difficult to detect because it diffuses. This also makes them typically less dangerous because diffusion also means dilution. Levels do matter. Tritium is also pretty low in terms of radioactivity. The radiation cannot penetrate the skin except in very high levels (you can find keychains, watches, gun sights, etc with small bits of tritium and phosphorous to create long term glow objects). Ingestion and inhalation are more serious since your internal organs are more susceptible (see weighted dosage). The real cool thing is that we can measure radiation with high precision and in real time, so we can detect these dangers. Mostly because these devices are cheap.

In addition to the requirement of a more active approach needed to detect ground/water contaminants there are also a larger variety of pollutants that are harmful. Many of these need specific tests, which can consume your samples. Of course we can do pretty good guesstimates for what we should look for, but we do need to recognize that the process is both more fuzzy and more involved. We can grow these projects by making them cheaper, but that's a tall order (it is happening though).

Edit: I do want to note that most radiation detection devices do not distinguish between types of radiation. These differences do matter in danger levels. This can add complications the above but there is a decent signal that is still useful. But as with everything, some expertise and domain knowledge is quite important.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#273

Post by denton-scratch »

Aeolun wrote: post #39
yellow_lead wrote: post #27

The author says the waste isn't liquid, but also says that spent fuel rods are cooled in pools for several years. Does the water not become irradiated in that time?

Does your cup of water become irradiated from having a hot spoon stuck in it? I think the water is mostly safe. At worst the water will have little slivers of radioactive material floating in it but that’s only if something already went wrong, so I imagine it’s cleaned before being discharged. Ultimately you can also cool it down and reuse it, so you might not need all that much water relatively speaking.

> so I imagine it’s cleaned before being discharged.

There's plutonium dust in the silt under the Irish Sea, off the coast from Sellafield. Inhaling a single particle of plutonium dust (much smaller than a 'sliver') can kill you. I think your imagination has misled you.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#274

Post by bborud »

rndmize wrote: post #58

While it's good the author has gained a better understanding of nuclear waste, I feel that they're almost repeating their mistakes in their discussion of renewable waste. I'm fairly sure that everything they listed - solar panels, turbines, batteries - can be recycled; the question generally is whether its cost-effective to do so. (Another important question is probably on whether we want to spend the money on develo…

> one of the biggest steps we could take is strong right-to-repair laws

I could not agree more. Thank you for bringing this up.

I think part of why this doesn't turn up more often when green parties try to get elected is that it isn't sexy enough. It is much more fun to imagine building new and shiny stuff or have an opportunity to strongly signal values. But something as boring as laws that would require all manufacturers to design for repairability and banning any manufacturer who even looks like they are trying to limit who can repair stuff, is too boring.

I agree: this would be a very good place to start.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#275

Post by ZeroGravitas »

jeffbee wrote: post #217
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #18

The author, who gives every appearance of being funded by the industry, founded an activist group that claims: > Aim for 50% nuclear at least, as per the science. Which suggests a pretty cavalier attitude to "the science". edit: I take it back, she's in cahoots with Shellenberger and GWPF so it's the fossil fuel industry that she's supporting. I thought the timing was mysteriously exact for both her and Shellenberger…

Yeah, if the fission industry wants to be taken seriously they need to hire assassins to murder Shellenberger in his sleep. I have some sympathy for the scientific and technical justifications for fission, but I have some doubts about the economics and whether capitalist private utilities can be trusted to operate the reactors. I have zero doubts that Shellenberger is a mendacious tool of the fossil fuel industry who…

The fact that the most publicly visible spokesperson for nuclear energy is regularly on Fox News saying that Climate Change isn't a big deal, is mind blowing to me. That's like it's number one selling point, and their salesman is pretending it's not real.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#276

Post by kuschkufan »

johndhi wrote: post #30

This was an awesome article. It makes me feel better. I feel like I have generalized anxiety about nuclear waste existing out there, and this quelled it.

yeah, i agree - what a great feel good article. light on any hard facts, but makes that up with feel good stuff. right what people needed to bolster their existing opinion of "nuclear energy = good"

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#277

Post by DiabloD3 »

KptMarchewa wrote: post #191
thatfrenchguy wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Controversial opinion: by scaremongering about nuclear power—which the west could have started adopting in the 1970s like France did—the naked tree huggers did as much to set back climate change mitigation efforts as the oil lobby. I've always hoped they're secretly funded/friends with the oil lobby, because otherwise that's just pure sadness.

Actually just by russia.

I'd like to also echo this. Best analysis of the history behind the anti-nuclear craze of the 60s and 70s is basically Russia infiltrated the Hippie Movement of the 60s to exploit the "government is bad" soft anarchism (=minarchism) in the movement to delay America from getting a leg up.

For the past 100+ years, Russia has been one of the largest energy players in the world, bigger than Saudi Arabia. You can see this today in the Russian Invasion in Ukraine, as Germany tries to comply with the international regulations and shut the Russian Nord Stream pipeline off and can't; Russia has a stranglehold on everyone on that side of the world.

So, given that, they feared an America that could meet its energy needs without pollution, heavy investment, and significant cost; while Russia was literally killing its own people to make the oil and gas flow as a cost of doing business. Thus, they slipped right in and used the Hippies to astroturf an anti-nuclear position.

Reagan may have torn down that wall, but Russia won the cold war; and then they made sure, post-Soviet, to make sure we'd never attain energy independence. The end result of that trainwreck is currently under investigation by the FBI as per the recommendations of the Jan 6th Committee.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#278

Post by ad404b8a372f2b9 »

wirrbel wrote: post #117
rayiner wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Extinction rebellion have a page on her (NSFW warning for some nudity in the banner image Controversial opinion: by scaremongering about nuclear power—which the west could have started adopting in the 1970s like France did—the naked tree huggers did as much to set back climate change mitigation efforts as the oil lobby. At least with the oil folks, they were pushing a status quo that was likely to stand until today…

> Controversial opinion: by scaremongering about nuclear power—which the west could have started adopting in the 1970s like France did—the naked tree huggers did as much to set back climate change mitigation efforts as the oil lobby. You would have thought that France would have supplied the European continent with electricity now that Russia cut its gas supply, but it turns out that France received electricity from…

Our national energy company EDF has been the largest energy exporter in Europe for ages, in 2019 it was the largest in the world. In addition to that it's made us the cleanest country in the continent for close to 40 years (along with hydro-rich countries). The notion that 2022 is a smoking gun for nuclear is ridiculous. All it reflects is the past 12 years of successive liberal governments writing laws and reforms to gut our nuclear fleet and EDF in favour of private companies.

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#279

Post by Accujack »

erpellan wrote: post #186
nickelcitymario wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While these are reasons to be suspicious, they do not counter a single point she made in her article. Her logic and her facts were solid. If they're not, I'd love to see a take down of that. But I see no problem with anything she wrote, I remain convinced nuclear is the only rational energy source left, and all this fear mongering about nuclear is causing us to slowly kill ourselves.

It takes a decade to bring a nuclear plant online, at astronomical cost. Instead, why not take that money and start building wind turbines, solar PV and grid-scale batteries? They can start generating (ie. delivering ROI) in a matter of months, be constructed incrementally and are cheaper per KWH.

Newer designs (existing reactors use 1970s technology) are cheaper and faster to build. Look up the concept of "Small Modular Reactors".

Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste

#280

Post by Krasnol »

goatlover wrote: post #256
Krasnol wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm quite sure op meant 5x higher than certain renewables not fossil. Nobody is talking about fossil anymore. It's on the way out just like nuclear.

At some point it will, but has fossil fuel use actually declined so far? From what a I’ve read, the Arctic is being looked at as a new frontier for oil and gas exploration as the ice retreats.

Yes, it has declined in countries which invest into renewables: https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-energy-c...
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