so the half life of uranium 235 is 235,000 years and you have a graph of something with a half life of 300 years...
i am pro nuclear btw
I changed my mind about nuclear waste
311–320 of 428 posts
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Fukushima Daiichi. In case those two words aren't enough to jog your memory: Yes, I get that nuclear power scares people, which is why we should put aside our emotions on the subject and just deal with the facts. We've had decades of empirical evidence about nuclear safety at this point. Zero radio-logical related deaths from Fukushima. And zero deaths in all history from all other civilian nuclear waste. > "the Ja…
The comment I was responding to was "WITHOUT ISSUE". A 30 km exclusion zone, even if temporary, is AN ISSUE. > And zero deaths in all history from all other civilian nuclear waste. It's rare, but happens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_civilian_nuclear_accid... > September 30, 1999 Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan > Two of these workers died. "Inadequately trained part-time workers prepared a uranyl nitrate solution…
We are discussing nuclear waste in this thread.
I said "stored well and safely without issue".
You find 2 dead workers from an industrial accident over a 70 year history that was not actually about nuclear waste but was a fuel processing and fabrication facility making fuel for experimental reactors. Not civilian power reactors. [1]
Even if you included it (which clearly it's not related to waste so shouldn't) it would still be the safest and best managed waste of anything we have!
The exclusion zone is not nuclear waste. It is interesting though because a lot of research after the event seems to show that the evacuation and such a large exclusion zone was a mistake and we should evacuate less in such events. But in the moment I get everyone was scared and didn't have a good idea of what to do.
[1] https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-sec...
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#313Earlier quoted context omitted.
Things that emit thermal radiation are not radioactive. An easy way to conceptualize it for stuff here on Earth is that radioactivity involves stuff flying out of the nucleus of an atom, while other forms of radiation do not.
Thermal radiation is in fact emitted from the nucleus of atoms; all matter emits black body radiation. The reason hot things generally aren't considered radioactive is because that would pull literally all matter into the discussion. But that wasn't the point being made here. The point being made with the hot spoon example is that EM radiation doesn't make other things radioactive (except insofar as it heats things u…
I think you may be confused about the distinction between radioactivity and black body radiation. The fact that gamma rays, microwaves, visible light and so on are all on a spectrum doesn't mean that every EM emitter is radioactive.
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#314While nuclear power can give us the most bang for the buck, it's main flaw has to do with the degree of centralization it requires. It takes the infrastructure of an advanced civilization to not only design, build, and maintain the facilities and equipment, it also requires the educational infrastructure to produce the personnel needed to operate them safely. This means that it requires a degree of centralization, an…
Isn't this a case where efficiency through centralization is a huge win for the environment?
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#315Earlier 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.
The fossil fuel industry is not funding pro-nuclear arguments because they want to see 50% of their business lost to nuclear. They are not worried about losing huge profits to nuclear because from a purely economic perspective nuclear is not cost-competitive with fossil fuels. Hence it doesn’t pose a major threat, absent massive government-subsidized build-outs (which aren’t remotely on the table now.) The fossil fue…
Nuclear is not cost-competitive in the US because it is defined as not being competitive! The problem is the standard for radiation is as low as reasonably achievable. Oops, that means that if nuclear isn't expensive that means you could pile more safety systems on it. It's a stealth ban.
Now, if your objective is public safety you should use a different standard: Better than any viable competing technology. Within the limit of rounding nuclear is currently 100x safer than it's closest competitor: natural gas. By mandating that level of nuclear safety we are actually increasing deaths by causing the use of a far more dangerous technology instead.
(And note that her post repeats a common mistake about nuclear safety--assigning the Fukushima deaths to the nuclear plant rather than to the politicians. The evacuation of the city did not make sense from a safety standpoint. Growing food there will not be a good idea for some time but the expected death toll from sitting put was zero. The only non-worker nuclear power deaths are from Chernobyl.)
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#316Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is one problem with Nuclear power that was never talked about before the Ukraine War: War itself. More specifically, war in the area that is powered by nuclear. Damage to reactors, power plant workers fleeing, damage to nuclear waste containers, and more.
It actually seems to be a case study that empirically proves the opposite. Hundreds of thousands dead in the Russian invasion of Ukraine so far, untold injuries. Incredible amounts of destruction of cities and civilian infrastructure. But yet none from an exploding nuclear power plant. Why? Because its not really possible and it serves very little point. If the goal is to terrorize people and inflict damage there are…
If a pressurized water reactor is hit breached with explosives, it instantly releases superheated water vapor carrying radioactive iodine and caesium.
For reactors that could be threatened, they should be "walk-away safe" and even more focused on recycling spent fuel so large quantities are not necessary to keep on hand.
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#317Earlier 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. I've always hoped they're secretly funded/friends with the oil lobby, because otherwise that's just pure sadness.
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#318The 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…
She also had a recent piece out on The Free Press (formerly the Common Sense substack)
https://www.thefp.com/p/climate-activism-has-a-cult-problem
TLDR: She writes about her time in Extinction Rebellion as a media guru and highlights some issues the group has with it's 'eccentric' founder.
That article came out 18 days ago. So there seems to be something of a media coordination going on.
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#319Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know people who were so sick and tired of trying to figure out where to dispose of their fluorescent light bulbs that they just threw them to the side of the road on the highway at night. It’s completely undetectable.
Yup, same issue with e-waste. It can be a pain to properly dispose of your broken 10 year old laptop. So many people don't do it. It just does in the trash can with everything else. Make it easy, people do it, minus a few edge case shitheads. But I'd rather 75 out of 100 people do it right and have 25 shit heads than 75 shit heads and 25 people doing it right.
Does your country not have recycling centers?
Over here every municipality has a center where you can just hand in any domestic waste unsuitable for the trash can. It's a bit inconvenient because you have to go out of your way, but it is definitely quite doable.
And electronics can be handed in at any store which sells electronics, which includes stores like the equivalent of Walmart or Home Depot. You'll be going there anyways, so it's literally zero extra effort.
Re: I changed my mind about nuclear waste
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
The comment I was responding to was "WITHOUT ISSUE". A 30 km exclusion zone, even if temporary, is AN ISSUE. > And zero deaths in all history from all other civilian nuclear waste. It's rare, but happens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_civilian_nuclear_accid... > September 30, 1999 Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan > Two of these workers died. "Inadequately trained part-time workers prepared a uranyl nitrate solution…
We are discussing nuclear waste in this thread. I said "stored well and safely without issue". You find 2 dead workers from an industrial accident over a 70 year history that was not actually about nuclear waste but was a fuel processing and fabrication facility making fuel for experimental reactors. Not civilian power reactors. [1] Even if you included it (which clearly it's not related to waste so shouldn't) it wou…
"Re-processing facility" means it comes from used rods (i.e. "waste").
This is fine, you can have your thread dedicated solely to waste. Though I do think that waste reprocessing should also be included in such a thread.
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As to the more general matter, people aren't concerned so much with waste, as with everything about nuclear power. Including "accidental waste" such as that caused by the Chernobyl civilian reactor failure.
Yes, I'm glad we're designing and building meltdown-proof reactors.
The long-term waste, regardless of how it originates (whether from conventional waste, decommissionings, or what have you) needs to be processed such that people a hundred, thousand, ten thousand years from now don't have to do anything special about it.
I think this can be done. But without stringent, real-time regulations I am not confident industry, or even government, will do what's necessary.