[yesplease]

That's what you get with the military managing things...

[steam_cannon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cyrus', '[')url=http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2640425.ece]Holy shit.[/url]

[TheDude]

Deep Time, by Greg Benford. Addresses the topic of communicating with people of the future, in indelible/timeless symbology. Interesting read.

Link fixed by Aimrehtopyh

[kolm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cyrus', '[')url=http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2640425.ece]Holy shit.[/url]

[gg3]

Hardly as risky as the pandemic uncontrolled release of dangerous fossil fuel wastes, that are presently screwing up the climate and trashing the planet.

As for nuclear wase, we should be calling it "nuclear recyclables." Yesterday's used fuel rods that can be reprocessed into tomorrow's new ones. Between now & then they can be stored in swimming pools at the reactor sites, where you can keep a good eye on them and know they're not sneaking out to cause a climate catastrophe.

And the low-level stuff is not a big deal, especially compared to the radiation released through burning of coal (yes, coal is full of radionuclides, all of which go merrily floating up into the sky when the stuff is burned...).

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'A')s for nuclear wase, we should be calling it "nuclear recyclables." Yesterday's used fuel rods that can be reprocessed into tomorrow's new ones.

[manu]

For those of you who are for nuclear energy, can we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard? No one else seems to want it.

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', 'F')or those of you who are for nuclear energy, can we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard? No one else seems to want it.

[dohboi]

Energy, your "pessimism" is the most hopeful thing I've heard in a while. Thanks for cheering my gloomy spirits.

[manu]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergyUnlimited', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', 'F')or those of you who are for nuclear energy, can we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard? No one else seems to want it.

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', '
')As far as I have heard, most states dont want nuclear waste in their State. The last I heard was Nevada rejecting a proposed nuclear dump way out in some canyon. Not much multiplyed by thousands of new reactors is alot. What are you going to do with all the atomic bombs?

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', 'F')or those of you who are for nuclear energy, can we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard? No one else seems to want it.

[MC2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', '
')I have no complaints. Hell, they could put the spent fuel canisters in my basement if they'd like.

pretty pics.

[manu]

Starvid, that site didnt convince me at all. First the final dump isnt even built and you have had waste since 77. Second its bullshit govt propaganda meant to make everyone feel all cozy and warm. What about the polluted water? Just flush it out into the big ocean? More jobs??? Yes, for the dumb people who want to shorten their lives by working around hazardous waste. Another thing is that they say it is encased in concrete and steel. After 500 years it will be safe. Unfortuanately concrete and steel will not last 500 years so down the line it will leak. Where it leaks to no one will know. Maybe you should go live on that nuclear waste ship for a year and then get back to me.

[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('manu', 'S')tarvid, that site didnt convince me at all.

[manu]

O.K> Starvid I'm not just talking about Swedan.
Let's take a look at the U.S. Millions of gallons of radioactive waste Thousands of tons of spent fuel. Huge quantities of soil and water contamination. Oak Ridge alone has 167 "know dump sites" on its 37,000 acres. There are 108 cleanup sites in the U.S. already that are polluted, and you want to make more. The govt says it will "try and have these cleaned up by 2027". Try isnt good enough for me, it amounts to a post dated check and may never get done. These scum-bags lie about everything they do. People lived on this planet for hundreds of thousands of years without nuclear power just fine and there was no pollution. If you are so into nuclear power why dont you move to Cheryrnobyl

Physics

The radioactivity of all nuclear waste diminishes with time. All radioisotopes contained in the waste have a half-life - the time it takes for any radionuclide to lose half of its radioactivity and eventually all radioactive waste decays into non-radioactive elements. Certain radioactive elements (such as plutonium-239) in “spent” fuel will remain hazardous to humans and other living beings for hundreds of thousands of years. Other radioisotopes will remain hazardous for millions of years. Thus, these wastes must be shielded for centuries and isolated from the living environment for hundreds of millennia [4]. Some elements, such as Iodine-131, have a short half-life (around 8 days in this case) and thus they will cease to be a problem much more quickly than other, longer-lived, decay products but their activity is much greater initially.

The faster a radioisotope decays, the more radioactive it will be. The energy and the type of the ionizing radiation emitted by a pure radioactive substance are important factors in deciding how dangerous it will be. The chemical properties of the radioactive element will determine how mobile the substance is and how likely it is to spread into the environment and contaminate human bodies. This is further complicated by the fact that many radioisotopes do not decay immediately to a stable state but rather to a radioactive decay product leading to decay chains.

[manu]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MC2', '[')
Seriously, people really need to lose their "Jane Fonda does China Syndrome" mentality left over from the seventies and enlighten themselves about nuclear technology and relative risk.

We will be lagging seriously when we finally break ground on the next new NPP, but it will happen. Thanks to Hollywood and other misguided morons for sticking the U.S. far behind the (nuclear) power curve...

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', '
')Actually, if you work with nuclear waste deep underground you will recieve far less radiation than if you, for example, sit in the office. Deep down you are shielded from cosmic radiation (remember that radiation shield made out of 500 metres of rock?). And the cosmic radiation is far more intense than that given off by the spent fuel canisters.

[Kylon]

I think we should take nuclear waste and put it all in one place, and use the heat generated by the nuclear waste to generate power.

Have the waste storage pay for itself.

[Graeme]

New way to store nuclear waste, and cheaper

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')ustralian scientists have found a new and cheaper way to filter and safely store nuclear waste.

Zhu Huaiyong, associate professor with Queensland University of Technology (QUT), told Xinhua on the telephone on Friday that his research team has discovered how to create nanofibres, which are millionths of a millimetre in size and can permanently lock away radioactive ions by displacing the existing sodium ions in the fibre.

"We have created ceramic nanofibres which attract and trap radioactive cations (positively charged ions), possibly forever," he said.

According to Zhu, the ceramic material can last much longer than the radioactivity of a radioactive ion. While other material such as plastic or steel, couldn't.

The ceramic nanofibres are made from titanium dioxide, a mineral Australia abounds in and used in white paint. They are also much cheaper to make than metals like steel, and chemically stabler.

"The fibres are in very thin layers, less than one nanometre in width, and the radioactive ions are attracted into the space between the layers," he said.