this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
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Strangely enough it hasn't been solved in the almost 70 years of nuclear energy. And I doubt it will be solved in the next 70 years either.
I think that depends on the definition of "solved".
In Finland, the Onkalo repository is being steadily built out (honestly, there might already be waste stored there, I haven't checked in on that story in a while. I know there was some delay due to COVID).
In the United States, there's been a lot of the usual politicking about where to build something that doesn't exactly sound appealing to have in one's backyard. Nobody wants to be the senator who allowed the government to build a nuclear waste site in their state, no matter how safe the site actually is.
This has led to the unfortunate situation where by law, the EPA is only allowed to consider a site in Nevada (because the other sites were in states represented by the Speaker of the House and President pro Tempore of the Senate), but because Nevada became an important state for Obama to become president, the site couldn't/wouldn't actually be built there and has been on hold pretty much ever since. My armchair understanding is that the Nevada site is probably one of the better places in the United States that you could store nuclear waste, but politics has ensured it will not be put there for a long, long time.
What do you mean hasn't been solved? Nuclear waste is being processed and stored constantly and with high safety. Not to mention reprocessing which could be done if not for being outlawed.
The only permanent storage for high level waste is currently being built in Finland, if I'm not mistaken. Germany thought they had found one, but they have to retrieve all waste because of leaks. Back to square one.
All we have up to now is temporary surface storage.
There is deep salt vein storage here in the us actively being used as we speak.
The pyramids weren't buried 1km under the surface in flowing salt which will further engulf the waste for geologic time scales.
Also we didn't forget about the pyramids. What does that even mean? People have lived right next to them since they were built.
Yes there are archaeological sites which have been forgotten and rediscovered.
Nothing you're saying is a strong argument about self sealing deep storage waste burial sites. I don't think you realize just how little waste nuclear reactors produce, they're not pyramids, they're a few barrels across years.
I'm well aware of the hazards communication projects. Not really relevant to deep salt storage.
Thousands of years is nothing across geologic time scales.
Yeah 11 tons is literally nothing. That's only 575 m^3 of uranium.
That's a third by mass of the average single German households trash production across the same time period. And it's more dense, so less volume.
Ah. Even so, that's less than the trash output of 1000 citizens. The quantity of waste is not very worrisome to me at all, especially considering all the other possible hazardous wastes from other industrial processes.
Right. Across eighty years. Our current methods are genuinely good, and can more than meet demand current and future.
Reprocessing is a more than viable solution, if you feel that demand can't be met.
What do you prefer? A power plant where all the hazardous material it generates you throw out into the atmosphere, or one where you can capture all of it into a container and prevent it from going out into the environment?
Neither. I don't buy the assumption that they are necessary. Renewables plus storage are very well capable of reliable supply.
Edit: https://www.diw.de/de/diw_01.c.821878.de/publikationen/wochenberichte/2021_29_1/100_prozent_erneuerbare_energien_fuer_deutschland__koordinierte_ausbauplanung_notwendig.html (in German, published by the German Institute for Economic Research, an institution as unsuspicious of being "too green" as it gets)
Don't get me wrong, they are capable of a much larger percentage of supply than they currently provide, but to handle the predictable periods of peak demand on the grid, it would be incredibly inefficient to rely only on renewables plus storage. It's not the most environmentally friendly solution for that.
Do you have an english translation for the link in the edit btw?
Being too green is not the problem. The problem is not being green enough...
Unfortunately, no. Most of the site lets you choose English, but for this specific article you'd need Google translate, or deepl, or whatever else.
It has, it's just illegal to do in the US. France has been doing it since the 60s.
It was solved less then 10 years after nuclear power was discovered.