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LAN_403

BigBad

Thu Jan 30 2014, 01:03AM

Registered Member #2529 Joined: Thu Dec 10 2009, 02:43AM
Location:
Posts: 600

Fast breeder reactors are really the answer to most nuclear waste disposal; but at the moment, it's cheaper to just store the waste on-site, because nuclear fuels are inexpensive to mine right now. Eventually we'll run out of ore and then that will change.

Uspring

Thu Jan 30 2014, 09:20AM

Registered Member #3988 Joined: Thu Jul 07 2011, 03:25PM
Location:
Posts: 711

Breeders produce more waste, i.e. plutonium, than they consume. Pu can be utilized (i.e. disposed)) as MOX fuel in standard reactors.
Most of the waste activity comes from the fission fragments. Breeders don't help there.

Dr. Slack

Thu Jan 30 2014, 09:24AM

Registered Member #72 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 08:29AM
Location: UK St. Albans
Posts: 1659

Conundrum wrote ...

I assume launching the waste out of the Solar System as part of a meteor shield for an Orion is out of the question?

Aside from any cost issues, unfortunately there's a very vulnerable bit of the journey between 0km and 100km altitude, where any accident could spread the waste far and wide over the surface of the Earth. It's not unknown for rockets to explode shortly after takeoff, Challenger, the Ariane 16/32 bit reusable fin control software module bug, etc etc.

Perhaps if it could be done without rockets, waste doesn't need any kind of g-force limits so a damned big gun/mass driver might be feasible to orbit the stuff. Basically once the stuff left the muzzle, it would get into orbit, period, though that makes the vulnerable bit of the journey getting it up to speed in the gun.

Carbon_Rod

Thu Jan 30 2014, 09:44AM

Registered Member #65 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 06:43AM
Location:
Posts: 1155

If the US reprocessed spent rods like France there would be 84% less material in stockpiles from the past 40 years. That being said, the old northern CANDU reactors do process both of these low quality U and Pu forms just fine. This old system is safer since the material does not need to be refined, and minimal amounts of Pu can be fed into them in a regular mixed fuel rod. This system was developed in North America to help decommission old non-viable arms stockpiles in an economical manner.

As a side note, naturally occurring U was around during our evolution, and in most forms is relatively far less toxic than man-made Pu... That being said, coal power plants still produce far more radioactive pollution than most reactors. Additionally, the carbon from burning fossil fuel (i.e. depleted isotopes aging millions of years) is changing the isotope ratio in the atmosphere, and biological organisms seem to treat each form of carbon slightly differently.

Politics haven't changed in 4000 years, the primitive hunter-gatherer energy policy is still dominating peoples decision process.

"
The Blind Men and the Elephant:

It was six men of Indostan
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind

The First approached the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!

The Second, feeling of the tusk,
Cried, Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!

The Third approached the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
I see, quoth he, the Elephant
Is very like a snake!

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee.
What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain, quoth he;
'Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said: Even the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!?

The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Than, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
I see, quoth he, the Elephant
Is very like a rope!

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

Moral:

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!
"
(John Godfrey Saxe)

Uspring

Thu Jan 30 2014, 02:12PM

Registered Member #3988 Joined: Thu Jul 07 2011, 03:25PM
Location:
Posts: 711

Carbon Rod wrote:

That being said, coal power plants still produce far more radioactive pollution than most reactors.

I guess you are excluding Chernobyl and Fukushima and possible hazards from waste dumps.

Patrick

Thu Jan 30 2014, 11:55PM

Registered Member #2431 Joined: Tue Oct 13 2009, 09:47PM
Location: Chico, CA. USA
Posts: 5639

Ash Small wrote ...

Patrick wrote ...

We need a star-trek like understanding to modifiy nuclear chemistry.

We just need a bit more investment in fusion technology. No radioactive waste, except the reactor linings themselves. No chance of a 'runaway reaction', as power needs to be supplied to get the fusion process going, and to maintain it (no power in=no fusion).

All the research at the moment is into materials for the reactor linings, as these require regular replacement, and become radioactive in use. Ideally something is required where the resulting product has a short half-life, so therefore doesn't require long term storage.

oh absolutely, fusion is the answer. Really if we Americans had a sane clear thinking environmentalist base, we'd use 50 years of natural gas from here on out, and in that 50 years perfect the practicality of fusion, then for centuries humanity would be set. Sadly, in America, we have a small but vocal, psychotic environmentalist movement that knows nothing nor cares at all about the civil needs of humanity.

testtest

Fri Jan 31 2014, 12:54AM

Registered Member #3271 Joined: Mon Oct 04 2010, 02:29AM
Location: Canada
Posts: 159

Original question on detonating a nuke underground to get rid of waste: no. You are better off just letting it underground. Issue are the future dispersion of the stuff and the new stuff you generated if it gets to the aquifer. Also consider the time-line with future generations. Better solution these days with present tech is breeder reactors and for bombs stuff processing in a reactor similar to the CANDU. Perhaps get some electricity as a bonus.... this would need a systematic, international effort.

On the general topic of nuclear waste disposal on should think of the amount of radioactive sources already present in the atmosphere at this time.

With my scintillation detector and multichannel analyzer I can still pick up the Cs remnants of US atmospheric H bomb tests in the ashes from some trees in my fireplace. The 50s kids generation have a radiation burden from that era still. But today Lake Superior, with its coal burning electric plants is more radioactive from the rain soot deposits than lake Ontario with all the nuclear reactors around.

It is one thing to bring to mind disasters from nuke plants and the waste disposal issue but how many real death occur due to those compared to the yearly deaths in coal mines each year and many other causes that we can control?

/RANT ON

@patrick:
Quote: "oh absolutely, fusion is the answer. Really if we Americans had a sane clear thinking environmentalist base, we'd use 50 years of natural gas from here on out, and in that 50 years perfect the practicality of fusion, then for centuries humanity would be set. Sadly, in America, we have a small but vocal, psychotic environmentalist movement that knows nothing nor cares at all about the civil needs of humanity. "

Agreed gas is cleaner and fusion might/could be an answer but will , aside from the difficulties, be totally blocked by big oil for the foreseeable future if ever found practical. How much gas is burned in the Alberta tar-sands to produce a barrel of sulfur laden oil? They are more rabid than environmentalist in protecting profits.

Look in the 1990s project of using about 10% of desert space in Arizona to provide California energy by solar thermal collection, with potassium storage at night, that was deemed too costly. Yet, it was less that what was spent in the Iraq war for one year.... This would have allowed California to go all-electric, including base transportation. I'll look up that study and get references. It was also described by Scientific American a few years after that. We have the technology and can take risks. Stop blaming environmentalists (I do remember flying in LA several times in the 70s. It looked worse a bad day in Beijing today. You could not see the city from the plane going in for landing, just a big eye watering yukky yellowish muck. People forget how bad it really was before action needed to be taken. Environmentalist were also blamed for wanting clean air and water by controlling car and manufacturing pollution. I remember moving in Palo Alto in the late 70s after the birth defects were clearly linked to high tech companies dumping solvent waste in the sewers in several cities across the US. That was the birth of what is now called "responsible chemistry" to track that stuff.

Look at the future if you want a humanity or healthy kids, never mind civil needs if they are sick.... Remember Galileo was also thought to be psychotic too as are many forward looking folks.

/RANT OFF

BigBad

Fri Jan 31 2014, 08:40PM

Registered Member #2529 Joined: Thu Dec 10 2009, 02:43AM
Location:
Posts: 600

Dr. Slack wrote ...

Aside from any cost issues, unfortunately there's a very vulnerable bit of the journey between 0km and 100km altitude, where any accident could spread the waste far and wide over the surface of the Earth.

Nah, it wouldn't. Rockets basically explode low order, not high order; it's relatively easy to shield against.

wrote ...

It's not unknown for rockets to explode shortly after takeoff, Challenger, the Ariane 16/32 bit reusable fin control software module bug, etc etc.

Yup, but it's not at all hard to wrap the waste in a steel or copper jacket. Meteorites make it down to the Earth after all.

But I'm not saying it's economic, because it isn't.

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