Quote:
Originally Posted by RH77
Even still, we're talking about some seriously toxic waste. You're research probably shows the volume it also takes to safety store the liquid. It's larger than a gymnasium -- it requires a holding system that can withstand at least 100-years of storage and a site with few natural disasters. In addition, the problem of transportation safety has not been fully assured.
Maybeh we can just store it and let future generations worry about it when it starts leaking 
RH77 |
Just brief comment on the above and then onward,
The volume of nuclear waste is a non-issue its the volume of the shielding and systems that take the space. If we had the foresite to design a system to bulk store we would be set but then the issue of a possible nuclear meltdown within our waste storage system comes into play.
One thing though, Nuclear waste may become a very valuable commodity in the near future. There are cells very similar to photovoltaic that produce electricity when exposed to nuclear radiation (which also blocks and shields radiactive content) and in no small order either, they make much more juice than a standard solar cell with sunlight.
They are still in the experimentation phase but this gives me hope, perhaps each one of us someday might have a refridgerator sized device sitting in our backyard running passive nuclear electric energy into our homes.
Not to mention the shielding from nuclear plants could be used for electric also increasing the plants efficiency.
There is already a 10yr paint that produces light off H30 nuclear isotopes relatively safely, I am waiting for that to start showing up on the radar (its already for sale in places) Imaging the paint in your house lighting it.
Now if we could get fusion to work safely then all this would be moot!