[mythtv-users] [Slightly OT] solar power for all our gadgets

Brent Norris brent at brentnorris.net
Thu Mar 19 16:24:26 UTC 2009


Carl Reynolds wrote:

> First, no one has come up with a way of safely disposing of the huge 
> amounts of radioactive waste generated by a nuclear power plant. When a 
> plant is operated for a period of twenty years (the minimum amount of 
> time necessary to break even on the construction cost of the plant) it 
> will generate a mass of radioactive waste equal to the mass of all the 
> material that went into the original construction of the plant. Also 
> keep in mind that it is not safe to operate any nuclear power plant for 
> more that forty to fifty years because of  the deterioration of 
> materials due to exposure to radiation. This deterioration requires 
> complete replacement of the plant at end of life leaving another vast 
> pile of radioactive material.
> 
> The radioactive waste from a nuclear plant will remain deadly for 
> thousands of years  after the original plant has ceased to exist. We 
> have absolutely no way to guarantee that we can protect future 
> generations from being exposed to this radiation. We bury it in the 
> ground and hope that the ground around it stays stable and put up signs 
> that say 'Don't dig here', but who is to guarantee that the signs will 
> continue to exist a thousand years from now or that people will be able 
> to read it? When I've asked people in the industry how we are dealing 
> with this, the response is always, "We'll figure that out at some point, 
> but nuclear power is too important now for us to hold off on production 
> while we figure out how we will protect people in the future from our 
> radioactive waste."

Isn't at least part of this solved by the whole Breeder Reactor idea, 
that has just been unimplemented in the US because of the nuclear 
proliferation ideas?  I was under that impression that France has gone a 
long way to reduce their nuclear waste by reprocessing it and using it 
again.

Brent


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