88,000 tons of radioactive waste - and nowhere to put it
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- čas přidán 27. 08. 2018
- The United States produces 2,200 tons of nuclear waste each year…and no one knows what to do with it. The federal government has long promised, but never delivered, a safe place for nuclear power plants to store their spent fuel. This means that radioactive waste is piling up all over the country. We visited one of the worst places where the waste is stuck: a beachside power plant uncomfortably close to both San Diego and Los Angeles. And we asked the people in charge of the waste there: what happens now?
Video by: Rachel Becker, William Poor, Alex Parkin, Cory Zapatka
Audio Mix: Andrew Marino
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What do you think we should do with nuclear waste?
Space
Verge Science send it to outer space what else is there ;)
The desert or places at the poles where no one lives?
Verge Science well theres is no answer what did we do with that radioactive waste in chernobyl underground that melted dwn on the ground
Maybe we can use it to paint
we could always put in on Buzzfeed's headquarters.
RoyVonSoySauce Make any pipe bombs lately? Freak.
I believe their headquarter's already full...
Yeah, radiotherapy for the primary tumour of America's cancer.
buzzfeed is the cancer of our generation.
I do support this decision.
I’ve lived within 30 miles of the plant my entire life and I can tell you people here rarely if ever talk about the plant as a potential concern.
I live near a nuke plant too and it’s rarely ever discussed. We tend to overlook things we don’t recognize as part of our daily lives. Don’t take it for granted.
@@bergensteinmacwhorfmanteis2417 do you love near a plant where they make nuclear bombs or just a nuclear energy plant
Nuclear energy station
The capital of Denmark, Copenhagen is within spitting distance of the Swedish nuclear plant Barsebeck - in operation since 1975
Nuclear plants are very safe these days
The "waste" still has almost all of its original energy so it's fuel for Molten Salt Reactors. They can burn it to exhaustion and the small fraction left gets stored for only 300 years.
youre talking pie in the sky.. building those reactors is decades away
Now, do the calculation about how much energy was created with that fuel, and how much carbon isn't in the air because of it. All of the radioactive waste on Earth is comparably tiny. This is only an issue if you are standing right next to it. Take a step back and realize that this really is not that much matter.
Yeah but people in the year 5021 will have to deal with millions of tons of nuclear waste around the world that didn't produce any energy for them, is it fair for futur generations?
because those concrete blocks won't last for hundreds of year
@@ViperVenoM13 I think you might be under-appreciating the sense of scale we are talking about here. A million tons sounds like a gigantic number until you compare it with the size of our planet. Compare this with all of the millions of tons of carbon released into the atmosphere from burning petroleum products.
I can breathe carbon not so much with nuclear waste
@@ViperVenoM13 yes because if it has such a long half life, it's not very dangerous
@@gregpaszt4671 I can drink water but not carbon
Just drag it to the recycling bin
The file is too large, do you want to permanently delete it?
Nah. Just delete System32 and you're fine for good.
bob david 😂😂😂
The whole reason all this waste exists is because reclaiming fuel is illegal.
@@aaronsosnoski1017 r/woooosh
This nuclear fuel isn't really "spent".
The only way to actually deal with all this stuff is to use it, not bury it in the ground (and our heads in the sand).
Uranium fuel rods still contain 90%+ of their potential energy when they're removed from reactors as waste. The problem is that solid fuel reactors are a ridiculous idea in the first place, but have ended up being the de facto reactor design due to a whole mess of military, market and political reasons.
If this could be reprocessed for use in a molten salt breeder reactor (far more efficient, much much safer), nearly all of the long-tail isotopes would fission to generate clean, zero-carbon electricity, leaving only a tiny fraction of the original waste by volume (think pounds instead of tons) and with a half life of about 300 years instead of 20000.
It's worth noting this process could potentially generate 10x more energy than the original reactor did during its entire lifetime, while actually cleaning up its waste rather than shoving it into a mountain.
Na big oil doesn't like that
Don't write gibberish there is nothing like that what you have mention why you didn't wrote the reference on what you have written all this thesis what on earth makes you think that if there were a better solution and still scientist won't use that method and would still work with a more danger and less efficient, The ultimate thing which can save us from all this nuclear waste crisis is fund the nuclear fission research heavily that would be the only thing that can give us the abundant energy for the cheapest price and without being a threat to the environment.
Here is some good information on next generation nuclear Fission (not Fusion) that is actively being developed in China, India and Canada:
czcams.com/video/7kBCMEUuSNw/video.html
There are a bunch of alternative Nuclear ideas out there, Bill Gates has thrown billions into a company called TerraPower, look it up.
If we have a chance in hell of averting climate disaster, we need to be doing EVERYTHING:
- Next gen Fission
- Fusion
- Large scale wind, hydro
- Pumped hydro storage
- Domestic solar
- Battery storage / smart grids
Here's a more recent one that explains how inefficient solid fuel reactors are: czcams.com/video/c7baTdyHv8g/video.html
@ Abhay This is not theoretical nonsense. Oakridge National Laboratory literally prototype such a reactor for 4 years, running it for over 20,000 hours. It holds the record for the highest temperature nuclear reactor at around 900C where it self-arrested due to its design being 100% passively safe. It ran on uranium dissolved into a FLiBE salt in thermal-neutron configuration. They did not test the implementation of a thorium blanket around the reactor for breeding purposes, but the running of the reactor itself is far past being fanciful promises or even promising designs. It is literally tested and proven, with technology from 4 decades ago.
Oakridge Molten Salt Reactor Experiment: czcams.com/video/tyDbq5HRs0o/video.html
As I understand it, 4th generation/thorium reactors can use the waste from older facilities like these and in doing so, reduce the halflife of their radioactive material from thousands of years down to just two or three hundred years at most before they are totally inert.
So.. there is that. Look into it.
yeah, on the point, people keep fearmongering about nuclear energy, when in reality its the safest, cleanest and most efficient energy source we have
You forgot about the excessive amount of handling of the product to alter it and do so........it is NOT NEARLY as simple as you make it sound. Read about decommissioning sometime, and the spin off effects......Hanford in the USA is the single most polluted place in the Western Hemisphere (over 70 square miles of ground water unfit to drink and rising).....This is a problem for the industry....... in Canada ,the NWMO (Nuclear Waste Management Organization....solely funded by the Radioactive waste producers)and OPG(Ontario Power Generation....one of the Funders) are trying to bury it right next to the largest drinking water reserve in North America. The problem is NOT going away......I say shut the industry down until they can figure it out...... they are making billions of dollars, and appear to have been irresponsible with their waste product planning right from the start.
@@joeblower5003 I never said the solution was easy. But it’s a solution that provides energy and makes the nuclear waste inert so much faster so that’s about as good as its likely to get.
Existing and on verge of phase out CANDU can do the same.
@@JudgeMad well not safest but safer then coal and gas by far
Uranium is very dense. It would be helpful to maybe state the volume of the waste as well, since it definitely takes up less space than the amount of coal ash would be produced from generating similar amounts of electricity from coal, for example. It's all also contained in the fuel rods, easy to handle and store.
The other contrast that isn't made between where the waste is stored for nuclear and fossil fuels. The nuclear fuel is secure and available for reprocessing. Fossil fuel waste is "stored" in the atmosphere. And yes the volumes involved with nuclear are incredibly small.
space isnt the problem ahahahaha
Very true, all the used fuel is stored in an area about the size of a medium sized strip mall parking lot. Funny thing is we are doing the same thing with renewables right now, treating it as the new savior (which it is with the proper energy storage) but we have no idea what were are going to do with the mountains of waste in a couple decades when all those panels, batteries, and turbine blades reach their end of life. I usually send this video to help folks play catch up with the science to fill the gap the scary unknown the media plays off of.
czcams.com/video/4aUODXeAM-k/video.html&t
2200 tonnes per year? Maybe with technology from the 70s, but that misrepresents modern nuclear reactors. A 1000MW nuclear power station could power a city the size of Amsterdam and produce 30 tonnes of waste per year. Compared to an equivalent coal powered station, kicking out 300,000 tonnes of ash per year.
They are not separating high, mid and low level nuclear waste. Reactors produce huge amounts of very low level waste (first cycle coolant water mainly), which is either a simple proces of filtering it or decays below safe levels in months. And I know uranium is heavy but 30 years of 2200 tons a year would be a bit bigger that what she showed there. But they picked a true expert on radiation. Nothing beats measuring your own radioactivity (inside of a very well shielded reactor) to check your exposure.
it's funny that you mention 70s technology when the electro-refining process used at Argonne National Labs for the EBR-2 reactor and reprocessing facility, was invented in the 1960s. It will literally be 1960s technology that can save us from the waste we generated with our 70's technology reactors. That is some irony!
Ash is better than oil when it comes to which one could be easily disposed
COAL ASH IS RECYCLEABLE,,,,,,,,,GOOGLE IT
What of Nikola Tesla
Better than having a couple of million tonnes of coal ash seeping arsenic into the ground water...
Future Hindsight: No, Arsenic does not decay, it'll be toxic for eternity...
Ah, sorry, I took your first comment to be supportive of coal.
HAHAHAHA you must be talking about China because any coal that is burnt in America is filtered about 98% before it reaches the atmosphere
If you process the actinides and burn them in a fast reactor, then yes it is less than
well said people are so stupid it shows geo engineering is doing its job the masses have their brains reduced to think logically
I am one of solar advocate, I used solar power energy for 8 years to lessen my electricity monthly bill. Its just 1200 Watts but very helpful. No brown out during power outage.
Nuclear waste is recyclable. Once reactor fuel (uranium or thorium) is used in a reactor, it can be treated and put into another reactor as fuel. In fact, typical reactors only extract a few percent of the energy in their fuel.
Yes but eventually people will stop using it. Maybe it will wear out, or maybe something will happen to humanity where it is not useful anymore (think apocalyptic event). Eventually it needs somewhere to go.
But in terms of that scale and timeline, the amount of waste produced is very very small. It’s not that difficult of a problem and the benefits are astronomical
@@OzCroc it will eventually be shipped into space when its safe enough to do so. its the most logical since space is radioactive already
@@zeropride1133 That will cost a lot of money and spend a lot of fuel
@@OzCroc everything has a price.
You forgot to mention that newer reactor technologies can use spent fuel as energy. They old reactors are incredibly inefficient at extracting energy from uranium. Newer ones extract more and thus produce less waste.
So instead of using 5% now we can burn up what 10%? and now we have to handle more of an active substance.
@@coolhandluke1503 here's type of reactor that re-uses its own waste, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_fast_reactor . US had prototype in 1986.
coolluckyme2007 His comment is still a good one and acknowledges a risk that many laymen nuclear supporters don’t recognize.
If you utilize actinide waste products by burning them into isotopes with shorter decay rates you are increasing the radioactivity of the material inside your reactor. This requires that your core be made of materials that can handle higher amounts of radioactivity that will in turn increase your facility costs and likely increase maintenance.
However from a cost analysis you have to compare the costs of more expensive reactor core to that of long term waste disposal costs (decommissioning), which in the long term seems to favor IMSRs (like what Terrestrial energy is building in Canada) and ABRs (like experimental pro types featured at ANL and INL)
What about fusion reactors haven’t they been perfected
@@amigaamigo5307
Fusion has nothing to do with Fission Reactors
self powering Fusion Reactors aren't a Thing yet.
Considering America's experience with extraterrestrials, they should try selling it to them
Lol
Indeed
Cos they only land in America lol
Stonks
@@Br-sy9vi A theory could be that the US has already secretly set up an alliance or partnership with ETs and are working together already with new weaponry and tech. It would make sense kinda. Just a random theory though, no evidence to back it up.
Japan: into the ocean we go!
Most of the waste can be recycled, Caesium for can be used to make precise atomic clocks and Strontium can be used to make red color lights.
88,000 tons is nothing. It sounds like a lot but it's nothing compared to the general waste and the level of waste produced from other energy methods. Coal (for example) produces 120 million tons of toxic waste a year.
@09rja Exactly! The level of fear and ignorance about radioactivity is shocking. Not only is the waste dense, compared to coal waste etc. it is ridiculously clean and safe. Also, it's not the long term waste you have to worry about. It's the short half life stuff that's super hot. Duration of waste is inversely proportional to radioactivity. Why isn't this taught more widely? More people die servicing windmills every year than the combined death toll from the entire history of US nuclear power.
Oh, one more thing. I have a feeling you got those toxicity numbers from anti-nuclear activists, which can present factual info very dishonestly. It may be technically true that the waste _could_ kill that many people _but,_ it has to be delivered perfectly. A baggy of Ricin could kill hundreds of thousands but, it has to be administered properly. The radioactives would have to essentially be injected via syringe or something to kill that many people. An environmental release would be of very limited geographic scope. If someone spilled that baggy of Ricin, you evacuate a few hundred feet and it would be fine.
@@jobelb.garcela9476 I think you mean "if properly processed and concentrated then placed in a complex device with a high failure rate then intentionally triggered inside a high population center." Not "mishandled."
Jobal Doctolero if you can get over military protected place that heavily defended, yeah
Kevin birdofgreen ...I misunderstood a nuclear waste from a processed material. But I still worry once a disaster strikes like fires, Tidal waves or earthquakes at the storage area and the effect would be enormous to the communities nearby.
As my former professor of physics once pointed out (about any NPP in general): Don't you expect there will be anything else standing on that place once you tear that plant down and clean it up, because there WILL be another nuclear power plant. There are reasons why the plant stands there instead of a kindergarten.
I don’t see your point
All the industrial advancement and forward movement we’ve had in 245 years...and we still run on steam
Maybe because it's the cheapest, most effective, most versatile way to generate electricity at the moment? You need a kinetic force to spin those turbine blades. In the case of wind and hydro, it's wind and water that spin the blades. If you don't have those (wind doesn't always blow and you don't have dams or fjords everywhere), you gotta do it somehow and the best way is to boil water, which is practically free. Just gotta find a way to boil it. The fact that we can do that by using multiple fuel sources (coal, gas, oil, nuclear) is why it's been used for so long. There's no need to improve the process, because it's already really good. Even fusion, which doesn't exist yet, would work the same way once they figure it all out, by heating water and making turbines spin.
I’ve seen the video were they strap radium glow in the dark tubes on to photovoltaic cells.
"Everywhere I Look Something Reminds Me of Her" by Frankin Drebin
If nuclear waste reprocessing became a thing here in the us, and we updated our plants to 21st century technology, as opposed to plants full of 1970s era technologies, we could fix this proble, have more power, more efficiently, AND not need to mine as much uranium or store as much waste.
Ok, how would that be done?
Sharkhead1177
tried it we cant shoot the shells fast enough
(Very simply put) the majority of what the US classifies as nuclear "waste" still contains perfectly viable unused Plutonium and Uranium. This extracted material can then be recycled and used in other plants. Additionally, this drastically reduces the quantity of waste that requires disposal. Unfortunately, the peak of the nuclear era in the US has come and gone. The government and other private entities do not want to continue investment in this old '70s technology that is UNSAFE. There are plenty of new, modern, extremely safe methods to provide sustainable, clean(ish) energy that does not considerably contribute to global warming. These methods, however, require a high initial investment. Those that have the capital to make such investments do not understand/ignore the science behind this method of energy production and are thus not willing to invest.
to extract remaining usable uranium you need a lot a money (its not efficient compered to mined or bought from Russia uranium). You will also create 10 or even 100 more times more radioactive waste in form of liquid (acids, water and so on).
@@user-rs5hb6gd8e 10-100 times more waste? Please elaborate.
That's why we need Breeder Reactors which uses its own nuclear waste as fuel.
They should also use CANDU reactors too
Not to be pedantic, but isn't it technically not nuclear waste but a higher efficiency?
Similarly, The 'Travelling wave reactor' by the company Terrapower can also be put to use, as it uses nuclear waste as it's primary fuel.
Do you think people in power actually care about progressing nuclear energy?
Not that simple though..
It's all about money and politics....
Men in power will not pay for better tech.
They will rather feed their own wallet..
We had a plant near me quietly get "tore down" they removed the dome and than just dumped a bunch of concrete on top of it. It's fenced off and gaurded.
I’m very pro-nuclear when it comes to power generation. I worked for a major power company back in the 1980s and worked on a nuclear power plant that was under construction and about to come online. Nuclear is by far the best non-renewable option for generating power - vastly better than fossil fuels.
That said, the decision to locate a nuclear power plant on a Southern California beach has always puzzled me. Back about 20 years ago I did some contracting work that required me to commute from just north of San Diego to Orange County on a daily basis. Seeing that nuclear power plant right on the beach, right next to one of the most heavily traveled Interstate highways, in an area well-known for earthquakes, landslides, and wildfires, seemed like a recipe for disaster. I realize that nuclear power plants are huge NIMBY projects and that this location was well away from large population centers in the 1960s, but a problem in this location would be so much worse than a problem in, say, the desert areas further inland.
As for nuclear waste, burial deep on federal land in Nevada really is a great plan. It’s one of the least populated areas of the country, with little danger of contaminating groundwater or agriculture of any type. Nuclear waste can be disposed of in lots of places if it’s buried deep enough and in properly sealed containers, but it’s still best to do it away from anywhere where groundwater could become contaminated.
The pressurized water reactor needs water to cool the steam used by the turbine and so they are located next to water. This puts them at risk. A molten salt reactor operates at more than twice the temperature so they could be cooled by ambient air and be located away from water. Just one of the reasons an MSR is safer than a PWR.
Extra fun part is that the only county in Nevada that approved of the plan was the one the waste repository was actually located in.
I heard that Nye county wants to use Yucca Mountain to store the waste, but the whole NV state says: no. Wh
@@washingtonhidalgo3056 It would create a ton of jobs for them
@@blackburn-ud9dm county*
Guuys, dont confuse. This is not nuclear waste, this is used nuclear fuel. We can use it in fast neytrons reactors. This is unlimited energy source(thousands years). Russia has 2 fast neutrons(FN) reactors and now they are building 3rd one.
Reperat: FN reactors uses waste from plain reactors. There is no waste from FN at all(actually, 1000 times less then plain reactors)
Unfortunately, the Government has forbidden developing FN reactors. Meanwhile russians build and build, they dont stop.
Elon Musk I know very little about fast neutron reactors however if it is built by union labor it will be of the highest quality. Thank you for your insight!
that is true. sell this waist to Russia. they will make electricity.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast-neutron_reactor
The should put the nuclear waste into Star Trek and teleport it into canada.
@@robertbuck9936 And the highest cost!
The UK had Fast breeder Nuclear Reactors ( Eg Dounreay) in 1955 that used spent nuclear fuel to make new nuclear fuel But the use of cheaper more polluting reactors around the world caused this tech. to be forgotten ( like VHS vs Betamax 0r Concord)
I saw a video about how scientists could "recycle" the waste. Maybe people could start doing that.
And if not, we could always fill rockets with it and launch it into the sun
@@Rangerfan-gz1rx hmm maybe
@@Rangerfan-gz1rx Rocket might explode, too risky
Just dump it in a volcano
youre talking pie in the sky.. building those reactors is decades away
I wonder if they'll turn the waste into fertilizer in the future 🤣🤣🤣
Not, Sure
88k tons is an amazingly tiny amount of waste for 70 years of energy generation. You could fit all of it in the space of a few freighter ships.
Just drop it at somalia, no one cares LOL 😝
@@charancharan6996 it cant
@@charancharan6996 What rockets?
6:44 she says 1700 tons.
You joke, but that's what happened when Somalia's government went away for a few decades, the Somali coastline is heavily contaminated by radioactive and chemical waste, dumped by various pseudo-criminal organisations.
Or let the politicians drink it
MAKE politicians drink it I vote for!
🤣🤣🤣😂😂😂
Do you want a radioactive Pelosi vs atomic trump?
but if they die from drinking it, isn't it still radioactive waste?
It’s not enough for our current president, he gets thirsty
I've often wondered why we don't just put the waste back in the uranium mines but when i have nasty stuff to get rid of I just post it to someone I don't like.
Glad they consulted a reporter to get the important information. Lol.
its not actually waste its all usable material but public fear keeps it from being used.
Partially usable yes and most important -- very expensive to refine.
Дмитрий Д it doesnt need to be refined, just bundle it up and put it inside fast reactor and it will burn it all
Based on this fear mongering I would guess they are talking about the pipes, concrete floors and primary coolant part of the reactor and then saying the concrete is nuclear waste...
Sure, but its not really dangerous.
Did they ever work out all the bugs on fast breeders?
EBR-2 ran for 30 years in Idaho without a single incident. Russia has a couple liquid metal-cooled fast reactors operating (not sure if they're in a breeder configuration or not) right now.
USE IT.
Its not completely useless and still holds plenty of power behind it.
exactly, just build another gen4 fast reactor and we will be done. blablablarmagedon from nuclear meltdown, imagine this world with 5c increase of average temp from fossil fuel. which one is more destructive?
and what's the point? it's way inefficient to produce enough energy with that and in the end you still got the waste
Chad Walker current gen nuclear power is just extract less than 5% of the fuel, the rest is dumped because of the compatibility issue. gen 4 reactor in theory can consume all 99% of fuel and reduce the radioactivity to just hundred of year
J KH in the nuke industry we use it as long as it is profitable we cant just keep losing money. The new reactors could use it much longer but the problem is stupidity and corruption. For instance vc summers units 3 and 4 were extremely close to being finished but years of wentinghouse not getting the work needed done set it so far back the vest nuclear construction company in the us couldnt bring it back and the failure of the government to bail it out cost sce&g costomers millions in fees after scana is making them pay for it. The government should be building these things not toshiba. Because of toshibas going under the nuclear business will most likely not be able to succeed
Correct. Plutonium power plants have started to be available. The video is nothing more than a scare tactic to have people support "green" energy.
Thinking that used nuclear fuel is more problematic than the waste produced by the alternative methods of meeting our energy needs is failing at risk assessment.
Turn the water into a semi solid by adding gelatin to prevent water from leaking from holding tanks such as the leaking holding tanks in Fukushima
I heard it's the the equivalent of a chest x-ray
good answer comrade
I heard it’s the equivalent of 2 Hiroshima’s
no!
Yes
I was in the toilet.
Try pressing the Az-5 button
"I understood that reference" - Steve Rogers
BRUTAL!!
What does this mean I'm on my phone
@@troybernal5085 Can you tell me how an RBMK reactor explodes ?
@Garrett McGinnis why worry about something that isnt going to happen
They never told or asked us or even shared when enjoying them but telling us now when it's a problem...
30 miles from San Diego and 60 miles from LA, you forgot to mention how it’s zero miles from Camp Pendleton Marine Corps Installation
Three words... Nuclear Dimond batteries. It's the power source of the future. Nuclear waste isn't waste, it's energy we just aren't using properly as of now.
Look it up, not something I just made up. Is an actual thing.
Some amazing stuff
Future of energy or not, I believe something on that line is the future of Radioactive waste.
That's interesting... But I wonder how many milliamps these things would actually be able to produce. 2v is nice, but is that with a load on it?
I am a little skeptical about diamond batteries but I will still give you thumbs up.
Verge: What do you think we should do with nuclear waste?
Separate 96.5% of the U238 for future fast reactors (Chloride, Lead, Sodium-cooled, etc). Then take the radioactive transuranium elements (Pu, U236,Np237,Am241,Cm244) which makes-up 3.5% of the spent fuel and isolate it underground -- for 300 years, the radioactive hot transuranium elements will be inert in 300 years. Do this, Humanity will only leave legacy waste that will only remain dangerous for 300 years. This means our civilization can completely rely on nuclear energy for all our energy needs without destroying the environment, while only leaving a trace of radioactivity. It's entirely possible a new nuclear era will be about a new beautiful world.
Lel what ‘-‘
Burn the bad stuff in LFTR
Sounds too good to be true, do fast reactors in widespread use nowadays? How about waste from fast reactors? Why not yet?
Probably it's better to wait for space cargo to be cheap enough to dump nuclear waste into space, since everybody just kinda sit still on a pile of waste.
CZcams guy > nuclear scientist
fusion is the answer
Nice information
Upload dates brings context to the topic at hand, especially for future viewers. Please bring it back.
You have made a video portraying exaggerated ill effects of nuclear energy, while having never made a video about the 4th generation nuclear power plants and molten salt reactors. Molten salt reactors cannot meltdown, and certain designs consume the “spent” nuclear fuel that is leftover from older nuclear power plants. Every issue of concern about nuclear power is corrected by using newer nuclear power plant technology.
Nuclear power is the most efficient and cleanest source of power. If you think that it can be replaced by wind and solar you are wrong, the math doesn’t add up.
thank you
canada had a garbage CANDU reactor, CAN't-DOO and it was such junk their canadas government sold the whole works for 15 million canadian dollars, which works out to 10 bucks here.
@@miamicakes1830 Canada is now host to the first commercial molten salt reactor. It's a clever design built to be ultra safe and fit within the current regulatory regimes. It uses salt as fuel in vented tubes and non fuel salt as primary coolant. It will be able to burn waste PWR fuel.
www.moltexenergy.com/news/details.aspx?positionId=106
Somebody smart finally
This 100%. Nuclear is the future and people are fools to not see it.
HI-STORE CISF in New Mexico is the perfect place for all the stored nuclear fuel. None of it should be considered waste because it all of can be reused.
It’s theoretically possible to use spent fuel, if it was that simple they would be doing it.
710 Stiz* no one said it was simple, but our government is too incompetent, and influenced by the coal industry to handle an objective such as this. It’s embarrassing that we can’t even look to our gov which is appointed democratically to find solutions to complex situations such as this considering how much is at stake🤦🏾♂️
@@FowlorTheRooster1990 there’s no reactors that use spent fuel.
@@UnknownUser-nu8ny did u not read the part where I said theoretically? We don’t have the technology to use spent fuel as of now. Calling our government incompetent is not even related to the situation what so ever. And you say “so much is at stake” what do you mean by that. The waste is kept in a metal container with ventilation and multiple feet of concrete that is designed to protect from any natural disaster. As far as my knowledge goes I don’t think there has ever been an accident with spent fuel (if so please tell me). Also by saying “so much is at stake” did you mean about coal industry and natural gas? If so I think we both can agree it’s not the best for the environment, but it’s a industry we need for both jobs and as a nation. After all electric power is no better because to make one Tesla battery it’s as much pollution as most cars in their whole lifetime(17.5 tons) there’s no good solution, don’t blame the government for private sector. Also you labeled our government as elected democratically, we don’t have a democracy in the us. It’s a democratic republic.
@@FowlorTheRooster1990 correct me if I’m wrong but is that the fuel you need the heavy water for? Here in the us we only have light water reactors.
Best would be finding ways to make it less radioactive and easier to store or even better find a way to make it usable for something
youre talking pie in the sky.. building those reactors is decades away
As someone who lives within 20 miles of the San onofre nuclear station, i don’t know a single person that shares a concern of the spent nuclear fuel. The engineers who designed the plant did it well if you actually research structural design and spent waste storage solution. The real issue is the US government is supposed to pick up all spent nuclear fuel at any US nuclear plant. They have failed to make enough space for the nuclear waste we have in the country. The us government is failing to act.
So burn it all in new molten salt reactors. They run on spent fuel, and it burns it almost totally. And they cant go fukashima. If they lose power, the mass expands from the heat causing the reaction to die. It literally cools itself off.
Yup!!
Burns to almost nothing.. you lost me on that one. Burn implies a chemical reaction, this is nuclear. Next, how does it go to nothing? Some radioactive elements are stable and can't easily be split as their binding energy is too high.
@@davidkennedy7630 research it....a little google will tell you everything you need to know. I'm not gonna lay it all out in the damn comment section.
"Almost to nothing" Meaning there will always be nuclear waste left behind, and no proper way to complete dispose of it. Nuclear energy is dangerous, and does not belong on Earth as of now. Humans are too stupid to use it correctly.
I've researched it enough to know you have no idea what you're talking about, Sketch6995. You make it sound very good though.
at least they aren't pumping it into the air like coal plants
Yeah! And they aren't killing the Pacific Ocean like Fukushima, either! ....Oops.....never mind.
Brad K what? pacific is gigantic and its radioactive material that released is minuscule compared to diluted uranium in sea water. opps....... never mind
roy k Miniscule? You have no idea what you're talking about.
Brad K what? 580 barrel? you know how many ton uranium naturally occurred in sea water? 3,3part per billion or if you want total uranium in sea water is 4,5 billion TONS
roy k "...authorities implementing a 20-km exclusion zone around the power plant and the continued displacement of approximately 156,000 people as of early 2013.[4] large quantities of radioactive particles from the incident, including iodine-131 and caesium-134/137, have since been detected around the world. Substantial levels have been seen in California and in the Pacific Ocean" --Wiki
And not to mention Chernobyl. You going to call that miniscule too?
WAIT A MINUTE ... I drove past there so many times!!! I never knew what it was, I guessed it was some sort of plant but never really thought about it
The point being missed is that the fission byproducts with the longest half lives are those that present the least risk. U238, whilst not being a byproduct, forms between 97-98% of the uranium content loaded into the reactor. It doesn't change inside the reactor core. U238 has a half life of around 4.2 billion years, thus from a radiological safely / risk perspective U238 itself can be ignored completely.
Just throw it at the sun lol
edit: if you somehow couldn't tell this is obviously a joke...
wooooosh
We dont have a Great History with Rockets as Humans and if the rocket blows up a large area pf the Earth is contaminated with Nuclear Waste
First need to make scramjet spaceplanes work, or build a space elevator.
It’s easier to throw it into another star than it is to throw it into the sun.
There are researchers considering using fusion reactors to dispose of nuclear waste, so you’re not off the mark.
Олег Шелеметьев it’s a joke
Power from new generation reactors fuelled by thorium and entirely different in concept from uranium/MOX plants will essentially solve the nuclear waste issue and furthermore they simply can't produce the highly dangerous element, plutonium.
Just so other people are clear and have some perspective; "But, as Tickell’s article points out, it is relatively easy to avoid this contamination problem."
Relative ease is extremely relative. If you're going to create Uranium 233 without high levels of U-232 contamination, you need to be able to separate the Pa-233 from its parent Thorium. You aren't going to do this without some very special equipment including a freaking nuclear reactor.
Cliff Notes: Nobody except a large government with nuclear infrastructure is going to build a nuclear weapon using U-233 and if they can build it with U-233, they can also build it with Plutonium, which has greater yield with less material required. If you're going to all that trouble, an implosion device isn't that great a leap. The proliferation problem is largely overblown in regards to most nuclear fuels used in power reactors.
Less than 10% requires long term storage.
I lived 1/2 a mile from that plant for years! Swam and kayaked in the ocean on San Onofre beach. I got thyroid cancer and Breast cancer a few years later. No one else in my family have had any of those cancers. The thyroid cancer was from exposure to too much radiation so the oncologist told me. Anyone else? Looking to find out how many others are in the same boat. Because the authorities do not talk about cancer in the area.
I live here in San Clemente and surf next to theplant often. Many of the local politicians talk of getting rid of it but I don't think it will ever happen
I can understand people's apprehension, but the government needs to start education programs or something to placate people's fears. The simple fact is, we are going to need power for the foreseeable future. Renewables (wind, solar, hydro) can do their part, but there is no way they can supply the entire grid (not yet). So we either resort to nuclear, or fossil-fuels. Some people think that fossil fuels are the lesser of those two evils, because at least fossil fuels isn't dumping radioactive substances into the environment. But... the truth is trickier.
When you burn coal, you do end up throwing tiny amounts of harmful substances into the air. I don't mean greenhouse gases, I mean radioactive substances (also mercury). Coal power plants do their best to try to filter these out of their exhaust, but some do still leak out. Per pound of fuel burned, nuclear fission is more dangerous. But per watt-hour of energy produced, coal does produce more radioactive waste. Nuclear fission is ideal (in a way) because all of the harm is concentrated into neat boxes that can be safely stored. Instead of just thrown into the air.
You might argue, what about Fukushima Daichi, and Three Mile Island. These things clearly aren't safe! But the counter-argument to that is simply... those where all very old reactors (Chernobyl was in a class all it's own). People like to play the environmentalist, saying we shouldn't build new reactors, or modernize the existing ones. That they should all be shut down. But we can't do that, not unless we cut off a huge chunk of our energy consumption. So we keep using old, outdated nuclear reactors. And the older they get, the more of a risk they can become.
Edit:
Removed gas, I made an error claiming it contained radioactive bits.
Great power, terrible waste produced. I haven't heard a way yet of making accidents impossible or a solution to the waste product. Everyday a nuclear reactor operates the problem only potentially gets worse. If you are saying we have no choice then we are doomed. Maybe not us today but someday.
ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh
Even when we take into consideration all of the worst nuclear accidents that have happened to date, pretty much every other power source has more fatalities related to it. Nuclear power is dangerous, and it should be treated with respect, but it's actual danger is hugely inflated in people's minds.
It's not seen in that chart, but in the same study that produced it they found that globally (taking a yearly average that takes into consideration the major nuclear accidents) 10 times more people die from falling off their roofs while installing solar panels than people have died as a consequence of nuclear power.
Look at France 90% nuclear and doing fine. Besides nuclear is literally the second least deadly form of energy, second only to wind (solar has some really dangerous materials that are in it which cause more fatalities then you think)
speedy01247 Slight correction, as of this year it's 75%, but still 100% agree with this thread on everything.
you should read about desertec project, you will realize how wrong you are...
I live within 20 minutes of what we call the Santa Nofre Boobs. I’ll be very curious to see how it gets taken down eventually. However i’ll miss the yearly siren tests.
Amazing how nobody has ever been killed by spent nuclear fuel, and you can still make a one-sided video framing it as a threat. Does this manageable problem seriously take precedence over the reliable, emission-free energy these plants produce? Do you take climate change as a serious threat? Do you understand that access to reliable power is a necessity going forward?
We all understand that nuclear waste is deadly and that it lasts for thousands of years. We also know that there isn't any real need for another Fukushima or Chernobyl, we know that wind, solar, wave and electromagnetic power don't produce such deadly waste and....we understand why you feel the need to make such stupid comments too :)
@@zeph6439 There is an energy cartel crafting indoctrinating spin in order to maintain profitability in the uranium market and to thwart the public from waking up to either demand that this technology be used to safely power the world for thousands of years, for next to nothing in cost, or to keep us from doing it ourselves, in our own backyards. There is no harmful waste or threat to public safety, especially when the reactors are engineered properly.
An educated person shouldn't be considered an authority in their field simply based on academic accolades. Follow the money to who wrote the curriculum and you'll often find many shocking conflicts of interest. Look a little deeper and you'll find a multitude of highly decorated, academic freethinkers challenging said conflicts, whove since been labelled crackpots by the media that is often funded by the very same sources.
@@cautionmike697 Whatever the spin, my feeling is that when I become a rich man I will most certainly invest in Green stocks instead of in fossil fuel related industries. No matter what, the future is written regarding fossil fuels and at long last, greenies like me have politicians on our side :)
Yes the war in Ukraine! Lmaooo of course if there's a war we are all doomed.
No one cares for the land when we are all visitors on her
@@zeph6439 depend on the type of waste, most of them last for like hundreds days to 100 years.
This constant fear of nuclear is holding humanity back.
That's why we don't have nuclear fission reactors yet.
Dude, fission is what we already have. You are thinking of fusion.
@Youthro You are saying that as if nuclear fission has untapped potential. It really doesn't actually i'm pretty sure I have heard that solar has become the cheapest source of energy available, and it's much cleaner. Also if you are talking about fusion which I doubt you are, I have personally never heard of anybody who's scared of it, and fusion is being pursued quite heavily by both private and public entities, for example the huge ITER Tokamak reactor. If you know more than me or feel my opinion is faulty, feel free to respond.
Actually fission has a ton of untapped potential. The reactors running today were literally designed half a century ago. They only utilize about 3% of available fuel, and rely on detrerministic safety, and must be large. Other designs, several of which have been extensively prototypes, are 100% passively safe, run off of fuel hundreds of times more abundant, can load-follow and be refueled continuously, produce no long-term waste, and has projected costs using current off-the-shelf components lower than 3cents per kwh.
Fission has plenty left to offer. It Just doesn't because the government erected a ton of first-mover barriers to nuclear innovation, and then shortly after, discontinued its own nuclear research efforts, placing the field into a developmental coma. Lots of people and companies happy to be the 2nd person to build a Gen IV reactor. But no one wants to put up the billions of dollars to get the NRC to figure out how to regulate an entire new design, while always being subject to the whims of any random president to deny a licence to the project on political grounds and flushing those billions down the drain. It has happened multiple times before. No private capital is going to risk that much money with that kind of ridiculous capriciousness placing it at risk.
Humanity's pursuit of progress has led us into a corner called Anthropogenic Climate Disruption (ACD). It is a situation rapidly driving the planet into a 6th mass extinction event. Short terms thinkers tend to be pretty clueless about such things.
Every gram of plutonium and U238 can be burned away in a molten salt fast reactor into short lived waste, and make a crapload of electricity doing it. The fuel in a 20Kg CANDU fuel bundle makes about 1,000,000KWh of energy, but in a MSFR it could make almost 150 times that and no long lived waste.
Source?
Kirk sorensen is your source..
Divergaming google MSFR reactors. They are superior technologies for safe, efficient power generation that have never been given a fair shake. Their day is coming, just a matter of when.
@@N8TheSnake ok. I'm not questioning the superiority of nuclear power. Just wanted a source.
Nathan D Drunk version of me: The parasite loves to think they know better and yank at the great chain like a child instead of looking at the long term impacts. Where would we be if early nuclear innovation wasn't regulated out of existence? Recycling nuclear waste is practically banned in America, something breeder reactors NEED in order to operate efficiently.
Give it to the people the Plant supplied the power to . . . . and the 'Owners of the Plant' their families would love it !!!!!
2020 and these things still here lmao, I love driving past sitting nuclear power plants just chilling with all that nuclear fuel by it self ya know
i think what should be done is repair the leaking steam generator and other issues, refurbish the plants, and put the reactors back in service
doesn't really work that way. the generators are usually way too radioactive/hazardous for workers to enter and fix it.
leaks happen. ideal situation, they don't occur. leaks are fixed all the time whether under radioactive hazardous situations or not. this video is made by liberals for liberals
Any native Southern Californian knows that those things are
nuclear boobies.
Hyung my dad and I always laugh when we see them going to San Diego
Tanner fox
sano boobies, straight facts
Yes, yes they are.
lol i live in Orange County and I always drive past it on the way to san Diego for sports
My professor taught us about this in "FUTURE STUDIES" in college! This was in 1986! And so why hasnt anyone done anything about the waste yet?
I am a formulation chemist by trade and developed explosives suppression systems with the military,FBI and DOE in addition to armor, water treatment for oil and gas remediation and a host of other defense and industrial developments.
I also worked with some PhD's that held patents in long term nuclear waste shielding of permanent protection vaults.
The bulk concrete containers are hopefully not Portland Cement, which deteriorates after 5 to 6 decades.
I worked to develop ultra high strength concrete using formulations similar the Roman cement developed 3000 years ago that gets stronger over the centuries,unlike the cement used in construction today.
One PhD I worked with had brilliant yet lower cost concrete shielding solutions in conjunction with my long term non degrading cementious formulas.
Fun work.
Re your last sentence, do you expect anything substantial to come of it? Are the Feds even interested? Good luck! For all of us...
*THERE IS A WAY* to deal with it. New nuclear reactors like BN-800 and BN-1200 feed on nuclear waste. Of course, not all types of nuclear waste can be eliminated this way, but a huge chunk.
"It pained chemists to see precisely fabricated solid-fuel elements of heterogeneous reactors eventually dissolved in acids to remove fission products-the "ashes" of a nuclear reaction." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqueous_homogeneous_reactor The next best thing to a molten salt reactor.
I don't think you realize what nuclear waste encapsulates. It's everything, radiactive waste material, radiated materials from hospitals, irradiated stuff. What you're talking about is nuclear spent fuel. The waste itself which is not spent fuel is far larger.
I don't think you realize what I wrote. I specifically used "of course, not all types of nuclear waste can be eliminated this way, but a huge chunk" qualifier, which makes my position on this perfectly accurate.
Thorium lftr?? too??
Would that nuclear reactor produce it's own waste?
Eye content is fantastic, professional af
true that... I just miss 4k
0:31 Most plants in America have spent nuclear fuel in them-Someone.
6:03 Eureka! That's it! Put it all up in the air!
That guy at 1:20 just casually going for a swim next to the nuclear waste facility lol
One of the most famous longboard surf sports in the world is right there.
This is a problem that can be easily solved. But nuclear fear mongering videos like this continue to make it a challenge
Flez What do you mean?
@@Simon74 Despite demonstrating the safe levels of radiation and minimal risk that is involved, this video continues to try to paint nuclear energy in a negative light by making it seem scary or "eerie". The solution to this is a political solution, not a technical solution. So if nuclear continues to be sold as this big scary thing, the uneducated public will never agree on a course of action and nothing will be done, technology will never move forward.
@Micheal Stillabower In the short term if there are any safety concerns it should be moved to underground storage. But in the long term the majority of the hazardous waste can be recycled for more power. The small quantities left over can be stored safely at surface level facilities. whatisnuclear.com/recycling.html
@@peasley9 I think SpaceX or nasa should jettison it into space.
@@chatteyj that really activates my almonds
There's San Onofre, just chillin' there not really doing anything, and then there's plants like Davis-Besse, with a LONG track record of incidents and issues but it's still up and running, even as I type this, it's running at 100% with a crack in the containment. Woo. Wiki Davis-Besse. It's RIDICULOUS.
Its 2020 now, they’ve come up with containers which the waste goes into and is monitored for over 5 years
88 thousand tons of waste on the wall, 88 thousand tons of nuclear waste. Take one down, put it underground, 87 thousand tons of nuclear waste on the wall!
Edit: wasn't talking about a US/Mexico wall. I was talking about the 99 bottles of beer song.
build the wall out of spend nuclear fuel excellent idea
great idea: use the nuclear waste to build the mexico wall...it wouldn't have to be a very high wall, no one can get near it
Learn to recycle instead.
not a bad idea actually! that will definitely keep them out eh 😂
Building a wall between the US and Mexico with nuclear waste is a terrible idea, we wouldn't want any *Super Juan's* running around, now would we?
Too many Alarmists in this society.
Too many smarty pants keyboard Warriors,Who don't Know what a REAL problem is.
yea just drink it then ill give u 5 minutes of life then u can rethink Alarmists in this society.
@@cheliserobson6536 What is the REAL problem then?
Many issues are more pressing for us on a daily basis. If you obsess over this thing a world away,Over which you have no control,You often miss the REAL issues. You will accomplish far more if you focus on making a positive LOCAL impact.
@@cheliserobson6536 Remember that this is an informative video about the nuclear waste crisis, that has already been there for more than a decade. And all we did is listen. That makes us Alarmists?
the see levels rises dramatically and these storage objects become fragile , we all know where that will end.
Drove by it today!
Dry-cask storage is now used for storage of spent fuel after it is removed from the reactor facility. These casks are now stored in 34 states.
And it's very safe. Because they have no moving parts that can break. Ive touched them and the radiation off the casks are extremely low. You detect normal levels at only a few inches from them and only slightly more at the surface of the casks.
*Nevada doesn't want to take one for the team....shame on them*
.....
Internet Explorer As a resident of Nevada, please accept this apology: ”Our bad, guys.” Internet Explorer, since you don’t think it’s that bad of an idea, give them your IP address and maybe they can bury nuclear fuel under your home.
it would be a better thing to do than for the governor to waste everyone's time and money on those stupid pointless overpasses that go nowhere you see on the way to las vegas.
Don't worry it will be spread all over foreign countries in next invasion. For example 90 Italian peace keepers got cancer while serving in Kosovo (Former Yugoslavia)
Nevada is acting like they're actually using most of that land, lol
Lita Mendoza they weren’t about to bury it under your house. They were going to bury it in the desert.
Keep it where it’s at,on the site where you can guard it forever
They will be praying they didn’t tear that down when gas is 20 bucks a gallon and no one can get it.
They shot this on the perfect day! The overcast, misty air etc... I love it! Great videography!!
I agree
I live near Babcock and Wilcox in western pa where they buried all the waste in the field next to the factory. The cancer rate in my town is off the charts. When I was 17 my buddy and i went for a walk at like 2am. We saw guys in those white suits burying the stuff in the middle of the night. Ridiculous
What’s cool is I drive by this everyday for work
90% of the waste is just the clothes of the workers and other one time use items and they usually stop being radioactive within a couple of hours or even minutes. That is low grade waste and makes up 1% of the radiation os all waste. 7% of the waste is made up of intermediate grade waste and is usually first stored on site to later be safely be stored in dedicated warehouses above ground. The last 3% of the waste is what people think is 100% of the waste. Actual nuclear fuel. And no, disposal isn't as big of a problem as people think. First it's put in cast metal casings which insulates it. Then it's put in clay so that it can absorb eventual shocks at the final storage place, as well as to further insulate and prevent irradiating the surroundings. Then you put it in a hole 500+ meters under ground in the bedrock. Sadly, not many countries have even started doing this and are still storing used nuclear fuel enclosed, in pools of water
the tune of the first few secs made me think the background song was gonna be Call Me Maybe
Dan Han I had to replay video to hear it. I thought that too! 😅
The waste can be used either in MSR (Molten Salt Reactors) or DFR (Dual Fluid Reactors). Just invest in the development of these two reactor types. Both produces no nuc waste or very little, depends on the lay out
You always have fission products as part of nuclear fission and only a few have commercial applications if separated. That means you always have a waste... it's just that fission products are shorter lived. Most take 300 years or less to reach background radiation. MSR is the fission power plant we need, for sure, but they still generate waste, it's just easier to manage.
I didn’t know u had knowledge like the people who designed these plants if that were true this would be at every plant as it increases the amount of energy they can produce per rod
@@LifePaki so you learned something new
paul sehstedt that’s common sense😶
Sodium reactors definitely are not the stablest form of energy fermi tried that a while ago with their breeder reactor and it didn’t go so well
The Nevada waste disposal site is ready-why not use it?
I live in an area where they want too put Nuclear Waste and it's near people !!! Really worrying.
As they have to transport many miles on trucks . And God forbid theres no LEAKS on the way before its dumped here !!!
No nuclear waste here !!
Recycle what can be recycled, transfer what can't be recycled to transportation casks, move it to centralized secure sites, and encase it in concrete, deep underground where there is no underground water supply. Also potentially look at developing nuclear technology that uses waste from present day reactors as fuel and preferably churns out shorter lived wastes. Thorium salt reactors have been proposed to help in this regard, as well as fusion.
All the suggestions you made currently exist. France recycles 90% of their fuel. Yucca Mountain is the most studies real estate on the planet and is about 70-80% complete. An alternative, which is interesting and should be looked up, is an area in the Pacific where some scientists suggested burying it because that region is very stable, there is little sea life, and if there ever was a leak, it is so deep that and leaked radioactivity would be so diluted that it would be difficult to differentiate from background. We also have designs of reactors that can reuse used fuel and designs that yield no waste. So what's in the way of moving forward with any of these ideas? Uninformed, scientifically illiterate activists who are driven by emotion instead of facts, and the politicians who listen to them.
@@jvigil2007 Preaching to the choir man, I know all that stuff, i'm just stating the obvious to answer the questions that were asked. I think also an aspect is lobbyists from other industries, it wouldn't shock me even a little if big fossil fuel companies were on the donor list of some anti-nuclear groups, even ones that oppose fossil fuels, because the public will push back if an environmental group tries to stop a pipeline from being built, but the public can be easily manipulated into stopping a new nuclear plant if fear mongers push them even a little. Wind and solar companies have a vested interest in seeing nuclear fail because it completely puts them to shame in output consistency, cost per watt, and even emissions.
Id say soon humans will find some planet and use it as their radioactive dump 😂
We have one already. Do you know why the earth is hot on the inside? 99% due to nuclear decay. All we, humans, are doing is speeding up the natural process a little bit. Read about the Oklo lake natural nuclear fision reactor in Gabon. Nothing special about what we're doing.
The spent fuel is recyclable actually, it's just heavily regulated because a byproduct is Plutonium and "Nuclear weapon bad"
So you have hippies and politicians to blame for the waste. France recycles their waste.
InfiniteWars Na we have our own planet for that
@@PeterKese It's not 99%, it's closer to 50%. The rest is primordial heat.
@@PeterKese true bernie sanders dumped nuke waste on hispanics too
I clicked on this thinking it was a story about the nuclear waste water at Fukushima. This was eye opening.
I just realized something with many inventions:
We don't think where will put the waste
Capitalism is about profit for investors.
Except breeder reactors eat nuclear waste.
Eclipse Now, talk is cheap!
@@svtinker Physics isn't, but fortunately it makes for great research into great new reactors that actually eat nuclear waste. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor They're actually an old reactor, and if you go over here to this page you'll see JFK touring the Molten Salt reactor - a reactor that ABSOLUTELY CANNOT melt down as it is ALREADY a liquid. eclipsenow.wordpress.com/molten-salt-reactors/ But stubbornness is cheap, so I expect a trite reply with no substance. Go for it - surprise me.
Errrrrr... Nowhere to put the waste? 🗑 It's in a place right now!!!! So the waste does have a place!!
Besides, if it leaks, Calis homeless problem is solved. Double bonus.
Switch to Thorium
Pure thorium won't run, it has to be an additive.
TinFoilVeteran The nuclear waste from Thorium with a Plutonium additive is far less than current methods
*face palm* thorium is converted into uranium you Moro
@@ijusterik5384 lol they are 2 different elements. you cant convert them.
The reason that it is not buried at depth is that the spent fuel may have future value in other uses or in reuse. So why would you not store it for now?