• UndercoverUlrikHD@programming.dev
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    4 months ago

    Here’s all of Switzerland’s high level nuclear waste for the last 45 years. It solid pellets. You could fit the entire world’s US’ waste on a football field.

    It’s not the greatest challenge mankind have faced.

    • HauntedCupcake@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Also want to point out, most of that is container, not spent fuel. The safety standards are so ridiculously high that they basically guarantee zero risk.

      More people (per plant) are exposed to elevated levels of radiation due to coal power, and that’s not even including the health risk of all the other shit they release

    • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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      4 months ago

      In Germany, we’ve got a location with 47,000 cubic meters: https://www.bge.de/en/asse/
      That requires some pretty tall stacking on that football field. Or I guess, you’re saying if you’d unpack it all and compress it?

      Also, we really should be getting the nuclear waste out of said location, since there’s a known risk of contamination. But even that challenge is too great for us, apparently.
      Mainly, because we don’t have any locations that are considered safe for permanent storage. It’s cool that Switzerland has figured it out. And that some hypothetical football field exists. But it doesn’t exist in Germany, and I’m pretty sure, Switzerland doesn’t want our nuclear waste either.

      • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        we don’t have any locations that are considered safe for permanent storage

        I’m gonna hazard a guess that the “consideration” was not from actual scientists but rather activist homeowner groups in every potential site.

        NIMBYism and nuclear, name a more iconic duo

        • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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          4 months ago

          I mean, can you blame them? Why would anyone want toxic waste in their backyard? Not to mention that the search is mainly conducted by companies, which have a vested interest in not making all the issues transparent.

          Having said that, I am not aware of the ‘scientists’ coming up with good suggestions either. Gorleben got hemmed and hawed around for the longest time, but its selection process was non-scientific from the start.

          It’s genuinely not easy to find a location where anyone would be willing to claim that it will remain unaffected by geodynamic processes for millions of years. And we don’t have a big desert or some other unpopulated area where you could chuck it without political opposition, when it’s not 110% safe to do so.

          • JamesFire@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            Why would anyone want toxic waste in their backyard?

            It’s not toxic, nor is it in their backyard.

            Not to mention that the search is mainly conducted by companies, which have a vested interest in not making all the issues transparent.

            What issues?

            It’s genuinely not easy to find a location where anyone would be willing to claim that it will remain unaffected by geodynamic processes for millions of years.

            Good thing we don’t need to.

            • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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              4 months ago

              It’s not toxic, nor is it in their backyard.

              It is toxic and they wrote “NIMBY”, which means “not in my backyard”, which is what I used figuratively here.

              What issues?

              Depends on the location. In Asse, there is water entering into the caverns, for example.

              Good thing we don’t need to.

              You should inform the BGE about it. They’ll be glad to hear all their challenges are solved.

      • UndercoverUlrikHD@programming.dev
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        4 months ago

        I’m speaking strictly of the mass. Most the volume on those containers are likely structure to make sure there is no accidental leak, similar to Switzerland.

        I also misremembered, it was all of US’ waste that could fit on a single football.

        • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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          4 months ago

          Unfortunately, there’s not much structure to these, no. It’s nuclear waste from the 60s and early 70s, when there were practically no safety laws in place yet. They just got dumped down there in steel barrels. In a salt mine, which now has water entering it. I’m hoping, the barrels got at least filled up with concrete, but I have no idea.