TVA maps new plan to meet energy demand
Dave Flessner, The Chattanooga Times Free Press, January 28, 2007 via MSNBC
To meet the growing energy needs of the Tennessee Valley, TVA estimates it will need the equivalent of a new nuclear power plant every two years. ...
The U.S. Department of Energy picked TVA's Bellefonte site in Hollywood, Ala., for the new AP-1000. ...
The two new reactors proposed at Bellefonte are among 31 new units being considered nationwide by utility groups ...
By October, TVA and its NuStart partners are due to submit their application to the NRC for a new type of pressurized water reactor -- a Westinghouse AP-1000 design -- at the Bellefonte nuclear plant site. Regulators will have three years to review and sign off on the plans before construction begins. ...
If the license application for the AP-1000 is submitted this year and construction is under way by 2012, any private owners of Bellefonte or similar next-generation plants could qualify for up to $125 million a year in federal subsidies ...
Just an update on what is going on with next-generation nuclear plants, the time frame and subsidies. My position remains the same, that only four of the next-generation plants should be built until the technology is demonstrated. In the meantime conservation, battery based vehicles, wind power, solar troughs and as necessary IGCC plants and CTL plants with carbon capture should be the basis of our energy policy. In 3-5 years thin-film PV and solar PV concentrators should be ready for prime tme and begin to become a primary source of renewable energy.
Why IGCC? It's a lot less proven and less efficient than the claims its supporters make. Pulverized coal plants can be made more efficient and cleaner (including co2) than IGCC will ever be.
Posted by: Energy Pro | February 02, 2007 at 09:48 PM
Why four as the magic number? The AP-1000 isn't a radical change; most of what they did was deleting "safety" systems that they thought they needed in the 50s (but ended up distracting maintenance personnel instead of enhancing safety--this is really why TMI happened).
Why shouldn't we only build four IGCC plants, or four CSP plants, or four CTL plants? And what does CTL have to do with electricity?
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 02, 2007 at 11:45 PM
Energy Pro - I strongly disagree. While IGCC is less proven, using it reduces criteria pollutantes, especially mercury, to lower levels than can can be economically obtained in pulverized coal(PC)plants and CO2 can be easily separated from other useful gases to a greater extent than in PC. Not to forget the main reason for their use, in that they can produce power more efficiently than PC plants, thus using less fuel. Why else are so many of the leading power producers proposing building IGCC plants? While they are not comitting to building only IGCC plants, they believe their is a high probibility that they will add more to the bottom line once carbon capture and disposal is required.
It is more expensive than PC, but not that much more considering the benefits that are achieved. If done right it will have a very acceptable level of environmental impact. It is a lessor risk than building a large number of next generation nuclear plants until the first few have been proven or until conservation and renewables can fill the gap.
Stewart - CTL doesn't have anything directly to do with electricity. In the context of my comment, I was really off topic, but I was speaking to the larger need for energy. Sometime in the next 10-20 years we are very likey not to have enough affordable liquid fuels, not to mention the global warming that they cause and we are are going to need to supplement them in some way until we develop battery powered vehicles that need electrical power for recharging. CTL certainly contributes to global warming, so the more need to bush on with battery propulsion. When we are at that point the choice will be between renewables, coal and nuclear. It is going to take a very long time to ramp up renewables and in the meantime I would rather see coal than nuclear.
The only technology I would like to see limited is nuclear. I would agree that it has a fine safety record, but I do not see any significant progess on a path to recycling or disposal of waste. Some countries, other than the US, don't seem to have that much concern, but I think we must set the example. Technologies used in Europe may be suitable, but there are questions as to their safety and/or as possible sources of weapons grade materials. I support demonstration of any technology that would be safe and not lead to proliferation of weapons. But I believe the political reality is that we will not be able to move very fast in that area and I don't support nuclear power until that whole package can be put together.
Posted by: Jim from The Energy Blog | February 02, 2007 at 11:57 PM
I agree Jim, let them build 4 to prove the new technology. A new level of monitering for safety, cost, and waste disposal that is completely public is also needed. No more nuclear secrets or revolving door DOE regulator/nuclear contractor execs.
And cut the subsidies, all of them. To fossil, nuclear, and fuel farming.
Use half of the saving of taxpayer dollars to fund direct tax credits for investment in renewables, conservation, and plugin vehicles, hybrid or pure EV.
Use the other half of subsidy cuts to pay down the huge deficit closely related to energy policy.
Don't let any new nuclear plants be built before all subsidies are terminated. The kind of contracting that has become the norm has to stop, no more handouts of government funds borrowed from China and Saudi Arabia to nuclear contractors and multinational oil companies.
Speaking of Exxonmob, they are offering 10k per scientist who will dispute GHG caused climate change. Through a buffer, American Enterprise institute. To quote "The Godfather"; "Yes Senator, the mob has a lot of buffers". Hehey.
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 03, 2007 at 12:50 AM
Jim:
>>It is going to take a very long time to ramp up renewables and in the meantime I would rather see coal than nuclear.
Why? Spent nuclear fuel is at worst easily controllable and at best a 500-year stockpile of fuel, whereas "spent coal" ends up in the atmosphere. Storing nuclear waste isn't killing anyone, but coal emissions are.
>>Technologies used in Europe may be suitable, but there are questions as to their safety and/or as possible sources of weapons grade materials.
The technology currently used in Europe is PUREX, which is a military-surplus plutonium extraction technology. Of course it's a proliferation hazard; it's supposed to be--if you have weapons-grade plutonium, the production of which is incompatible with a power program. Recycling technology that is actually designed for the purpose of recycling doesn't separate plutonium, since it doesn't have to--a plant built in the US (combined with fast breeders) would almost certainly use this process. The technology isn't far off, either: GE put a complete plant (fast breeder reactor with onsite recycling plant) through the first stage of the NRC certification process in the early 90s. The design is still state-of-the-art. And if that's not close enough, Canadian reactors are efficient enough to run directly on American spent fuel--we could easily build 100 Canadian reactors in the US without straining the fuel supply (and may we someday have the problem of a nuclear waste shortage!).
Why don't you support changing the political climate that leads to us being unable to move quickly on nuclear power (especially recycling)? Nobody (outside of industry) pretends that the current situation is perfect; everything would seem to indicate to an intelligent person that something is extremely wrong. The average independent pro-nuclear advocate wants to change this broken system, not continue it or subsidize it. I couldn't support the system as it stands, but that doesn't get in the way of my support of the technology and knowledge that the system could be made better.
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 03, 2007 at 01:59 AM
Jim from The Energy Blog wrote: The only technology I would like to see limited is nuclear. I would agree that it has a fine safety record, but I do not see any significant progess on a path to recycling or disposal of waste.
Why might (if I may phrase your deal breaker in this way) increased-sophistication of nuclear spent-fuel dispensation be important? Have you read this book?:
amazon.com/Megawatts-Megatons-Turning-Point-Nuclear/dp/0375403949
Note that the book pages are available for viewing online by clicking Search inside this book. Searching for < france waste > returns hits for pages discussing the pros and cons of closed vs open fuel-cycles. Here is a quote from page 144:
Have you read this World Nuclear Association webpage on the myths and realities of radioactive wastes?:
world-nuclear.org/info/inf103.html
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 03, 2007 at 02:13 AM
Stewart - "Why don't you support changing the political climate that leads to us being unable to move quickly on nuclear power (especially recycling)?"
Why don't you accept that energy efficiency and renewables can do more faster than nuclear without any of the problems.
Also is new nuclear going to do without the Price Anderson act? Futhermore is the new nuclear going to be made responsible for the 'safe' geological storage of waste before proceeding on this plan?
Posted by: Ender | February 03, 2007 at 06:14 AM
What might be the relevance of the status of geological storage of spent-fuel, Ender?
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 03, 2007 at 07:23 AM
Ender: Why don't you accept that energy efficiency and renewables can do more faster than nuclear without any of the problems.
A-hem, living in Germany I can directly see how "renewables" live up to their promises: not at all. Your beloved wind power delivers a measly 4% of our electricity, despite being subsidized in a way that boggles the mind. Meanwhile, we replace our working nuclear reactors with dirty brown coal, conveniently ignoring 6.000 premature deaths caused by it every year, and electricity prices are rising, too.
While we're at it, "efficiency" is to electricity generation as starvation is to food. If you can manage to convince a hobo that he won't be hungry anymore if only he ate less, then we can talk about "efficiency" pipe dreams. (By the way, efficiency guru Amory Lovins can't tell a Volt from a Watt. He's completely wrong.)
Futhermore is the new nuclear going to be made responsible for the 'safe' geological storage of waste before proceeding on this plan?
I hope not. Burying fuel is the most stupid thing your illiterate politicians could ever invent and mandate. Slightly used fuel is a lot more dangerous than either fresh fuel or completely used up fuel. WTF is the reason for wanting to bury it prematurely?! That doesn't make the slightest bit of sense, and putting waste handling into the hands of the industry would certainly lead to a much better policy.
Now to put the danger in perspective: generating one GWa of nuclear electricity and dumping the slightly used fuel (not waste!) with an effective half life of some thousand years into the ocean (which nobody proposes, it's just a simple scenario), might kill 0.6 people over the course of many millennia. Burning coal instead and disposing of a million times more waste with infinite half life in a landfill, will kill 75 people. And the consensus seems to be that the coal waste that's carelessly dumped into the atmosphere will kill everybody by cooking the planet. Honestly, I cannot understand where that strange obsession with used nuclear fuel comes from while nobody gives a fsck about the coal waste.
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 03, 2007 at 07:55 AM
The issue of subsidy is buried in the loan guarantee's that avoid political embarassment by not defaulting but rather conflicting the State against properly supporting alternatives that would cause there loans on N to default.
Posted by: karl | February 03, 2007 at 09:33 AM
Good point Karl. The house of cards that is nuclear power will topple a lot of institutional investors and their political allies as it crashes.
Exactly where are these new nuclear plants going to get their funding, subsidies can't pay the bills alone?
Even the outrageous pass on liability for nuclear power from congress doesn't guarantee nuclear investments. Bet on nukes with wind reaching record new lower costs? Seems kind of risky.
Don't institutional investors try to avoid risk? Does the pass on liability for nuclear accidents also cover waste disposal?
I doubt that, since the operators have been collecting money from consumers for waste disposal on every kwh of nuclear powered electricity sold and collecting it for waste disposal. But it has all dissappeared in lawsuits brought by nuclear plant operators against the government for not meeting the deadline to store the waste at Yucca Mountain.
Which has already cost over 50 billion and is so flawed it will most likely be abandoned. There was only 17 billion in the waste disposal fund when nuclear plant operators sued and took it all back.
What if a court decides that plant operators are responsible for their own waste, now that they have custody of the cleanup funds? The house of cards falls, very hard!
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 03, 2007 at 12:25 PM
amazingdrx: ...wind reaching record new lower costs
Good one. Just remember, low for wind is high for almost everything else. I mean, a full $6bn investment for a single GW---if nuclear power was that expensive you be crying even louder, wouldn't you? Yep, that's what wind tinkertoys cost, and I'm being generous. (But we've been over that already twice, and I doubt the facts will disturb you on the third iteration.)
What if a court decides that plant operators are responsible for their own waste?
What waste? The slightly used fuel will be recycled, of course, while the actual waste becomes harmless as rock within ~300 years. Taking uranium out of the ground, fissioning it and burying the fission products actually saves lives by reducing exposure to radon (over the course of many millennia, if thinking ahead isn't to much to expect).
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 03, 2007 at 06:00 PM
Jim,
Why do you want to see more coal but not nuclear? You write this site. You know how deadly coal is (1 million dead per year from pollution and mining). You know what it sends out into the environment. Particulates, mercury, arsenic, CO2, NOX, SOX, toxic metal and nuclear material. Why is it preferable to definitely kill more people with more coal use than nuclear? You know nuclear has a better safety record.
Carbon capture. This costs over $100 per ton now.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_storage
Posted by: Brian Wang | February 03, 2007 at 08:03 PM
I notice that everyone is studiously avoiding the Price Anderson Act. Are nuclear power plants now so safe that they do not need to be insured? What insurance company is going to insure them if the liability is not limited to 500 million?
Any answers there?
Posted by: Ender | February 03, 2007 at 09:17 PM
Nucbuddy - "What might be the relevance of the status of geological storage of spent-fuel, Ender?"
It has enormous relevance. Part of the current problem is that we are happily partying on with no thought to the consequences. The long term consequences of coal are just being found - long term health problems from the direct output and possibly changing the earth's climate.
So you propose to be equally irresponsible with nuclear power. Just generate the electricity so the party can continue and leave the disposal of waste to someone else preferably long after you are dead. Are you going to be around to guard the waste above ground for minimum 500 years??? No the US and Australia might not exist then.
How about we grow up a bit and take responsibility for the waste we generate OR don't generate it in the first place.
Posted by: Ender | February 03, 2007 at 09:24 PM
Ender wrote: It has enormous relevance.
Please be more explicit.
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 04, 2007 at 12:25 AM
Nucbuddy - "Please be more explicit."
Sure - read some of my previous posts on the subject
Posted by: Ender | February 04, 2007 at 12:32 AM
Ender:
>>Are nuclear power plants now so safe that they do not need to be insured?
Safety does not imply insurability. Insurers don't want to be left holding the bag if there's a non-problem and a bunch of ambulance-chasing lawyers blame every case of the flu within a 50-mile radius on the reactor. To be insurable you have to be popular, not safe. In other words, the insurer cares only about the probability that someone will eventually come to them for money--which is related to the safety record but not entirely dependent on it. This is one of those special cases.
>>It [geological storage] has enormous relevance. Part of the current problem is that we are happily partying on with no thought to the consequences. The long term consequences of coal are just being found - long term health problems from the direct output and possibly changing the earth's climate.
1. Why is geological storage necessary? We already store all the fuel we're going to need for the next 500 years if we recycle it, the actual waste is less hazardous than what we're storing now, and when we're actually done with it we can put it back in the same hole we got it from. There are even some uses for several important rare materials found in already-split atoms--primarily industrial catalysts and inaccessible solid-state heat sources.
2. Coal is "possibly" causing global warming? I sure hope that we're not at the stage where people start pretending global warming isn't happening as an excuse to stop nuclear power plant construction.
3. We've produced 500 years' worth (at current consumption levels) of nuclear waste that is a total of 1% used (factoring in the part at nuclear power plants that's 3%-5% used as well as the part at processing facilities that's 0% used). That means that we have to either get rid of it by producing as much nuclear electricity from recycled fuel as possible--or guard it for 10,000 years. Your choice.
4. What are the long-term consequences of dry-cask onsite storage? A lot of people have been doing it for a while and nothing has gotten out.
>>So you propose to be equally irresponsible with nuclear power. Just generate the electricity so the party can continue and leave the disposal of waste to someone else preferably long after you are dead.
That damage is already done, if you want to look at it that way. We can either use the rest of it that's sitting around in casks, barrels, and underwater racks, or we can keep it around and treat it as an unsolvable problem and a punching bag.
>>Are you going to be around to guard the waste above ground for minimum 500 years???
Are you going to be around for 10,000?
>>How about we grow up a bit and take responsibility for the waste we generate OR don't generate it in the first place.
Coal plants have been effectively disposing of their waste for centuries--nuclear power has a waste problem because it's socially responsible enough to care about it.
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 04, 2007 at 12:47 AM
It's really funny to see you all try to wiggle out of insuring nuclear power plants.
Really ridiculous attempts to redefine what insurance is. Why don't you redefine "is" too.
Nuclear power poses uninsurable risk. There is no way to compensate homeowners who lose their property to a nuclear power plant disaster or radioactive leak from a nuclear fuel or waste processing facility.
It is financially impossible to compensate people for the loss of groundwater or the use of the land itself from radioactive contamination. No one has pockets that deep, even the uS government. Especially with the record debt levels built up by this administration.
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 04, 2007 at 12:56 AM
amazingdrx:
>>Really ridiculous attempts to redefine what insurance is.
Where did I say they shouldn't be insured or try to redefine what insurance is? All I tried to do was explain how insurance companies make decisions. My statement represents the reality of the situation, not my opinions of the situation's merit.
>>There is no way to compensate homeowners who lose their property to a nuclear power plant disaster or radioactive leak from a nuclear fuel or waste processing facility.
1. There is. Pay pre-accident fair market value. It's expensive, but not impossible.
2. There is no way to compensate homeowners who lose their property to space aliens from the planet Zorkon who zap people in their sleep with anti-gravity beams. Thus, all new homes should be designed for a full gravity inversion at immense cost. Since homeowners can't pay this immense cost, developers who build homes are not only raping the environment but robbing homeowners blind. Sure. In other words, what accident is going to cause those consequences?
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 04, 2007 at 02:06 AM
Stuart - "Safety does not imply insurability. Insurers don't want to be left holding the bag if there's a non-problem and a bunch of ambulance-chasing lawyers blame every case of the flu within a 50-mile radius on the reactor"
So what are you going to do, continue receiving handouts from the government? What if the citizens paying these handouts start to refuse to?
One enormous advantage of renewables is they are insurable and despite needing subsidies for start up costs do not need continued insurance subsidies.
"1. Why is geological storage necessary? We already store all the fuel we're going to need for the next 500 years if we recycle it,"
However then you get into the whole proliferation thing with lots of plutonium in circulation that can be easily re-processed into weapons grade material. Also breeder reactors are a lot more dangerous than normal reactors so you are up against the insurance thing again. Pretty much every way you turn nuclear has big problems.
"Coal plants have been effectively disposing of their waste for centuries--nuclear power has a waste problem because it's socially responsible enough to care about it."
No you don't care about it. If you did then you would support a moratorium on nuclear power until a long term safe storage method was perfected. The fact that waste storage problems are swept under the carpet means we really do not care as long as the party continues.
Also if you really cared you would support renewable power which generates no such waste. I will probably not live another 50 years however that is no excuse to leave waste around the place that will last for 10 times my remaining life.
Posted by: Ender | February 04, 2007 at 03:26 AM
Ender wrote: Price Anderson Act. Are nuclear power plants now so safe that they do not need to be insured? What insurance company is going to insure them if the liability is not limited to 500 million?
The Price Anderson Act requires $10 billion in insurance coverage -- not merely $500 million.
world-nuclear.org/info/inf67.html
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 04, 2007 at 04:06 AM
Ender: Are you going to be around to guard the waste above ground for minimum 500 years?
Interesting, seems we're actually making headway here. Just for the record, nuclear waste has to be stored safely for 500 years, while coal waste has to be stored forever, is that about right?
Well, and here's how to store the waste: build a concrete shelter, stick it in, seal the entrance. An old mine might be a good shelter that doesn't even have to be built. Somebody, say a powerplant operator, can look for it for the next 100 years, then a sign reading "Please do not eat the black glass" is put up. Since people with common sense tend to not eat glass anyway, I fail to see why you need to "guard" fission product waste.
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 04, 2007 at 05:27 AM
Udo - "Interesting, seems we're actually making headway here. Just for the record, nuclear waste has to be stored safely for 500 years, while coal waste has to be stored forever, is that about right?"
No not really 500 years is the minimum some of it is dangerous for 10 000 years. Renewable waste does not have to stored at all or guarded because renewables do not generate waste.
"Well, and here's how to store the waste: build a concrete shelter, stick it in, seal the entrance. An old mine might be a good shelter that doesn't even have to be built."
Most mines have water. Water leaches out the radionucleides that then get into the water table. Good solution so far. Also what seems like a dry spot today could be under water in 500 years.
"Somebody, say a powerplant operator, can look for it for the next 100 years, then a sign reading "Please do not eat the black glass" is put up. Since people with common sense tend to not eat glass anyway, I fail to see why you need to "guard" fission product waste."
Assuming that a person in 500 years can read English what you write today may say then "come and eat this black glass - it is really good for you" Try reading Chaucer in the original Middle English to see how language can change in 500 years. However what is to stop them from using the interesting black glass for ornaments or building houses???
Think you have to guard it!!!!
Posted by: Ender | February 04, 2007 at 05:46 AM
Ender wrote: some of it is dangerous for 10 000 years.
(Putting aside for now the lack of both apropos qualification and apropos quantification in your statement) it is our sensitivities that hurt us, Ender. Human sensitivity to radiation has been dropping exponentially over the past several decades. One reason for that is that energy and wealth have increased in availability. Another reason is that research into, and availability of, radioprotective-substances has increased. You yourself probably consume many of these very radioprotective-substances on a regular basis. For example, it seems that people typically are not aware that most of the familiar culinary herbs and spices have already been found, through laboratory research, to be powerful radioprotectors. (Yummy Italian seasonings are radioprotective? Yes.)
Chernobyl, more than anything else, was a lesson in the hazards of malnutrition. Ditto for Hiroshima and Nagasaki (especially when the latter-two are considered with the former, since together they show that consuming plentiful amounts of iodine sources such as seafood protect against the hazards of radioiodine.)
However, we might imagine that our descendants would somehow miraculously find themselves thrust into a new Dark Age, where modern science, technology and wealth were not available. In that case, we might also imagine that they would have other problems that far outweigh those involved with having to share a geographical trillionth of their world with a few repositories holding high-level radioactive waste.
(As you have been previously advised, several times now) these concepts are further explicated here:
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/BOOK.html
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter8.html
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 04, 2007 at 06:53 AM
Ender: some of it is dangerous for 10 000 years
Oh my, and I thought you had been listening. Silly me. No Ender, nuclear waste(!) is dangerous for only 500 years, and that's being generous.
If you disagree, please name the dangerous radionuclide that is a significant fission product and has a half live on the order of a thousand years. Tell you what, name two, since I'm pretty sure the first one you pick is no fission product at all.
Water leaches out the radionucleides...
From glass?! Be serious, glass doesn't dissolve in 500 years. We're storing liquids in that stuff, you know. Running water didn't leech anything out of the natural reactors at Oklo, and that was no engineered storage facility.
Assuming that a person in 500 years can read English
I see, I need to type more slowly.
We are talking about glass. It is black. It is hard. It is tasteless. It is insoluble. It has sharp edges.
Can you get your head around that concept? Thanks. Now please explain how to get anyone to eat it.
An ornament? Well, go ahead. Black glass makes for an ugly ornament, but if you want it... A building? Well, black glass makes for a lousy building material, but if you insist... Hey, it doesn't even emit Radon, which natural rock would do.
External exposure to 100 years old nuclear waste(!) is no danger. Heck, if the Caesium was removed, I'd even drop the 100 year requirement. The only way to hurt someone with that stuff is to whack him over the head with it, and that works with any old rock.
Don't you think it's about time you read up on the actual contents of fission product waste? I mean, you're so completely off track here, it's not even funny anymore. You shouldn't be wasting an obviously working brain by rehashing nonsense.
...because renewables do not generate waste.
Of course not. The production of GaAs does not release even trace amounts of Arsenic, blasting the cement for the construction of windmills doesn't release any CO2, the copper for the generator coils is extracted from the blue sky leaving no mine tailings at all and not dyeing rivers bluish green, the composite material for the rotors is created from organically grown hemp and wool, not coal and crude oil, and silicon is reduced from quartz by the hot air produced by gaggling environmentalists alone.
If I were advocating for a low-waste energy source, I'd be a bit more careful with my assertions and I'd be trying hard to replace dirty coal. Oh wait, that's what I'm doing...
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 04, 2007 at 01:47 PM
Udo - "Oh my, and I thought you had been listening. Silly me. No Ender, nuclear waste(!) is dangerous for only 500 years, and that's being generous."
How about Technetium and Palladium?
"From glass?! Be serious, glass doesn't dissolve in 500 years. We're storing liquids in that stuff, you know."
Despite what you say not all waste can be stored in glass. Some of the problems are here:
"http://books.nap.edu/books/0309073170/html/91.html#pagetop
Radionuclide transport out of the waste form and repository (the near-field environment) through the more distant geological host medium (often called the far-field or the geosphere) to that part of the environment accessible by humans (the accessible environment) is probably the most uncertain area of modeling. The theory for transport of solutes in natural media is reasonably well developed, but actual measurements have yielded surprises in the magnitude of the travel distance and direction (see Sidebar 6.1 and Sidebar 6.2 ). These measurements force examination of whether the established theories apply in all cases. Even if classical behavior is assumed, transport models require detailed information on both near-field and far-field properties (i.e., properties of the geological medium between the repository and the accessible environment) of the repository system. Given the spatial variability of natural media, this is a formidable task. Clays and salt, which are relatively homogeneous media, generally have less spatial variability in physical and chemical properties than crystalline and volcanic rocks but are harder to characterize because low-permeability experiments are very difficult at large spatial scales.
Moreover, radionuclide migration experiments in a medium that has been chosen because it should confine the waste for very long times can be conducted only over very short distances (e.g., meters) for periods of a few years. Such migration experiments have been conducted in several underground research laboratories (URLs), for example, at Mol (Belgium), Grimsel (Switzerland), Stripa and Äspö (Sweden), El Berrocal (Spain), and Fanay-Augères (France) (see, for example, Kickmaier and McKinley 1997; Brewitz et al., 1999). These experiments have very significantly improved understanding of radionuclide transport in geological media.
It is, however, well known from experiments done elsewhere in more permeable media that transport parameters are scale dependent; consequently, the parameters measured at small scales cannot always be used to represent phenomena at larger scales (Matheron and de Marsily, 1980). The scale issue is related to the heterogeneity of natural media and, in particular, fractured media.
Another difficulty encountered in modeling radionuclide transport in geological media is that of properly accounting for the numerous coupled hydrogeochemical interactions that take place among the solutes, host rock, and particulate or colloidal matter that may be present. Much has been learned about these complex interactions, mostly in laboratory experiments and also in some of the transport experiments done in URLs, as mentioned above."
and
"Waste storage methods are dependent on the chemical and physical characteristics of the waste, as well as the type and concentration of radionuclides. Most solid DOE wastes are first put into appropriate storage containers, such as drums and concrete vaults. These containers are generally stored in DOE storage facilities that are engineered to protect people and the environment from contamination. These DOE storage facilities are subject to regular monitoring by Federal and state regulators who conduct inspections to evaluate compliance with all regulatory health and safety requirements.
DOE stores its high-level waste (primarily liquid wastes resulting from nuclear fuel reprocessing) in tanks at the West Valley, New York; Savannah River, South Carolina; and Hanford, Washington sites. At the Hanford Site, some of the original single-shell tanks that have begun to leak have been replaced by double-shell, carbon-steel tanks. These range in volume from 500,000 to approximately one-million gallons each. The double-wall is actually a tank within a tank. Highly sensitive monitoring equipment is installed in the space between the tank walls to detect any leaks that might occur. At the Savannah River Site, high-level liquid waste is being removed from the tanks and converted to a solid-waste form suitable for permanent disposal. DOE reduces the volume of high-level waste that it vitrifies by pretreating the stored high-level waste to separate many of the nonradioactive substances from the radioactive ones. The remaining less radioactive waste will be mixed with cement and fly ash and solidified as grout or "saltstone" as a final form for disposal. When DOE solidifies high-level waste into glass logs through vitrification, granular calcine, or concrete-like saltstone, the waste still needs to be stored awaiting final disposal. "
So contrary to what you say not all waste is stored as glass - there are many methods of disposal and thousands of tons of highly radioactive transuranics that WILL be radioactive for thousands of years. So unlike the rosy picture of waste in glass that you are desperately trying to paint this is so far removed from reality that you must be purposely deluding yourself so that you can accept nuclear power.
"We are talking about glass. It is black. It is hard. It is tasteless. It is insoluble. It has sharp edges."
Sure and we never grind up something hard to
make medicine? Perhaps the shaman of the future will use it in this manner. The problem that you have is a lack of imagination. You cannot conceive that the USA itself may only be distant memory of a golden age of gods in 1000 years. The problem is that nuclear power involves compounds that could conceivably be dangerous if misused on a time scale that is totally unimaginable by humans.
"Don't you think it's about time you read up on the actual contents of fission product waste? I mean, you're so completely off track here, it's not even funny anymore. You shouldn't be wasting an obviously working brain by rehashing nonsense."
You of course mean stop bothering to bring up embarrassing and unanswerable facts about nuclear waste so you can go back to your delusions. If waste is so safe why not volunteer to have some? I am sure your backyard, if you have one, could hold several dry casks for your children, again if you have them, to play around. You could be doing the nuclear industry a great service here as could your fellow advocates. "Adopt some waste today" could be your slogan. Perhaps you, given your extreme liking for nuclear power perhaps you could adopt one of the leaking ones from the Hanaford site or store some spent nuclear fuel in your swimming pool.
"Of course not. The production of GaAs does not release even trace amounts of Arsenic, blasting the cement for the construction of windmills doesn't release any CO2,"
I didn't bring this up because as you full well know the production of all these is not solely for renewable power and they produce no ionising radiation. Also I am also sure that you would not want to mention the uranium tailings dams, the coal power used to enrich the uranium or the depleted uranium left over from enriching that finds its way into enemy tanks and then into the environment as highly dangerous powder.
Posted by: Ender | February 04, 2007 at 07:26 PM
Only 500 years? A dubiouis claim, but if true..
How much will it cost to have nuclear contractors babysit it per year? 100 billion, 200 billion? Let's say 100 billion to be conservative. Only 50 trillion.
No problem then. What a bargain.
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 04, 2007 at 07:58 PM
Ender:
>>So what are you going to do, continue receiving handouts from the government?
I'd restrict the ability of the ambulance-chasing lawyers to blame every case of the flu within a 50-mile radius on the reactor, but that's just me.
>>One enormous advantage of renewables is they are insurable and despite needing subsidies for start up costs do not need continued insurance subsidies.
That's a perception issue; a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's not an advantage--that's equivalent to saying "it's good because I like it."
>>However then you get into the whole proliferation thing with lots of plutonium in circulation that can be easily re-processed into weapons grade material.
Plutonium never has to be separated to actually recycle the material--notice how the process I linked to before has no stage labeled "plutonium separation."
>>Also breeder reactors are a lot more dangerous than normal reactors so you are up against the insurance thing again.
No, they aren't--the cooling system of the EBR-II fast breeder in 1986 was deliberately shut off at full power as part of a test. This is a pretty much universally-recognized no-no; most reactors' fuel melts under those circumstances, but for EBR-II, it turns out hot metal expands, expanded metal is less dense, and the reaction rate goes down when the atoms are farther apart. A fast breeder that takes advantage of this basic physics will not melt down. Period.
>>No you don't care about it.
Don't tell me I don't care. Disagree with me all you want, but don't tell me I "don't care."
>>If you did then you would support a moratorium on nuclear power until a long term safe storage method was perfected. The fact that waste storage problems are swept under the carpet means we really do not care as long as the party continues.
1. What's wrong with dry-cask storage over a 300-year period?
2. Do you understand that we've already partially used so much uranium that if we were to go in and get rid of the long-lived parts it would take 500 years--and a bunch of EBR-II-type fast reactors--to do it? The waste is here, it's not going anywhere, and fast reactors are the only way we can get the storage time down from 10,000 years to 300. Recap:
10,000: The required storage time of the waste we've already got as it stands
500: The amount of time it would take, at the current rate of consumption of electricity, to consume all the waste we've produced in fast reactors
300: The required storage time of the waste once it comes out of the fast reactor
3. Why do you oppose reactors that run only on materials currently in the waste stockpile?
>>Also if you really cared you would support renewable power which generates no such waste.
I'll tell you why I care. I could not have been born naturally; if I had been delivered that way my neck would have been broken and I would have died. A c-section in a modern hospital with modern technology that requires access to energy is the only way I could have been born.
In a low-energy society, I would be dead. Period.
Ah, just chalk up another stillbirth. At least we didn't build waste-eating reactors, because they would have made the nuclear waste we already have sitting around in casks last 500 years instead of 10,000. If the last sentence makes sense to you, I don't know what I can really say.
I speak only of reusing the waste that has already been produced. I can't say that enough, as apparently it hasn't gotten through. If we decided to produce all of the electricity for the developed world with waste-eating reactors running on only waste materials, we'd be set for the next 500 years--that's how inefficient the current nuclear fuel cycle is.
Renewables were on their way out in the 1600s because they couldn't provide enough energy. They still can't. Try telling someone like me that it's a good idea to roll back technology.
>>I will probably not live another 50 years however that is no excuse to leave waste around the place that will last for 10 times my remaining life.
We've already created 10,000-year waste; the question is whether we will be allowed to build waste-eating reactors to use it, be set for energy for the next 500 years, and reduce the lifetime of that waste to 300 years.
>>No not really 500 years is the minimum some of it is dangerous for 10 000 years.
The part that's "dangerous for 10,000 years" is the part that the waste-eating reactors would use as fuel.
>>Assuming that a person in 500 years can read English what you write today may say then "come and eat this black glass - it is really good for you"
I would think that people in 500 years will be more intelligent than that.
>>Try reading Chaucer in the original Middle English to see how language can change in 500 years.
I don't know about you, but I have, and it's definitely possible to read Chaucer (oh, and I hate to nitpick--but Chaucer wrote in the 1300s; a more appropriate example would be Shakespeare).
>>So contrary to what you say not all waste is stored as glass - there are many methods of disposal and thousands of tons of highly radioactive transuranics that WILL be radioactive for thousands of years. So unlike the rosy picture of waste in glass that you are desperately trying to paint this is so far removed from reality that you must be purposely deluding yourself so that you can accept nuclear power.
Nuclear power doesn't have anything to do with Hanford.
>>Sure and we never grind up something hard to make medicine? Perhaps the shaman of the future will use it in this manner.
That says more about alternative medicine than nuclear waste.
>>The problem is that nuclear power involves compounds that could conceivably be dangerous if misused on a time scale that is totally unimaginable by humans.
500 years is not unimaginable--10,000 might be. If you get your way and we don't build waste-eating reactors, it will be 10,000 instead of 500.
>>You of course mean stop bothering to bring up embarrassing and unanswerable facts about nuclear waste so you can go back to your delusions.
Haven't heard any facts yet.
>>If waste is so safe why not volunteer to have some? I am sure your backyard, if you have one, could hold several dry casks for your children, again if you have them, to play around.
We've already made all the nuclear waste we need to make for the next 500 years, even if we expand nuclear power to 100% of generation--if we use waste-eating reactors. The waste is here; let's make the best of it.
>>Perhaps you, given your extreme liking for nuclear power perhaps you could adopt one of the leaking ones from the Hanaford site or store some spent nuclear fuel in your swimming pool.
Hanford, once again, was a weapons complex. Explain what this has to do with nuclear power.
>>I didn't bring this up because as you full well know the production of all these is not solely for renewable power and they produce no ionising radiation.
Ionizing radiation is better than chemical contamination, no?
>>Also I am also sure that you would not want to mention the uranium tailings dams, the coal power used to enrich the uranium or the depleted uranium left over from enriching that finds its way into enemy tanks and then into the environment as highly dangerous powder.
How about the coal mines or removed mountaintops? Keep in mind that recycling waste need not involve uranium mining.
Coal is not used to enrich uranium; electricity is. It's the coal plants' fault for polluting; the enrichment plant's use of electricity does not in and of itself pollute. Take the French for example--their enrichment plant, Tricastin, is 100% nuclear-powered. Keep in mind that recycling waste doesn't necessarily require enrichment, either.
And yes, DU should be used in reactors instead of shells. I agree.
>>How about Technetium and Palladium?
We're talking about half-life of everything in the waste combined together--the short-lived parts balance that out.
Also, technetium and palladium are useful (especially palladium).
amazingdrx:
>>Only 500 years? A dubiouis claim, but if true..
It's 300 years; 500 years is the length of fuel supply using only recycled waste. That's physics, not somebody's opinion.
>>How much will it cost to have nuclear contractors babysit it per year? 100 billion, 200 billion? Let's say 100 billion to be conservative. Only 50 trillion.
That's three numbers you've pulled out of your ear. Why should it cost any more to store waste in onsite dry-cask storage than it already does? What's the cost of coal fumes, in lives, in the environment, and in direct costs?
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 04, 2007 at 08:54 PM
Stewart - "'ll tell you why I care. I could not have been born naturally; if I had been delivered that way my neck would have been broken and I would have died. A c-section in a modern hospital with modern technology that requires access to energy is the only way I could have been born."
If we are going to talk like this then my wife's life depends on epilepsy and thyroid medication so I have very much at stake. YOu are making the very mistaken assumption that renewables mean low tech.
Nothing could be further from the truth. A few posts ago on this blog is a report that up to 50% of the US's power could be generated by renewables. Energy efficiency does not imply living in caves.
I am not sure who has been brainwashing you on this however they have done a pretty good job. Total reliance on nuclear or coal are only dead ends eventually given enough time. As you say modern medicine gives us wonders however do you want this for everybody or just rich westerners. Reducing our energy use and providing an example of low energy use from endless renewable power will allow a lot more babies from places you would not even think of installing a nuclear fuel cycle to survive just like you. The world is a lot bigger that the US and Australia and they deserve a decent lifestyle just as much as us.
The waste eating reactors are a long way off and we need to act now. 500 years is very long time. Can you honestly give me an ironclad guarantee that the dry casks are going to be guarded for 300 years. Our country was only settled by Europeans 200 years ago. 300 or 500 years is a very long time in human terms. What happens if in 50 years the US collapses and the money for storage evaporates. As hard as it is for you to imagine the US is not forever and will collapse at some time in the future - who looks after it then?
Posted by: Ender | February 04, 2007 at 11:18 PM
Ender wrote: Can you honestly give me an ironclad guarantee that the dry casks are going to be guarded for 300 years. [...] What happens if in 50 years the US collapses and the money for storage evaporates.
The science of risk management is more complex than that.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_assessment
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_management
The "Precautionary Principle" has been put forth as an "alternative to risk assessment".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle
The geometry of "Precaution" assumes that it is possible to "do no harm".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle#Do_no_harm
Are you, Ender, meaning to imply that it is possible to "do no harm"?
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 05, 2007 at 12:06 AM
Ender:
>>YOu are making the very mistaken assumption that renewables mean low tech.
They do. They're intermittent and diffuse; technology runs on energy and requires access to it. These things were abandoned long ago--for a good reason.
>>A few posts ago on this blog is a report that up to 50% of the US's power could be generated by renewables.
First, do you know what a limit is? Second, something tells me that the 50% figure isn't evenly distributed--where does it show up?
>>Energy efficiency does not imply living in caves.
Correct--but you're talking about renewables, not efficiency. Improving efficiency (read: reducing the rate of increase in demand) locks in the fossil-fueled status quo by allowing it to work longer than it otherwise would have.
>>I am not sure who has been brainwashing you on this however they have done a pretty good job.
Can't resist an ad-hominem argument, can you? Let's stick to the subject at hand.
>>As you say modern medicine gives us wonders however do you want this for everybody or just rich westerners.
I want it for everybody. How did rich westerners get to be that way?
>>Reducing our energy use and providing an example of low energy use from endless renewable power will allow a lot more babies from places you would not even think of installing a nuclear fuel cycle to survive just like you.
No, it will just bring us down to their current level. And why wouldn't I think of installing a nuclear fuel cycle in a Third World country? Iran is possibly the best example--see this article and this blog post for my reasons for encouraging them to build as much nuclear power capacity as their infrastructure can support.
>>The waste eating reactors are a long way off and we need to act now.
An Integral Fast Reactor is a waste-eating reactor; one was built (the aforementioned EBR-II) in the mid-1980s. A design certification application was submitted to the NRC but withdrawn after successful pre-application review.
A Canadian reactor is a waste-eating reactor; these have been operating almost as long as American reactors have.
These are only the two closest to the market. The technology is available; it has all been developed.
>>500 years is very long time.
It's less than 10,000, and that's what we're going to end up with if we don't recycle it.
>>Can you honestly give me an ironclad guarantee that the dry casks are going to be guarded for 300 years.
Can you guarantee that they'll be guarded for 10,000?
>>Our country was only settled by Europeans 200 years ago.
Society lasts longer, and there are some exceptions to the general rule about nations--Britain is approaching 1,000 years of relative political stability.
>>What happens if in 50 years the US collapses and the money for storage evaporates. As hard as it is for you to imagine the US is not forever and will collapse at some time in the future - who looks after it then?
I don't think the US is ever going to collapse like Rome did (other scenarios are entirely possible--for example, that the US system would spread around the world, and that the US as a distinct legal entity would be absorbed by a "world government" and cease to exist), but what happened to the Soviet Union's nuclear waste? Its successor nations assumed responsibility, with the assistance of the international community. In today's interconnected and globalized world, nothing significant is going to be simply forgotten about.
Posted by: Stewart Peterson | February 05, 2007 at 01:13 AM
Stewart Peterson wrote: How did rich westerners get to be that way?
Here is one answer:
amazon.com/Global-Inequality-Richard-Lynn-Vanhanen/dp/1593680252
This Rushton review provides a synopsis of the book:
vdare.com/rushton/061207_iq.htm
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 05, 2007 at 01:38 AM
Stewart - "They do. They're intermittent and diffuse; technology runs on energy and requires access to it. These things were abandoned long ago--for a good reason."
Well I can certainly see why you are so for nuclear power. If you believe this then you are ignoring a hell of a lot of evidence to the contrary. Diffuse power can be concentrated and stored.
Can you provide one scrap of evidence that supports your idea that renewables cannot support a technological society?
Posted by: Ender | February 05, 2007 at 05:49 AM
Ender wrote: Diffuse power can be concentrated
Yes - with a Dyson sphere. It might be worth noting that we do not have any of these.
Ender wrote: Can you provide one scrap of evidence that supports your idea that renewables cannot support a technological society?
Yes.
world-nuclear.org/info/inf99.html
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 05, 2007 at 06:37 AM
Ender: How about Technetium and Palladium?
Half lives of 200.000 and 2.000.000 years. These would lead some people to the conclusion that Tc and Pd are no danger at all and others to the conclusion that they are dangerous for at least a few million years.
Whichever conclusion you prefer, it seems like you pulled this "dangerous for 10.000 years" factoid out of thin air. Is this necessary? I thought you were scientifically minded, unlike amazingdrx in his own little world. You shouldn't have to invent "facts".
not all waste can be stored in glass
Not IN glass, the waste IS glass, that is an amorphous crystal of metal oxides and silicates. All waste can be put into this form, with the only exceptions being Tritium and Krypton. Technically, rocks are also glasses, so skip the hair splitting.
Moreover, the liquid waste you seem so afraid of starting to leak is from military Plutonium recovery, we're talking about civilian power. Even though, the liquid waste is actually a solution of mostly nitrates and can be converted into a glass by evaporation and oxidation. In fact, that's what the French do at La Hague.
thousands of tons of highly radioactive transuranics
No, there aren't. Worldwide, there's only about 1000 tons of Plutonium, and Pu isn't _highly_ radioactive. There are only some tens of tons of _highly_ radioactive transuranics, and these aren't waste, but mislabeled fuel. Again, please get your numbers correct before quoting them.
Sure and we never grind up something hard to
make medicine? Perhaps the shaman of the future will use it in this manner.
Errm... let me get this straight. You are absolutely hell-bent on proving that it is conceivable that somebody manages to ingest fission product glass and that we should guard against this possibility?
Okay, it is possible: A wacko shaman grinds up the glass, dissolves it in hot hydrofluorid acid, then neutralizes the excess acid using sodium hydroxide, then has somebody drink this cocktail of mostly fluorides of calcium, silicon and rare earths. That's about the only way to get the stuff into an organism.
But really, whoever is stupid enough to drink this concoction deserves a Darwin Award, radioactive or not. Heck, I guess you'd die from just ingesting lots of silicon fluoride alone.
Oh, and while we're at it, what would prevent the shaman wacko from instead dissolving a GaAs solar panel, huh? Arsenic is highly toxic and has infinite half life. What would that cost, to guard those worn out solar panels for all eternity, huh?
The problem is that nuclear power involves compounds that could conceivably be dangerous if misused on a time scale that is totally unimaginable by humans
"Could conceivably be?!" That's all you got?! The REAL problem is that COAL power involves compounds that ARE DEFINITELY dangerous even if PROPERLY HANDLED on a time scale totally unimaginable AS WELL AS IN THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE!
If waste is so safe why not volunteer to have some?
Volunteer?! I WANT some to build a battery out of it! I WANT to store all the nuclear waste that was produced to generate all the electricity I'll ever use in my life (about the size of one billiard ball) and that of twenty generations of my children (so that it can decay for 600 years) in my basement to lower my heating bill!
Now you please store your CO2 in your basement, along with the ashes (about one million billiard balls, and they will emit Radon). "Adopt some ashes" could be your slogan. *chuckle*
Also I am also sure that you would not want to mention the uranium tailings dams, the coal power used to enrich the uranium or the depleted uranium left over from enriching that finds its way into enemy tanks and then into the environment as highly dangerous powder
Ah, and now we're walking the entire laundry list until at the end everybody forgot what progress we made on getting you to understand fission product waste and you can start from the beginning. So let's get it over with:
- Uranium is enriched with nuclear power whereever people have this amazing device called a brain, which is in France. The AFR doesn't even need enrichment, btw.
- Tailings are just rocks. Every mine produces them, and uranium mines produce a lot less of them than a coal mine.
- Depleted uranium is not "left over", it is fuel for the AFR. The military uses it just out of convenience, they could use Lead or Tungsten equally well and it wouldn't make a damn difference. Uranium is already everywhere in the environment (2ppm in soil), because mother nature put it there.
And don't forget, Ender, Adopt some ashed today! Take care of some gas cloud!
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 05, 2007 at 07:40 AM
We can't wait until 2020 to decide to build more nuclear plants. By then the old nucs will be decommisioning and the gas fired plants will be shutting down for lack of fuel. Nuclear waste is a political issue, not a technical one. Most of the byproduct can be recycled into new fuel and the rest is quite easy to deal with. We've got to get past the pie in the sky delusions about wind and solar and the voodoo "science" scares about nuclear power before it is too late. We can't let the global economy slow down. It will kill millions. Poverty is not an energy policy.
Posted by: Bde2200 | February 05, 2007 at 12:04 PM
Nuclear is really on the move.
Worldwide the number of new nuke plants under construction (28 plants, 22.7GW), planned (64 plants, 68.9GW) or proposed (158 plants, 124GW)
http://www.uic.com.au/reactors.htm
Currently nuclear energy saves the emission of 2.5 billion tonnes of CO2 relative to coal (plus savings on mercury, arsenic, SOX, NOX, particulates, thorium ,uranium etc...). For every 22 tonnes of uranium used, one million tonnes of CO2 emissions is averted. Energy inputs to nuclear fuel cycle produce only a few (eg 1-3) percent of the CO 2 emissions saved. Doubling the world's nuclear output would reduce CO2 emissions from power generation by about one quarter.
some of the responses from Australia's nuclear agency to anti-nuke arguments
http://www.uic.com.au/nip43.htm
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/local/16567802.htm
Unit 1 restarts May 2007
http://www.tva.gov/news/releases/octdec06/bfn_fuel.htm
the list of plants under construction
http://www.uic.com.au/nip19.htm
Posted by: Brian Wang | February 05, 2007 at 12:30 PM
Udo - "Whichever conclusion you prefer, it seems like you pulled this "dangerous for 10.000 years" factoid out of thin air. Is this necessary? I thought you were scientifically minded"
I asked me to provide 2 long lived fission products which I did. These 2 are beta emitters for a long time.
"Not IN glass, the waste IS glass, that is an amorphous crystal of metal oxides and silicates. All waste can be put into this form, with the only exceptions being Tritium and Krypton. Technically, rocks are also glasses, so skip the hair splitting."
So this would be the same "glass" that:
"http://books.nap.edu/books/0309073170/html/86.html#pagetop
Nevertheless, the common perception is that for geological disposal specifically, one must be able to predict the future accurately—and it is beyond established engineering practices to predict accurately for many thousands of years how the waste and the repository will behave. It is also beyond established practice to predict accurately whether or not some of the radionuclides disposed in the repository may move through the geological formations and eventually come in contact with human beings and the environment in the future and cause them harm"
So we cannot even predict how these 'glasses' are going to behave:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1766332/posts
"Storing high-level nuclear waste without any leakage over thousands of years may be harder than experts have thought, research published in Nature today shows.
Ian Farnan of Cambridge University, UK, and his co-workers have found that the radiation emitted from such waste could transform one candidate storage material into less durable glass after just 1,400 years — much more quickly than thought1.
Current plans for disposal of some of the most dangerous material generated in nuclear power plants, such as radioactive elements extracted from spent fuel rods, differ from one country to another. A common strategy being explored is to encase the waste in a hard, crystalline ceramic material — a kind of synthetic rock — and then put it in steel canisters and bury them in cavities excavated underground.
Because many radioactive substances continue emitting radiation for a very long time, the containment must persist for an awesome duration. Plutonium-239, one of the most deadly by-products of nuclear power, has a half-life of 24,000 years, meaning that only half of any initial batch has decayed over this time. Ideally it should stay put for about ten times as long: a quarter of a million years."
So to summerise you want to put material that may be flawed in ways you cannot understand in repositories that you cannot predict with present tools the possible migration of the stored material into the biosphere. Sounds irresistable!!!
""Could conceivably be?!" That's all you got?! The REAL problem is that COAL power involves compounds that ARE DEFINITELY dangerous even if PROPERLY HANDLED on a time scale totally unimaginable AS WELL AS IN THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE!"
Isn't that enough??? So I cannot prove that 800 years in the future that x people will die from nuclear waste you think that this is an open ticket to produce as much of this as is needed to support yourself in the way you have become used to.
Again the false dichotomy of if it is not nuclear then it is dirty coal. I propose something that is neither. BOTH coal and nuclear are dirty in their own charming way. You desperately try to portray nuclear as clean only by totally ignoring the long term unsolved problems of nuclear waste.
"Now you please store your CO2 in your basement, along with the ashes (about one million billiard balls, and they will emit Radon). "Adopt some ashes" could be your slogan. *chuckle*"
So you want me to store waste from something I am also against - coal??? Tell you what I am putting a renewable power generator on my house this year along with a renewable water heater. See if you can match this with a nuclear power generator in your house.
Posted by: Ender | February 05, 2007 at 07:55 PM
Ender wrote: the possible migration of the stored material into the biosphere.
Problem-strength is inversely-proportional to energy availability. For the safest future, energy-production should be continuously ramped-up exponentially.
gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/1/15/1950/64392/#77
gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/1/15/1950/64392/#79
It takes energy to render an environment clean. It takes energy to render a species immune to biological insults.
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/BOOK.html
phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter11.html#6
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 06, 2007 at 02:16 AM
Ender wrote: books.nap.edu/books/0309073170/html/86.html
Nevertheless, the common perception is that for geological disposal specifically, one must be able to predict the future accurately—and it is beyond established engineering practices to predict accurately for many thousands of years how the waste and the repository will behave. It is also beyond established practice to predict accurately whether or not some of the radionuclides disposed in the repository may move through the geological formations and eventually come in contact with human beings and the environment in the future and cause them harm
The next sentence in that book reads:
...And that brings us back to risk-management vs. the Precautionary-Principle:
thefraserdomain.typepad.com/energy/2007/01/the_state_of_th.html#comment-28223506
Are you, Ender, meaning to imply that it is possible to "do no harm"?
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 06, 2007 at 03:19 AM
Ender wrote: If waste is so safe why not volunteer to have some? I am sure your backyard, if you have one, could hold several dry casks
Posted by: Nucbuddy | February 06, 2007 at 07:35 AM
Drop the hypotheticals please! The time is now. A large percentage of the population worships nuclear power. Pony up, gather around, let's plan some suburbs as part of the new plants.
There are problems of course. We see this for high voltage power line contamination decisions. Who decides for the children? How does the married couple decide?
My sister walked away from a much more wonderful home she could of afforded to buy easally at one point because of such proximity. Define wonderful though. Define necessity. The risks we know about may not be important compared to the risks we don't have a clue about, but so what? TO be blind on faith- no, we can do better then that.
So it is of course the case that ground zero is a humane place to die. No argument there. Waterside docking mansions or not. You put yourself in other peoplels shoes though, to decide for them, and saying you would do the same for yourself "hypothetically" is just blowing hot air.
It's no solution to just spare them the truth. We've done that, it didn't save the world. It did erode at trust, it did corrupt demomcracy, it does explain much of our present mess.
Every job has both it's "income" and it's cost to society. Most do not contribute, but rather take. Human teachers for example. There jobs have largely been obsolete since movable type. But they stand in front, collecting paychecks, further ignorance, exploitation, to pay there rent. Yet we think ah now we can finally set our students free to learn, we can finally let the robots protect them from having to listen to those who if they could think would be doing that instead themselveds.
Today we learn about a must know report here. Titled summary for policy makers, it then proceeds to talk poorly about matters not so much scientific but absurdly technical. As if policy makers can weigh it's claims against competing ones or have the time. I tried to find the nonsummary. The directory is protected.
If that's a policy summary then the makers it is for must be both parinoid and no nothing about making policy. So not much will happen.
It's not like a bunch of highschool drop outs got sequestered in a hotel room for two years while the best presentation money can buy delighted them day after day on the issue and then there opinion became law. That I would respect. That's what is most beautiful about jury service. That is what those who poison are planet fear most. The people understanding by respecting those who they can reasonably trust.
It's what the recent blockbuster was about. The power of a jury corrupted or saved by just one person who but for the corruption we can count on being on every jury of consequence.
So I do not say build or mothball. I don't comment on global warming being myth or more established then that smoking isn't the best you can do for your health with the money it costs to engage in. I do ask, please, let's get someone who we have a reason to believe talking. PLease let's do that. Especially about this. Let's let th COngress debate. Let's be civil. Let's maybe even pass laws against unanswered propiganda pushed out on the AM dial that has nothing to do with logic or truth deciding more and more what the owners of the amps that like a cancer connect to the good but nieve ear drums of this land. It's what we should learn from the millions being slaughtered by neighbors and friends with rocks and sticks because of "whath they heard on the radio"
Before slaying you neighbor, at least look the guy who's telling you to do that in the eye. At least have him visit your home personally with this directive. Don't believe what you see on the tv is more then a cartoon. Don't believe even Rush can take his act to a blog. He's just an actor, just a clown, just a sick innocent like most of us. Empathise with him but how much more clearly could he be saying DON'T BELIEVE A WORD I SAY!
Posted by: karl (Ok, I succumb, I'll call your bluff) | February 06, 2007 at 10:18 AM
First, I just posted something on here about this thread but missed this thread. Sorry.
I write now to distill a point I make concisely. The distinction between what's "scientific" and what's "political" is illiterate. But beyond that I have struggled my own life with how to help people or the people make better decisions.
It's my approach- you could call it a nonviolent one. One of empowerment of regular folk so they take there opinions more seriously, they take there diet of influence to be as critical of that of lard. Quite a quaint notion I know.
But accordingly I accept that there are limits to what the people will decide. I place my faith in the fact that since we can't handpick what they get to have a say in to the extent that this current administration thinks it can -we would be long gone if prior administrations had such a drug addled view- I choose to work with the peoples wisdom.
This notion is not discovoered in whatI've seen put forth by others above. Accept what you can not in fact change. Efficiency savings, and recognising that teh amount of energy an activity uses can be quickloy recognised to some extent by th e ordinary eye, or at least within a generation, means you spare kids the propiganda about powerplants but instead teach once again elementary concepts in elementary school.
SOmething teh didactic research shows most gifted placement students are not even getting.
Drop a cup with a spring connected to a cork in water- what happens, is a classic such illustrating test. Yeah, my physics teacher got it wrong. I have gotten over it. I ran for the hills. He would do a little dance when I showed up once a month or so, for the one class of his I couldnt' drop.
He was smart. Only smart people can be so stupid. He didn't claim to be a newton. Yet we sat assembled as though he was. When even then much less time in front a boob tube watching a real actor portray newton would of let us stand on his shoulders, as i did, in th middle of the night, after continuing my education at one of the very best institutions of highest learning in the world, thathappened tohave a decent PBS station, that owuld air the call tech lectures with animations and dramatic portrayals fillign the can and only the pompoous ass for a few seconds at opening and close of each episode.
SO I started where Newton left off to the extent I could. WHich is where most people can start. Rocket science is after all for kids. Brain surgery is for machines now to do. All new power plants can be totally unneeed if we let people know how evil it is to turn there ignitions to thereh "trucks" as if saluting the flag. It's not other then missleading to say transit is only this portion of energy use.
People have large families out of desperation. That is fact. People die now because we lack the political will to let health be a right over which we should not pretend only to fight. War use of nuclear power isn't what creates it's evils, it's the notion that people want the kids they are having. They don't. This is also pureu fact. As control over reproduction comes to people they exercise it. Only stealing oil or paying off the loans for powerplants etc. requires more people to be born- nothing requires us to burn up the energy as if we need it to breathe.
This is not a place for how to generate it at lower cost. WIth the amount needed being outside the scope of discussion. Thi s is a political place. It at least should be about what is right. If you can't explain it to the people then this is the price we pay for raising a nation of illiterates, or it is you who is illiterate. I believe in being accountable. The alternative is being suffered all over the world, and has been for generations. We should aspire to better then it. We can. We must. Trust.
Posted by: karl (accepting the will of the people can be hard I know) | February 06, 2007 at 11:34 AM
Buddy, do you pronounce it "nuclear" or "nuke-you-ler"?
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 06, 2007 at 01:39 PM
Karl, could you please translate your posts before posting them? Thanks!
I liked that idea about replacing wheels with belts, if that is what you meant? Interesting.
Posted by: amazingdrx | February 06, 2007 at 01:42 PM
Ender: [You] asked me to provide 2 long lived fission products which I did.
Scroll back up, read again. I asked for two dangerous fission products with half lives on the order of a few thousand years, and I'd accept even one as lending credit to your "dangerous for 10.000 years" propaganda. You failed twice.
So this would be the same "glass" that
Actually not. They're talking about slightly used fuel, not waste. It is still a glass, though, and a similar glass refused to leak for 2 billion years at Oklo.
Again the false dichotomy of if it is not nuclear then it is dirty coal
If you are against both equally, you shouldn't be expressing any preference, especially not in that unscientific way you do. If you really think that Piddle Power could replace *both* coal and nuclear power... Errm, doesn't matter, you don't. If you truly believed that Piddle Power had merit, you wouldn't be inventing "facts".
I'm still waiting for something that supports the 10.000 years claim. But I'm not holding my breath.
Posted by: Udo Stenzel | February 06, 2007 at 06:03 PM
Udo - "Scroll back up, read again. I asked for two dangerous fission products with half lives on the order of a few thousand years"
1. The long half-life of technetium-99 and its ability to form an anionic species makes it (along with 129I) a major concern when considering long-term disposal of high-level radioactive waste. 99Tc (T1/2 = 2.1 x 105 years)
2. Not sure about Palladium 107
"Actually not. They're talking about slightly used fuel, not waste. It is still a glass, though, and a similar glass refused to leak for 2 billion years at Oklo."
How would you know this? Where is the research?
"If you are against both equally, you shouldn't be expressing any preference, especially not in that unscientific way you do"
So it's piddle power now? That is really scientific. I am for power options that do not leave a legacy for the future to clean up.
"I'm still waiting for something that supports the 10.000 years claim. But I'm not holding my breath."
Plutonium is pretty close:
"1% of the mass is 239Pu and 240Pu resulting from conversion of 238U, which may either be considered a useful by-product, or as dangerous and inconvenient waste."
"half-life of Pu-240 is 6,560 years and Pu-239 is 24,110 years,"
Posted by: Ender | February 06, 2007 at 09:32 PM
"So it's piddle power now? That is really scientific. I am for power options that do not leave a legacy for the future to clean up."
I'm sure you are, but it allways is the case that whenever a nuclear plant is closed a coal plant opens in its place.
When you consider the incredibly small amount of waste generated by a nuclear plant compared to a coal plant, nuclear leaves a much smaller 'legacy.'
Posted by: Dezakin | February 08, 2007 at 04:34 PM
So if anything I'm just prompted to deliver the caveat now.
HOpe this prompting isn't too far away from the place I mentioned it.
I've been scanning the empirical world, belt sanders and all, but have also suffered the realisation that there are three purposes served poorly by round air filled rubber wheeled contraptions.
The third one, is steering. However the need to steer at speed is not much of an issue, even so my entire point was that we waste most of the energy at low crusing speeds on rolling resistance. Using a different means to support the weight, to conquer the otherwise downward accelrating tendency of earth supported masses, then that which either steers well or changes the inertial energy of the mass quickly safely, consistently etc., is real insight.
Especially if it's other then air, if it doesn't rob one of the use of the ground to 'push' off of and 'grab back' onto. One of these days instead of telling peoplle not to flush some Rush is goign to say I want you to head east, acclerate for one minute, then all break at once. Done so in the right place, and one might topple buildings with it's aftermath.
I just left google video. There you can see a guy on a bike powered by modern batteries having to yield to slower cars. ALso closeups of the new wheel motors with internal gearing that does not just increase torque but of coourse allows some greater flywheel effect by turning that unsprung weight faster even at low sppeeds- especially when yhou need the centrifugal forces that is.
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He's athletic and frightened to, rightfully. The typical bike has the weight almost segway apart from the earth, and the center of mass getting lowered by hauling all that rolling resistance conquering stored energy around is not just the making of an expensive 'ruck sack' but a bag we need not suffer the mixing in of.
As a child I missed my sister, and imagined zooming horizontal down the highway on what flashlight cells perhaps. Now this is a reality. THe uk roads are quite different already, and he intrudes where pedestrians only are supposed to be just to prove the silence etc. The new video though shows the watts used in a bottom of your screen inset but more importantly however blurred the 72 volt contraption spins the drive wheel even at 25mph proving my point about trying to get a tire to do all three things not jous on a wet foot track loop fence over to climbed.
These video's are incredible. Cameras on helmets, on handlbars, turned down to show the wheel failing to spin the earth away from you for lack of weight, surface, and all that using a balloon to anchor or reel fails to do.
I propose the opposite of the segway. WE can engineer away rolling resistance. Once it is gone, man, you are now talking about high speed for practically walking energy beyond the turbulence. That means that you can go faster then the wind, without needing an extra bagel even. Even when it's blowing much too fast. Or when it's blowing in your general direction.
Like a boat.
Because we do notice the cost of traveling for commuting even. It's a myth that we don't. At least in my part of the world, the desert. This is why we don't sprawl sanely. Instead we live in little fortresses incompatible with what was here when we arrived, when we could easally just shared the ground.
So yeah, the watts are measured even with fat tires in three digits. Even at high speeeds. Not whata car, any car, suffers.
MOdern materials. Roads built to interface with them, of them. WHo among us spends any time in other then fiction thinking of this? We have to. Disnelyand none of us can afford more then a few weeks at annually. To bury our heads the rest of the year, to think that spending thousands there does not imprison us here, that is to lie, to ouselves, so cruelly.
As a kid I went there many times a year. The magic eventually fades. Now even there recruting pitch for staff perplexes more then amuses.
Vision. Give people what they want, not what they needed ages ago. A way to move faster, safer, cheaper, and moost of the other problems go away. Including GM's latest hustle, sacrificing the vulnerable with faith our religion of blaming victims shall keep them off the hook long enough for them to escape the shop at least.
It has, he of the inset wat meter etc, a bbc report showing tesla engineers- you know lioke the kids who show up to spend the night with someones 12 y.o. daughter on NBC, and there trademarked line about electric vehicles o ftgfhe past being for people who didn't want to drive.
As he goes fifty percent above the legal limit. (90mph)
Bragging about not a drop of gas. As if the paint....
Well.
Wheels are like motors, getgting a motor to be a wheel is not that impressive. Getting a way to surf the earth, that's more on target. Avoiding being crushed in a collision by avoiding the collision is what getting out of the box does I think. It also pays for lunch, every day, a good one. Maybe dinner to- even Champaigne, that means vinyards, to enjoy, routinely.
It is after all poor americans who use most of the petroleum. Who spend more then they tithe, who writhe not in joy, but wanting something else. Nobody will Tesla to there call center thankful for saving the time only going a mile a minute would of cost. But of course safety isn't just going slow, oh no.
It's being able to avoid getting hurt. One video is titled "80 volts" and has a mention of 80mph, but it's just a wheel, spinning horizontal on a motor, and just a guess. He's lucky it didn't 'explode' as car tires routinely do even on the road.
I'm not a part of that circle that hears this many amps and feels the commensurate rush with what the ancient designs might offer.
So I've made the proffer. A scientific city, would be much more then quite a ditty- might more then what's beyond it, what's plugged into it, what fisses and hopefull doesn't ever pop.
Insight can be a better mop. If only we could expect much more then less then any pathetic drop. Aspire to more then just the extra cop. Not fantasize about the super hop. But really drop to the ground and approach the spped of sound and be there without such need for care.
SO I stand by my suggestion. Lose the steering wheel as well. WHen not straight, just stop as it can faster then anything else could turn away, and then rotate. A tank for peace would be a carpet to accelerate to on the way to the market. A moving shelf for any elf. Levitation is a gimmick. FOr each of us, a little polymer here, and there, and we'll have nothing to truly fear.
Posted by: karl (meant to follow up on my wheels being obsolete comment....) | February 08, 2007 at 10:25 PM