Operated from 1972 to 1996 and produced 119 billion kilowatt hours of energy
Dry cask storage is a method for safely storing spent nuclear fuel after it has cooled for several years in water pools. Once the fuel rods are no longer producing extreme heat, they are sealed inside massive steel and concrete casks that provide both radiation shielding and passive cooling through natural air circulation—no water is needed. Each cask can weigh over 100 tons and is engineered to resist earthquakes, floods, fire, and even missile strikes. This makes it a robust interim solution until permanent deep geological repositories are available. The casks are expected to last 50–100 years, though the fuel inside remains radioactive for thousands. Dry cask storage reduces reliance on crowded spent fuel pools, provides a secure above-ground option, and buys time for nations to develop long-term disposal strategies. In essence, it’s a durable, self-contained “vault” for nuclear waste
I mean nuclear energy is fine and all, but i’d argue that solar is still better.
Think about it:
Cyanobacteria and their photosynthesis (essentially generating energy out of sunlight) was the foundational breakthrough that allowed life to expand all across the planet and feed multi-cellular organisms, give rise to the modern variety in life that we see.
Solar panels are like photosynthesis (kinda), just on a more technical level. If nuclear energy would have been significantly cheaper in the last few decades, solar energy might not have been developed in the first place, because there would have been no perceived need for it, so we’d be stuck with nuclear.
But it is important that solar energy is available, and so it’s a good thing that cheap nuclear power didn’t prevent solar energy from happening. We should be thankful.
The reason why nuclear is necessary is because of scale. Solar can’t scale up fast enough to even meet demand, let alone exceed it. Nuclear can. But both is good as well, we can do as much solar as we want and then make up the gap with nuclear.
Solar can’t scale up fast enough to even meet demand, let alone exceed it.
Based on what argument?
Math
Nuclear energy is downright silly. “These rocks get really hot when we put them close to each other, let’s boil water with it to turn turbines” lmao like something outta the scp foundation
Computers run on magic runes written in gold.
on top of that, the information represented within them modifies itself, like characters dancing around and shaping new patterns, hence the nickname of “dancing spirits”
Even weirder when you think about cpus. “Here’s a rock we filled with lightning and tricked into thinking.”
Pretty much all of our electricity is boiling water to spin turbines, even hydro except with that we wait for it to recondense to spin the turbine. Wind and solar are the only large scale exceptions, and even then some solar is boiling water instead of PV.
Even wind is just using a windmill to spin a turbine, Solar and some very limited small scale thermocouple power sources are our only non wheel based power sources.
Very odd and hyper simplified take on it.
What I don’t get is if the waste is emitting enough radiation to be harmful, why don’t we use it to make power.
Power generation is all about thermal differential.
If the differential is too low, then your power generation either doesn’t work or is incredibly inefficient.
Spent fuel is not radioactive enough to produce a large enough thermal differential to run steam turbines. In some cases it can be reprocessed through some expensive means and then used again. However, the key word here is expensive. It’s considerably more economical to use new fuel than it is to reprocess old fuel.
Breeding reactors are a thing but their economic viability is questionable.
Levels far to low to be viable energy sources can still be biologically harmful.
until permanent deep geological repositories are available
I have been growing up with the outlook that one day we might find these yet somehow this promise/hope still sounds exactly the same many many years later
I think the main reasoning why permanent solutions haven’t been “found” yet is because we still closetedly believe that we will find a better use for the waste if we just wait a few more decades.
it would be a shame to bury all that waste under 1000 meters of concrete now only to find out you can re-use these spent fuel rods for another round in the reactor in 2050.
In Germany we already found suitable places but lobby work and local governments worked against it and now it’s in moist mines in leaky barrels.
The problem with DGRs is the resistance from uninformed locals and environmental groups, on a technical level we know how to build them and how to make them safe.
I thought the problem was SEP fields. Because as soon as you’ve found an ideal location for a facility all the locals come out (probably in part funded by oil companies) and are like “this sounds great but not here”.
Americans also know how sloppy US contractors get.
Why not just mix it to trace amounts with sand and deposit in a biologically dead zone?
Outside the environment you mean?
Well, it’s usually planned deep underground (and in rock that’s unlikely to have water or earthquakes running through) in hopes of it remaining undeterred for as long as possible. If you were to dump it in the desert, then winds or the occasional rain might still carry it all over the place.
So I guess the high security double fencing is not necessary then?
“The casks are expected to last 50–100 years…”. Let’s see 2025-1972=53 years. Sounds like it is nearing time to start replacing these or to figure out a better solution to reuse the high level waste.
Behold: Breeding
I mean, breeder reactors…
Wow. That’s excellent perspective on how little waste nuclear plants create!
It’s even more efficient these days. French reactors produce miniscule amounts of waste
I’m pro-nuclear power. don’t get me wrong. but…spent nuclear fuel does not account for all the radioactive waste produced in fission power production. even the majority of it by mass or volume. low and intermediate radioactive waste represents a MUCH larger footprint
alright, low and medium level radioactive waste is large in volume, but it is low(er) in radioactivity. how dangerous is it really? what security mechanisms have to be present to ensure it doesn’t contaminate the landscape? Would it be okay to just dump it somewhere in the great canyon or the rocky mountains? Would it reasonably do any harm there?
Would it be okay to just dump it somewhere in the great canyon or the rocky mountains? Would it reasonably do any harm there?
I wouldn’t put it anywhere near a water table if you want to keep consuming that water.
it needs to be protected from weathering.
Yucca mountain was ideal for a lot of reasons - remoteness, stability, but I suspect there are many similar places - also mines. the good thing re: this waste vs fuel waste is it’s relatively low half life will render it ‘cool’ in a few hundred to a few thousand years.
Where does it go?
Yucca Mountain
up ya bum
Same goes for the industry behind making photoelectric panels, etc. Fusion would also have a lot of side waste due to neutron bombardment.
Same goes for the industry behind making photoelectric panels,
I’m not sure how to parse this. are you suggesting that PV production involves radionucleotides?
the recycling of photovoltaic panels has improved enormously over the last decade, and made huge leaps in just the last few years. In some ways, it’s becoming a focus for providing new panel production because the recycling can be quite profitable:
"In 2004, according to Germany’s state-owned Fraunhofer Society, Europe’s largest institute of applied-engineering research, one watt of solar power required about sixteen grams of polysilicon; this has dropped now to about two grams. As Hannah Ritchie, a data scientist and a senior researcher at Oxford University, calculated recently, “the silver used in one solar panel built in 2010 would be enough for around five panels today.”
re: Fusion - yeah, irradiated hardware is going to be a real thing, but we don’t really have much of an idea how much of it will be produced. to be determined imho.
Very much so. Anything that gets too hot has to be interred.
This makes it a robust interim solution until permanent deep geological repositories are available.
Molten Salt Reactors can mostly eat these; until the newer ones come out that can eat these more easily.
Technology will find a way, with proper resourcing.
Technology will find a way, with proper resourcing.
And research. It has been illegal to do research on nuclear power in some countries for decades. And then they go “SeE, nO iNnOvAtIoNs!”
Which countries?
Are you talking about illegalality to enrich to level beyond that required for civilian use?
This post is incorrect, and harmful. Casks do not only last for up to 100 years. They are given a 20 year certificate, and a renewable 40 year certificate inperpetuity pending safety inspection of the casket.
Edit: sorry, I thought you were arguing they dontast that long. My brain skipped the “only” at the beginning.
The image you linked literally says they last 100+ years. Sure, they need to be checked on to make sure nothing is going wrong, but when is that not the case with hazardous material storage?
That’s similar to what’s done with a lot of mine wastes, which are just as harmful, if not more.
Millions of tonnes of metal-rich tailings are held back at a given mine by their engineered dams. The only thing stopping a ‘tee hee whoops’ is routine inspection and maintenance, even in post-closure
It is not at all similar. Those mines were just sealed off from the outside world with the dangerous materials therein left to polluted surrounding ground waters. These are stand alone and separated containers meant to hold these wastes indefinitely, until such time as their half lives render them no longer a threat.
You’re thinking abandoned mines. Closed mines are different, and the difference is big. With closed mines the objective is to return the land to its preexisting land use or one that supports something else equally as valuable.
To do that, wastes are managed in a variety of ways. Usually the biggest issues are related to water quality and preventing contamination. Landscapes are re-established and reclaimed. It’s not just dust your hands and walk away like it used to be.
We have disposal technology, it just isn’t economical or politically supported: the material can be reprocessed, splitting it into the transuranic elements. The uranium and plutonium can be reused as fuel, americium and other elements with industrial use directed as such. The waste left that has no use can then be stored in a smaller footprint… And as a bonus to reprocessing, would only be hazardously radioactive for 150 years rather than thousands.
All that shit costs money. Just toss the waste wherever and wait for public funds to appear, amiright?
But when 8 years of wind turbine blades pile up its not a problem?
So is nuclear waste yet plenty of people here seem to act like that’s not relevant despite more nuclear waste being reprocessed than decommissioned wind turbines.
nuclear waste is more recyclable than wind turbines?
Maybe it has more subsidies for recycling?
If these float, these could make some awesome artificial islands or parts of piers. Could also form the basis for reefs with a bit of modification.
They’re glass reinforced epoxy (plastic). Id rather not add those to the ocean except in the form of floating boats.
there’s an awful lot of people here that don’t understand volume over output. this is a small amount for 24 years when compared to the volume of toxic waste that fossil fuel plants put out.
Even the amount of radiation is lower, as coal power plants output quite a bit of radioactive material
Doesn’t seem like much, tbh
It really isn’t burning coal etc. Will kill way more people and do way more damage than just having this sit around chilling
What ever happened to Yucca Mountain? I thought that was supposed to solve America’s nuclear waste problem for good.
They’ve been talking about that since I was in primary school in the 1980s.
The problem is the weak railroad and interstate infrastructure. There are too many derailments and crumbling bridges to transport such ‘hot’ materials safely. There’s also the danger of hijacking and making of dirty bombs.
If the cylinders in the OP can withstand missile strikes (supposedly) why would a derailment be a problem?
Because mountain > missile
/j
Probably what happens to all these projects.
Maybe Nevadans don’t want that in their backyard? Or maybe they oughta at least get serious compensation for it.
But they don’t get a say.
For what? The existence of something?
“Not in my back yard” is the biggest cause of so many issues in the world. Get over it.
For argument’s sake, let’s say you live near a disposal/storage site.
It’s underfunded, so it leaks into the groundwater. Or maybe they don’t catch a leak in time. You develop cancer because of radiation because you live close to the storage/disposal site.
It’s not an uncommon scenario. Fracking has done this with wastewater being pumped back into the ground (https://news.yale.edu/2022/08/17/proximity-fracking-sites-associated-risk-childhood-cancer), and even places like Whidbey Island in Washington state have dealt with forever chemicals leeching into their groundwater (https://www.whidbeynewstimes.com/news/navy-expands-testing-of-wells-for-forever-chemical/). Yes, we need a storage site, but people should have a say about what is stored near where they live… whether it makes a difference or not.
You’re not wrong in that people should have a say in what is stored where. But…
I can’t say that no one lives near Yucca Mountain but almost no one lives close to it.
Yucca Mountain was considered because its a mountain of solid granite without an aquifer under it.
I love how you take the sins of the fossil companies and try to make nuclear responsible for their actions. It’s almost like the problem is the unhinged capitalism and lack of regulation and not the nuclear power itself.
Nuclear is great. I never said it wasn’t. My point is that no storage solution is perfect and communities should have a say in what is stored near them.
Comparing fracking to nuclear waste is comparing apples to oranges. These are literally one of the most carefully handled materials in the world. We aren’t just dumping them in a pit and forgetting about them.
I’m not anti nuclear by any means. All I pointed out was that people should have a say in something that has the potential to cause health impacts on their communities.
It would be nice to see a comparison with the waste generated by other sources, over the same period and the same amount of energy generated
Why? That waste we mostly don’t need to worry about. This waste will be deadly for thousands of years…
The global heating caused by coal will be deadly as well but on a much more global scale.
Don’t forget the coal ash, which is something to worry about.
Yeah, no need to worry about the billions of tons of C02 that has been pumped into the atmosphere…
You could make out with those casks for 5 minutes every day and not suffer any ill effects. Unlike any of the byproducts from coal.
What waste are you referring to that you think does not need to be worried about?
The byproducts from solar panels and wind turbines.
Edit: the impacts of storage production are probably a way more fair comparison and I will still put Lithium-based battery production as less harmful than this type of waste that requires long term storage I doubt our species to be capable of.
No, we do need to worry about those. The company producing them just doesn’t need to put in any effort to contain them, and the public has to deal with it. Nuclear is largely so expensive because they have to be incredibly safe, to an honestly ridiculous degree. Meanwhile other power production just throws their hazerdous waste around and let’s everyone else deal with it so they can continue to make a larger profit.
Still waste, and some non radioactive waste can remain dangerous too. Maybe not as bad and for a shorter amount of time, but still.
I think it would be nice to see, to put things into perspective.
If you’re worried about nuclear waste affecting your life in any negative fashion, don’t go outside and breathe the air or stand anywhere close to a radio transmitter.
Blatant misinformation, there are so many resources you could read or watch to better inform yourself, but you have, at this point, deliberately chosen not to.
