[savant_penguin]

The problem is what to do with the nuclear waste you constantly produce. And the risks associated with having a new Fukushima in your hands. And the proliferation of nuclear technology.

That said it still seems better than many alternatives

[ceejayoz]

> The problem is what to do with the nuclear waste you constantly produce.

We know what to do with it. Bury it, deep and somewhere remote. The US already has such a place: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_r...

[pbak]

Indeed, but then how long does your moral responsibility last. Will the United State exist in a thousand year ? Will there still be an organization to monitor the place for leaks ? How deep is deep enough ?

Also, what about Not the United States ? It seems everybody is synchronizing policies, if you hear the rumblings out of the European Commission. Where are they gonna store the wast ?

[ceejayoz]

Europe has similarly suitable sites.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repo...

The stuff stored in these facilities is not magic. It doesn't get up and run around. The sites are selected to be deep enough and to be resilient to leaks. I'm more concerned with our culpability for melting the world's glaciers and ice caps than the risk of someone digging up barrels miles deep a thousand years from now.

[pbak]

Thank you about the Onkalo site. I didn't know about it. Do you know if Russians have anything similar planned closer to Europe, in the Oural for example (iirc the oldest geological region in Europe) ? I could only find Krasnoyarsk on the web.

On your other info : I don't know about culpability. I'm passing the 40 year old mark, and I don't remember my generation, or the generations right before mine having enough influence on such matters until very recently.

These choices were made much earlier, by within your framing I'd say more culpable age brackets, and which are slowly let's say "disappearing".

What remains, in my opinion, for people currently in charge of affairs, and in the future, is a matter of responsibility to all future generations. We most certainly know what's what now, and the ethical and moral calculus is publicly in evidence, as a consequence of, amongst other such operations, the Greta Thundberg UN tour.

Again, not arguing against nuclear. If we do it, I'd say let's not create new problems out because we're too sure of our probability projections... As pointed elsewhere, we were due for an Ice Age. That might still happen down the line, whatever happens to surface human politics. Let's make sure somebody's there to check for such leaks down the line, and that it's easy to access.

Once we decide we won't make matters worse now, why stop at that ? Let's make sure we don't make them worse down the line out of some new error.

[ceejayoz]

The Russians seem to opt for "chuck it in the water somewhere".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Karachay

https://www.vice.com/en/article/vbn9e9/the-soviet-union-dump...

[pbak]

Thanks !

[effie]

We know how to store the waste now and we can keep doing the same for hundred years. Why would it become a problem later? Is people IQ going to drop? It is a pure straw man to ask about what happens with waste monitoring in thousand years from now.

[pbak]

I'm not arguing against nuclear. I'm arguing for doing it better.

And a straw man ? Really ? I'd argue that the real hazard here is precisely such an off-hand moral position as you seem to have. Either that, or you think current civilization will stay as is, only progress.

IIRC, the Yuka mountain folks did indeed take such questions into account when designing the facility, as they though not doing so would be irresponsible. Moreover, barring climate change, we're statistically due for the start of an ice age sometime this century or the next. That would most certainly cover northern Europe.

So it's not a question of IQ, but of the stability of the civilization occupying a territory in the very long term. That could have major repercussions on any maintenance organization.

My questions would be, why even design such deep structures if it's now to take into account generations in the far future ? Solutions could be much simpler for nuclear fuel disposal.

[effie]

The discussion on problems associated with naive future people digging nuclear waste from hundreds of meters in the ground is not relevant for our current environmental and social problems. If you want to discuss our responsibility to people after civilization disappears, please find a different discussion page for it. This one is about nuclear energy being relevant part of energy policy in coming years and decades.

Regarding doing it better, that is commendable but some waste will always be generated, we can't just burn the fuel down into non-radioactive state.

[stjohnswarts]

Lol human civilization won't be around at all in a thousand years if we don't do it with all the climate change occurring.

[josefresco]

not yet!

"In the meantime, most nuclear power plants in the United States have resorted to the indefinite on-site dry cask storage of waste in steel and concrete casks.[14]"

Our local region just fought to shut down a plant, and now the fight continues on where to ship (or not) the waste. In the meantime of course, they're fighting over these short term store options which have guarantees of only 25 years.

[throwawayboise]

Breeder reactors can produce less waste. You can cask it and store it on site if nothing else. It's not a major issue.

[insert_coin]

The proliferation of nuclear technology is a good thing.