[qnleigh]

> use rockets to slowly launch the waste into space. We can already design a storage capsule that can survive re-entry.

Do you have a source in mind for this claim? Even if a capsule could survive reentry, surely it wouldn't survive impact.

[cyberax]

Yes. We're _already_ launching nuclear waste into space, in the form of RTGs with Pu-238. So there's been a lot of work towards making them passively safe, although the weight constraints for deep-space craft necessarily limit the amount of achievable safety.

> Even if a capsule could survive reentry, surely it wouldn't survive impact.

It'll be moving at a terminal velocity, and can be engineered to not fragment on impact.

For example, I remember reading about a proposal to alloy the nuclear waste elements with a carrier metal like iron or nickel, and then cover them in an ablative graphite shell.

[maxerickson]

The Pu-238 in Rtgs is produced for the purpose, it isn't isolated from waste.

Of course it is more or less equivalent when it comes to handling.