I disagree, in as much as problems at Hanford do not reflect anything about the current state of nuclear technology. Hanford is not a commercial power station, it is a federal research establishment and part of the weapons infrastructure. The closest Canadian equivalent would be Chalk River, but there is really no equivalent as we made no attempt to refine isotopes for weapons in Canada.
But Chalk River was a reasearch institute active during the early years of exploring nuclear energy, and it also has great warehouses full of hazardous materials. We have learned much from the activities in these projects, and no one today would consider storing nuclear wastes as liquids in tanks, certainly not from power plants, which shouldn't produce such material. Canadian heavy water reactors, which I might remind you, can run quite happily on what is considered the spent fuel of a US light water reactor, typically run on unenriched uranium, which requires no exotic processing to prepare, and when spent, in a CANDU reactor, it is really quite spent, and can be prepared as a solid waste block encapsulated in glass, and stored underground in the same mines from which it was extracted, nested in gravel beds in the Canadian Shield, where there is zero risk of groundwater contamination nor exposure via earthquakes or whathaveyou. I don't have any really strong opinions about the adoption of nuclear energy one way or the other, but most criticisms I hear of the industry just aren't up to speed with the current state of the technology. Pointing at 60 year old mistakes as a reason to dismiss the current technology makes no sense. -Pete On Sun, 24 Feb 2013, Keith Hudson wrote: > It was good to read this because I think it comes just at the right time to > permanently affect new build in the advanced countries. The news of these > leaks comes on top of the realization of universal shale gas and ought now to > finally stop the bleatings (and false propaganda) of the wannabe power station > constructors (who, be it noted, are not the slightest bit interested in > running them once built). > > Keith. > > > At 21:56 23/02/2013, Natalia wrote: > > Most of you have probably read this by now. Given what this news reveals, > > how can more new builds of such plants be justified? > > > > http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57570857/wash-state-governor-6-underground-nuclear-tanks-leaking/ > > > > Natalia > > _______________________________________________ > > Futurework mailing list > > [email protected] > > https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework > > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework > > _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
