One thing I've always wondered is why no one seems to have suggested just sending it off into space?
M -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Keith Hudson Sent: Sunday, February 24, 2013 1:43 PM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION; pete Subject: Re: [Futurework] Washington State nuclear waste leak At 09:12 24/02/2013, Pete wrote: >(PV) 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. (KH) Our equivalent in the UK is Sellafield with scores of waste tanks (some leaky) contaning radioactive liquids of long half-life that should have been sequestered decades ago. One of the reasons why a solution has not yet been found is the poor quailty of scientists and engineers attracted to a career in nuclear projects. Whereas, 70 years ago, it took dozens of the world's most brilliant physicists to construct the nuclear bomb, today, most UK universities (201 out of 203) eschew teaching nuclear engineering because they can't attract students of any calibre. Our Nuclear Inspectorate has been under strength. >(PV) 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. (KH) I didn't know the above, but the point is taken -- apart from "zero" risk. >(PV) 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. (KH) One 60 year-old mistake is that no insurance corp has yet agreed to cover nuclear reactors. Another fact of the last 60 years is that no civil engineering firm that has been all too eager to design and build a reactor has yet agreed to run them and to supply electricity at the price stated on the tin (that is, the low price that politicians keep on telling us is the real price) -- or indeed to run them at all. What's more -- considerably more -- is that the cost of sequestering radioactive wastes year after year, or rather century after century, has never yet been estimated and published. (Even glassified blocks, buried at very deep level has to be inspected regularly so that its safety for hundreds of generations of humans is assured.) The long and the short of both of the above facts is that nuclear power has had to be subsidised before, during, and after construction. We've never been given the true costs of nuclear-generated electricity. Keith > -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-und > erground-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 _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
