It's not a hot topic now but it was once in the news. Never hear of it any more. I wonder what great solutions have been found to deal with disposing of it safely? My thoughts back then (1970's ?) was to pack as much of it as possible on a one way rocket and blast it into the sun. It could even be a cooperative project between all the 'nuclear' countries. Would this make nuclear (or nucular, as Bush would miss-say) energy too expensive to be practical? It would certainly be a permanent fix! What say you?
Oh... I just thought-- they did find an answer to the problem didn't they. They now make bullets with the stuff, right? :confused:

It's not a hot topic now but it was once in the news. Never hear of it any more. I wonder what great solutions have been found to deal with disposing of it safely? My thoughts back then (1970's ?) was to pack as much of it as possible on a one way rocket and blast it into the sun. It could even be a cooperative project between all the 'nuclear' countries. Would this make nuclear (or nucular, as Bush would miss-say) energy too expensive to be practical? It would certainly be a permanent fix! What say you?
Oh... I just thought-- they did find an answer to the problem didn't they. They now make bullets with the stuff, right? :confused:

Bad, bad idea and just as bad science!

First, do have any idea how much nuclear waste is currently being held awaiting deposition? Thousands of tons. Do you have any idea what it costs to launch a ton into space? And even worse, what about a missile accident? One that either explodes on launch or falls back to the ground?

And you are certainly confused alright about your "bullets." Obviously you are thinking of depleted uranium which has nothing to do with nuclear waste.

Perhaps a little bit of research would do you a tremendous amount of good.

how about a solution:
a bio-engineered organism that eats radioactive debris?

I saw a documentary on TV a few months ago about how Sweden is dealing with their nuclear waste. They're tunneling deep into the ground (as there is a lot of deep rock in Sweden) and keeping it stored under pools of water (you could apparently swim there, as long as you didn't swallow any). It was all pretty high tech and seemed well done, which is typical of Sweden. There is an inevitable change coming (from coal and oil), but many countries don't seem to want to start spending the money necessary for this change, which is the thing, because dealing with nuclear waste needs to be done well.

how about a solution:
a bio-engineered organism that eats radioactive debris?If this thread had a prize for "ignorant of facts" ideas, it would be tough to know if you or Mogul should get it.

If you want to see some informed discussion, see Edufer's or my discussion of a few days ago in the "World's ice cover is melting" thread of the Earth Sciences forum.

It's not a hot topic now but it was once in the news. Never hear of it any more. I wonder what great solutions have been found to deal with disposing of it safely? My thoughts back then (1970's ?) was to pack as much of it as possible on a one way rocket and blast it into the sun. It could even be a cooperative project between all the 'nuclear' countries. Would this make nuclear (or nucular, as Bush would miss-say) energy too expensive to be practical? It would certainly be a permanent fix! What say you?
Oh... I just thought-- they did find an answer to the problem didn't they. They now make bullets with the stuff, right? :confused:

The easiest solution is to not generate the waste in the first place. We've always known how to accomplish this.

"Depleted uranium is what is left over when most of the highly radioactive types (isotopes) of uranium are removed for use as nuclear fuel or nuclear weapons."

So this isn't nuclear waste? Well, ok. My ideas were just to kick around. You know, to see if anyone had ideas about how it could be done, for instance. So, ah- lighten up guys!

Peace

They now make bullets with the stuff, right? :confused:

Not really a 'bullet', a DU projectile is about 30mm wide, javelin shaped, from 100mm to 900mm long. Sometimes with discarding fin stabilisation, and sometimes a copper tip, which vapourises on impact, and the resultant plasma helps defeat armour.

And that is Depleted Uranium, not nuclear waste. You can't say 'nuclear', 'Uranium' or 'Radiation' without people making jokes about two headed animals.

If you want to see some informed discussion, see Edufer's or my discussion of a few days ago in the "World's ice cover is melting" thread of the Earth Sciences forum.
how about an excerpt. i been to the thread, it's 11 pages.

how about an excerpt. i been to the thread, it's 11 pages.OK. See the two extracts below. See more between 12 and 19 dec in the Earth Sciencs forum's thread "World's ice caps are melting"

PS: With MetaKron's entry into the "Ignorant Ideas" contest, we now have a three way tie for first place! (His assertion that we know ways to avoid waste is contradicted by all known societies. In fact, about the only things we know about many is what archeologist have found in their trash dumps! Each succeeding society seems to more than double the waste produced by the prior one that lived on that land. For US vs. Am. Indians, the waste per capita has increased more than an order of magnitude!)

ON 19Dec at 40 minutes past the hour, Edufer posted:

"...one of the most abundant radioactive waste in the world, especially in USA and Europe: Back in 1988, Walter Marshall, Lord Marshall of Goring and chairman of Britain’s Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) said once in the House of Commons:

“Earlier this year, British Nuclear Fuels released into the Irish Sea some 400 kg of uranium, with the full knowledge of the regulators. This attracted considerable media attention and, I believe, some 14 parliamentary questions.”
“I have to inform you that yesterday the CEGB released about 300 kg of radioactive uranium, together with all of its radioactive decay products, into the environment. Furthermore, we released some 300 kg of uranium the day before that. We shall be releasing the same amount of uranium today, and we plan to do the same tomorrow. In fact, we do it every day of every year so long as we burn coal in our power stations. And we do not call that “radioactive waste”. We call it coal ash.”

The same thing happens in the USA and the rest of the world. As Dr. Dixie Lee Ray {head of US's AEC} said once: “Of all industries, the nuclear industry alone has taken responsibility for its wastes from the beginning. Yet, ironically, it is the one industry most often criticized for its waste management practices.”

ON 12 Dec I had posted at 56 past the hour:

As for the storage problem, I think it dangerous as currently done in US, basically on site - a tempting target for terrorists, but it could be safely shipped to 4 or 5 central well guarded facilities and stored for roughly a decade to let the shorter half-life isotopes decay. Then, it should be glassified (mixed with glass) to form a disk about an inch thick and foot in diameter*, so steady state temp is no more than 100 degrees C, which are then coated with a thin layer of pure glass - thick enough to stop the Alpha particles. Ships with disk-hurling slings etc or air guns, on their sterns steaming above a deep ocean trench should then send them on a billion year trip much deeper into the earth. (The disk shape, instead of balls insures that they will not roll to any one low point and disperse much more that the ship can throw them. Glass is very strong in compression and will take any pressure the deepest trench can provide.) I.e. IMHO, the waste is not a big problem and we can solve it with less than the current risk.
______________________________________________
*The total long life-time isotopes produce by an "all electric" set of about 25 US familes, during the entire life of each member (100 years and 100 people), will fit in one disk!

what does that have to do with being "ignorant of facts" by suggesting a bio-engineered organism for digesting nuclear waste?

what does that have to do with being "ignorant of facts" by suggesting a bio-engineered organism for digesting nuclear waste? Even while inside the finite life organism, the gamma rays still come out.

All chemical processes, including the subset that we call biology, do absolutely nothing to the nuclear decay rates. The use of living organism could internally stop some alpha particles, while they lived, but so would several layers of newspaper and one would not need to worry that the newspaper was attracted to your food and then you digested the "organism" letting your tissue be what stopped the alphas. Hard to imagine a more dumb idea. Only as Edufer suggest in the other thread, can you destroy / reduce the radioactivity - it is immune to all chemistry.

The basic ignorance is in the false idea that radioactivity is destroyed by digestion!

I read somewhere that high level nuclear waste generates so much heat that it can melt lead and they have to store it in insulated containers. So why don't they throw it into water and make steam to generate electricity?

I'm probably wrong. Tell me where.

I read somewhere that high level nuclear waste generates so much heat that it can melt lead and they have to store it in insulated containers. So why don't they throw it into water and make steam to generate electricity?

I'm probably wrong. Tell me where.

Getting radioisotopes to produce heat is the hard part, you wouldn't throw away a blend of material that does this!

To get a reactor to produce heat, you need to slow down the reaction, using a technique called moderation. (basically, slowing emitted nuetrons, so they have more time to interact with other nucleii, and increase the yield from the chain reaction). The slowing of the nuetrons releases their kinetic energy as heat, which is absorbed by water, usually. There are also 'control rods' which are inserted into the core, to regulate the reaction.

So, a blend of material that produced heat, that did not require constant monitoring, moderation, and control, would be a godsend to the nuclear power industry! You wouldn't go throwing it away.

The basic ignorance is in the false idea that radioactivity is destroyed by digestion!
instead of going crazy with typing you could have stated the above sentence.

instead of going crazy with typing you could have stated the above sentence.Sorry - Retired professors tend to be long winded, but I want to make point that ALL CHEMISTRY, not just digestion can do nothing to decrease the rate of radioactive decay.

Related to last two posts: Chemisty can concentrate a particular radio active source so it will be come quite hot ("red hot" is probably possible, but not done). This can (and has) been done to provide long-lasting, but very expensive, power sources for deep-space missions. (SNAP thermo-electric generators. etc.)

Sorry - Retired professors tend to be long winded, but I want to make point that ALL CHEMISTRY, not just digestion can do nothing to decrease the rate of radioactive decay.

eh, don't worry about it, it was a lame ass idea anyway ( the organism )

Aside from the costs of launching nuclear wastes into orbit away from Earth, look at the risks. If the rocket were to blow up before it reached far outside our upper atmosphere (exosphere), then it would all just come back to rain down upon us.

I think the best solution is to seal it as best as possible and to store it in the least earthquake zones in the world (plate tectonics).

...I think the best solution is to seal it as best as possible and to store it in the least earthquake zones in the world (plate tectonics).I do not know, but would assume that the deep ocean trenches (Places where edges of converging plates both are moving down towards the core -I think) would be much better than "least earthquake zones," as I think they must be relatively active earthquake zones. Not only because they would receive a one way ticket for at least a billion year trip out of the biosphere, but also because I doubt we are sure of the locations of "least earthquake zones."

For example, some time in the geologically recent past, the Mississippi Rivers was shifted about 10 miles sideways by one of the strongest earthquakes known. Another very strong one hit near Charleston SC. For all we know, a currently though to be "least earthquake zones" may have an earthquake next month that is even bigger. I think it true that (to paraphrase from boxing jargon) The less often they come, the bigger they are.

Do you have anything bad to say about my suggestion that glassified disks with high-level, but long half life, isotopes concentrated to make disks have temperature of about that of boiling water simply be thrown from the stern of a ship, one at a time, every second in a changing arc pattern avoiding disk collisions, while ship "steams" over a deep ocean trench?

I do not know, but would assume that the deep ocean trenches (Places where edges of converging plates both are moving down towards the core -I think) would be much better than "least earthquake zones,"

BAD idea! Saltwater is corrosive, and there is incredible pressure down there. Making a vessel to withstand these conditions would be incredibly difficult, and the results of a breach catastrohpic!

Best to put them in some nice dry cave, and forget about them.

BAD idea! Saltwater is corrosive, and there is incredible pressure down there. Making a vessel to withstand these conditions would be incredibly difficult, and the results of a breach catastrohpic!...Wrong.

The deepest diving vessels are glass spheres, not steel ones, as glass in compression is stronger than steel, which is more ductile and flows under lesser pressure. Note I am suggesting small SOLID glass disks, not a much larger glass bubble sphere with man inside!

The disk I described in earlier post will not break etc. at the bottom of the deepest known trench, or even in one ten times deeper, if it existed. In some sense, many rocks 50 miles deep are glass! When the disks are 10 or more miles deep, they probably will have, like rocks at that depth, had some "plastic flow" but still be well defined "inclusions" in newly forming rocks.

You speak of "vessel." - Perhaps you have not read my original post? (Glass disks I suggest are about an inch or two thick and approximately a foot in diameter with a thin outer layer of isotope-free pure glass that stops the alpha particles. (This only for ease of handling as the range in water of alpha particles is about a millimeter or less.)

These disk will soon be buried in sea floor sediment and in 10,000 years or so be deeper by tectonic plate movements. It is true that salt water is corrosive. Probably in 100,000 years most of the outer pure-glass layer will have dissolved. So what?

Even if 10,000 glass disks ENTIRELY dissolved in the first week, that would make an almost undetectable increase in ocean water radiation from natural isotopes already dissolved in sea water!

Note also that most of the mineral water sold in bottles has more radioactivity per liter than this would add to the ocean. In Brazil the radioactive content of mineral water must be disclosed on the label. The one I drank a few minutes ago had 5.7 “maches” in each liter, but I have no idea how “maches” relates to the units I do know. If you drink “mineral water“, you too drink radioactive water.

My question here is, why bother about the deep ocean trench and all that matter? Can't we just grind the waste into powder and throw it down the crater of an active volcano? Most radioactive elements are very dense and when they melt in the crater they should sink down deep into the earth's crust.

Unless the volcano erupts, then it's a different matter.

My question here is, why bother about the deep ocean trench and all that matter? Can't we just grind the waste into powder and throw it down the crater of an active volcano? Most radioactive elements are very dense and when they melt in the crater they should sink down deep into the earth's crust.

Unless the volcano erupts, then it's a different matter.

Well... Since you've already said "active", wouldn't you expect it to erupt???? :D

Ahhh, lets use the oceans as a dumping ground for all our waste. They're so huge that we'll never run out of space...........

Ahhh, lets use the oceans as a dumping ground for all our waste. They're so huge that we'll never run out of space...........Not true. (I assume you are kidding but answer just in case not.) Also I think that is exactly what NYC does. - I think they have several large barges that make the trip to an off shore deep point daily.

could you send it through some kind of "cyclotron", a device that causes it to lose electrons and or protons?

could you send it through some kind of "cyclotron", a device that causes it to lose electrons and or protons?I am not sure what "it" is referring to. If you are speaking of radioactive isotopes, I think the only way they can be changed into non radioactive ones is inside an nuclear reactor by absorbing neutrons or perhaps by induced fission.

In the distant future, (just kidding, I think), an electrically charged (so it could be dynamically contained) small black hole might be nice. You could feed trash into it at a rate required to just compensated for its evaporation and run your city on the high quality Hawking radiation constantly coming out. Who said: Garbage in - Garbage out? - some jerk no doubt. ;)

But to answer your question - no a cyclotron can accelerate charged particle, but much better machines exist for this now. When mater loses electrons, it can become a plasma, but that takes a lot of energy and we do not know how to contain one that is hot enough to process trash. (Colder ones exist in your florescent lights, contained by glass walls that do not get very hot at all.)

BillyT, seems you're in love with your idea so much you can't see the flaws. Pressure, right, you're just going to dump this stuff and not monitor the environment you drop it into? Because we are incapable of getting equipment to the bottom of these deep trenches, so it would be incredibly irresponsible to just dump stuff there and hope for the best.

Burying stuff. How do you know it will stay buried? Any vessel (glass sphere/disc, whatever) needs to be securely anchored, because if it works free, and is subject to any movement it will wear. Glass, will turn to sand, and shift. I don't know how you think you can bury stuff at this depth, because again, it comes back to operating machinery at great depths. (10Km down, in the deepest trenches!)

You seem to forget that we don't just have the radioactivity to be concerned about if a containment vessel fails, but that heavy metals are incredibly poisonous too.

You talk about concentrations, well, how much nuclear waster are we talking about disposing of? Numbers please, close approximations will suffice, as I doubt accurate figures are readily available, because of the sensitive nature of the data. Also, take into account that any leak will not instantly be dissolved across the entire world's oceans, and that local concentrations will be much, much higher, and consider that environmental impact.

Also, the idea that you place anything sensitive near an active geological feature, and hope for the best, it totally absurd. Trenches are near volcanic activity, how can you guarantee the motion of vessels placed near them?

...we are incapable of getting equipment to the bottom of these deep trenches, so it would be incredibly irresponsible to just dump stuff there and hope for the best. Not sure, but I think we can. Certainly not steel submarines, etc. but things inside glass spheres (lights and cameras etc) I think have already been to the bottom of the deepest trenches. This is way out of my field and I am just recalling newspaper and popular science magazine article, not peer reviewed journal reports. As I recall, it was an automated glass sphere from Woods Hole that went to the bottom, took a few photos of nothing unfortunately, and then dropped the external iron weights held by electromagnet to bob back to surface about a day later.

Burying stuff. How do you know it will stay buried? Any vessel (glass sphere/disc, whatever) needs to be securely anchored, because if it works free, and is subject to any movement it will wear. Glass, will turn to sand, and shift. I don't know how you think you can bury stuff at this depth, because again, it comes back to operating machinery at great depths. (10Km down, in the deepest trenches!) I never suggested burying it. Just throw the disks overboard. They will settle to bottom, and sit there until the downward motion of the converging plates takes them miles into the interior of the earth. Why would a disk 10 times thinner than diameter roll on nearly flat surface to some other place? So what if it did? The deep ocean trenches have essentially zero current. In some places it must be less than one foot /per week. No where inside the trench is it enough to pick up and move a flat disk. Forget this straw man objection, which you have suggested about machinery burying the disks in the trenches. I expect that dead bodies and whale shit etc. will slowly cover them in a few years, but do not think it important if (or if not) this is true.

containment vessel fails, but that heavy metals are incredibly poisonous too.No "containment vessel" - a solid glass disk.
The quantity of heavy metals added to ocean in 1000 years of this even if it all dissolved would not be a detectable increase in the ocean concentration. One third world car battery plant is discharging more lead into the ocean in one year than 1000 years of this would do, and that plant is not producing a detectable increase in the natural lead concentration of the ocean!

The increase in radioactivity of the ocean in 1000 years again making the ridiculous assumption that it all dissolves, would be detectable, not because there would be an appreciable increase, but only because one would be able to discover some new lines with a gamma ray spectrograph (large NaI crystal detectors that convert gamma rays into light flashes and then the total intensity of that light is measured. - I have worked with them.)

You talk about concentrations, well, how much nuclear waste are we talking about disposing of? Numbers please, close approximations will suffice, as I doubt accurate figures are readily available, because of the sensitive nature of the data. Also, take into account that any leak will not instantly be dissolved across the entire world's oceans, and that local concentrations will be much, much higher, and consider that environmental impact. Vitrification of high-level wastes has been extensively studied, both in theory and in pilot plants as it is very attractive, not an original idea of mine. All I am suggesting is larger , hotter disks thrown into ocean above deep trench instead of stored in a cave etc.
About 25 years ago I read an extensive study by the old AEC, (I forget name, but years prior to the formation of the Dept. of Energy.) They concluded that a vitrified disk smaller than a hockey puck would hold (and not even be significantly warmer than the ambient) all the high-level waste a family would produce in the lifetime of all its members. This is the basis of my claim that disk about 1 to 2 inches thick and at least a foot in diameter, which were at approximately 100 degrees C, could do the same for 100 families. (Probably could be much hotter but I do not want any cracking by thermal shock, even if thrown into artic water.) Sorry, but I do not have numbers but bet you can find them if you search. It is necessary to store the radioactive waste on land about 10 years to let the isotopes with lifetimes of 3 or 4 years or less decay before vitrification.


Also, the idea that you place anything sensitive near an active geological feature, and hope for the best, it totally absurd. Trenches are near volcanic activity, how can you guarantee the motion of vessels placed near them? I am no expert in volcanology, but strongly suspect that upwelling of magma etc is found most every where except where two plates are coming together with little mutual friction and now moving towards the center of the Earth. (If there is volcanic activity associated with trenches, I think it must be on both sides, miles from the trench, where the plates are bending to flow in a radial direction downward in the trench.) where the plates are spearating and deeper material is flowing radially away from center of the Earth there is great volcanic activity. (Mid Atlantic ridge is example. A few years ago new sterial island, Surdsy, was created. Great opportunit for biologist to watch life forms colinize it.) My idea that where the radial flow is in the opposite direction there should be little volcanic activity is mainly based on ignorance of the field, but in part on the simple idea that if "radially up" makes lots of volcanos, then "radial down" should make few or none.

Some else suggested that we simply throw the waste into molten magma where it is emerging slowly form the Earth and trust the heavy metals to sink towards the center of the Earth as iron did in the early history of the Earth. I would prefer this also be concern be evaluated by experts, but again I think that we do not know where all the valcanos and large earthquakes will be in the next 100,000 years, (so storage anywhere except a deep ocean trench may be a bad idea) but we can be confident that long before that, my disks will be just begining their more than billion year trip deeper into the Earth, safely removed from the biosphere. The biosphere may not exist when the stable elements those isotopes decay into return to the Earth's surface, assuming there still is an Earth. :eek: