If radioactive waste emits heat, why can’t we use it to produce energy?
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Pulling my comment forward as a direct answer- the short answer is yes it COULD be used – similar to home geothermal- to heat a water loop. Unlike a home geothermal water loop, you can’t extract heat from a home with this.
The more important question is SHOULD you. Cesium 137 is one of the main waste products and happens to be highly water soluble. When it’s in the soil, it makes it’s way into the ground water. So the more places you have this waste, the more places you have to secure from risk: environmental contamination, theft, fire, exposure to people, on and on. Also if it’s in any sort of vessel/container that’s not sealed – say one that’s got a water loop attached to it, that’s additional risk for leaking, weld failing, vessel becoming compromised…
Maybe you could weld it into a stainless steel cask and stick that in another vessel which you flow the water around, but that’s a lot of thermal mass to heat up… or you got to put a lot of “hot stuff” in there to make it worth it, and then hope the water stays flowing…
tl:dr – yes it’s possible, but the costs & risks outweigh the rewards
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