If nuclear is one of ways to obtain green energy, what are the byproducts of the experience and how do we sustainably rid ourselves of said byproducts safely?
In: Engineering
Tough issue. First one has to understand half life. Half life is the amount of time half of a sample takes to decay. Say something has a half life of 1 day. After one day half of the material would decay, another day and half of tje half would decay, etc. Two points should stand out. The first is that isotopes with short half lives are more dangerous because they are decaying faster but become less harmful faster. Isotopes like U238 have a half life of 4 billion years. The stuff is radioactive forever but most people are surprised to find that the material is not dangerous because the decay rate is so slow. This means that most radioactive waste has to he handled differently early than it has to be handled later. Early on, the waste is high in materials that have a short half life. These are often stored on site under water(for cooling and containment) for a few years. After this time has passed and the material is considered low level waste it needs to be transferred to storage for a significant amount of time, maybe thousands of years. One of the best ideas in my opinion is ceramic encapsulation. The idea is that you pack the waste in a clay like material that does not allow water to penetrate and throw the stuff back in a nuclear mine.
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