Why can’t we dump nuclear waste in the same place we mine nuclear fuel?
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One basic issue is that nuclear power plants aren’t next door to uranium mines. After paying to ship the rocks to the plant, now you have to pay to ship the rocks back.
This is a massive outlay in money and fossil fuel emissions just to get the uranium there. Paying about the same to get it back would make nuclear power completely unfeasible even with its massive subsidies. Nuclear power already uses too much fossil fuel to be a real alternative to fossil fuel, shipping the rods back would make a coal power plant seem positively green by comparison.
If a corporation remembers to check the seals on the storage barrels, and the concrete tank’s lack of leaks, on a regular basis, storing the barrels at the plant under 30′ of water is actually a pretty good place. Trusting them to do this is another matter.
Water is amazing at blocking radiation, so much so that were you to *swim* in such a pool, about 1 inch below the surface, you would experience *less overall radiation exposure than at the surface.* This is because the 1 inch of water is blocking the natural background radiation of the Earth’s surface.
Don’t go 6′ down though, water is great at blocking radiation but the spent fuel rods are producing **way** more radiation than the Earth’s surface background radiation.
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