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Nuclear Power (media.mas.to)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Weight is a way to make the problem sound worse than it is, because nuclear waste is so incredibly dense. It's not enough to be a big deal yet. Dumping it deep into the ocean is an option, but it's only going to happen to waste that doesn't have potential uses first.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

nuclear waste is so incredibly dense

Yes and no. Most current fuels are Uranium or Plutonium. Both between 19 and 20 g/cm^3^. For reference, liquid water is approximately 1 g/cm^3^. Unspent fuel is a similar weight to gold.

"Spent" U~238~ is usually around 96% U~238~. If we consider the remainder a rounding error and assume all 60 tonnes is 60 million kg of U~238~. That will give us a very rough estimate of 3,000 m^3^.

Also worthy of noting are other wastes that comes from mining and refining.

There is much waste already. The "spent" waste is too radioactive to safely re-refine until later.