Follow Slashdot stories on Twitter

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Science News

Women's Institute Consulted on Nuclear Waste 366

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the pull-a-name-from-the-hat dept.
Leon Stringer writes "The Guardian is reporting that the Womens' Institute is being asked for their views on the disposal of nuclear waste while senior scientists resign in protest of being ignored. What members of the public would you like to design nuclear waste storage facilities?"
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Women's Institute Consulted on Nuclear Waste More

Women's Institute Consulted on Nuclear Waste

Comments Filter:

  • Selective Nit-pickery (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 ) * on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:35PM (#13919764) Homepage Journal

    I'd expect this from The Mirror, Sun or News Of The World

    The article author should point out that this is in Great Britain (United Kingdom) and is an effort by the government (The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management) to get a broad range of opinion, unlike George W. Bush's White House in the USA, which is just fine with it's own set of selective facts and could care less what polls say.

    More than 1,700 copies have been sent to groups including schools and councils. But the move has fuelled criticism that the committee is pursuing public consultation at the expense of expert advice.
    I think this could be an issue of overreation. The public is being involved. Maybe the government plans all along to just ditch the input, but if it all comes a cropper then they do have the minor leg to stand on that they did consult with the public, so the public ought to just shaddup about their NIMBYism*.

    Interesting that the House of Lords has a Science and Technology Select Committee which is highly critical of the project. Ironically it's the Lords which are often derrided for membership qualified by title and/or heredity that are no stranger to bombast.

    * Not In My Back Yard

    • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:5, Informative)

      by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:46PM (#13919830)
      "The article author should point out that this is in Great Britain (United Kingdom) and is an effort by the government (The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management) to get a broad range of opinion, unlike George W. Bush's White House in the USA, which is just fine with it's own set of selective facts and could care less what polls say."

      Which is 100% wrong on how our National Nuclear Waste Facility and local facilities are figured out.

      Yucca Mountain is a ridge-line in Nye County, Nevada; composed of volcanic material (mostly tuff) ejected from a now-extinct caldera-forming supervolcano. The "mountain" is most notable as the site of the proposed Yucca Mountain Repository, a U.S. Department of Energy terminal storage facility for spent nuclear fuel and other radioactive waste.

      The US has been discussing and debating this since 1957 at the Local, State and National level for national sites, local sites and transportation.
      • Which is 100% wrong on how our National Nuclear Waste Facility and local facilities are figured out.

        No it isn't. Bush hasn't even pursued this in public. The last time I even saw this issue in print was while Clinton was still president. If the current party in control of the House, Senate and Presidency want to attach it to an energy bill and get it signed into law there's probably not much stopping them.

        Pegging Yucca Mountain to anything Bush has pursued lately is absurd.

        • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:5, Informative)

          by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:02PM (#13919948)
          "The last time I even saw this issue in print was while Clinton was still president."

          Try a Google News for Yucca Mountain

          Results 1 - 20 of about 384 for yucca mountain.

          Theres tons out there in print in this issue, and there has been all through the Bush Administration.

          • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Krach42 ( 227798 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @10:02PM (#13920266) Homepage Journal
            WIPP (Waste Isolation Pilot Plant) in Carlsbad, New Mexico was entirely completed during the Clinton era.

            It *also* had the same sort of sensationalistic criticism, as people are now attributing only to Bush.

            Every administration that tries to do anything about getting rid of nuclear waste is going to hit resistence by the public, who are going to detest whoever is in charge, whether they ask them nicely or not.
        • "Pegging Yucca Mountain to anything Bush has pursued lately is absurd." Google is your friend... actually in this case your enemy. "On July 23, 2002, President Bush signed House Joint Resolution 87, allowing the DOE to take the next step in establishing a safe repository in which to store our nation's nuclear waste." - From the Department of Energy Website. It's OK to hate Bush, but please try to use logic and check your facts before you post.

    • Re:MOD PARENT UP (Score:5, Funny)

      by RentonSentinel ( 906700 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:48PM (#13919842) Journal
      Liberalism must be preserved in the forum!!

      The "scientists" in question are probably Intelligent Design GOONs.

      Stop Bush now! Support a Womans Right to Choose nuclear waste disposal...

    • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gid13 ( 620803 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:52PM (#13919878)
      Yes, this is an appeal to authority, but please. The public is the LAST group you want involved with decisions like this. The vast majority of people have not studied nuclear systems or the waste involved, and should probably not have a say in it. Sure the government's job is to do the will of the people, but the will of the people who don't know anything about the topic at hand should be to defer to those who do.

      • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:5, Interesting)

        by ackthpt ( 218170 ) * on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:59PM (#13919926) Homepage Journal
        The public is the LAST group you want involved with decisions like this.

        And in the USA the public has been the roadblock to decisions on matters of this sort. You might like to see what a total mess Hanford in eastern Washington became while waiting for another site to open up to take in waste. Hanford was only intended for so much capacity for so much time.

        • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:4, Interesting)

          by robertjw ( 728654 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @10:05PM (#13920280) Homepage
          And in the USA the public has been the roadblock to decisions on matters of this sort.

          Problem is, who do you trust matters like this to. I understand and agree with your comment, but I don't know what the right answer is. I'm not willing to let the government just decide everything for me because 'they know best'. If we started excluding any particular group from voting there would be cries of discrimination. How to we come up with a better way to make decisions without losing our freedoms completely?
        • "The public is the LAST group you want involved with decisions like this."

          Damn right! The public is the absolute worst group to rely upon for such a long term (epochal) issue as high level radioactive storage. All you get from them is NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard).

          A far better group to rely upon: a religious fundamentalist organization that has an innate faith in a higher being that will come to their rescue when things go badly, and several millenia of longevity since plutonium has a half-life of 20,000 ye
      • People aren't stupid, and need to be involved in huge decisions that affect them. Not to mention the fact that sometimes the best and most interesting ideas come from left field. Diversity of experience and opinion is the key to figuring out complex, multifaceted problems. It's not always having the answer - it's asking the right question. The technicians and scientists can figure out the details. Studying nuclear physics isn't going to enhance your creativity. Should the public have a say in the design of

      • Perhaps the public won't be able to bring technical expertise to teh table but they are, at the end of the day, the people that are bank rolling the project so don't you think they should have a say? Government is supposed to be answerable to the people. Yes we should give them the power to make most decisions without consulting us (the people) but large projects like this that have long term implications should include the views of the people. Much like a Government shouldn't wage war on another state with

    • Science policy via opinion poll. Yea, just ask Kansas how well that works.
      • Science policy via opinion poll. Yea, just ask Kansas how well that works.

        You know how Nuclear Waste Disposal works...

        You can ask the public before hand or watch them bring your plans down later for not asking them.

        I grew up in Midland, Michigan, where a battle raged for years to stop the construction of a nuclear power plant. Everyone was sold on it and fine with the plans of Consumers Power and Dow Chemical Company, but the woman at the end of the street, Rosemary Sinclair, a promiment local attorne

    • ....t's own set of selective facts and could care less what polls say.

      couldn't care less ...I know, I'm an ass.

    • Re:Selective Nit-pickery (Score:5, Insightful)

      by marcello_dl ( 667940 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:08PM (#13919985) Homepage Journal
      The article author should point out that this is in Great Britain (United Kingdom) and is an effort by the government (The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management) to get a broad range of opinion, unlike George W. Bush's White House in the USA, which is just fine with it's own set of selective facts and could care less what polls say.

      Could be worse: Italy recently restored an electoral method that an overwhelming majority of people had voted to get rid of, back in 92: so we have three kind of governments, UK that asks people about their opinion, USA that ignores em, Italia that does the exact opposite of what people wanted.
      But did anybody ask the people before going to war in Iraq in any of the three "democracies"?

      • It's funny you should mention this because I read an article [cnn.com] about this no less than 3 minutes ago. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi actually tried to dissuade President Bush from going to war and actively tried to keep it from happening through diplomatic channels in the Middle East. Italy never sent troops to Iraq to fight in the war. In fact they did not send troops to Iraq at all until after the UN mandated support for the reconstruction effort.
        • Yeah, that little bit of revisionist history isn't playing well over in Italy [csmonitor.com] right now, especially due to Nigergate (Italy was the source of the Niger memos; former Italian intelligence officers drafted them long ago to make money, but the US, British, French, and Italians wouldn't buy them because they were obviously bogus; however, this time around, not only did they take the very documents that they had filed as bogus, then passed them off to the British and Americans as genuine). Of course, that's jus
          • At least Britain and Australia only had small majorities against the war

            I can't speak for Australia, but up until war was declared, the majority of British people opposed the war.

            There's also the small matter of the largest popular demonstration against government policy ever recorded.

      • Perhaps one more thing to nit-pick: the USA is a republic, not a democracy (as in, the people get to have their say by proxy, not by direct voice). The country's founders thought direct democracy was a horrible idea (i.e. mob rule). That's why the President of the US was never to be elected through popular vote (and still isn't). The people don't need to be consulted because the idea is that they elected voices for themselves. If they don't like those voices, then they don't have to support them the next ti

  • This is sexist! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:37PM (#13919775)
    Why do they always leave the sweeping up to the women?

    • Re:This is sexist! (Score:2, Insightful)

      by ackthpt ( 218170 ) *
      Why do they always leave the sweeping up to the women?

      Maybe it's because women like Florrie Capp are more responsible than their mates.

    • Re:This is sexist! (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Just image nuclear waste storage facilities in a range of pastel colours!

  • Who should decide? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Auckerman ( 223266 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:39PM (#13919795)
    How about ones that are qualified to properly dispose of nuclear waste. Presumably, leading engineers and scientists. You know, the ones that could potentially design a place to put the waste into, where by the local envrioment takes as small of an impact as possible. I don't think politicians and random interest groups typically qualify for this task.
    • How about ones that are qualified to properly dispose of nuclear waste. Presumably, leading engineers and scientists. You know, the ones that could potentially design a place to put the waste into, where by the local envrioment takes as small of an impact as possible.

      Excellent plan, then we just move to wherever they are living since the storage obviously won't be in their back yards!

      • Re:Who should decide? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Auckerman ( 223266 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:59PM (#13919925)
        Excellent plan, then we just move to wherever they are living since the storage obviously won't be in their back yards!

        I find this view really odd, you know the "not in my back yard view". People are perfectly comfortable living in a place with continual toxic waste emissions. Car exhaust, toxins in everyday objects (paints, walls, toys, you name it), but the moment the word "nuclear" comes into play, all of a sudden images of toxic waste man comes to mind and superstition overrides reality. The fact of the matter is, as far as overall envriomental damage, nuclear is FAR clearer than how we typically power our cars and cities. It is a solvable problem and quite frankly people just need to realize it's less dangerous to live near a nuclear reactor or permant nuclear waste facility than it is to live near a coal powerplant or coal mining facility.

        • Re:Who should decide? (Score:4, Interesting)

          by djmurdoch ( 306849 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:10PM (#13920000)
          It is a solvable problem and quite frankly people just need to realize it's less dangerous to live near a nuclear reactor or permant nuclear waste facility than it is to live near a coal powerplant or coal mining facility.

          Why is it then that the owners of nuclear facilities don't have to fully insure them, and they need laws limiting their liability?
          • are coal powerplants and mines insured for damage caused to the people living next to them?
            • are coal powerplants and mines insured for damage caused to the people living next to them?

              Their owners are liable for that damage, so it would be a good idea to insure against a claim.

          • Re:Who should decide? (Score:4, Informative)

            by zerus ( 108592 ) on Tuesday November 01, 2005 @12:43AM (#13921073) Homepage
            I don't know where you learned that fact, but it's not true or even applicable in this case of people living near reactor sites since it's NRC regulations that people cannot receive more than the average natural dose if they are outside boundaries of the site (also why most sites are in remote areas). Facilities are very heavily insured for both the site and the utility. They need laws limiting liability same as they need laws limiting the liability for a surgeon. Some laws are created for the benefit of the masses. It is entirely true that a family member is priceless to one's family, but should an accident occur, that person is not considered priceless by others. If a site has an accident and a worker dies, should the family be awarded as much as they want? The answer you get from most people is: of course not! Barring another chernobyl (which is impossible with western reactors due to the negative void coefficient and containment structures), what damage could be done to a large area that a utility would be liable for? A utility in that case would go under faster than Enron so there would be no trial. So you want a reason why facilities don't insure them fully? There ya go.

            • Re:Who should decide? (Score:4, Interesting)

              by djmurdoch ( 306849 ) on Tuesday November 01, 2005 @01:15AM (#13921235)
              Barring another chernobyl (which is impossible with western reactors due to the negative void coefficient and containment structures), what damage could be done to a large area that a utility would be liable for?

              Yes, an accident like Chernobyl is probably impossible, but nevertheless, the Three Mile Island cleanup has cost roughly a billion dollars so far, and will cost a couple of hundred million more when the other reactor there is shut down and the whole facility is decommissioned. This wasn't paid for by the owner or the owner's insurers, it was mainly paid for by the ratepayers in that region. Under the Price-Anderson Act in the US, and similar legislation in other countries, the owner's liability is limited.

              If owners of reactors were required to carry sufficient insurance to cover an accident like that, then electric rates would be higher and profits would be lower, but the cost of the electricity they produce would better reflect the reality of the danger they pose.

              This thread started with a claim that nuclear plants are safer than coal, and that is probably true during normal operation, but coal fired plants don't have catastrophic accidents that cost so much to clean up. Coal plant operators should be required to clean up their emissions, but nuclear plant operators should be required to clean up after their accidents.

              • Re:Who should decide? (Score:3, Insightful)

                by 10Ghz ( 453478 )

                This thread started with a claim that nuclear plants are safer than coal, and that is probably true during normal operation, but coal fired plants don't have catastrophic accidents that cost so much to clean up.

                They might not have "catastropic accidents", as in blowing up, but they are catastrophy regardless. They spout humungous amounts of pollution, and they spread lots of radioactivity to the atmoshpere and surrounding areas (more so than nuclear power-plants do).

                There has been... what, two major nuclear

            • Re:Who should decide? (Score:5, Informative)

              by nathanh ( 1214 ) on Tuesday November 01, 2005 @05:13AM (#13922006) Homepage
              Why is it then that the owners of nuclear facilities don't have to fully insure them, and they need laws limiting their liability?

              I don't know where you learned that fact, but it's not true

              Nuclear Industries Indemnity ACT [wikipedia.org].

              The law [Price-Anderson] suspends U.S. liability laws for nuclear power plants. ... According to Public Citizen, a 1990 study calculated that without Price-Anderson, nuclear power corporations would pay more than $3 billion annually to fully insure their operations.

              HTH. HAND. DFRNA.

    • Re:Who should decide? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by hey! ( 33014 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:16PM (#13920035) Homepage Journal
      Engineers design.

      Design is creating a solution to a specified problem with a specified set of constraints.

      Engineers don't get any more say than anybody else what the problem or constraints should be.

    • Re:Who should decide? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Hal_Porter ( 817932 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:20PM (#13920051)
      Hasn't it occured to you that a government consultation excercise might be just be a PC way to describe giving people a description of the problem and a list of all the technically feasible solutions with their pros and cons. That way they realise that none of the options are ideal, and yet one of them must be picked. If you describe it properly, they'll usually pick the best one. It's not like the men from the ministry arrive and listen to a bunch of women describing half arsed schemes for shooting waste into space.

      The fatal problem with the kind of elitist solution you're describing is that all the non engineers and scientists feel that things are being done behind their backs and start to complain about it afterwards. This is exactly what happened with GM food - their was a wide spread, and as far as I can tell completely baseless, belief that the technology was inherently unsafe. The Guardian was one of the cheer leaders for this oddly enough - look at any of the columns by George Monbiot on GM, or anything technical. Lots of other people grumbled about a lack of consultation. So after that the Labour government has realised that you need to keep non technical people in the loop for this stuff, hence this sort of thing.

      Oddly enough, in consultancy jobs, this is a very good technique - before you make a big change, you need to give the people that own the company a reason for the change, and a list of options and get them to pick one. In fact, it's almost exactly the same situation, since the people that you're trying to get in loop aren't particularly technical - and you're trying to avoid a situation where something breaks because of a change to their code which they haven't agreed on, which tends to be expensive for everyone.

      • Re:Who should decide? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Ed Avis ( 5917 ) <ed@membled.com> on Tuesday November 01, 2005 @06:50AM (#13922246) Homepage
        It's not like the men from the ministry arrive and listen to a bunch of women describing half arsed schemes for shooting waste into space.
        In fact, that's pretty much what did happen, if this article is to be believed: Top adviser quits 'bleeding obvious' nuclear committee [timesonline.co.uk]:
        Government plans for disposing of nuclear waste have been thrown into turmoil by the resignation of a senior adviser, who has accused a key committee of endangering public safety by ignoring scientific expertise.
        The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) had become obsessed with public consultation at the expense of expert advice, Professor Ball told The Times.

        It had spent a year considering far-fetched disposal options that were dismissed years ago by scientists, such as firing spent fuel into the Sun or shipping it to Antarctica, while hazardous waste languished in tanks that were vulnerable to an accident or terrorist attack.

      • Re:Who should decide? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Da_Biz ( 267075 )
        This is exactly what happened with GM food - their was a wide spread, and as far as I can tell completely baseless, belief that the technology was inherently unsafe.

        Your use of superlatives here is troubling. A few issues to consider here:

        * Monsanto's development of genetically-modified Bt Corn and significant potential problems with certain bug populations.

        * The use of GMOs to create "pharmafoods"--foods with pharmaceutical-levels of drugs, and issues with these foods intermingling with other crops via po
    • How about ones that are qualified to properly dispose of nuclear waste.

      They have just desolated huge areas of Washington State (Hanford) in the US and Cumberland (Sellafield) in the UK. Thus the polititians are looking for alternatives. My own sugestion is to drill a hole into the ground as far as is possible i.e. several kilometres, let off an appropriate nuke to create an underground chamber. Drill again to make an entrace to the chamber. Drop waste down hole, repeat exercise as needed. Do this in a uni

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re:Who should decide? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Megane ( 129182 )
        My own sugestion is to drill a hole into the ground as far as is possible i.e. several kilometres, let off an appropriate nuke to create an underground chamber.

        I'm sure the rest of the world would enjoy hearing about such a violation of the Test Ban Treaty.

        • My own sugestion is to drill a hole into the ground as far as is possible i.e. several kilometres, let off an appropriate nuke to create an underground chamber.
          I'm sure the rest of the world would enjoy hearing about such a violation of the Test Ban Treaty.
          It doesn't violate the test ban treaty because it isn't a test. It's production use for excavation.
      • The millions of people who live along the Columbia River, and drink its water, and eat food irrigated by its water, would disagree with you that Washington State is desolate. Southeast Washington is known for its produce -- wheat, onions and asparagus (and increasingly, wine) from the region are eaten all over the globe.
    • How about ones that are qualified to properly dispose of nuclear waste. Presumably, leading engineers and scientists. You know, the ones that could potentially design a place to put the waste into, where by the local envrioment takes as small of an impact as possible. I don't think politicians and random interest groups typically qualify for this task.

      True, but by how much do non-nuclear trained people outnumber the experts? You can have the greatest plan in the world, but if the public is against it, it
    • How about ones that are qualified to properly dispose of nuclear waste. Presumably, leading engineers and scientists. You know, the ones that could potentially design a place to put the waste into.

      Tell me where you find a qualified engineer whose opinions won't be colored by decades of work for the nuclear power industry or the military.

    • Re:Who should decide? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by vandan ( 151516 )
      Yes, but it depends which engineers.

      You wouldn't, for example, let the corporations that want to build the reactor offer their engineers for the task. Well, unless you're a damned fool, that is.

  • Well, duh. (Score:3, Funny)

    by B3ryllium ( 571199 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:43PM (#13919815) Homepage
    The Garbage Men, of course.

    I suspect there may be a number of Garbage Women, too, and their input is more than welcome in the design of the nuclear waste disposal facility restrooms.

  • I Have It !!!. (Score:5, Funny)

    by LaughingCoder ( 914424 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:44PM (#13919818)
    We should hire the guys who hid the WMD in Iraq. They know how to make stuff completely disappear!

    • I am not sure this is a troll...here's a few valid moderations, take your pick. ...or it could be 'funny' because we all see the irony in the fact that our president (and apparently his staff) were so damn sure they would find something that they risked looking terrible to the world...and failed to find anything. ..or it could be 'off topic' because it really has nothing to do with the story. I'd buy that one too. ...it could be 'interesting' because if the Bush administration was right in going into Iraq
      • "Troll is an over used moderation, don't mod it a troll because you disagree."

        I agree, that's what overrated is for. Watch, someone will mod this down as overrated even though it's not even rated. It's a two because my karma is rockin, not because someone modded it up.

        But I never worry about the mods. I'm a virtual fountain of insightfulness and funny. They may get one or two, but I come back swinging.

  • Mayhaps a bit of common sense here? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Entropy ( 6967 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:44PM (#13919820)
    What members of the public would you like to design nuclear waste storage facilities?

    Engineers.
    • What does Microsoft call the people who pass through its program? Microsoft Certified Engineers...

      I don't think that "Engineers" is nearly good enough.

      How about "Nuclear Waste Disposal and Storage Engineers"?

      • What does Microsoft call the people who pass through its program? Microsoft Certified Engineers...

        And they aren't Engineers. Engineer generally means that someone has been certified as such by a recognized body, as opposed to a corporation. In some places (like Texas), it is illegal to call yourself an Engineer without the cert to back it up.

  • What about the Men's Institute? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bgibby9 ( 614547 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:46PM (#13919827) Homepage
    Oh wait a minute, there isn't any!

  • A Monty Python moment (Score:3, Funny)

    by zecg ( 521666 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:47PM (#13919833)
    What members of the public would you like to design nuclear waste storage facilities?

    As a senior member of the Lufthansa-pudding party, I advocate putting all matters regarding nuclear waste in the hands of mustachioed women.

  • bah (Score:4, Insightful)

    by machine of god ( 569301 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:48PM (#13919839)
    Lets face it, it's a political issue, not an ecological one. They'd put it in juice boxes if it was cheap and nobody cared.

  • Hrmmm (Score:3, Funny)

    by Flower ( 31351 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:48PM (#13919840) Homepage
    I believe this issue is too complex to be knowable and any solution that does arise should be attributed to an, as yet unnamed, Creator.
  • Politicians [www.wipp.ws] chose Yucca mountain Nevada over Deaf Smith County Texas.

  • Ask Slashdot: (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tackhead ( 54550 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @08:51PM (#13919868)
    > What members of the public would you like to design nuclear waste storage facilities?"

    Ask Slashdot: Where would YOU put the UK's store of lethal radioactive waste?

    Yucca Mountain

    Loch Ness

    Orbit

    The basement of The Women's Institute

    CowboyNeal

    Breasts!

    CowboyNeal's Breasts!

  • recycle (Score:2, Interesting)

    by colonslash ( 544210 )
    how about using it [eurekalert.org] before it is "stored"
    • I always wondered why this area of research never seemed to get the level of research it deserved.

      Maybe it is impolitic to put into practice?
  • Clearly they have the wrong people making the decisions. The obvious answer is to reprocess the fuel and pull out the Plutonium which can then be combined with uranium to make mox and stuffed back into reactors where it can be burned.

    If the waste is from light water pressurized reactors then the next best thing is to ship it to Canada where we have Candu reactors and we'll burn it for them. Waste from light water reactors is still more radioactive than what the Candu system is designed to run on (natural uranium - 0.7% U235, 99.3% U238) So a Candu can make very good use of it. But it should be reprocessed to remove some of the undesirables.

    We need about 75 BIG 1GWe Candu's to support Tar Sands operations but it seems only Total SA has caught on. Why waste 25% or more of the carbon mined producing CO+CO2 as a byproduct of generating the Hydrogen we are desperatly short of when you can just electrolize water? The difference is that by 2015 Tar Sands will be ramping up to about 3.3 million Barrels of Synthetic crude per day. With Nuclear assitance that can be closer to 5 million. By 2015 I expect the world will be in a HUGE energy crisis because I expect world oil production to peak by 2007 and then go into decline. If we have 8 years decline of 3% per year that is a loss of about 20 million barrles per day of world production. (World production is about 82 million barrels per day. USA consumption is about 20 million barrels per day. China is about 7 million and India about 2.5 million barrels per day. Yet I see the press blames China and India for high oil demand and hense high oil prices. Thats the press for you - just a source of distortion.)

    If anyone things the oil crisis of the 70's was bad I can say right now that is was a picnic compared to what is comming!

    Next, we should be building the advanced Integral Fast Reactors (IFR's) which Argonne Labs designed by about 1994. The program was shut down by Clinton.

    The wisdom of this will be very clear long before 2014. By then the short sightness will be felt every summer when the electricty is out and also every winter when the heating oil is short.

    IFR technology is proven and it burns all actinides leaving only short lived waste which has industrial uses such as gamma sources and atomic batteries.

    In short - none of the so called waste is really waste. It is actually very valuable if used intelligently.

    Furthermore it can solve our energy needs for at least 100's if not 1000's of years.
    • There is plenty of oil to last for a good while. I suggest a little more research. The tar sands themselves will last a good while and plenty left to drill before it hits the peak.

      Don't get me wrong, I'm all for developing new energy sources, just not into the scare-mongering "peak oil" crap that isn't close in the near(50 to 100 years) future.
      • Since I live in Calgary Canada and work in the industry then I'll put it this way. If you know where to drill then why don't you make some suggestions. British oil companies certainly don't because the North Sea peaked in 1999-2000.

        Mexican oil companies don't because Canatarell production is expected to go into terminal decline in 2006 and Pemex has some prospects but not much. Indoneasia doesn't seem to know where to drill because Indoneasia became an oil importer this year as did Britian. Indoneasia use to supply Australia.

        Iran doesn't know where to drill. The Saudis say they can up production but they have been saying this for years and so far no real joy. The USA doesn't know where to drill because their production peaked about 1970. Two years ago the largest geophysical field operations company in the world shut down North American operations. It seems there was not enough exploration work to keep them going. They were a client of mine.

        Ok. More research.

        1) Saudi Ghawar field 5 MBOPD
        2) Mexico Canatarell 2.1 MBOPD less 14% per year starting 2006
        3) Kuwait Bergan 1 MBOPD
        4) China DaQing 1 MBOPD less 7% per year starting 2004

        These are the 4 largest sorted by production. Ghawar is running over 55% water cut with over 7 million barrels of water injected per day. 65% comes from North Ghawar. Original reserves were estimated to be about 65 billion barrels and 55 billion have been produced to date. Most of the flank wells on the anticline have become injector wells. With the remaining reserves clearly dropping (but no acknowledgment from the house of Saud) the arial extent of that feild is significantly smaller today than it was say in the 70's. It is about 1/4 or less in fact. The writing is on the wall and the Saudi's can lose 2 MBOPD production at the drop of a hat.

        So I don't know where you get your information from. I get my information from industry sources including the Geological Survey of Canada. I do consider myself informed. Now if you want to beleive the DOE be my guest.

        As for the Tar Sands. Yup - it will last a good long while because there is something like 1.8 trillion barrels in them. However with over $1 billion per year being invested in production facilities we are going to be lucky to get production up to 3.3 MBOPD by 2015.

        So if you feel you are up to it I guess we can go head to head and compare each and every oil project in the world. When we do this the numbers come out to 2007 as being the most optimistic realistic estimate for the world peak.

        But yes - you are correct there is lots of oil adn lots more to be found. We just cannot find it fast enough to replace our consumption.

        A MASSIVE building program to tap every renewable and alternative energy source should have been underway 10 years ago. In addition we should re-engineer our homes to capture as much solar energy as possible, probably via more insulation - over R50 and passive solar designs.

        There is no reason that all new housing should not be energy self sufficient in fact. It can be done. I know how to do it. I've been in houses in Calgary that demonstrate the principals - houses without a furnance.

        Since North American Natural Gas production peaked in 2001 we have lost a large percentage of the North American Fertilizer industry and now we'll be losing the plastics industry. The president of DOW Chemicals has already announced possible plastics shortages. This is due more to hurricane damage - but declining production is in the picture as well.

        The way I see it - North America does not have a workable energy program in place. The world does not have a workable energy program in place. The political administrations are dreaming and are proposing solutions like wars.

        As I see it - the only reason the UK and USA are in Iraq right now is control over oil and a desire to liberate Iraqii oil. I would prefer to see engineering solutions instead.

        If people think nuclear waste is difficult to handle then I will suggest it is a lot better to handle than 1000's of body bags filled with dead kids.

  • Technical or political? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by peacefinder ( 469349 ) <alan.dewitt@gmAA ... inus threevowels> on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:10PM (#13920001) Journal
    If they're asking non-technical people to make technical judgements, then it's daft.

    But if they're asking for political opinions, then this is probably a good idea. No matter how good the technical decision, the choice still needs to survive a political process on the way to implementation. Soliciting diverse opinions up front will be helpful in getting the product through that painful phase. It beats pressing blindly forward and hoping for the best, anyway.
  • That nuclear waste materials are moved by ship to be stored in huge underground facilities where they are covered in a water bath until they have stablized enough to be processed for reuse in medical equipment, radiothermic generators, smoke detectors, etc. As for what should be done, well we should continue fission power station research so breeder reactors become so efficient they produce little to no nuclear waste materials.

  • School children (Score:3, Interesting)

    by danharan ( 714822 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:17PM (#13920038) Journal
    I vote for having middle school students decide this based on the available evidence. Let them call witnesses and decide on the process.

    Oh, I realize this will piss off the scientists. Think of it this way: these adult politicians and scientists are suggesting handing over the responsibility for extremely toxic and long-lasting waste to future generations. It's a persistent reminder of our failure to use cleaner alternatives, and we should be made to account for this.

    Although we can't ask the 7th generation what their wishes are, we can ask the next. Does this infuriate you? Do you think they're not responsible enough? Think this through: they will be handling that waste when you're wearing diapers.

  • Not in my backyard (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ripbruger ( 312644 )
    A common theme when it comes to burying nuclear waste is "Not in my backyard." Everybody agrees that it should be done, but nowhere near where they live. This happened with the AECL hearings back in the 1990s. The plan was to dig into the Canadian Shield (which is all Precambrian Shield), and bury the waste safely and backfill it. It did seem technically possible, but the public wasn't going to have any of it. Kind of a shame when you consider that hundreds of engineers and researchers spent a good chu

  • Well.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by mormop ( 415983 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @09:33PM (#13920128)
    "What members of the public would you like to design nuclear waste storage facilities?"

    The bastard who designed the shrink wrap on CD-Rs. You know the one, where you pull the little tape that splits the plastic coating except it snaps so you run your nail along it except it's so bloody flexible that it won't tear. Then you have to get a really sharp knife and cut it scoring the jewel case. I mean for f***s sake, if getting a CD out of a wrapper can be made such a pain in the arse by a thin bit of plastic just think the container he/she could make if given enough steel, lead and time.....

    And another thing.. F***king blister packs that need a friggin scalpel to open... NNNNNNNRRRRGGGHHHHHHHH,.,..... World turning red..... can't think...... I think I'm lapsing into unconciou
  • Of course, the only one who could do it properly!!!

  • Try thinking of them as the "50% of the population Institute" and you might see why. Obviously, they don't have that level of support but there's no reason why they should have any less input than the hundreds of lobbying groups that represent like 10 rich people or companies.

    TWW

  • I'd like to see a Martha Stewart-Arnold Schwarzengar-Silvester Stalone matchup.

    And turn it into a reality show.
  • Recycle it until you have no waste.

    Breeder reactors, folks. Know them, use them, love them.

    IFRs are good, too.

  • The public of course should be consulted. That's supposed to work through the public's representatives, Members of Parliament, but it's become clear those public servants really serve corporate interests. So we include extragovernmental groups of organized citizens. It's probably about as much acknowledgement of the limitations of our current republican democracy as are trade unions under a socialist government.

    Excluding scientists, though, has nothing to do with including the public. Except when government
  • If scientific and technical minded people are supposed to be so smart, then why are they always losing out?

    Good lord! If uneducated baboons, sorry I mean politicians and lobbyists, can manipulate the general public then why can't all the highly educated people in the world get with the program?

    It doesn't take a rocket scientist to read what marketers are doing to influence and create our thoughts about what we think we want and need every day.

    But instead of figuring out how to win, the scientists comp

  • If you fill out the nuclear waste reclamation facility survey on isle 12 near the adult diapers, you become eligible receive a 5 dollar off coupon on cigarettes!

  • Organized Crime (Score:3, Funny)

    by ocie ( 6659 ) on Monday October 31, 2005 @10:12PM (#13920318) Homepage
    I would like to see gangsters consulted on this. They are good at making things disappear and seem to have a knack at avoiding governmental red tape. Of course, pirates are a close second.
  • Here in the United States, and eventually the world, I think the Christian Church should be the ones to decide.

    If we're going to have faith based science, why not faith based nuclear waste disposal?

    Oh, wait. You mean it has to be something different than the way we do it now.

  • Suggestions from the WI (Score:3, Funny)

    by cowbutt ( 21077 ) on Tuesday November 01, 2005 @07:29AM (#13922327) Journal

    • Put the waste in jam jars and sell it at the next church fete.
    • Knit cosies for the waste to stop it achieving critical mass.
    • ...

Slashdot Top Deals

THEGODDESSOFTHENETHASTWISTINGFINGERSANDHERVOICEISLIKEAJAVELININTHENIGHTDUDE

Close