Uranium from the Ground

How much uranium is in the world and is it adequate as an energy reserve, where it is, and who produces it. Supply and demand for Uranium is discussed. How it is mined from sandstone to get the yellow-cake. What dinosaur bones have to do with this. Mill tailings and what should and should not be done with them.

[@l33tpie]

If I could only get a series of videos like this for the entirety of the sciences disciplines, I would happily learn everything.

[@SUBRASHANKAR]

Absolutely

[@joro8604]

I did not realize how much there is to Nuclear Engineering. This guy is great. He helps on the high level to supplement the MIT series which is a deep, deep dive- sometimes confusing.

[@penguinbloopers]

You had me at radioactive dinosaur bones.

[@WadcaWymiaru]

I read "bones" and laugh...

[@edgardogho]

I like how he is a right handed guy on the classroom and a lefty on the glass marker.... Magic of video inverting

[@jimbo92107]

Oooooh, I thought he was just writing backwards, which actually isn't very difficult. Took me about one day to get good at it in the military.

[@adamkendall997]

Pretty sure it's just the effects of the yellow cake.

[@Kamil_O]

Scientist call something a cake and then they dont allow you to eat it...

[@redgeneral5792]

You can eat it, but you won't like the results.

[@segasys1339]

I have some yellowcake right here on a CIA napkin.

[@michaelbme1983]

@@segasys1339 don't drop that shot

[@segasys1339]

@@michaelbme1983 lol classic. Glad someone out there is as random as me.

[@MikeStrom62]

Why would anyone down vote this? It's just a factual discussion of where uranium comes from.

[@pyalot]

Because the button exists, it must be pressed, at least by somebody.

[@duku3215]

F@_k you. Its KZbin Thats why B17GH!

[@motog6436]

"Don't worry, the uranium is in a triple layer of protective sandwich bags!" Best line I've heard all week

[@williamcraig6377]

Mmmmm. Yellow cake. What kind of frosting? Sounds delicious. More great content professor!

[@Swarm509]

And is "All Natural" so it has to be good for you! Don't forget your glass of radon infused water to go with it!

[@karhukivi]

Yellowcake looks delicious too, but if you eat a little of it you will have a violent attack of diarrhoea. I know, because a colleague foolishly put a small sample of it in a shirt pocket which later contained a biscuit that he ate. The effect was dramatic, but he is still perfectly healthy more than ten years later!

[@elektronikzmbrtlar1586]

@@karhukivi did they put his diarrhea crap in a radioactive contamination box thingy?

[@halbrown7121]

Edmonton City Center airport was where the yellow cake, in 45 gal. drums, from Uranium City used to be flown to. So yellow cake got all over the inside of the hanger, and elsewhere, according to a mechanic I once talked to. The land is no longer used as an airport, but it has yellow cake contamination. Their hanger was at the west end of the airport. Developers have declined to develop the property. Most people don't know about the yellow cake contamination.

[@michaelschwartz9485]

I'm so glad I found your channel! These videos are great! I'm sure I'll watch them more than once!

[@aytunch]

01:56 Pauses: "-Nope, I am not reading that word"

[@Ledabot]

I pronounce it "Ni" as in Bill Nye the science guy and "ger", as in Germany. It's probably incorrect but its better than the bad word.

[@marks6663]

@@Ledabot It is pronounced Nye-Jere, rhymes with gear.

[@nottherealpaulsmith]

@@marks6663 i'd say it's closer to nee-jerr but that works too

[@mullerz2776]

Excellent video sir. A question that intrigues me is what causes the material to become radioactive? The earth is so fascinating and its creation of these materials

[@jordanhazen7761]

Heavy radioactive elements like uranium and thorium can't be created by any process on earth. All we have was present at the time this planet formed, ~4.5 billion years ago, coincidentally about equal to the half-life of U238... so half of what existed back then is gone, decayed now into many other elements (eventually stable lead), as has ~98% of Earth's original U235 endowment, given its shorter 700,000 year half-life. So, if humans evolved a few million years earlier than we did, natural-uranium reactors would have been easy to build, with no need for enrichment, nor heavy-water moderators... imagine some steampunk nuclear industry springing up in early Industrial Revolution years - maybe not such a great thing, given prevailing safety standards back then! Anyway, uranium/thorium mostly comes from supernova explosions, at the very end-of-life of massive stars, flung out across the universe and forming part of the material that will later condense into new stars & solar systems. So, the very early universe, with only 1st-generation stars, had no uranium, nor much of the other heavy metals.

[@stockstreamtwitch]

This knowledge is A+

[@ZIlberbot]

thanks for such detail! That explains why its important to do ventilation in the building: concrete is made from sand and any sand should include some micro parts of either uranium or other related to its decay radioactive elements which eventually will generate radioactive radon in any building with concrete components.

[@BekirCigerli]

Really nice video thanks for doing that. 😊

[@NewJak14]

You are awesome! Thank you for making and sharing these videos!

[@mrlucasftw42]

Nice video - just curious though. I remember seeing various stories about outrage over uranium mines by locals near to them regarding pollution (whether radiation, or chemical from what is used to separate out the yellow cake). Whether it was water supply or just more general soil pollution. It would be good to hear a bit more about that.

[@AlldaylongRock]

All mining is bad. Uranium mining is the best "energy resource" mining because you barely need any. And it's quite plentiful. Extracting stuff like neodymium (for wind turbines or EV motors) is way harder and generates much more tailings.

[@ElementalMaker]

Uranium is cool and all, but are you really able to write backwards that proficiently? I'm in awe.

[@abandonedminesofpennsylvan266]

Blows my mind.

[@frond8951]

ElementalMaker the videos are flipped

[@PhilipWong55]

To generate 1GW of electricity for one year requires 940 kg of U235 and 23.5 tons of U238 that is processed from 210 tons of uranium from 165,100 tons of ore. A thorium molten salt reactor will require 950 kg of thorium 232 to produce the same amount of energy.

[@nunyabidniz2868]

The mill tailings still seems like a good source of sand for concrete highways. Since they aren't enclosed structures, the radon isn't a problem [can't be concentrated] and users are all shielded from the low level radiation emitted by the vehicles they're riding around in...

[@karhukivi]

Mill tailings are usually mixed with about 10% cement and pumped underground as a slurry to backfill the voids left during mining operations. Then when the stuff has set, the "pillars" between each void ("stope") can be mined out to achieve 100% mining extraction.

[@MikeStrom62]

I just found you! Love 💕💕💕 your content

[@sergarlantyrell7847]

Radioactive yellow sand... I'm now reconsidering going to the beach again.

[@topjds1492]

Would love for you to do a video on the economics or benefits of fission and fusion. Why is fusion so coveted?

[@Phillipx90]

It doesn’t exist

[@chapter4travels]

This is a great question. Assuming a fusion reactor existed, what would be the benefits over advanced fission? The best I can tell nothing, fusion doesn't provide anything special.

[@sarcasmo57]

Fascinating

[@aleshinteregger8554]

i love your into

[@earlspencer7863]

How did uranium get into dinosaur bone I didn't get it.

[@adamkendall997]

@@QueueTeePies I'm just confused how that would make it stick out from the surrounding background radiation. Unless it causes the uranium to be more concentrated.

[@earlspencer7863]

Aliens fed dinosaurs the uranium to make them obey their commands.

[@zolikoff]

Proof that T-Rex were fission powered beasts! If you didn't fear them enough before...

[@karhukivi]

Uranium dissolved in oxygenated groundwater will react with the phosphates in the bones and become concentrated in the bones. A similar reduction happens with carbon, so crude oil is often radioactive and likewise for graphite deposits in Canada where uranium is concentrated up to 20% in some instances, forming economic deposits which are mined. This chemical property is what makes uranium attractive as a nuclear fuel, the chemistry of thorium is quite different and economic deposits of thorium (and rare earth elements) are as the name suggests "rare".

[@earlspencer7863]

@@karhukivi Thanks. The fact that Uranium was in ground water was left out in the video. Thanks for making it clear and the extra info.

[@frequentlycynical642]

I can remember as a kid in the 1950's, everyone thought they could buy a Geiger Counter and wander the deserts of the SW and get rich.

[@Paul-uy1ru]

By digging out the sandstone and grinding it up one does pollute the environment. Something what was fixed in the ground is now taken away by the wind.

[@paulanderson79]

It's not processed in the open air. Besides which, we want to retain the uranium ore, not scatter it all over the place. Wasteful.

[@pierrejanssens5000]

i am a bit confused about U3O8 . Oxigen is minus 2 as in H2O in a covalent bond. .8 atoms makes minus 16. So how does uranium fit in ?

[@ramons8908]

Australia also has a very high concentration of outraged lefties, might be the highest in the world too, we have coal and gas in plentiful supply too, but we pay absurd prices for electricity because of the high concentration of lefties.

[@adamkendall997]

Maybe if we use centrifuges to concentrate outraged lefties to critical mass, we'll have an unlimited power source and everyone will be happy.

[@nunyabidniz2868]

"Outraged lefties" is any left-handed person who is stuck trying to use a rt-handed tool [scissors are the WORST!] Outraged *leftISTS* is a redundant description, since outrage is the default state for every leftist I've ever encountered... ;-)

[@Ledabot]

I'd be pretty outraged living in aus right now. Somehow i feel like theres just as many outraged righties.

[@davidelliott5843]

U235 is 0.7% of natural uranium and costly to separate. Sadly the light water reactors we use today, use only about 3% of the energy contained in the fuel. The irradiated fuel is then stored. Molten salt reactors can burn 99% of the fuel energy. The Canadians at New Brunswick are building a plant that will use waste irradiated fuel to power the new reactor. No need to mine anything as the fuel is sitting in deep water tanks.

[@karhukivi]

But countries using nuclear power do not want to become dependent on others for their supply of fuel. Some waste u238 was also blended with decommissioned weapons grade U235 under the US-USSR "Megatons for megawatts" agreement, now terminated I think.

[@warrenklein7817]

U233, U234, U235, U236, U237, U238 - six atomic weights, all uranium, over 99% U238 but you need the rare odd number uranium, U233, U235, U237 to use the plentiful U238. Contrast that with Thorium, every single atom in the world is the same.

[@nikolaisafronov3452]

Any talk about Thorium?

[@kuhaku9587]

For a lot of people, business comes before peoples lives.

[@jabr991]

And binge watch I shall...

[@tomr6955]

And the bit about breeder reactors?

[@frankyflowers]

how does a Geiger counter find fossils? if the uranium made them then isn't there uranium around them still?

[@snehalshetty1771]

Wow

[@andrewlambert7246]

You have forgotten to mention that reactor producers have created a cartel like situation when it comes to the supply of uranium i.e. buy my reactor and get fuel for its life. Russia and France are two of the countries that have such a policy.

[@doradosurfcharters]

Writing backwards was impressive 😂

[@tomkelly8827]

Why is Uranium mined at a Uranium mine and not from Coal ash? I have heard that fly ash has more energy in the ash in the form of thorium and Uranium then the coal did in the first place. Also Thorium is found along side rare earths so rare earth mines can pull Thorium out of the same ore that they are getting neodymium and friends from. There is no need for additional mines, not at all just an added step at existing mines

[@samwise1790]

Often with these things its a matter of what form the elements are in and their concentration. For example plenty of minerals have let's say, Fe, Li, P, etc, but certain minerals contain it in such a way that it's energetically or procedurally easier to liberate it from its crystal structure than others, or is in much higher concentration. There's uranium in practically everything, but at low concentrations or in difficult to separate minerals (like zircon, for example).

[@qball6218]

Ahhh... Yellow Cake! Now Dave Chappelle's skit makes sense. I can't be the only one.

[@hmosesmamulu6491]

Dude...I'm literally here because of it

[@wompastompa3692]

Whose ranium?

[@mosesmilamayat6062]

Assuming energy resources permanently run out, that is to say they are (finite), there is no point in killing each other - USA, N.Korea, Iran and so on, over finite resources because even if anyone emerges as the ultimate winner after killing off all other competitors, that winner will eventually be met with a resource depleted world, meaning they would in the end - after all that murderous struggle & victory, die too. Surely our intellect should enable us to see such an out come. Assuming that energy resources do not run out permanently - which it seems is the case, but rather there can be periodic shortages, we can do one of two things. Either we continue to kill each other using the resources we have accumulated, from sources that do not run out permanently - a completely and utterly wrong thing to do, to use up the very infinite resources to destroy ourselves, or use those very resources to find more resources there by mitigating the shortages. This choice has been open to us since the dawn of our existence and will always be until we wake up to it. If we assume that humanity has a half life of 100 million years, the point being it is much less than the half life of elements of Uranium or the sun (sources of energy), this means the human life will run out (extinct) way long before these energy source will do. So these energy resources are infinite with respect to the humans maximum life spun. It seems we are killing each other under the mistake that resources run out permanently which is not true. They are sometimes in short supply. It is smatter to use the resources to find more because it is endless. I hope we learn this and quickly change. Both war and peace require huge investments one is unquestionably better than the other. Finally evidently no energy resources have really permanently run out in the last 1000 years. There is only theoretical speculation that they could run out permanently based on a mono-intellectualism.

[@alvarorodriguez1592]

“One ton of the good stuff is enough to power a nuclear reactor for three years” If you read the Wikipedia article on Fukushima, each of the four reactors there had around 60 tons of Uranium in them. So…it’s not as merry as that. I guess the concentration of “the good stuff” is pretty low.

[@randomperson-ws3zq]

3 percent enriched is the norm for commercial reactors

[@mastershake42019]

Got that Yellow cake Don't drop dat shit! Chappelle show

[@DOLRED]

I just saw information as to the quality of drinking water in the US. There are a few states which have undesirable levels of Uranium (Exceeding EPA Standards) in drinking water. I am happy not to be living in those places. One of those states is a red state which has been continually touted as a large success in recent decades for population migration. Good Luck to those folks!!

[@ozymandias7392]

DOLRED you wanna get super mutants? THAT’S HOW YOU GET SUPER MUTANTS.

[@canadiannuclearman]

How can he write backwards ?? Must have a lot of practice

[@mrjava66]

Gary Lewis the video is replayed reversed. Look at the buttons on his jacket.

[@andyp1510]

@@mrjava66 Like a mirror image.

[@adamkendall997]

Did you not see his bag of yellow cake?

[@civilianspaceagency7106]

Something Doesnt Make Sense About the So Called mill Tailings .... If it were Valid that this is Nothing but normal regular sand and All they did was extract uranium from it an put it back it should be Less Radioactive . Hence it Should be even safer than regular sand with the uranium Not Extracted . Can you Please Enlighten me As to Why This is .

[@whosdr]

The sand was dangerous before it was pulled out of the ground.

[@LoveNeverFails81818]

I'd be curious how we could do any of this without a constant supply of petrol - seems to me the world is headed toward a collapse given that we have declining ERoEI rather than increasing ERoEI - and given that we have no substitute for oil - once the oil decline is terminal, how will we mine iron, coal, u238, nat gas, silver, potash, nickel, cobalt, lithium - do we intend to keep up this way of life without petrol?

[@chapter4travels]

Synthetic liquid fuel from coal made from the industrial heat generated by advanced nuclear fission. Can also be made from carbon capture from the atmosphere, but it's better used in the atmosphere by plant life.

[@LoveNeverFails81818]

@@chapter4travels still a lower return of energy... the ERoEI is lower for coal. In fact, the ERoEI is lower for an agrarian lifestyle than a hunter gatherer lifestyle...

[@chapter4travels]

@@LoveNeverFails81818 The ERoEI is lower for coal until oil gets scarce, then it won't be. Same logic or lifestyle, scarcity changes the equation.

[@LoveNeverFails81818]

@@chapter4travels yes... agreed that we are dealing with declining usable energy with our current technology and understanding of physics... the overall point I’m getting at is that, overall, our declining ERoEI necessitates a reduction in our consumption of energy (or more accurately the energy that is “lost” due to entropy). Nobody is addressing this in the media or in the political sphere but you can be damn sure the military machine, the tip of the spear, has looked at this threat, and has made some plans for this. Usually that means war and loss of life. The ignorance of this #1 issue in the general awareness drives this momentum towards war because the people, overall, believe absurdities like: Telsa cars and power panels will solve our problems with oil “running out”.

[@chapter4travels]

@@LoveNeverFails81818 Honestly, that is Doomer thinking. We have and will have tons of energy for a VERY long time. The source of that energy will come from the uranium in seawater, virtually every country in the world will have equal access to it. This means fewer wars over energy resources, not more.

[@nathanflett6427]

Thorium

[@WadcaWymiaru]

Thorium STOMPs!

[@nathanflett6427]

@Matt S I'm not going to argue with you. Go do some research.

[@nathanflett6427]

@Matt S No Ted Talk. I don't watch that leftist rubbish. And I will take some time to research more about Thorium as a nuclear fuel, when I find it.

[@nathanflett6427]

@Matt S Lol. Regardless.

[@MemeKing44]

yellow cake oishi

[@phoule76]

is it generally thought that asteroid impacts brought the uranium here to begin with? (all the heavier elements already here at the planet's formation sunk to the Earth's center when the surface was molten)

[@johnballs1352]

No, not at all.

[@Azerkeux]

Our planet is still undergoing differentiation today, if that process had already stopped the core would slowly lose heat and the planet would eventually become uninhabitable in a 'heat death'.

[@samwise1790]

@@Azerkeux well, the core is cooling down, slowly, and has been for a long time. It's why komatiite lava is impossible to form today, as an example.

[@glarynth]

In Australia, even the very rocks are trying to kill you.

[@kevintaunt4385]

How did an ancient original element like uranium end up so richly sequestered in a sedimentary sandstone?

[@TurkishRepublicanX]

You're going to have to ask a geologist I'm afraid.

[@karhukivi]

Because it can be dissolved in oxygenated groundwater and leached out of the parent material, usually granite. Then it can be precipitated later if the solution encounters reducing chemicals like phosphates in a sandstone or carbonaceous material in shales. Thorium is not soluble and does not easily form economic deposits.

[@kevintaunt4385]

Thank you so much, George. I hadn’t considered migration for some reason.

[@karhukivi]

@@kevintaunt4385 You're welcome!

[@karhukivi]

@Matt S You are guessing! The amount of uranium in seawater is tiny, about 1000x times less than in most granite rocks. The uranium was precipitated in fluviatile sandstones long after the rocks were formed. These have been well-studied by geologists and uninformed "opinions" are just that - opinions.

[@jimbo92107]

When you say 1 ton of U can run a plant for 3 years, are you talking about conventional water reactors, or MSR's?

[@AximandTheCursed]

Pretty sure he means conventional LWR/PWR/BWR analogues, MSR consumption of fuel is still in the theoretical/estimated range and depends both on size of the reactor and fuel cycle (Low enriched Uranium thermal, or more highly enriched fast spectrum have different rates of consumption, after all)

[@mrjava66]

www.nuclear-power.net/nuclear-power-plant/nuclear-fuel/fuel-consumption-of-conventional-reactor/#Uranium_235_consumption_in_a_nuclear_reactor He is referring to the amount of U-235 consumed by a typical LWR in the U.S, or any about 1000 MegaWatt fission reactor.

[@davidelliott5843]

The Moltex design being built in Canada will burn waste fuel from a LWR next door. It will deliver a waste with 1/1000th of the life of current high level waste. The fuel will be a molten chloride salt contained in tubes similar to PWRs. The coolant around the pins is the same salt without the fuel. Heat is extract by a third salt via heat exchangers. It is fast spectrum has no moderator and can burn all of the nasty stuff that’s normally stored in the “too difficult” pond.

[@ravener96]

So what elliot

[@JohnBrown-vn2qw]

dude sounds like james garner

[@digital_harry]

I think you meant densest element, instead of heaviest?

[@MarkAShaw64]

With elements, does it not amount to the same thing?

[@mrjava66]

If you are looking for a metal that is very dense, but, also affordable and easily machinable, urainium is often a good choice. Gold is very expensive. Tungsten is very difficult to machine. Everything else that is available in commercially sensible quantities is far less dense. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium

[@TurkishRepublicanX]

@@MarkAShaw64 yes exactly, it's all about the size of the nucleus. Hydrogen is the lightest

[@zapfanzapfan]

Heaviest naturally occurring element, meaning heaviest atomic nucleus. It is not the densest, that is Osmium.

[@karhukivi]

@@MarkAShaw64 "heavy" as in heavy elements means a high atomic mass, not the material density.

[@joeypadgett7895]

"oh look, yellow make up"

[@cabdisalaancumar2557]

My hous nier thow mach from somalia

[@martinwalker8569]

Czech Rep - west Bohemia - big source of Uranium, mined by political prisoners during 50's - when communists took over, mined for russian nuclear programs

[@BLKBRDD]

Hi North Korea!

[@zenriyakaruvyin8273]

haha my liek is the point between 1.6 and 1.7 k likes lmao. i do love physics.

[@ingerechtannon2471]

,whoen I do the laundry I have to searchh through the Nucleaf sock sock to sort out and find the missing socks their are always some matching socks in the nuclear sock pile and I think T- Rex used to wear Argile socks Vanna

[@KaroJhe]

Yes

[@Ethantheflagwarzguy]

i bet it tastes like yellow cake heheh...

[@koikogo]

Fission is expensive and inefficient. Centrifugation is the best.

[@IngeTanis]

Read a book

[@pawelzybulskij3367]

I thought uranium is worth more than gold.

[@BillFromTheHill100]

Only if it's in a bomb!

[@h1ghfructose682]

@@BillFromTheHill100 plutonium

[@grantrennie]

Your little map missed out the uranium in the UK and also the Congo in Africa, where the US gets 90% of its uranium from, or is that kept off the maps?

[@DouglasEdward84]

The United States doesn't get even CLOSE to 90% of it's Uranium from the Congo. What are you on about? Shares of U.S. Purchases of Uranium in 2018 according to the U.S. Energy Administration. Canada 24% Kazakhstan 20% Australia 18% Russia 13% Domestic Suppliers 10% Uzbekistan 6% Namibia 5% China, Niger, South Africa and ALL others 3% Congo isn't even on the chart anymore, and the imports reflect the map shown.

[@PercivalBlakeney]

Q. What do you call a bankrupt fella from Tehran, suffering from malnutrition and exhaustion? A. A depleted Iranian. 😉

[@mattkerle81]

Very superficial coverage, and also dated. The Ranger mine pictured isn't a sandstone host, it's an unconformity deposit hosted in a carbonaceous schist.

[@FuckingFootballzzz]

Don't mean to act like a little kid but he stopped after Australia 😂