Nuclear Waste Is Manageable. We Just Have To Do It. | Random Thursday

[@paulgar8]

JS, As a (retired) degreed nuclear engineer, I must compliment you on making a needed subject available and clear to the general public. LOVE your work!

[@ApresSavant]

I agree, and what saddens me is that 30 years ago when I was in school studying this stuff (and entertaining co-op jobs at CANDU facilities), we had so much hope for these recycling / treatment options. I still think we should be going more nuclear, but the uninformed and the special interests tie our hands, so this will be my grandchildren's problem.

[@paulgar8]

@@ApresSavant Nice to hear from north of the border. CANDU's Can Do! (I spent seven years as a migrant worker from south of the border at Pickering.)

[@ApresSavant]

@@paulgar8 at the time I was interviewing at the AECL research center in Mississauga, and they were looking for people to staff the Bruce facility. I went Navy because we were looking at nuclear powered subs and ice breakers then - Sadly I never got to put the nuclear part of my physics degree to work as a government change killed them all.

[@kevincasey5035]

PTG, As a retired Safeguards Advisor I fail to see how Joe made it clear. He skipped over the fact that if you can enrich to 4% then 95% is not a problem technically. It is only monitoring by the IAEA that keeps countries honest. He also misses out the UK when he mentions reproccessing and the fact that Pu can be extracted at this point. Another thing monitored by the IAEA if your country is not a permanent member of the UN Security Council.

[@paulgar8]

@@kevincasey5035 I believe he made clear the different physical possibilities available with our present "waste" situation. That some of these could lead to materials at enrichments that qualify as "weapons-grade" or at least dirty-bomb grade is also true, and that is why we have safeguard treaties. However, treaties and laws only keep honest people honest. You also need a cop on the beat to enforce society's standards.

[@HorzaPanda]

Calling it waste when it still has so much potential fuel in, and using that fuel would reduce your waste quantity by >90%, seems downright ridiculous to me O_o

[@Zubotai]

@Gareth Fairclough I would say it feels like filling a fast and with balloons so you spend less time at the pump when filling it up. Not sure why that analogy popped into my head but damn I wanna make gas tank balloons now.

[@HorzaPanda]

@Gareth Fairclough I've been on a tour of Sellafield once, so I've heard of some of the problems of reprocessing, but yeah, once through and done is an insane waste and that's a perfect analogy.

[@HorzaPanda]

@@Zubotai Want to give that another shot? I've tried reading through several times now and am still confused at what you are trying to get at

[@HorzaPanda]

@Zangief The Red Is this at me or Zubotai?

[@Dave5843-d9m]

Reprocessing is a serious engineering challenge and heavily regulated. Chemical processing to turn the fuel pellets into salts is really easy and the regulators are interested in safety only. Those fuel salts can be burnt in fast spectrum molten salt reactors.

[@BrendenParker]

"Reprocessed in France, illegal in USA" Maybe re brand it as "freedom reprocessed nuclear fuel" or simply "freedom fuel " then it will be ok

[@Coconut-219]

Just convince them it will somehow solve gun crime and they'll pass anything - ignoring other outstanding issues. :)

[@metalgearsolidsnake6978]

nonesene

[@johnkessler966]

It was only illegal for a couple of years back in the 1970s. Now it is simply uneconomical.

[@KRYMauL]

Oh just call it nuclear waste for your nuclear family because apparently the US still thinks they're in the 1950s.

[@KaiserMattTygore927]

@@Coconut-219 Americans solving gun crime? that's rich. just tell us that its "convenient" since that's all we care about.

[@robcampbell7175]

I love how we have endless billions of dollars to kind of maintain our military but $10 billion for dealing with nuclear waste is impossible.

[@w花b]

There's a reason why universities hunt foreign students (especially if they're from China). That's the current state of American priorities

[@scratchy996]

That's because the military deals with immediate threat. We will all be dead in a few decades anyway, so why spend money on something that will harm others in the far future ? Let the spend money on it. They should thankful we spend money on the military, or their radioactive asses would not even exist.

[@meskisz]

Because Zelensky asked.

[@robonator2945]

also 2 trillion stimulus checks can be written without pause, a solid percent of that military hardware can be donated to a good cause of the literal bloody taliban, and all the while we still funnel cumulative billions into renewable which are impractical even now (necessitating grid scale energy storage to function) and are only going to become less and less practical overtime. It's almost like the government can't be trusted to adequately handle funds, or anything for that matter, and we need to stop leaning on it for legislation as opposed to people taking personal accountability for changes they want to see.

[@literalantifaterrorist4673]

@@meskisz oh right, because 15.8 billion USD is comparably exorbitant to the roughly 1 trillion USD we're spending on the military each year. stfu

[@threeballedtomcat9380]

Finland seems to have the best solution right now, but reprocessing HLW and using it for other applications makes, in my opinion, far more sense. Great upload, great information, Joe. I really enjoyed this video......

[@lonestarr1490]

If they prove that it works with sufficient efficiency. Wouldn't be the first piece of technology that sounds good on paper but fails to life up to its promises. I don't say that's the case here. I just say nothing of it is beyond testing phase, yet. So maybe it's too early to bet all your money on it.

[@Soken50]

Which is why France has the superior idea, recycle the plutonium and spent fuel into MOx fuel, sort the waste according to their levels and composition, cast the most radioactive and long lived into glass which will keep it stable for ~ 10 000 years, put it in a steel cylinder rated for about 1 000 years in favorable conditions, then put them down 10 meter shafts cast in concrete in a hangar awaiting the opening of our deep geological storage called CIGEO where a stable relatively impermeable clay strata will keep the longuest lived isotopes from migrating too fast once the steel glass and concrete casings naturally fail ensuring us a good million years before the now stable isotopes reach the surface through percolation. Meanwhile for the less radioactive, shorter lived stuff it's stored in subsurface sites similar to landfills but more closely monitored. Ultimately Gen 4 nuclear plants were supposed to reuse depleted uranium in fast breeder reactors to reenrich it and further reduce the amount of waste but it's not looking good given the dislike of nuclear energy here at the moment.

[@stevenwilliams1805]

I'm not one for large or, unfettered government power but, surely there are some areas we'd be better off admitting when we don't know enough about to have any input. I could be wrong but, I expect public opinion is largely to blame for the lack of progress in these types of things. And as a whole, it seems there is a lot of things the public is uninformed of.

[@threeballedtomcat9380]

@@stevenwilliams1805 The biggest problem with anything to do with "nuclear" is public fear. There is a lot of misinformation and that is why it is so good that this site and a few others provide accurate information. With the fossil fuel situation in the USA there needs to be options, renewable energy (solar/wind) isn't going to provide a viable alternative- with the right approach nuclear is the way to go.....

[@stevenwilliams1805]

@@threeballedtomcat9380 fear is often a byproduct of ignorance. I wish more people would realize the power we now hold to educate ourselves. And I doubt anyone watching these videos are among that fearful public. But, all I can do is try to convey what I learn to others. And that's not easy when the attempt is offen meet with the attitude of "I know all i need to know" or "I dont need to know."

[@SilliS]

There's this Finnish song about nuclear power called "Suomi-ilmiö" (By Eppu Normaali). The lyrics in the chorus literally say that "No other countries than Finland has it risk free". I really hope they didn't jinx it! Gotta trust in Onkalo...

[@PennyAfNorberg]

I learn some in swedish when I studied in Forsmark.

[@mikitz]

I believe the song came out during the 80's and they're probably being a bit sarcastic. Still, let's dump that shit in Onkalo or sell it on to some potentially nefarious organizations for profit. Either suits me.

[@tapio_m6861]

@@mikitz That's exactly what it's supposed to be, it's sarcastic. It came just after the Three Miles Island incident and it was meant to show the ridiculousness of how the Finnish engineers were supposedly impervious to to any errors and that "yeah things might be bad out there, but we are perfect and do things up to the code."

[@Cheka__]

Suomi's a good smg in BF5

[@matheussanthiago9685]

it's almost like a piece of lyric that Borat would come up with, if Borat were was from Finland instead of Kazakhstan

[@RRW359]

"It's on a fault line; I don't know how that was overlooked" *sweats in Hanford*

[@Wilhelmofdeseret]

Lmao gotta love hanford

[@paavobergmann4920]

...Gorleben....

[@dreadswizzard9142]

At least PNNL is getting somewhere over there. They could probably power the country if it was legal to reprocess the waste.

[@godsfavoriteant9293]

@@dreadswizzard9142 it is defense waste. There is nothing there to be recycled for civilian purposes.

[@dreadswizzard9142]

@@godsfavoriteant9293 There are several still active reactors at Hanford that are used for power generation.

[@nickhahn3276]

Ex-USN Nuclear Mechanic here - thanks for covering all of this stuff, Joe. The ignorant fear of nuclear power is frustrating to someone who worked directly with reactors for a few years, nice to see some fact-based assessment of the real problems we face.

[@dieubermensch]

Wouldn't it be just simpler to go full renewable? Solar, wind etc?

[@bearcubdaycare]

I have a degree in physics. I think that the "ignorant opposition" meme is unhelpful. For instance, a friend who worked on the Yucca Mountain project confided to me decades ago that it had likely unfixable problems. And as this video says, the waste problem is still unaddressed (except the Finns, who seem a good model for many things, not just nukes). Problems have been unsolved, and billions spent. Someone needs to be more Buck Stops Here about it. I don't hear broad fear about nuclear like when I was young. People seem more amenable to it. But, frankly, justifiable concerns like costs (high), waste (unsolved on my continent), control when things go wrong (Fukushima, etc.) without someone going in to die.

[@nickhahn3276]

@@bearcubdaycare I'd wager a lot of the issues are political; most funding issues are. Politicians making decisions regarding science and technology rubs me the wrong way, even though I understand the necessity of the involvement. Regardless, I was only expressing frustration. The fine line between catering ignorance and calling it out is challenging to walk, especially after seeing how well the USN has done thus far to maintain a clean record, only to see broad dismissal of the technology. The technology is not at fault in these matters, it seems. Just the poor decision making that can lead complex endeavors astray. I'm glad to hear you've seen an improvement in your time regarding it; I hope that the broad trend follows suit.

[@MCWaffles2003-1]

@@dieubermensch its a great idea until you consider what could happen on a cloudy windless couple of days. Also, battery tech is nowhere near able to store the amount we need yet to continuously power entire cities or even regions of the country. Then there is also the problem of power density and powering cities and industrial districts. For instance, an electric arc furnace requires around 475MWh to smelt 1 ton of steel. With PV at around 20% efficiency and perfectly sunny days supplying about 1000W/m^2 of light we find it would take a solar panel a little bigger than 1.5x1.5 km 1 hour to smelt 1 ton of steel. The US produces over 250,000 tons of steel per day. Assuming we get 8 hours of directly overhead sunlight per day (we don't) this would mean we would need a field about 1300 x 1300 km or around 1.7million sq km of panels JUST to meet our electricity demands to run arc furnaces...

[@dieubermensch]

@@MCWaffles2003-1 hydro electric batteries. Boom

[@Spamlure]

Glass vitrification sounds like the way to go. Break down the radioactive material into small particles and encapsulate with glass. Glass is so stable it can last up to a million years. That's longer than the danger the radioactivity poses. These glass beads (maybe no bigger than a marble?) can be dumped into the old mine shafts where the original uranium was removed.

[@erutrottti]

As Finns are simple, Onkalo simply means a hole. So we are just creating a sophisticated hole for this stuff.

[@AammaK]

Exactly! :D I mean it's prettier than "kolo" or "reikä" for example

[@thestudentofficial5483]

You Finns are so great in many ways it's unreal.

[@lonestarr1490]

@@thestudentofficial5483 Wait, are you talking about the Onkalo thing or about a certain profile picture?

[@thestudentofficial5483]

@@lonestarr1490 Definitely the Onkalo hole

[@catinthebox9400]

ok

[@nApucco]

“Recycling is illegal in the USA” ... why am I not surprised xD

[@Derty_the_grower]

Not even true, heh. Bill Gates just reopened up the recycling of waste also, so that is ultra naive to say at this point in time now.

[@flyingpugs3678]

Recycling isn't illegal in the USA

[@sovietshnuckums2357]

Don't hate on him bro he just repeated what the guy in the video said

[@choronos]

@@Derty_the_grower What are you on about? No, the United States does not recycle nuclear fuel. Source: the United States Government. www.energy.gov/ne/articles/5-fast-facts-about-spent-nuclear-fuel

[@__WJK__]

All would be forgiven if the comment said... Nuclear recycling is illegal in the USA ;) ;) ;)

[@gatticusfpv3174]

Hey Joe this is excellent as always and really important since nuclear power can buy us some much needed time. But for the sake of accuracy I just found out from a nuclear scientist on Twitter that the ban on reprocessing in the US was dropped in 1999. It's purely a lack of political will power and funding at this point.

[@bannor99]

"It's popular in France but illegal in the United States" just like real cheese

[@DNRTannen]

Or Kinder eggs

[@m1k3droid]

Japan, also. you know, despite Hiroshima...

[@AnnieWarbux]

Hey hey hey.... don't knock the Cheeseheads! They've got Scrumptious Cheeeze!🤗

[@2009heyhow]

But why is it? It sounds like such a good solution. Anyone?

[@ronvosick8253]

Who cut the cheese 🧀?

[@RupertBruce]

We had a hill near my home in England that was grass-covered and had a circle of tall trees at the top. My father referred to it as Anthrax Hill - The burial mound was planted with trees as a long term marker for where the diseased bodies lay.

[@kylerussell5882]

I’m currently getting my PhD in nano materials for high radiation environments and wow your videos are phenomenal. Now I can watch your videos for “work purposes”

[@countertony]

The "launch it into space" approach made for a good scene in Clarke's early novel "Islands in the Sky", but yeah, turns out Heinlein was more accurate in that there ain't no such thing as a free launch. ...I'll get my coat.

[@godsfavoriteant9293]

That was Niven's catchphrase not Heinlen's.

[@f4ptr989]

Not to mention that 6% of space launches fail. A giant explosion of nuclear waste in the atmosphere, bad idea.

[@countertony]

​@@godsfavoriteant9293 wait - are you sure you're not thinking of TANJ (there ain't no justice)? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_ain%27t_no_such_thing_as_a_free_lunch

[@foxkenji]

@@f4ptr989 that was the past. Falcon 9 is extremely reliable. Plus, the nuclear fuel canisters can just be made tough to resist breakage. Even better, could be put on a system similar to a crew capsule.

[@godsfavoriteant9293]

@@countertony to be fair, the expression is older than both authors.

[@zatar123]

Anything that lets us use this waste for something, anything, other than just sitting around being dangerous, is an idea worth exploring.

[@jsn1252]

@@Real_Eggman (Mostly un)spent fuel can't be turned into weapons. The isotopic composition of the Plutonium in spent fuel is completely useless for bombs, and the technology to enrich plutonium doesn't exist.

[@davidlepage1183]

@@jsn1252 Dirty bombs...

[@23rt2308u24tkhg]

It's actually sitting around doing nothing.

[@johnkessler966]

It has been explored for many decades. It has been used in a few countries, but at present, it is far from economical. Also, taking into account practicalities, there was a reputable study conducted to determine how much of the existing spent nuclear fuel is worth keeping for future reuse. Not all that much of it, it turns out.

[@milosstojanovic4623]

@@jsn1252 they did not use it make nuclear bombs, they were adding used nuclear waste to regular bombs to spew radiation, USA did it in my country, so our province has 40%-60% increase in tyroid, limph and other cancer cases. They were also using cluster bombs that are forbidden.

[@mattyward4822]

" we already have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world a thousand times over , what's a few more " bruh ... quote of the year , so fuckin true , its like your house is on fire but your still worried about leaving the stove on 😂

[@gibbeldon]

So far the few countries who have nuclear weapons didn't blow up the planet. It only needs one crazy dictator with access to nuclear weapons to set the world on fire. I believe that is the root of the fear.

[@matthiasnagorski8411]

@@gibbeldon fun fact: a lot of those scary countries with dictators would likely be way more stable if they were allowed to develop nuclear energy to be used in their infrastructure. That's why we did the Iran Deal. But most people can't wrap their heads around the concept that those dictators only get to power because of the instability that comes from a lack of resources. They make promises to change things and get elected, or the official government is too weak to repel the coup. If we could assist countries by teaching them how to harness nuclear power for their infrastructure, for public use, we would take the claws out of those dictators. Never mind the fact that the reactors don't create the stuff necessary for bombs.

[@outerspaceisalie]

@@matthiasnagorski8411 That's mostly true but not always true and not continuously true. You can't answer the entire question of power by mentioning how a transition occurs at a time of instability. Once they are in power they are in power; fixing their resources will not send their leader running in most cases so its a little late in most cases.

[@simonmalmstrom9593]

10/10 comment

[@TheGhungFu]

"We Just Have To Do It." ?? There is no "We" when it comes to doing the right things. "We" generally applies in cases like "We are screwed".....

[@dubbynelson]

This guy right here has the right idea.

[@monad_tcp]

technically if we aren't going to survive for 24.000, we are already screwed. its not our problem, why dealing with it ?

[@monad_tcp]

how to solve the nuclear problem in a nutshell: leave it in plain sight don't do anything, hope the civilization can last 24K years, if it doesn't, then future people are stupid enough to open one of the cans, let them just die, that will tell the lesson to others, soon a myth of damned place will emerge, problem solves itself.

[@Soken50]

@@monad_tcp No, the smarter idea is burying it in an impermeable rock strata with nothing geologicaly interesting, leaving no trace of it on the surface, that way no one will bother to dig hundreds of meters and stumble on it, even less so if civilisation has collapsed

[@paavobergmann4920]

" We are screwed" is actually a very fitting paraphrase for the specific problem at hand. So "We have to do it" as in " some of us, Anyone, really" is kinda true in this case.

[@katiewyatt4399]

Me while watching this video: "Why don't we just launch it into the sun?" Literally 2 seconds later: Oh.

[@gtbkts]

Same.

[@donaldhobson8873]

Besides, we will have probably disassembled the sun before it all decays.

[@Matok1]

Incredibly dangerous to do, because every once in a while, a rocket does still explode. A stupid amount of rocket fuel required, probably would require more power than we've ever made out of the spent fuel. Also, just getting it out of earth's gravity well doesn't mean it's going to fall into the sun, it's in orbit around the sun at that point. If you want it to actually hit the sun you have to spend a lot more power canceling all the orbital velocity of the rocket around the sun. If you fail that, the rocket has a good chance of 'revisiting' earth in the future when their orbits line up again. Just a few small reasons not to.

[@gptiede]

@@Matok1 Yep. 11 km/s to get it out of Earth's gravity well and 30 km/s to get it to fall into the Sun. Even Starship has nowhere near the capability to do this.

[@YounesLayachi]

@@Matok1 great answer

[@trr2k]

I was hoping for some mention of the integral fast reactors as I believe they are designed to recycle spent fuel.

[@briandoe5746]

24,000 years is five times longer than recorded human history.... Today I learned that cuneiform is only 5,000 years old and some of these massive Stone cities that are 13,000 years old like the one they found on Vulcan apparently didn't have written text. This almost feels like it should be an episode.

[@arnefines2356]

It should. And they made beer before bread.. according to a dude on Rogan

[@CarlosAM1]

meanwhile nature has made nuclear reactors 2 billion years ago and the fission products are still stored underground, aint that cool!

[@arnefines2356]

@@CarlosAM1 nature always finds a way!

[@CarlosAM1]

@@arnefines2356 incredibly, hell nature literally beat us by 2 billion years in making a nuclear reactor. Natural nuclear reactors are quite a fascinating topic

[@TathD]

Massive stone cities on Vulcan? What's that?

[@ericlotze7724]

I was reading a Congressional Report on this issue on MICROFILM at my University (UNF) a few months back. What annoys me was they had all the "proper" methods worked out in there, had sites/transport planned out (which was funny too, as it assumed waaaaaaaaaay more nuclear plants boing built.) All of this and yet now i am viewing photos of that report that i took with my *cellphone* and not much has changed in the terms of USA long term storage/reprocessing.

[@KRYMauL]

Burying the "waste" and connecting it to the grid in the form of batteries sounds like a brilliant idea.

[@bdwinter72]

I just keep thinking all of this stored waste is going to be so valuable once we start reusing it

[@jamese9283]

@D People need to get brave and go for it. It's the right thing to do.

[@paperburn]

I know there is a open discussion on mining landfills now, older landfills might have enough metals to be profitable

[@jasondashney]

I think the idea of trying to permanently bury this stuff is ridiculously shortsighted. If we put the same amount of money into research as we are into that facility, I bet we could come up with some great solutions so that we wouldn't even need the facility. Making this stuff so hard to access once it's in there just doesn't make sense to me given its potential.

[@alphagt62]

If the waste becomes valuable, it could really offset the cost of nuclear power in the first place. Nuclear power is expensive, if nothing else.

[@mikitz]

The best part is that the nuclear 'waste' isn't going anywhere anytime soon. At least the disposal sites of the future should be designed reuse in mind from the get go. The government policies will shift to enabling reuse at some point to the private sector (not necessarily anytime soon) or they'll simply oversee and manage the process themselves once a viable technology is finally available for use.

[@brothershamus1160]

This is quite a sensitive subject for me, as in my city (southern uk) there are several decommissioned nuclear subs that haven’t been de-fuelled, and in 2004 the place they are held failed to meet nuclear safety standards. Seven of these submarines have been in the graveyard waiting to be de-fuelled longer than they were actually in use by the Royal Navy. Every Monday at half eleven you hear the old blitz alarm go off when they do the alarm drill.

[@AnnieWarbux]

🤯That's Insane!! This whole thing is Insane! My Dad retired from a local Waste Recycling RESEARCH plant. Scary Stuff! Indiana has the most Manufacturing Jobs and Manufacturing Companies. In NWI I see the Nuclear Stacks spewing, the Refinery Burning off, the Mill's Coal bits that fall from the sky, the Vaseline Goo on my windshield, and then we have Soap Production, a Corn Oil Factory, Garbage Mounds, Abound and so much more!! Now, The Current U.S. Administration has to reverse the dismantling of the EPA, that the Previous Administration enacted, and Race to get Ahead of Ourselves!

[@__WJK__]

Not that it's likely possible (thanks to nearsightedness and bureaucratic red tape) but if those subs could somehow be properly re-commissioned as a tourist attraction... I would imagine (if done right) they would not only be a very popular tourist attraction but would also generate a fair amount of revenue.

[@stevefox3763]

@@__WJK__ yes, the USA's first ever nuclear sub was cleaned up, restored and is now a museum ship. It can be done if people are prepared to do so.

[@stevefox3763]

Seamus, it's OK, you'll get a warning if something is amiss, the three legged people with be a dead giveaway lol

[@__WJK__]

@@stevefox3763 - Imagine the tourist potential if one of those subs could be re-commissioned to a point where they could actually take paying customers on an actual mock-mission/dive excursion(!)

[@grumpystiltskin]

Coal plants release 10,000 times as much radiation in the ash, which contains U and Th.

[@Bryan-Hensley]

Absolutely 100% false. You might be accurate in the 1950s

[@natanzadworny2287]

@@Bryan-Hensley I mean, the waste IS radioactive... Maybe not 10000x tho..

[@businessproyects2615]

Now we know where to find more then, well done coal.

[@atticusmulkey9378]

This is the best random channel I’ve ever stumbled across...

[@joeypadgett7895]

Illinois Energy Professor has some great videos on this.

[@Derty_the_grower]

Tell him to do the one on the leaking nuclear Turkey Point plant in Miami, that is giving kids leukemia and its going into the Atlantic where we get our fish from

[@josephburchanowski4636]

@@Derty_the_grower Except the radiation isn't giving kids leukemia nor is the radiation harming the environment. 215 times seawater tritium is beyond tiny because of how little tritium is normally in seawater. You are literally freaking out about Bananas worth of radiation. (A Banana Equivalent Dose, B.E.D. is equal to 0.0001 mSv)

[@__WJK__]

@@josephburchanowski4636 - Appreciate the info, that said, how many bananas would it take to make one of those nuclear, diamond-infused batteries(?) ;)

[@josephburchanowski4636]

@@__WJK__ Well those diamond batteries utilize radioactive carbon. Much of the Banana's radiation is in potassium isotopes, not as much from carbon. If you were forced to remove the little natural radioactive carbon from bananas, and make a diamond out of it, it would take a lot of bananas. It obviously depends on the size of the diamond battery, but I'd guess some number many magnitudes above a trillion. It goes without saying, but this is beyond impractical.

[@__WJK__]

@Joseph Burchanowski - Hmm... so what if we were able to increase a banana's potassium isotope content via hybridization(?) Just kidding... regardless of my mostly facetious comments... you're knowledge on the subject matter is impressive, thank you for sharing the info.

[@ManOfLore1]

Excellent video. Although, I do believe you missed another possible solution. The molten salt reactor. Many designs look incredibly promising. Especially the ones from Moltex and Elysium Industries.

[@GetMedQ]

Google "ITER" Fusion Reactor prototype. 35 countries, 65 Billion cost... starts running in 2 years

[@ManOfLore1]

@@GetMedQ Yes. I am well aware of ITER. I truly hope that pays off.

[@GetMedQ]

@@ManOfLore1 Wish more people knew

[@michaelmeehan5505]

"Into Eternity" was a fantastic documentary. Worth a watch, folks!

[@ToxicTerrance]

0:49 is how the doc ends. Absolutely beautiful.

[@davidhendriks1395]

Great docu indeed!

[@EricMeyer9]

That doc is garbage. Just slow motion walking and scary music. Very poorly researched. Pandora's Promise is much better.

[@zapfanzapfan]

Yepp, and fantastic use of Kraftwerk music. Nuclear technicians working to the tune of Radioactivity was just inspired.

[@lukacsnemeth1652]

Thats just a red herring, thought up by humanities majors, so they can get involved. Surely any society advanced enough to carve 500 m deep into granite bedrock knows what radioactivity is.

[@matthewblack7206]

'Burn' up most of this waste in Thorium cycle reactors.

[@vipondiu]

Thorium is just a fuel. The reactors that burn waste are fast-spectrum reactors. They may overlap or not

[@treborheminway3814]

Isn't there also "slow" burner reactors as well?

[@vipondiu]

@@treborheminway3814 unfortunately no, the thermal or slow spectrum (BWR, PWR) tends to accumulate the higher actinides, while fast or hard spectrum tends to burn everything. 90% of reactors in the world are thermal spectrum, because of it's advantatges, and that created the accumulation we have. But it can be easily solved. The russians operate sodium based reactors that are hard spectrum. I don't know if anybody else does

[@elinope4745]

Those reactors are called thorium reactors but they use many isotopes. The thorium is a secondary fuel, the primary fuel is mox fuel and uses plutonium.

[@vaclavzajac214]

@@vipondiu Actually, the bad thing about PWR and BWR is that they are burner reactors which greatly decreases efficiency. The created plutonium isn't a bad thing, it's a fuel for the reactor. One of the biggest problems of the video is that it treats actinides as waste even thought it isn't. Uranium breeders make even more plutonium because it's their entire purpose. For burners like BWR or PWR, there is 0.8 plutonium atoms for every fission, in convertors like most FNR or HWR it's around 1 and in breeders it's up to 1.1. The only difference with Thorium breeders is that they make U 233 instead of heavy actinides but otherwise it's the same process.

[@maxthejew]

Little delayed, but I agree with most of this. The issues I do take with it. 1. enrichment of uranium isn't a linear process. You'd think like "Oh this is only 9% enriched uranium and you need 90% no biggie. Unfortunately, 9% is about 90% to 90%. It's not an easy process. 2. Proliferation is an actual issue. It's one that concerns me. It's not about the quantity of weapons in our nations hands or other nations hands. Most nations have a sense of self-preservation. Most people know that there's automated systems in place that ensures mutually assured destruction. In the case of extremists though, mutually assured destruction isn't really an issue. Your faith and ideology dictates everlasting peace for the destruction of non-believers, and suddenly the mutually assured destruction that keeps the world from bombing each other suddenly doesn't matter. The proliferation risk comes from the fact that the process for making enriched uranium is energy intensive if done by gas diffusion (took up 10% of the entire US power grid at the time to make enough U-235 for nuclear tests and bombs) , and if done by the centrifuge technologies, to balance correctly, is a pretty guarded secret. So those extremists run into an issue of making the bombs due to acquiring the essential ingredients. This is simple math...the more material out there, the easier it is for them to acquire. And while typical weapons grade is 90% it's actually because it's the most efficient and biggest bang for the buck.... but not necessary for a low grade bomb. You can make due with lower grade. Weapons grade is a bit of a misnomer. The actual ability to make a bomb is relatively simple and relies on mostly physical interactions. That all being said, I still think it's necessary to have nuclear power in the mix. Molten salt reactors, gas reactors, There's a very unique build out of China and Japan to use thermocouples with the reactors like RTG's for metal processing. Using the excess heat for other industries and not just energy generation with a steam turbine. The plans also included building such a factory in old coal plants to cut down building costs. I'm a big fan of FAST reactors. They are breeder reactors which has a high proliferation risk, but the ability to utilize nuclear waste is a tremendous advantage for a few reasons. We have a lot of waste we can reuse to mix in with new fuel. Would cut down operating costs tremendously.

[@azide_rdx7937]

You've convinced me that nuclear isn't as bad as I thought

[@jeffsmith9351]

You fell for the bullshit. Im so sorry

[@w花b]

blub

[@itsROMPERS...]

Except that he's saying it IS as bad as we thought, because while there are ways to mitigate, WE CANT DO ANY OF THEM BECAUSE THEYRE ILLEGAL, which leaves EXACTLY where we started.

[@vuubi1]

@@itsROMPERS... sorry but thats like saying renewables dont work because they're not used enough... Nuclear isn't an incredibly dangerous fuel, we just dont wanna spend the money to get rid of the waste the right way

[@El_Presidente_5337]

@@vuubi1 Here in Germany we had nuclear waste on the move 24/7 because there wasn't a safe spot for it 10 years ago. Now we have temporary storage facilities but storing it in a hall isn't directlysafe for eternity. And just throwing a butt load of money at the problem would directly increase the cost of nuclear power plants. Not to mention that a nuclear powerplant itself is already expensive aswell as the deconstruction of one.

[@Aabidaleem]

its satisfying to see Joe pushing videos again after his much needed break....ur videos are my inspiration to study sciences.....thanks for everything Joe

[@jackking5567]

UK here. Many years ago I went on a tour at Sellafield nuclear plant in Cumbria. They actually had a visitor centre as an attempt to educate and promote their work. Few failed to realise that it actually ran two separate trips at that plant - the public exhibition centre with video screens, buttons to press and as expected was heaving with screaming kids. The other tour was fantastic: Put your name onto a list and you were literally herded onto a waiting bus. There were many warnings about no photography and before we set off we were checked over by armed police. The tour began.. The bus drove around the massive site to start with. It's a vast site with randomly numbered sheds dotted around and hissing steam pipes venting from remote sections of the vast empty compound (I still say there's things beneath the site that few know of) Eventually we drove closer to various structures and sheds, massive structures and sheds. The guide explained things from her script and the driver would slow to let us see. We were told of their awesome work in reprocessing and how valuable components were removed for re-use. She made the site sound awesome. Next she pointed out a small link between buildings that stood many feet off the ground. She explained that they reduced waste so much that only a small passage was needed to link buildings (propaganda at its best..). I shouted out "So what happens to this waste sludge in the last building". The guide stalled but I kept asking. Her reply was priceless - 'We've not worked that bit out yet' was her reply. They were reducing waste in size and of some components but that waste was also concentrating and becoming just as dangerous. Sellafield is being dismantled. It was built too quickly and rushed through at the insistence of an impatient British Government who cared more about the need for nuclear weapons than the population of its country. The legacies of leaking storage tanks built with no removal plans factored in at the design stage is staggering. Gone are those responsible for the mistakes made there and in are we who have to deal with it all.. I have nothing against nuclear power but do feel that not everything is factored in when it comes to its claims of immense energy output etc. Add in processing, mining and the waste legacy and nuclear energy isn't such a great idea after all. I suppose they could go back to the old days with waste disposal and do what the UK did: Literally throw 55 gallon drums of nuclear waste into the sea around the whole coastline of the UK. Check KZbin for the videos and prepare to be shocked.

[@steviamac2999]

30 odd years ago as a yts apprentice in west Cumbria the tour took us in the buildings and we were allowed to watch the fuel rods be stripped down, given access to the viewing platforms above the massive pools of water where it was being cooled .They even let us stand on top of a reactor that was down for maintenance on the power station part of the site. Quite an interesting day out to be fair.

[@Shleemaa]

Need more videos about nuclear energy!

[@mj1653]

“A phone that powers itself” Apple: haha - no.

[@Soken50]

Of course they'd be all for it, it would justify their BS "certified technician" required to change an effing battery, at least a radioactive battery would present some amount of risk

[@Stonehawk]

"and this is why we made the INCREDIBLY BRAVE DECISION of removing you charger port"

[@entropicprinciple9276]

LMAO

[@googleyoutubechannel8554]

I thought the plan that pretty much every geo / nuclear eng agrees with is just to drill deep bore holes using existing drilling tech (which we're super good at already, and is relatively cheap) in non-geo active areas, and put the high radioactive waste sealed in ceramic etc deep underground. This completely solves the 'thousands of years risk'.

[@eordonez85]

"It's on a fault line; I don't know how that was overlooked" Who's fault was it? lol

[@richardhee]

The fault of that line probably. Now the next question for you, who did draw that line there?

[@darktruth8013]

LMAO 😂

[@QiuSe]

Someone who put everything on the line

[@Ass_of_Amalek]

richardhee the brits are the ones who drew the lines.

[@35axeman]

Thanks Joe. Your techo-geekiness makes me sound smarter when I poorly retell this kind of information to my friends.

[@GetMedQ]

Google "ITER" Fusion Reactor prototype. 35 countries, 65 Billion cost... starts running in 2 years

[@w花b]

@@GetMedQ no

[@timfriday9106]

what friends? ;) lol

[@grumpystiltskin]

200 years storage gives us 200 years to build another cask. Why would we think we can't spend one week in the next 200 years to make another cask?

[@theunspoke815]

I FOUND IT!!! IT'S PRONOUNCED "HEY LOU" LIKE YOU'RE YELLING AT YOUR FRIEND "HEY LOU, GET ME A BEER WHILE YOU'RE IN THERE!!" 😉😉

[@MuhammadZeeshan-rb5pj]

I was expecting "HEY LOU, GET ME A BEER WHILE I LISTEN TO THIS NERD ON KZbin" 😂

[@oscarraygoza4350]

Evwr since I watched "pandoras promise" documentary my perception and curiosity towards nuclear energy changed, good video

[@davidgeary490]

Pandora's Promise was a very clever, slick, manipulative propaganda piece. I was on a panel of four discussing it on stage after a showing at a cinema in my city several years ago - full house with mostly uranium / nuclear workers. We two panelists pointing out the obvious propaganda tricks, slight-of-hand, misdirection, straw men arguments etc. by director Stone was an eye-opener for the audience. We seem to have won the day. Some nuclear proponents approached me afterwards and said as much.

[@paavobergmann4920]

@@davidgeary490 "some nuclear proponents" should have been the giveaway. How sure are you you haven´t been played?

[@andrewhooper7603]

@@paavobergmann4920 "Of course they would say X, they believe in X!" doesn't illuminate anyone.

[@davidgeary490]

@@paavobergmann4920 They were nuclear industry staff of my acquaintance, and genuine in their comments. The 400 people in the theatre audience were mostly industry staff, including clerical staff (this is a nuclear town) . I think they appreciated that I was bold enough to call b.s. on the whole climate catastrophe / crisis / apocalypse end-of-the-world type fearmongering messaging in the film - because those people, physicists & engineers, don't really believe that nonsense either.

[@Hardzinho_yay]

Very nice, I'm researching for my master's degree about nuclear batteries (nuclear generators) using burned nuclear fuel as a radioisotope source. There're many polytical problems, mainly stems from the fear of weaponization and terrorist attacks to the reprocessed fuel (that create many transnetunian isotopes with lower half life but higher activity) many can't even be handled for research outside USA (or Russia) like Pu-238 and Am-241. France does a great job with nuclear fuel reprocessing, in Brazil we had centriguges for reprocessing fuel too but because os the non proliferation of nuclear weapon treaty and fear of weaponization of the nuclear waste it was discontinued (more like USA said 'reprocessing is bad' and we need to shut down our facilities). There're many uses for nuclear waste (also for radiopharmaceutical, medical equipment, nuclear batteries and research). Today reprocessing the spent fuel can shorten the lifetime or even close the lifecycle completley but at the moment is a bit more expensive than, well, ding absolute nothing (and wait for the radioactivity dry out...for, 25k years). But reprocessing is far from unviable

[@ComradePhoenix]

Its like I've said for years: if its hot enough to be worried about, its hot enough to burn again.

[@Soken50]

Sadly not, it can be radioactive and not produce much heat, that's the reason 95% of the fuel is still intact in "spent" fuel and most of the activity is from the transuranics, that is to say the waste part, not the uranium which isn't that "hot" once you stop throwing neutrons at it. You can however reprocess the uranium and plutonium but you're still left with a couple percents of waste every cycle.

[@paavobergmann4920]

It´s the toxicity of the heavy metals that are involved that worries me most, tbh.

[@Ender240sxS13]

@Zangief The Red wrong on all counts mate. See modern uranium fueled nuclear reactors only burn around 2% of the total fissionable material in them, after that point they are no longer able to sustain a chain reaction, but 98% of the highly radioactive and still fissionable material is still present in the fuel, hence why it's so dangerous. We are fully capable of reprocessing the fuel, basically removing the fission byproducts from the fuel rods. If we were to do that the waste that is produced, while still toxic, is much much less radioactive and much safer and easier to handle. So why don't we do this??? Because one of the byproducts of the fission process is actually weapons grade plutonium, and the facilities and procedures that we would use to recycle the fuel rods and get rid of the non-fissionable materials are the exact same facilities that could be used to extract weapons grade plutonium. And since we have agreed to a bunch of nuclear non-proliferation treaties we are restricted in how many of these sites we can have and how frequently they can operate etc. Since if we just built and ran these facilities in order to reprocess all of our spent fuel then who is to say we aren't also extracting and hording tons of weapons grade material that could be used to make hundreds of thousands of more nukes, which makes countries like Russia and china nervous. Of course there are other solutions, like liquid thorium fluoride salt reactors, which can be duped with waste material with out the need for reprocessing methods that could also make weapons grade material. In fact if we actually did this we could supply the entire planets power needs for the next 70 years only by burning the "spent" fuel we currently have stockpiled.

[@ComradePhoenix]

@@Soken50 Yes, thank you for explaining exactly what I meant as if I was wrong.

[@ComradePhoenix]

@Zangief The Red Dude, its not perpetual motion. Its just using the fuel that wasn't burnt on the first pass.

[@benjaminanderson7066]

Molten salt reactors can use spent fuel and make energy. Look it up.

[@ravener96]

Some types can, specifically fast reactors can. The other ones usually work on specific fuel cycles to control the neutronics. Fast reactors are a bit looser with the neutron econony

[@uberraisin4487]

13:05 "That could run your heart for 50 lifetimes" "Or something big for 15 mintues"

[@bigbones916]

It saddens me that nuclear is the greatest energy source we have been gifted but we are too afraid to use it.

[@paavobergmann4920]

Well, its a poisoned gift, that´s the problem. We need to get out heads clear about if it is really worth it if we honestly consider everything involved, and afaik, that has not ever happened so far.

[@bipedalbob]

So you didn't watch the video then but felt we all should hear what you have to say. Therein lies he problem we face, to many talkers not enough listeners.

[@spartan117zm]

We should’ve been smarter with the locations of our reactors. If we’d have built them all out in the middle of nowhere, then an accident wouldn’t matter as much and people wouldn’t be as scared of building new reactors. But because there’s literally big facilities within a few minutes drive of people’s homes, it does make sense that they’re scared, even if that fear is scientifically unfounded due to the incredibly small probability of an actual accident occurring. Fear is often illogical, and yet we’ve played into that. All new reactors should be built out in the desert or the plains, with minimum distances from any nearby towns or residential developments. We already do this with nuclear weapons silos, why not reactors too? The government owns enough land out west to make it viable, and then you also eliminate a lot of the NIMBY problems.

[@frederikja2210]

@@spartan117zm you cant built power reactors too far away from people tho. 1) you need good infrastructure to transport people, paramedics, firetrucks etc to the place. 2) people are gomma work there, so it has to be fairly close to living spaces. 3) you cannot transport power infinitely, you will lose energy over distance

[@bipedalbob]

@@Szolrykor I think your wrong, on more than one point.

[@danielaustin7643]

the answer: the SANEX process, during my masters i worked in a group that were was working on such technology and i wrote my master thesis on nuclear reprocessing.

[@ericlotze7724]

The main risk/issue with reprocessing is the potential for nuclear proliferation / accusations of it. So there is *some* diplomatic mess, but nothing that can't be solved.

[@ravener96]

Proliferation is a bogus scare. America already has nukes, and any country who set their mind to it can make a breeder pile.

[@ericlotze7724]

@@ravener96 Bogus or not, it exists. You have to account for tabloid sources/idiots. Without them we would be all nuclear + renewable long ago...

[@ravener96]

@@ericlotze7724 sometimes you just have to give a firm "no" to them, its the same reason we dont really pander to anti vaxers, we just tell them nice dear and go on without them.

[@ericlotze7724]

@@ravener96 Bit of a false equivalency, i agree the criticism is dumb, but it has SOME standing unlike anti-vax etc. Being able to make a pile of plutonium is no joke, but safeguards etc can and have existed.

[@peterblinn7946]

For those who might be wondering, as far as dumping radwaste (or old refrigerators, National Geographics, or anything else we want to get rid of) into the sun is concerned, you can't just aim for it and fire. There's a LOT of orbital velocity you need to kill from where we are: 67,000 miles per hour. The expense would be enormous.

[@crawkn]

The issue which is often missed regarding long half-lives is that the half-life is inversely proportionate to the radioactivity. i.e., if a material has a long half-life, it is less radioactive than if it has a short half-life. So how many years a material is radioactive is a pretty deceptive measure of its relative danger to health.

[@palladin9479]

Well I think in the case of the spent nuclear fuel rods, it's all the transuranics that get produced and are surrounded by carbon which itself can capture neutrons and undergo transmutation. So you got a small pile of extremely radioactive stuff that just burns with energy for a decade until it's all transmuted into stuff like cobolt-60 or cesium-137, that stuff is hot enough to be really dangerous to anyone near by and lives just long enough to be really annoying for storage. It takes a good century or two for most of the bad stuff to have radiated off and transmuted and humans just aren't really equipped to think in that kind of time scales.

[@kangarooninja2594]

"Add an X to it and make it Cajun" Oeaux noeaux you didn't goeaux there!

[@gotscroogled]

Thankyou for doing these videos. It seems like there is so much wasted potential with nuclear energy.

[@jaredmulconry]

Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. It can apply to nuclear power, as it so happens. Nuclear seems like a really good buffer as more energy generation is handled by renewables. It's a shame more of the world isn't interested in making use of it. I really wish Australia would, rather than putting more money into coal power (in the current year, etc.)

[@anydaynow01]

I always thought about renewables is a good bridge to gen 4 fission, RTGs, nuclear batteries, and eventually fusion. After all renewables and chemical battery creation (and disposal) is another massive toxic waste problem waiting to happen since so much of it is required and they have to be replaced every 20 years or so (yep renewables aren't renewable); some of it can be recycled but considering our current track record with paper and plastic, legislations need to change.

[@jaredmulconry]

@@anydaynow01 Recycling seems a tragic tale of what could have been. At least, thus far. I wonder how recyclable solar panel, wind turbine and other similar tech is at end-of-life. There's probably some amount of material loss to the environment, but do designs exist that are have a good recycling potential? I'm worried the answer is "we didn't really factor that into the design"

[@grantwalkersound]

There's also Terra Power which has a reactor design that uses the high level waste for power as well. I think they leave 1% waste at the end.

[@GetMedQ]

Google "ITER" Fusion Reactor prototype. 35 countries, 65 Billion cost... starts running in 2 years

[@hurrdurrmurrgurr]

@@GetMedQ And it will start generating more power than it consumes in just twenty years!

[@vortexgen1]

Just talk to Kirk Sorenson about Thorium reactors and how all the spent fuel could be used up to 99% in the Thorium reactor.

[@rickkcir2151]

But thorium reactors can’t be used to make nuclear weapons so governments don’t want them. Which is so depressing that it hurts. The number one reason humanity doesn’t use something that can save all of us, is because it can’t be used to make weapons that can kill all of us. We really are a trash species.

[@PlushGrenade]

Type one civilization seems so far off when we can’t figure out something with this much potential.

[@MYOB990]

We need to be burning it, as in a breeder reactor.

[@Betterhose]

They've built one in the 1970s relatively near to me. Guess what: The construction was finished but it never went online due to heavy protests of the local population. The plant was turned into a theme park called "Kernwasser Wunderland". 🤦‍♂️

[@MYOB990]

@@Betterhose Yep. Needs to be in the middle of nowhere, and protected from stupid Envirowacko lawsuits. And, there need to be considerable education to counter the BS Fear Mongering on the Envirowackos.

[@josephburchanowski4636]

@@MYOB990 "Needs to be in the middle of nowhere, and protected from stupid Envirowacko lawsuits." There isn't a 'middle of nowhere" in America that Envirowackos aren't going to go after it on.

[@anydaynow01]

@@MYOB990 That and the fossil fuel industry lobbyists and lawyers, that industry was heavily involved in a lot of the legislation which cut nuclear off at the knees and provided skewed evidence to whip the Envirowacko mob into a frenzy.

[@__WJK__]

@@MYOB990 - Just get Elon Musk to back it and the PR will resolve itself ;)

[@NewJak14]

Thank you for talking more about nuclear fission!! Please keep it up, there is so much more to tell. Fluid fuel is the real game changer and is in the development phase now. As you say, 95% or so of high level nuclear waste is still unspent fuel! The 5% that is waste, the "fission products", is what contaminates the solid nuclear fuel. So the fuel needs to be removed from the reactor. Then to reprocess it, you melt it down and remove the 5% fission products by chemical processes, and have 95% new solid fuel for a reactor. BUT, if your fuel is already fluid inside the reactor, you never have to remove it from the reactor! You can more easily extract the fission products right from the active fuel. The long half-life actinides can be left in and will eventually fission. Also, fluid fuel is far safer as it can be easily and passively removed from the core if it overheats. The core is designed to keep heat in, so removing the overheating fuel from the core will allow it to be passively cooled with no intervention required.

[@dr.zoidberg8666]

"... but as we continue to focus on reducing carbon emissions," We emit more CO2 every year than we did the last year. The acceleration rate of yearly emissions has not changed since at least 1850.

[@galaktoza]

I always find it sad that CO2 minded people are always overshadowed by large countries that just don't care and only pursue profit. In the end, it's only the citizens of climate woke countries that pay eco taxes. Kind of like being punished for good behaviour. Why bother then?

[@us89na]

"we" being China, India, and the EU. The USA is reducing CO2 bigly by changing from lower efficiency coal-fired plants to higher-efficiency combined-cycle gas-fired plants.

[@jch8376]

stop farting

[@jordancornelius7061]

@@us89na "We" being humanity. We're all on the same rock, breathing the same air. Your problems are my problems, and vice versa. Secondly, flaunting the "incredible efficiency improvements" because of switching from possibly the dirtiest form of power generation possible to a more modern, yet still fossil powered and thus emitting technology is a bit of a misnomer. See also: the emergence and prevalence of fracking the often unaccounted for leaks of methane/NG that can easily undo lower CO2 emissions offshoring of pollution

[@Szolrykor]

​@@dr.zoidberg8666 The planet isn't doing anything, my brainwashed bourgeois activist friend. People are. The reason there isn't coherent global action is because people are different. So if you want to address things on a global scale, you have to factor in things like western cultures being virtually the only ones on the planet who actually care about things like pollution and CO2 emissions to any significant degree, while simultaneously being the most decadent, narcissistic and wasteful people on Earth, while people (no doubt like you) simultaneously advocate for more of the world to relocate to those countries and join that consumerist society, because it's a "better life" after all. The reason nobody is "funding sustainable development of poor nations" is because there's no such thing. What you're asking for in reality is for more wealth to be fraudulently redistributed from western nations to the pockets of other countries (and corrupt politicians) around the world so they can continue snowballing in population and western capitalists can replace you with a more exploitable workforce.

[@ShadSorensen]

Certain types of molten salt reactors can take all the waste, use it as fuel and what’s left over is only radioactive for 300 years. Please do a video on that tech

[@MnrBugi]

Elysium. Moltex

[@paavobergmann4920]

Shortening the half life usually means increasing the activity, that sounds like a very mixed bag to me.

[@ShadSorensen]

@@paavobergmann4920 yes but the same type of containment is needed in both cases. You just only have to baby sit it for 300 years and there is a fraction of the waste there was before.

[@The-three-eyed-Prophet]

The Most Dangerous waste out there right now is the red sludge that is left after extracting / mining Auluminum Please make a video about this !!! ...

[@ResandOuies]

So that recycle thing, can you just keep doing that. Getting 90%+ back every time? If yes, wouldn't that pretty much solve the problem by it self?

[@devluz]

The main problem isn't technical but it just costs too much to do it. It is cheaper the put it in temporary storage and mine new stuff. And if you make nuclear more expensive who is going to pay for it?

[@zapfanzapfan]

In the 70s people thought we would have run out of uranium by now, a bit like peak oil, so reprocessing and breeder reactors were popular to make the fuel last longer. Turns out there is no shortage of uranium so... use once and store it was simpler.

[@Whiskey11Gaming]

Here is the thing... You CAN keep recycling, but only about 95% of the rod is reusable. At some point you will end up with a rod without enough fissile material or fertile material to sustain the reaction. This is why Mixed Oxide Fuels (the reprocessed rods) usually have stuff added to them, either natural uranium or plutonium, to sustain the reaction. The 95% of a fuel rod which remains is about 93% Uranium-238 (itself, not fissile, but fertile to convert to Pu-239) and the remainder is Pu-239 or other fissile actinides. So, if you take this as far as you can go with it, you'll eventually end up with no fuel rod, but you'll end up with near 100% of the original rod's weight in fission products which WILL need to be stored or otherwise separated. The Fission Products all have significantly lower half lives (most around 10-30 years) which makes the waste far, far, far, far more manageable than just a straight rod is.

[@professoroak7545]

I really appreciate you making this. its time that we have a mature conversation about properly utilising nuclear energy, us not using nuclear because of the possibility of bad consequences is like homo erectus not using fire because "fire burn, fire bad duh".

[@rationalpear1816]

We have solves this many times already. Like he said. Dry cask, underground storage, and reprocessing. It’s so dumb to think we need to protect people for centuries or millennia. Do you really think we won’t come up with better solution in that time? And if we are gone or back to a madmax situation no one will any the wiser. The animals and plants wandering around Chernobyl don’t have a clue and are perfectly fine. Worrying about nuclear waste is just the absolute dumbest part of this argument. PS. the main reason we aren’t doing mass scale reprocessing? The corporations making the nuclear fuel pellets for commercial reactors. Ruins their business.

[@YourCapyFrenBigly_3DPipes1999]

100% You are indeed a very rational fruit. I like that. 🍐

[@bluk4rd]

what about the thorium reactor...look into this, ted talk etc.... it can reduce our waste and can be build very small...

[@alexcesarz13]

I'm very glad to see you coming around on this.

[@bronzedivision]

If he was coming around he'd put to seconds into making sure he had his graphics lined up correctly instead of just showing scary barrels and other nonsense. In his last video he showed the Cosmo Oil Refinery Fire as the Fukushima accident. That's some pretty garbage tier editing and makes it clear that Joe doesn't care about science based energy solutions.

[@petergerdes1094]

This isn't a real problem. There are two possible cases: 1) Civilization isn't likely to crumble. In this case you just make sure it's safe for the next few hundred years and leave some notes telling the future ppl to deal. Future ppl aren't likely to want to rely on our disposal anymore than we'd want to rely on victorian safety of smallpox samples. 2) There is a serious chance of civilization collapse. In this case screw warning future hunter gatherers. That's only a small number of ppl who aren't living that long anyways so payoff in QALYs very low. Spend the damn money either on making that collapse even the tiniest bit less likely or on burying some knowledge they can use to restart civilization.

[@michaelfrench3396]

"why'd you create enough nuclear waste to kill humanity?" "Wanted to boil some water."

[@freddyzdead1]

I kind of expected you to at least mention the Traveling Wave Reactor, which appears to show a lot of promise as a solution for a lot of problems; being much safer, using present nuclear waste as fuel, and providing decades of power after activation with almost no maintenance. All we have to do is build one. That seems to be taking a long time, even with Bill Gates running the show. But it still looks like the best path forward in the present nuclear wasteland we're looking at.

[@alanfreeman3062]

Solutions Joe are what is needed. You mentioned one in this video you thought wouldn't work, but what if you're wrong. It just doesn't have to be hard. Impossible things are never impossible to do as with sailing around the world and not falling off.. Love to tell you how not to fall off.

[@igster8293]

I'm high and just saw the "Nuclear Waste" blue face and just about died laughing. Awesome.

[@nilosof]

What about Fermi's idea to use a cyclotron to keep splitting the atoms until the waste is not radioactive anymore. Not to mention the concept of a nuclear plant that only runs when you switch the power on do seem a whole lot safer, than today's critical mass plants you control with brake rods.

[@jaredsmith474]

cyclotrons use a tremendous amount of energy. Build another reactor to power the spallation of the waste from the first one maybe? :D ...but use a PWR with a negative temperature coefficient of reactivity and loaded poison chemistry to supplement the brake rods.

[@MCWaffles2003-1]

Why no mention of molten salt reactors? They don't HAVE to be thorium based. Instead of reprocessing nuclear waste into solid nuclear fuel why not melt it down and chemically separate the byproducts while keeping the useful fuel in a liquid state?

[@joegoulet7299]

Again, I truly respect your methods of educating the masses. Please keep up the great work.

[@kaades_]

*Me writing to send it into the sun* Joe: "and I know you are writing to send it off to the sun. Thats not a good idea." Me: oops xd

[@magtovi]

delete. delete. delete.

[@John_Fx]

Even if we could get it into space easily. it is EXTREMELY hard to send something into the sun.

[@palladin9479]

@@John_Fx Well that depends on how fast we want it to get there. If we wanted it there in a few years then yes it would consume a ton of energy for the trajectory, if we were willing to wait a century or two then it's quite easy to put it on an orbit that would result it in passing into the sun.

[@freemanacount5609]

This is a really fucking reasonable take on Nuclear Energy. And the prospects of waste-batteries is really intriguing.

[@chuckmaddox6725]

"Geographically quiet area" Asteroid: *Hold my beer*

[@Dinitroflurbenzol]

Meh, anything large enough to crack this will produce way more other problems

[@ChucksSEADnDEAD]

It would take a mass extinction event to go that deep.

[@absofjelly]

@@ChucksSEADnDEAD mass extinction? Problem solved.

[@DanielGijsbers]

Then let's store it very deep under a huge city, that should make you worry less..... 😂

[@curseoftheegglady]

O_O

[@invadercem2]

I made it to the other side of the hump! Congrats to everyone that survived to see pt. 2.

[@alienshep]

Been waiting for video like this. Good job.

[@NurMars]

12:29 The efficiency of diamond batteries has been debunked enough times already

[@specialopsdave]

He didn't make a claim about efficiency though

[@NurMars]

@@specialopsdave I meant efficiency for use, they may have very high energy density, but also very low power output, especially for their size. There are barely any appliances that would benefit from hundreds of years of runtime, but only use that little amount of power.

[@alphagt62]

@@NurMars the power needed for many things we use is getting lower all the time. The reason a lap top battery lasts 12 hours now days, when they only lasted 3 a few years ago, is mostly due to the lower consumption of the computer. Perhaps a future phone could run on such little juice that a diamond battery could work? Remember those calculators that ran on a tiny solar panel the size of your thumbnail? Before Smart Phones killed the calculator? While there may not be much that can run on a diamond battery today, doesn’t mean they won’t develop something that will run on it.

[@NurMars]

​@@alphagt62 Yes, power consumption is getting lower, but your average laptop has a battery of up to 100 watts, while commercially available betavoltaics (for example from citylabs) usually cap out at 100 micro watts, while costing a few thousand dollars. And even phones have something like 4000 mAh at usually 3.7 V have a consumption that is magnitudes higher than that, though you could probably power an old calculator with it, it would not be economically viable at all.

[@alphagt62]

@@paavobergmann4920 I certainly don’t mean to take anything away from battery technology, but during the same time these batteries were getting better, computer processor voltage has dropped from 5 volts, down to 3, then to 1.75, and now lies somewhere below a volt. This is what has extended the up time on computers. The much reduced size of the battery, and battery life, is more about battery technology.

[@less_likely]

I’m imagining that Seinfeld’s Hello bit is actually Seinfeld’s HALEU bit now.

[@PoochieCollins]

LOL

[@asdf9890]

I did a essay in college Engilsh class on what to do with the nuclear waste. I found an article on how to communicate the danger in the future and it had a drawing of huge spiked monoliths sticking out of the ground in random directions to convey the sense of danger underground, where the waste was buried. I thought that was badass (although kinda ridiculous) and it sticks in my mind some 20 years later.

[@inf11]

Can’t believe you didn’t mentioned Fast-neutron reactors :(

[@GetMedQ]

Google "ITER" Fusion Reactor prototype. 35 countries, 65 Billion cost... starts running in 2 years

[@joecarpenter2447]

Toxic avenger

[@lbarudi]

😂

[@analogGigabyte]

4:36 lol I laughed so hard I spilled my dinner! Love your vids joe!

[@udavster]

You missed fast neutron reactors. They can burn-up nuclear waste

[@johnkessler966]

Yes, they can burn waste, but not burn it "up" (read 100%).

[@Aconitum_napellus]

Interestingly, both Joe Scott and fellow KZbinr Tom Scott are actually brothers, and both of them are in fact fictional characters created by Simon Whistler.

[@FREDDYPACKS]

I really LUUV your channel, I've basically been been binging over it for the past 4 days that I've discovered it. what's fascinating and also scary at the same time, is how far we have come as a civilization, and how much we know about everything, and still how little we know about anything!

[@Graham.W571]

A Travelling Wave Reactor also uses spend fuel rods.

[@idcgaming518]

13:40 actually, gamma-voltaic would be photo-voltaic. This is as gamma radiation and visible light are both part of the EM spectrum and as such are both carried by photons.

[@YounesLayachi]

Yes but photovoltaic is an umbrella term here while gammavoltaic is more accurate. Reminder that traditional photovoltaic panels are best at catching energy from infrared light, not even visible light. A gamma ray source would probably just damage the regular PV technology, but don't quote me on that. Hence why a distinction is warranted.

[@jeffbenton6183]

@@YounesLayachi Good point. Joe also didn't mention gamma-voltaics, only beta-voltaics - beta radiation, of course, being free electrons (or positrons)

[@ReddwarfIV]

@@jeffbenton6183 Joe suggested gamma voltaics as a way to make use of High Level Waste when talking about fission batteries.

[@jeffbenton6183]

@@ReddwarfIV Huh, I must've missed that. I only member him talking about beta-voltaics in that segment.

[@Daniel-yy3ty]

@@jeffbenton6183 it was a remark in passing near the end 13:30

[@LaughterOnWater]

At 4:36 - Who makes a giphy meme out of this blink scene first... Love it! 6:47 - Not only a lot of launches... The time and energy to move something _toward_ the sun is a lot trickier than moving something away from the sun. You could probably do a whole video about that.

[@oplkfdhgk]

13:46 i actually really want nuclear power plant in my backyard. I think they look cool :D i was trying to learn how to diy one but i figured it's probably not good idea :D

[@ToofKilla]

Ever hear of David Hahn?

[@oplkfdhgk]

@@ToofKilla is he the kid who made nuclear reactor?

[@vaclavzajac214]

@@oplkfdhgk David Hann make a dirty bomb, not an actual reactor.

[@anydaynow01]

Then there is the dreaded Karen Council, otherwise known as the dreaded HOA, who won't approve of anything they can't understand or is different!

[@oplkfdhgk]

@@vaclavzajac214 well close enough 🤷🤣

[@The-three-eyed-Prophet]

the real problem with nuclear waste is that man countrys dont depose it the way they should .. germany for example used to store nuclear waste in metall barrels inside of abondend salt mines wich whas obviously a horrible idea the salt ate thru the metall and then we had to deal with it ... YES you can manage nuclear waste if you do it right but many countrys and nuclear power plants do what they can to cut corner´s ...the biggest risk is that powerplants might blow up for example if they are being used past their safe life span ...

[@garethbaus5471]

So NIMBY's ruin just about everything for just about everyone.

[@lordsamich755]

It's more about ego at this point. Anti-Nuclear campaigners just cant bring themselves to admit that this whole global warming situation is essentially their fault. They completely lost track of: 1.) Which problems were real (although manageable). 2.) Which problems they just completely made up. 3.) Which problems only exist because they were instantiated by Anti-Nuclear activists.

[@garethbaus5471]

@@lordsamich755 NIMBY's are much worse than just being anti nuclear, there are also anti wind, and solar advocates as well who have roughly comparabley justified in making their claims(as in pretty much having no ligitimate reason better than aesthetics)

[@garethbaus5471]

@Charles Brainard I would be fine with it, especially if it was literally my backyard and I got paid royalties by the companies using it.

[@lordsamich755]

@@garethbaus5471 They are not worse than Anti-Nuclear propagandists. Anti-nuclear propagandists prevent the only realistic alternative being built anywhere. They also prevent research into nuclear technology's that might solve some of their complaints, just because it would prove them wrong!

[@mathewseiller317]

“Haleu Clarice…”

[@randyhoward8738]

Hello Joe, Just thought you might want to know. I once worked on a Uranium-238 Decay Generator. You use a high pressure ionizing gas in a magnetic compression chamber to increase sample surface decay. The magnetic compressor will increase the samples inside self ionization. The decay will be alpha particles which a large and slow. You have talked about harvesting alpha, and beta. The gamma can be harvested by a scintillator, which will trap the gamma rays in its lattice structure. When the scintillator is heated on the inside surface. The outside surface of the scintillator will release the traped gamma ray as visible light which photoelectric cells will capture. You squeeze the energy out of waste to get it all.

[@williamthesling1201]

You mentioned Molten Salt Reactors in one of your past videos. MSRs are a class of reactor than can be designed to handle a wide variety of fuels. MSRs that consume spent fuel (that 3% of high level nuclear waste your refer to) are very possible. Elysium Industries is working on one such design. Check out: kzbin.info/www/bejne/laDYkKuprKdlmJI

[@chapter4travels]

Also, Moltex in Canada although they need some processing before their breeder can use it.

[@blankenator62]

No recycling in the US, gotta keep the mining industry alive somehow

[@anydaynow01]

Agreed, pretty much the same reason we have so much "trouble" recycling simple things like paper and plastic. Then they're talking about recycling something as complicated as batteries and solar panels? Within a few generations we'll have more toxic waste from renewable and battery sources than we know what to do with, unless someone has a plan.

[@us89na]

No - the reason you can't recycle fuel in the US is because dopey government is afraid of someone stealing mid-processed Plutonium and 'proliferation' which is a fake fear.