Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

[deleted] wrote

0

Arzibot wrote

the waste is still less than coal

2

[deleted] wrote

−1

Arzibot wrote (edited )

coal puts excess radiation into the environment too, and causes far more deaths.

not that their both not bad.

2

[deleted] 0 wrote

1

celebratedrecluse wrote

Don't you feel that the existence of an extremely dangerous waste product, with a radioactive period that exceeds the likely length of our civilization, presents a major problem?

Even if the radiation can be mitigated now by expert techniques and technology, what if there's a serious social disorder or natural disaster or something? Is the technology good enough to manage itself in case of a serious catastrophe, or is there a possibility of radioactive contamination? There are already historically large amounts of radioactive contamination on the planet due to Cold War testing, accidents, etc

What if this period of civilization wanes in certain regions or globally, due to ecological/economic/political collapse? Researchers are already thinking ahead and trying to figure out how to linguistically or otherwise convey the dangers and correct handling of the radioactive material, and it's been pretty difficult from what I've read. I mean, how do you even tell a future human who speaks a completely different language how to not poison themselves?

Also, I'm not saying this is inherent to the technology, but a lot of the currently existing nuclear reactors are built near fault lines and tsunami zones, which seems pretty much like asking for hulk powers lol

That said, I have also read that coal power produces significantly more radiation than a nuclear plant, by orders of magnitude, and the coal plant does not even sequester this radiation whatsoever, so this is all kinda moot in the face of the horribly damaging fossil fuel industry.

1