Disposal Of Nuclear Waste Essay Research Paper

Disposal Of Nuclear Waste Essay, Research Paper

The disposal of nuclear waste is quickly becoming the most important issue facing the environmental community today. Nearly twenty percent of our nation s electricity is being supplied by the approximately 100 nuclear power plants that are in everyday operation in the United States. So far, almost all of the nuclear waste created by these power plants is being housed in temporary storage facilities at each power plant. Although the total volume of nuclear waste produced in one year is small when compared to the amount of other poisonous wastes produced in the same time period, the need to find a permanent method of disposing this waste is rapidly growing. Nuclear waste is extremely difficult to handle. New technologies and advancement in waste treatment processes have made waste disposal safer, but it is still not absolutely safe. Not only do scientists have to worry about treating and containing the wastes; they also have to find sites to store the waste that will not allow the wastes to spread, even under the worst circumstances. There are many classifications of waste. Spent nuclear fuel is the radioactive by-product of making electricity at commercial nuclear power plants. It is highly radioactive and must be stored in special facilities. High-level waste is the by-product from production at defense facilities. This form of waste is highly radioactive and contains hazardous chemicals and toxic heavy metals. This waste is environmentally hazardous for thousands of years and must be kept in special storage facilities. High-level waste accounts for 95% of all the waste produced. Transuranic waste is the waste generated from the production of nuclear weapons that contain transuranic elements (elements with an atomic number greater than Uranium). Some forms of this waste have a half-life of thousands of years and are currently stored in on-site drums. Low-level waste is the generic category for waste, which does not fit any of the above categories. One source of this waste is from irradiated metal parts from the reactor. Most low-level waste is stored in shallow pits located on the reactor site. Uranium-mill tailings are the leftover materials from the milling and mining process. These tailings release radon into the environment. The amount of waste produced each year in the U.S. is 300 million tons and growing. All of the nuclear waste ever produced in the U.S. would only cover one football field to a depth of 15 feet. However, the potential dangers of this waste must not be overlooked. The current method of disposing of these waste materials is to store then in steel-lined concrete tanks filled with water. However, this form of storage is not permanent and the nuclear plants will eventually run out of storage space. In 1983, the U.S. Department of Energy selected nine locations in six states for consideration as potential repository sites. This was based on data collected for nearly 10 years. The nine sites were studied and results of these preliminary studies were reported in 1985. Based on these reports, the president approved three sites for intensive scientific study called site characterization. The three sites were Hanford, Washington; Deaf Smith County, Texas; and Yucca Mountain, Nevada. The Yucca Mountain Project is now being put through the necessary steps for implementation. Yucca Mountain is located on government owned land in a remote area of Nevada. The proposed plan is the first national permanent waste repository and will cost an estimated 6.3 billion dollars. The project will include borrowing 25-foot diameter tunnels through the mountain s inner rock. The finished tunnel would be 5.5 miles in length at its completion, and will house sealed metal canisters of high-level wastes. Obviously, there is much public concern over the project. One of the largest concerns is the possibility of seismic activity rupturing the tunnel and/or canisters. At present, the 104th US Congress, house Resolution 1924 proposed to make Hanford, Washington, the western US site for temporary storage, by default permanent disposal, of spent nuclear fuel from US reactors. This resolution stemmed from a growing recognition that Yucca Mountains, in Nevada, is a less than brilliant location for a US repository. The US government has no fallback position should Yucca Mountains not pan out therefore the Hanford Reservation is likely to be targeted again in the current Congress. The rational is that Hanford, at the doorstep of British Columbia and Alberta, has been degraded to such an extent already, it should be deemed a national sacrifice zone. Another leading contender for approval is a project similar to Yucca Mountain. Masoa Kasuya, a nuclear scientist, has a similar idea of boring tunnels into rock to house the waste canisters. The difference with Mr. Kasuya s plan is that these tunnels will be drilled into rock in the ocean floor. The reason for this variation is based on Quaternary history. The Quaternary history (1.7 million years ago to the present) can be reconstructed both chronologically and spatially by geologists. These studies will show what areas have had the least movement and seismic activity. From this data, they believe that they will be able to predict which areas will remain the least active in the future. They have found that Quaternary beds found on the land tend to vary in depositional speed and are subject to erosion, weathering