this post was submitted on 16 Nov 2024
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For huge countries as like the US: Maybe. You have enough space to also store the trash somewhere for thousands of years.
For small countries, like most of Europe, where the population density is way higher: hard pass.
Storage isn't that much of a problem, even in smol Europe countries.
Also it's contained in specific areas, some nerds are bound to wanna reuse what we now think of as trash/spent fuel. If it's still radioactive after it just means it radiates energy, we just didn't commercially learned how to harness it. There are ongoing studies into that too.
And radiation isn't as problematic as we are taught by media - humans lived in Chernobyl exclusion zone until death by old age, mammals there are thriving. The dangers of radiation are immediate tissue damage or thyroid cancer (again via tissue damage) if iodine isn't taken by exposed people.
Those same countries that found space for all the rest of their industrial waste?
Nuclear waste has a tiny footprint. Fence off a couple square km for security, dig a small but deep hole, and there ya go.
Obviously oversimplifying, but the point is that nuclear waste is a tiny issue. The entire world's waste could be stored in a single warehouse if we wanted to (we don't).
iirc nuclear waste isn't really that big of an issue anymore, they just drill a really deep hole that's like a foot across and nobody will ever see it again