Nuclear waste is not the problem you've been made to believe it is
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- Опубликовано: 15 май 2024
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This video comes with a quiz that will help you remember what we talked about: quizwithit.com/start_thequiz/...
How much nuclear waste is there, how dangerous is it, what can we do with it? Today we look into nuclear waste disposal and nuclear waste recycling.
The website that lets you calculate the radiation dose from uranium is here:
www.wise-uranium.org/rdcu.html
Numbers about the amount of nuclear waste are from here:
www.globenewswire.com/en/news...
The recent study about nuclear waste from small modular reactors is here:
www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073...
More info about the final nuclear waste deposit site from Posiva Oy in Finland is here: • Onkalovideo RC01
The 1984 study about how to build a final deposit site is here:
www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/67...
The 1993 Report from Sandia Lab is here:
www.osti.gov/biblio/10117359
More about the recycling in La Hague here:
• Recycling used nuclear...
The report with the comparison of different nuclear fuel cycles is this:
www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/...
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00:00 Intro
01:26 How Much Waste and What Type?
07:26 What Happens to Nuclear Waste?
10:38 Nuclear Waste Storage
16:05 Nuclear Waste Recycling
20:29 Summary
Many thanks to Jordi Busqué for helping with this video jordibusque.com/ 
Наука
This video comes with a quiz that will help you remember what we talked about! quizwithit.com/start_thequiz/1689233136796x251471525332019650
Who the hell are you?
I just found your channel today and I must say that I love your sense of humor, and that I find your videos very intriguing. ☢😁
@@jipangooshes Sabine Hossenfelder, a scientist. you are jipangoo, the most lowly form of goo.
Why do we all agree that fossil fuels are a problem? I disagree. Energy is not electricity. It is necessary to burn something in order to obtain not electricity, but energy to create something: Goods, heat, tools. The blast furnace is not powered by electricity, it uses fire.
So forget the nuclear waste and the cost of safe storage.
Solar and wind plus battery storage is waaaay cheaper, safer, and as reliable, and all can be recycled.
Oh, and there's radiation and meltdowns to guard against, and years of engineering and construction and safeguards..
So who cares about nuclear? Makes no economic sense out of the gate!
And the nuclear waste of a shut down plant, whoh.
"Think of fuel rods like world leaders, but a bit more reliable".
SHOTS FIRED!
Putin is reliable at releasing propaganda.
In this analogy Putin is like well recycled nuclear fuel in a breeder reactor(20times the original energy content). Uhh that's too dark even for me 🤣
Think of fuel rods like world leaders, toxic for years after they have 'retired '
oh oh, that's good 😂 I like this game 😋
Think of fuel rods like world leaders... when no longer useful, need to be entombed in an underground bunker
"And pray that shit dilutes quickly", oh God that is why I love you Sabine. You've solidified my opinion on the subject thank you so much.
✍️✍️✍️✍️🤳🏿
I don't remember Sabine swearing and it only made it hit stronger 😂
@@piotr5566 Exactly. If you always choose your words wisely, you can make your words matter more in each moment.
"every once in awhile, something blows up and we're asked to close our windows and pray that the shit dilutes quickly!" Now that's pretty much a matter-of-fact attitude right there. Nicely done, Sabine; it's not worth getting ourselves into a conniption fit over it all!
Its interesting how everyone knows about TMI, Chernobyl and Fukushima, two of didn´t kill a single person. But hardly anyone know of Bhopal chemical plant accident, that killed 20 000. Also Banqiao Dam falure that killed about 170 000 people.
And then there are stuff like Great Smog of London that people have a vague knowledge of, but don´t know that 5000 people died of acute respiratory problems... yea.. they suffocated.
The biggest dissapointing fact about nuclear waste, is that eating it won't give me superpowers.
Only in Troma Films is that possible. "The Toxic Advenger."
Quite so. The various movies of high level radiation producing yard long dangerous ants are amazingly stupid. See J.B.S Haldane "On Being The Right Size" which points out that large insects would need complicated things like gills or lungs, of which they have not the slightest trace. Supplying oxygen is more complicated than flying, or seeing things, or even in the case of nectar-fueled insects finding nectar!
Just drink beer, I become such after 18 beers😎
I'm sure someone else has noted this, but the Keith Richards reference was a classic. Delivered in a very German manner. Love your work.
The dry storage has nothing on the dryness of your humour and I love it ❤️
Yeah, that sass.
"... like wealth distribution, the highest 3% is the most toxic" ... 😂🤣 LOVE it!
THIS
😂😂😂😂👏👏👏😘🤣🤣🤣🌹
@@slink4956 well, viewers keep growing, so mayority has spoken, we love it. That's democracy. Learn to accept it... ✊
@@slink4956 To avoid a hangover, never mix the gripe and the grin? 😂
World leaders are far more toxic than nuclear power plant radioactive waste is a great comparison
Wow. I have not seen these videos or this woman before and I would love to use these videos in school classes as a teaching tool. Something about her is very fetching (good qualities to engage children are for the presenter to have a neutral, approachable and wise demeanor, the ones who exude wisdom cause a sense of awe and really make the students brighten up) and the videos have an authentic scholarly and easy-to-follow format.
Hi,
Saying that you haven’t seen videos of Sabine before sounds a bit more friendly than ‘this woman’.
(Just a friendly hint)
The person probably didn't confidently know her name when commenting. (Just a friendly observation).
I've been hooked on your video since the first one the amount of information that you deliver is phenomenal and your sense of humor is hysterical much appreciated
Yucca Mountain was abandoned not because of the resistance of the inhabitants but because it a part of a volcanic region made of Tuff stone, a volcanic mineral. It was cancelled because of the high possibility of a recent volcanic eruption.
Not only U235&238, Pu238 to 242 are isotopes to be regarded: Over 100 other isotopes exist due to radioactive decay network and most of the decay is producing Helium4, which induces gas pressure into the containers. The He4 2+ radicals due to the alpha decay are emitted with the speed of about ~5% of the speed of light and cause deathly damage of cells, if the decay takes place in alveoles or in between intestinal villuses. The high risk of deathly injury out of an alpha decay can be understood, if you know that the conversion factor to transform the decay energy from Gray (the energy the decay induces into a calorie meter) to Sievers (the biological impact factor of an decay particle) can be up to 70 (20 for alpha decay itself and a linear function for the maximum impact als a function of the depth of the impact in the biological tissue: In the German law StrlSchVanlage 18 C and D). In short term about 10% of the heavy metal will be emitted as He4! This He4 has the second highest gas constant behind hydrogen (2077 J/(kg K) and will crack the containers due to the high temperature caused by the decay. Other scientists say, this will happen (look in the video about Pu from the Professor of the University of Nottingham). The bentonite, that's will be disposed around the containers will also expand due to the humidity in natural environment and will produce crack in the deposit for the emitted isotopes out of the cracked containers into the biosphere.
I do not see, that the real problems are introduced to the public by this video. Funny (or not) jokes may not hide the real problems!!!
If Yucca were to experience an eruption, now tell the informed viewer how much radiation would be released even without nuclear waste in the mix.
He4 will flow harmlessly through the containers just as it does through everything else. They will lose their charge and eventually make their way to the surface where they could be collected and used in theory (The same process under salt domes that contain oil deposits causes it to be in natural gas where we collected all the world helium from, yes every helium balloon has nuclear waste inside of it.)
Your worries about disposal do not take into account the extremely low volumes produced and the ability for certain extremely small elements to travel through containment. It will not be an issue as described.
@@mikeburkart8028 He4 is inert and not radioactive and as a decay product itself not direct harmful.
He4 is a producer of leaks in the depository due to induced gas pressure and will open the door through the barriers for the radioactive ☢️ harmful isotopes into the biosphere. Therefore the He4 caused cracks into the barriers is the main problem for the safety of a deposit of highly radioactive heat producing waste and is really dangerous and must be considered in the safety assessment.
Wow!! Superbly detailed! Any studies of how to bleed off the He4?
On a lighter note, if the Sheriff of Nottingham can't help, how about Robin Hood?
Ah, straight laced German humour with efficient scientific delivery. Love it. Subscribed
I always wondered why there are only French and British humour sitcoms on television thinking the Germans had no humor but it justs takes time for the roasts being "not too soon". It's like they are avant-garde in the area. Who knows we someday see the humour of 40-45.
Just joking here, love German M.O. and we all are reminded by Russia again how people get forced in doing stuff that they do not endorse. Roast the leaders not the crowds!
A 7 year old German boy who has never spoken a word is sitting at the dining table one evening. Suddenly, he said, "My soup is tepid." His parents are overjoyed, but eventually, his mother asks , "Darling , why have you never spoken before?" the boy replied. "Until now, everything has been satisfactory.
There's a lot that can happen in 100,000 years. She massively underestimates the duration. 100,000 years ago modern humans just started appearing in Africa. 10,000 ago humans were still in the Stone Age. Being so sure about a sketchy hypothesis is unscientific.
@@George.Andrews.😂
@@TomCruz54321used Uranium rods could be re-used in thorium reactors that would incinerate plutonium. (Source Wikipedia)
This video needs more views. It is valuable information and there are a lot of misconceptions about nuclear power this helps dispel.
Came for the nuclear waste education, stayed for the jokes.
I love how you sneak physics into your comedy routines.
Nice comment . . .
She's hilarious all the more so, as her droll delivery just keeps moving on while the joke hangs out there.
@@courtlandcreekmore1421 This is my most favorite type of comedy, when the comedian dwells in it as little as possible, not at all is best, let me figure out if it's funny or not and how I should react.
"...Take my Neutrons! PLEASE!"
Sabine tries to dumb the basics down so 'special needs' folk *might* understand physics, 'and stuff', that is her fault
“Please, do not eat used nuclear fuel rods”. Thanks for the heads up 🙌
the more you know...
U-238 pellets are going to be the Tide Pod Challenge for Gen Alpha.
* cancels Deliveroo order *
She had to include it in case an american would try to do something that stupid..... Then she she can't be sued... I guess the rest of the world will go for the "If you are so stupid you will try to eat it, then it really can't be anyones problem than your own"-approach. 😉... I mean in Europe no one can sue people because you are peeing on an electric fence.... If you can't figure out it is a bad idea without a warning, then you really deserve the pain 😂😂😂😂
And it's good to know that eating one new pellet a year is fine as long as you live in a low radiation area.
Very impressive, Sabrina. Had a good laugh that I never expected, only you can make a topic as this entertaining, well done, and thank you
I live next to a nuclear burial site. It is the low level site located in Barnwell, SC. Basically safe based on our current knowledge. I worked there for a few years before moving to the Savannah River Site, which was a producer of high level material and holds millions of gallons of high level waste. In the area of government contracting, we maintained computer systems for everything from reactors to security. In general, we were very successful in solving technical challenges.. We of course, had much less control and success of political challenges.
Elsewhere containers are leaking and radioactive waste is contaminating groundwater. We should not be messing with the most dangerous materials known to man.
I can personally testify that the vast majority (I guess 90%) is not that bad. I used to work at an environmental analytical lab, and we got weekly samples of effluent and reaction slurry to run tests on, which I conducted myself. The effluent doesn't even register on the Geiger counter if you don't integrate over a day or two. I wouldn't use it to make coffee every day, but I'd rather take a bath in it than spend a day on the beach without sunscreen. The slurry had detectable radiation and other hazardous properties (BOD for example, but not as much as a blenderized sandwich after a warm day). Even that, though, the storage and waste protocols were a tad overkill in that they needlessly turned equipment and materials into low grade waste, which were in fact safe to just throw away.
If I contrast those samples with the _other_ samples I came across, there is no contest about which is more dangerous. It's the industrial and mining byproducts, by far. My workload was dominated by cyanides, [C/N]BOD, MBAS (surfactants), and flashpoints, so the big alarm bell is the cyanides. Cyanide is used in some mining and refining processes to chelate certain metal ions, and just a few grams of the solid waste products will kill you dead at several meters away under acidic conditions. They had to be diluted thousands of times just to get a result on our analytical curve, and I ended up just throwing the glassware it touched away. Distilling those samples was scary af. We called it "glass candy" because it kinda looked like chocolate fudge with shards of iridescent glass all through it, and I hope I never see it again.
You forgot to mention where the samples come from.
Was it coal power plant ash?
@@jannikheidemann3805 He said "industrial and mining byproducts". Doesn't sound like it's from coal ash.
@@thenonsequitur we're talking about two different sets of samples, totally different industries and locations. The scary cyanide samples came from mining. The less scary radioactive samples came from a nuclear reactor.
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Interesting, thanks for your comment!
Sabine, you are absolutely my favorite physicist. From fora where you dispute multiverses to discussions of various topics on high energy particle physics and other esoteric subjects, you make things clear and relatively easy to understand. Thank you.
I would add that Sabine uses the right amount of humour on her videos.
The cost to launch the waste into even low Earth orbit would be insane...send it to the Sun is as hard as sending it into deep space.
Now that's a bold statement about Keith Richards..
"I'd say it kind of works like a water mill, just a little more dangerous."
I'm gonna call you on that one. If you compare the fatalities from nuclear power plants vs. the fatalities from actual water mills (hydroelectric or hydromechanical power in all its forms), I'm pretty sure the nuclear plants are safer.
Here's the problem with measuring safety by rate of fatalities: The well-known paradoxon that that fatalities might be low precisely because of high awareness of unsafety and lots of safety measures. For example, if you meaure the safety of street types for bicycles and you go by fatalities, you might find that a German Autobahn is safer than a Dutch bike lane - because hundreds of thousands of people cycle on the bike lanes and virtually no one on the Autobahn, and even if one ends up on the road, they will be extremely cautious. Similarly, a worker in a water mill might be much more cavalier with safety precisely because the risk is lower.
@@Nebufelis "a worker in a water mill might be much more cavalier with safety precisely because the risk is lower."
If workers being cavalier causes more fatal accidents, then that's a work culture problem _and it makes that workplace less safe than one with a better safety culture._ The risk is not lower. The risk is higher. You are more likely to get hurt working there, which is the bottom line of risk.
No one is saying nuclear power doesn't have potential hazards. But if those hazards are mitigated through combinations of hazard removal efforts, engineered controls, safe procedures, and a strong safety culture, then I don't see the issue in saying that this is, in all the ways that matter, a safer work environment than one that lacks these things because there's a failure to perceive potential hazards and therefore gets people hurt.
The statistics bear this out. Nuclear is the safest power source by far. _How_ it gets safe isn't the question, what matters is that there's objective and indisputable proof that it _is_ the safest in terms of injuring or killing the fewest people.
@@wasd____ ..potential hazards!!!!!
@@Trylobyte Yes, there are many potential hazards at a hydro plant. All that water has a lot of energy. Read the stories of what happens when those dams break.
She was talking about the process by which work is extracted...i.e. via steam turbine. She was not talking about risk at that point.
The evolution of Sabine's humor has been one of the best things science youtube ever produced.
It's dry humor, which is like food. Some people just don't get it.
@@CR67 But this is just DARK humor. Like the skincolor of many people who don't get enough food.
Still just a little more to work on, though. Maybe just the faintest hint of a smile maybe?
@@rand49er the lack of the smile is what makes this kind of humor work though.
the humor seems very... "German." I love it.
20 Seconds and the sarcasm is already killing me. Or it might be the thorium sources from my collected smoke detectors i glued on my head hoping for superintelligence. It's giving me the vibes my teachers in primary school gave us. Only they didn't roast you for the audience's entertainment, just for their own fun. Love the presentation as always! Since the roasts never intersected with my way of thoughts yet(come close sometimes but not intersecting), I will push that subscribe button. Knowingly that those buttons in general will throw my email address around shouting : "Send me whatever you got!". Thank GOD(Guy's odd disorder) I'm feeling crazy today.
Smoke detectors use Americium sources. Thorium is probably most abundantly available in gas light mantles.
I cannot recommend using any radiation source in an attempt to boost cognitive ability.
Are you familiar with responsive sarcasm/humor? I was rather hoping on a funny response, not being taken seriously. Still can't believe I got fact-checked on a joke.
@@guyvandenbroeck8405
I thought my response was a real knee-slapper.
You are my favorite physicist by far on RUclips, the most genuine. What I don't understand, when people talk about the cost of a nuclear plant, is why the storage cost of nuclear waste is never included.
10 years after removal, the surface dose of a typical fuel assembly (24.000 half-life) is10.000 rem/hour.
"Even Keith Richard won't be around by then." Thanks for the smile.
He will end up being the last man standing on earth! Lol
But Cher will be. Dating someone much younger, I bet.
Don't be too sure of that
Bwahaha😂
@@johnnybgoode7983 I have a notion that all the drugs & alcohol in his system has pickled his organs and made him immortal.
I couldn't help but laugh out loud with "the higher 3% are the most toxic". Please keep adding this hidden gems while sharing these very interesting topics with us.
Yes the concept is laughable.
Remember in the USA, the top few percent of income earners pay almost all the taxes, and the bottom quartile pay no taxes.
@@donkloos9078 Hahahahaha
@Don Kloos , income-earners aren't the problem. The real problem is untaxed generational wealth.
@@jonathangwynne1917 Inheritance tax is confiscating people's private property that has already been taxed many times over. Socialism does not work and killed almost 150 million people last century.
As a former Navy Nuke, I can confirm. The really dangerous stuff has a very short half life. Anything useful is extracted and what's left can be stored pretty easily. It takes up very little space and may actually be useful in the future as technology finds ways to generate power from the remnants.
Due to the amount of nuclear reactors and weapon production, there is tones of nuclear waste that is not recycled and is being store and will remain dangerous for up to 200,000 years.
@@iainhamilton6773 "Dangerous for 200,000 years" -- No. That's not how this works. Google and read "Dr Bernard Cohen the myth of plutonium toxicity" and "ThorCon documents pdf the nuclear waste problem".
Google Rosatom’s Seversk plant. The technology is already there.
All your work is very professional and top-notch. I like your channel and videos. Keep it up! ❤
I was hiking with a friend and talking about nuclear waste solutions about the same time this was uploaded. I also told him about this channel earlier on the hike. Fantastic timing
she always uploads on Saturday 😉
I come for the information, but stay for the humour.
Sabine's humour is dried than a desert drought... Love it!!
@John smart Let's bang, ok?
A 2 hour lecture from Sabine would be perfectly fine with us
"Its the same physical principle that is behind Twitter suspensions". That is why I keep coming back to Sabine's channel. Keep up the good work!
Thanks for all the links in the description. Many vloggers promise those, yet few actually provide them.
"typically it's every 3-8 years. Think of fuel rods like world leaders, but a bit more reliable"
"it's similar to wealth distribution, the highest 3% are the most toxic"
"I really love how they assume that in 100,000 years everyone alive will be a complete idiot"
Sabine, dein Humor ist bei Zeiten ausgesprochen böse. Das gefällt mir sehr!
More generally, I/3 of fuel rods are replaced every 1 and 1/2 years and I was told by
ingineers nuclear waste is mesured in Curies.
engineers sorry
@@marcwinkler The use of Curies has been deprecated and the new SI unit for specifying the activity is Becquerel.
@@Psychx_ You are right, 1gr Radium - 1 Curie - 37 000 000 000 becquerels
do all her listeners know German? I know that RUclips also groups people by their location and Berlin is one of this channel's meta tags, so it could very well be that this basically is a gathering of one person that has English as a second language lecturing to a bunch of people with the exact same linguistic background .. also, nur mal so meine Mutmaßungen dazu 😅
The thing I've never understood, is that people are terrified of the ONLY waste that is actually properly managed. Nuclear waste leak: international crisis. Coal exhaust: dump it straight into our air supply.
Actually the proliferation of world ending weapons is up there with the problem of waste.
Safe storage of waste requires best practice over decades if not centuries. The track record of large companies not caring about anything other than short term profits tells me that the good ideas of this video will not be implemented. Not saying we shouldn’t look at nuclear. Just saying let’s be honest.
@@raoul1234567 You can't make nuclear weapons with nuclear waste, you can only make dirty bombs; which while bad aren't really on the same scale. And as shown in the video the simplest storage method is "put it back where you got it from", which doesn't suggest any imminent danger.
@@PlatinumAltaria No you can’t. Weapons are made by tweaking the fuel cycle and enrichment of the same fuel used to generate electricity. Can’t think of a nuclear powered country that doesn’t have or doesn’t want nuclear weapons.
Seepage of nuclear waste from faulty containment into groundwater is a real risk as is radioactive water from tailings dams at uranium mines. That’s not theoretical. That’s has already occurred many times.
@@raoul1234567 No, weapons are made using highly-enriched uranium. It's not a process any individual is going to be able to do, you need HUGE infrastructure. You should really just look this stuff up, nuclear waste does not make nuclear bombs, it just doesn't. Stopping countries from keeping the lights on is not some kind of noble anti-war crusade, it's demanding that old ladies freeze to death because you don't understand science.
Mine runoff is nothing to do with nuclear power, it's a problem with all mining that can be solved with proper planning.
@@raoul1234567 At least they won't be implemented if things are decided by companies.
This is excellent - thank you! Great presentation which holds the viewer's attention and contains relevant, interesting (and at times, fun) information. I really enjoyed this demystification.
A great Video Sabyne, very well explained - even I understood it!
Keith Richards was asked in the 80's how he felt about his public image as "walking death," and that only he and cockroaches would be alive after a nuclear holocaust. Without hesitation he responded, "I would need something to eat wouldn't I." He's still alive today.
Love the humour in this presentation. And just for the record, Keith Richards is immortal!
Oh, I hope so! 😁
Just listened to Between the Buttons---a great album.
Their music has a longer half life than plutonium.
In addition to your excellent sense of humor and competence, your wardrobe is genuinely excellent. Great upload as always.
Love the subtle humor injected in the midst of a serious topic👍🏻👍🏻
As someone living next to a nuclear waste storage (not a long-term one, stuff is stored above ground), I absolutely prefer this to living next to a coal plant. Radiation levels in my city are actually lower than those in the nearby cities.
Until there’s an accident
@@ptech88Statistically still safer than living next to a coal station.
@@ptech88 next to nuclear storage an accident might happen, and it might make you sick.
Living next to a coal plant you'll definitely get sick, no accident required. Since the coal plant being there IS the accident.
@@tharealmb nice point
I think the concept that is often misunderstood is that it is ultra heavy and dense. so while it does seem like a lot of waste it is contained in a much smaller volume than you would expect
And the toxicity of it is contained in a very small volume
The Swiss use nuclear for 35% ish of their energy needs they've been doing it for around 30-40 years, they can fit all their nuclear waste in one room, its a big room, but still.
@@Prometheus7272 - If they did actually put it all in one room, would it go critical?
(Only half kidding.)
@@sirrathersplendid4825 You'd get meltdown before it went critical. If you kept on throwing waste into the molten puddle on the floor, it'd get hotter and hotter until it melts the floor and forms a radioactive gas cloud. Getting it to explode requires it to be crushed together quicker than it can melt and vapourise. Not trivial.
@@MattOGormanSmith - Interesting answer. Cheers!
When I listen to this wonderful person speaking in such an intelligent , reasonable manner , I actually feel better about the human race.
Sadly Rob she is like nuclear waste, in fact quite rare.
Your sense of analogy is superb! ❤💙
Thanks Sabine very informative as always. Love the top 3% toxicity dig!
@@egparker5 it is based on their behavior.
@@egparker5 If you don't think the oligarch class deserves digs, you are part of the problem.
@@egparker5 Sure is; much like my prejudices against other toxic things. Speaking generally, the top 3% control the world and are hastening its demise. There are a few honourable exceptions within this group.
Thanks! I'm working at Kairos Power now and we need all the straight talk we can get.
Is that in Egypt?
It just seems true that we need Fission ASAP now for baseload, perhaps gas from grass by ecotricity and hydro for peak time, until we arrive at a nice clean harmless renewables grid? :)
@@jannikheidemann3805 haha, No, it's in CA. Molten salt cooled fission reactors. Nice try.
@@TheHorseshoePartyUK The public image of fission power has recovered some of the lustre that it had in the 60s. Now that the balance of concentrated power justify the negative implications of concentrated waste it's a better trade off than fossil fuels and the harm those emissions do to the climate. Many people are coming to this conclusion. It's spawning a renaissance in atomic energy. Thanks.
@@Quroxify I've heard the latest generation of full size fission reactors are even safer than they already are in good hands? People mean well but they do not quite realise - Fission has been running silently in the background for decades with only one real catastrophic meltdown and a handful of admittedly tragic, but small scale 'minor accidents' where material has escaped into the public and caused serious problems
Sabine, great presentation. Love your sense of humor !!!
Love your work young lady. Precise and dealing with the facts,
I’m always surprised at how many people casually accept breathing highly toxic vehicle exhaust (happens when your car us idling in traffic), but are afraid of nuclear waste that won’t be anywhere near them.
You're measuring the wrong dimensions for nuclear waste. You're measuring it in space, when in fact it needs to be measured in time.
I mean China gets to keep building Coal Plants while Americans aren't allowed to drive gas powered cars anymore, and in Ireland they want to get rid of all the Cows. How is any of that fair? The UN shouldn't be able to do any of those things until China is shut down for the sake of the Earth. If you aren't going to do that, THEN GFTO!
Yeah, it’ll be somebody else’s problem long after we’re gone!
@@outerspaceisalieok let’s measure in time. How many years until carbon dioxide is decomposed?
@@igortolstov487 My God...do the world a favor and read a basic science text.
I minor correction, the energy density of uranium is much higher than the figure you gave. In a breeder reactor, the mass specific energy density of uranium is about 2.6 million times higher than coal, or 40 million times higher by volume.
Great video. Love you Sabine❤
Love the video topic.
That top is fantastic!
I've always considered humor and intelligence inextricably bound. Sabine is a wonderful example. Her channel is a shinning example of unbiased, concise, research - driven information.
Did you mean shining?
Holtec international has a well thought out storage plan for spent nuclearfue it's above ground in New Mexico far away from any large metropolitan area the dry fuel storage casks are stored in a retrievable manner in a nice safe place, in fortunately United States spent fuel recycling was shut down it was a silly act that industry would have to be restarted be because the working knowledge has been lost there would be an initial learning curve hopefully short. The government will most likely have to get in volved, btw I have over forty years as a radiation protection tech notion and a couple of short stints as an engineer.
I've always considered scientists and lies for huge money schemes involving inflated fears inextricably bound. Sabine is a wonderful example of a fisisist well versed in lies.
And propaganda. She won't be around when Earth will have become a radioactive wasteland, so what does she care? Remember Tchernobyl and Fukushima? More such accidents are to be expect as we rely more and more on aging installations and overconfident and careless personnel.
@@davidnewland2461 Please reread and correct your text. Also add punctuation. You may be an engineer but your explanations make litte sense.
"spent nuclearfue it's above ground in New Mexico " what is?
"United States spent fuel recycling was shut down it was a silly act that industry would have to be restarted " Etc...
Dr. Hossenfelder is great. She breaks down scientific issues into easily understandable pieces. We need more instructors like her. More people would be interested in science if instructors communicated more conventionally and they didn't feel like they were being talked down to. She's also very funny. Love the deadpan delivery of her little jokes.
Both the writer and the actor should be given awards. Loved the video … educational and sassy !!!!! Color me impressed
Thanks for putting out your channel.
Personally, I'd really like to hear more information about the possibilities for nuclear reprocessing, presented in such a clear and digestible manner (I promise not to eat it).
I seem to recall suggestions for using tectonic subduction zones to slowly bury waste. There are problems with dependence on uncontrolled natural processes which can have unpredictable violent excursions from place to place, I suppose…
I just commented above about burial in deep ocean basins - in those basins the likely hood of some unanticipated process occurring (new riff zone or volcanic hot spot) is very low
In 2014 I took a Course on Nuclear waste problems from Nuclear scientist who worked at the Canadian Chalk River reactor in the 1940s. He therefore had a long history of low level radiation exposure. He however looked much younger than his age. There is evidence than low level radiation has some health benefits.
Very, very weak evidence. Might be true, but we don't have anything remotely close to firm evidence that it is true.
Your videos are great, Thank you!
Fantastic video, Sabine! Thanks a bunch! 😃
Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
This video should be required viewing for all major environmental groups.
Sabine long ago made up her mind on nuclear energy - she is for it. This video makes a show of objectivity but ultimately confirms her prejudices . . .
@@jamesneilsongrahamloveinth1301 Well - Is it good for environmental groups? I figure Greenpeace has a few prejudices as well as some others.
The underground storage will be safe in theory, for a million years. Whatever, I trust the geologists. But I am sure that humans will find a way to destroy it and release the whole waste to circulate on earth forever.
Given current trends, I would argue in 100k years humans will supplant farm animals as a food source for whatever the dominant species is.
Hey Sabine, I'm a fan of your channel and I suggest that you look for Thorium powered nuclear reactor, which are liquid fuel, the Molten Salt Reactors. They are even more safer nuclear reactors.
Sabine is the perfect blend of wit, wisdom and science. I don't drive long car journeys anymore, but if I did then I would take her lectures with me.
Nice pick for a lobby pr spokesperson
@@sensationsuperthrust I would call you a Troll, but I do not insult Robots. Find a mirror, and think before you speak...
@@damonreitmeier4539 beep boop beep boop :V
And music, don't forget about her music :)
She does has a sense humor
This was great. 😃 I would not even mind a 2h lecture so engaging when one knows how to explain complex subjects this well. 🤗
This is absolutely a topic I'd love a 2 hour lecture on! I once watched a 5 hour video on nuclear power and waste straight through without stopping 😅 I'm here for it!
@@b_dawg_17 Agree. 💯
But also the way it is presented matters; she does it so well. 🤗
Start with the economics of storage.
Do you think the companies that profit from the making of nuclear waste will be the ones to fund the safe storage?
If not, who will?
Yes...the public.
This is NEVER mentioned when we discuss how cost effective it is.
Then, let's look at a world map 100,000 years ago, 50,000 years ago and 12,000 ( during the ice age ) and tell me a storage location that will be suitable. Anyone?
Now, the comparison between nuclear waste and other forms of waste from energy production.
Basically, this argument boils down to, "they make pollution now, that they could deal with, but don't...with nuclear they will suddenly be concerned about by-product magically".
Seriously...I expect better from Sabine.
This is where her sarcasm should hit...instead she basically says "well they don't purify waste from coal, but nuclear waste storage will be faultless so it wins"
WTF?
@@yt.personal.identification you clearly are an Alien that never bothered to engage or even observe Humans.
These Biologicals in their current Evolution will NEVER as a Group do Shit that benefits them as a Group. These Biologicals are to Combative to EVER achieve a Planetary Solution to Topics like Energy Prouduction or Health Care and Education as a Group, a Corporation or Research Institute might do that and then a very interesting aka bloody Time will ensue. The Last Super Power on this Mud Ball keeps it's Citizens in debt on Principle to make sure that a few Control Hungry Biologicals can Feed their urges instead of making all of the above Topics avilable to their Citizens in an achievable Matter.
Nuclear Power Is a potent and Right now cheap Energy Prouduction Method, with a high cost for the Public in the Future. It will die when Humans invent a new Method, aka cold Fusion. Until then political needs will dictate the availability of Nuclear Energy to the Public. It Is Not that hard to Understand that, so the question Is what YOU do Not understand about that in regards to this Info Clip.
Shine Bright and stay Healthy
@@yt.personal.identification Let's just burn every hydrocarbon in existence then, because nuclear bad. Kek.
Nuclear waste can be dangerous, so its storage is closely monitored and regulated. The waste from coal fired powerstations is also dangerous and must be stored somewhere.
Unfortunately, the waste from coal fired power stations gets stored in the atmosphere.
If Greens would embrace nuclear energy they would gain a lot of conservative support.
Great overview and uncluttered information. Thanks.
I also love the humor interspersed in this and your other videos.
Here is a quote from the 1960s by one of my college classmates about non radioactive power. However, it mainly refers to getting to an 8 o'clock class on time: "Knowledge is power, but Sleep is more powerful than Knowledge".
BY DRINKING STAR : "... AND NOW, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE MOST POWERFUL ENTITY : ....O...P...T...I...O...N....
HUH ?!?
YA CHOOSE : TO SLEEP OR ....PRAY.... YEAAAAAAH....LOVE
@Sabii Bryan SABRYAN🤣
I should consider this the night before an exam
Thanks for a often humoristic presentation or a serious (though perceived so) matter. Most enlightening and entertaining.
Rational argument, always appreciated. Thanks.
Although I don’t live exactly in the area, I have heard of stories from this place near the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge about just how bad the chemical plants there have caused cancer within the local population. Even from my own personal experience, this one paper mill that used to operate not too far from where I lived went bankrupt and had to close down during the 2008 market crash and it singlehandedly made a large brake/creek/swamp area near where I live have hazardous toxins within the water there and make it unsafe to as much as fish out of it due to how bad the toxins have contaminated that water, so I mean yeah Nuclear waste can be pretty bad but in many ways it doesn’t even hold a candle to how dangerous chemical waste is to people and to the environment.
This was a very informative video. Thank you, Sabine.
Thanks Sabine for the wittiest and funniest way to learn technology and science!!! You are amazing!
The question isn't whether you'd want to live near a nuclear waste site, it's whether you'd want to live near one built 60K years ago that you don't even know about, or if you live in a tunneling society that lives deep in the ground because surface conditions are inhospitable.
I see no problems with any of that. Of course, a tiny problem for the tunneling society, but they'll learn soon enough and stop poking the material.
I just finished viewing another video, that says that even in the 1960s there were designs for nuclear reactors that can used RECYCLED fuel rods - and that the recycling process also greatly decreases their half-life. What with that? They said President Jimmy Carter stoped the recycling because it produces plutonium and that was banned by some international decree against nuclear arms
Best documentary I've ever seen! Great content delivered with a touch of humor! I'm subscribing.
As someone who used to work in nuclear radiation monitoring, thank you for pointing out how little waste is created and that 90% is low level.
Could have pointed out that low level is mostly not radioactive.. (just overly cautious)
And really, i would have loved if you used "banana equivalent dosage" like we used to haha.
I'm not sure if people realise how much (obivously very low level) radioactive matieral/environments we're potentially exposed to in our everyday lives... wristwatches with fluorescent hands, some old camera lens coatings, smoke detectors, long haul air travel, radon beneath our homes...
I prefer the chest X-ray (70 000 bananas) as a metric.
Thanks… I forgot the banana dose blurb from the 1960s, Ha.
How many Megabananas are we talking about?
@@CAThompson "one point twenty-one giga-bananas... where are we going to get one point twenty-one giga bananas??"
haveyou read about accelrato trans mutation of mixed waste? Proposed in the mid 1980s by Los Alamos labs in USA, it would convert waste to short half-life isotopes, and produe more energy than it requires.
Nuclear reactors are a stupid way to generate energy, because assuming you need most energy to cope with heating in the Winter, the whole system has to be scaled to meet the peak in winter demand because they take such a long time to ramp up and ramp down. In the summer they will be mostly redundant. Which is unfortunate, as the cost of nuclear energy is mostly in the cost of the reactor itself, rather than the fuel. If they ever get fusion to work the reactors are even more expensive to make relative to their energy output. I guess Thorium reactors will be pretty expensive too, since Thorium isn't an ideal fuel to use in nuclear reactors. The whole reason we are looking at Thorium is because Uranium is starting to get expensive, due to the growing demands on the limited supply.
Basically this is not a good approach. Maybe generating leccy in places with high solar energy and then using that energy to produce e-fuels such as methane would be the best idea.
as an aside, plutonium is also chemically toxic too.. :)
That was very up to date and informative. Thanks Sabine,
I grew up near a nuclear plant, complete with on-site hot pool storage of spent fuel rods.
I have no problem with low-level waste - discarded jumpsuits, boots, and other PPE. If you think I want to live near a hot pool of spent fuel with all the security problems and ongoing costs that entails, you have another thing coming. This stuff will be dangerous for a longer than I'll be alive. We were told in 1969 when the plant was being planned that nuclear power would be cheap cheap cheap. It turned out to be an ongoing federal headache, with the plant on the NRC watchlist nearly continuously, and the electrical rates are second-highest in the nation. We were told it would be safe - it wasn't. They had numerous radiation releases over the years. Maybe thorium will be good, but uranium is not on my preference list.
I'm more concerned with war, terrorism and natural disasters causing melt downs than what we do with the waste material.
This is really great. Thank you so much. I have been worried about this issue for decades. This programme makes science accessible and I also appreciate the dry sense of humour to go with all the factual stuff.
I just can't help it. I love every video you make, Sabine!! The dry humour pills just make my day even if I try to be serious about the topic. Please, keep on this track! 💜 Love from Spain.
I can't tell if it's entertaining or annoying like the drunk old lady at the bar telling you pointless story's
thank you! got inspiration for a safety minute presentation
There is a fire burning since the late 40's in west St. Louis, MO, USA caused by improper disposal of waste. Can't put it out. It is illegal to build a reactor to reprocess waste in the US.
Uhh, that's not how nuclear waste works. You are seriously mistaken.
11:35 While some say that Nuclear Energy production is cheaper, when taking into account the cost of engineering/ storing/ monitoring the nuclear waste, I've heard it said that the true cost would be like paying $1,000,000 for a cheeseburger 🍔
Well said. In addition to waste management/storage, you've got the cost of building the plants (reportedly it takes a decade) and the cost of de-commissioning them (reportedly it takes two decades) - not to mention the environmental costs of so doing. . .
@@jamesneilsongrahamloveinth1301 I didn't know that it took so long to build or decommission, but that doesn't surprise me either. Thank you for the knowledge!
@@jamesneilsongrahamloveinth1301 "two decades" ?? closer to 60 years.
From: *Nuclear Nonsense: Why Nuclear Power is No Answer to Climate Change and the World's Post-Kyoto Energy ChallengesChange and the World's Post-Kyoto Energy Challenges* by Benjamin K. Sovacool Christopher Cooper
*In the United States, there are currently thirteen nuclear power plant units that have permanently shut down and are in some phase of the decommissioning process, but not a single one of them has completed it* For example, Peach Bottom Unit 1 was shut down in October 1974, but will not even begin decommissioning until 2034.2' The Humboldt Bay nuclear facility was shut down in July 1976, but will not be completely decommissioned until 2012 or 2013.255 Zion Units 1 and 2 were permanently shut down in 1998, but the plant will not begin decommissioning until 2013. Further, unless license extensions are granted, all licenses for commercial
nuclear reactors in the United States will expire by 2038 and more than 100 reactors will enter the decommissioning phase, requiring billions
of dollars with little or no generating capacity to offset these costs.
Decommissioning at nuclear sites that have experienced an accident is far more expensive and time consuming. At Three Mile Island, Unit 2, which shutdown permanently after an accident in 1979, will not start the decommissioning process until 2014.
Fuel rods at Chernobyl, the site of the world's deadliest nuclear accident to date, are still being removed and operators expect it to take until at least 2038 to 2138 before the power plant is completely decommissioned.
I've just discovered your channel and want to say, never change a single thing. You are amazing and I love you. You are perfect in every way and I will be watching every video made and ever will be made by you and your associates.
relax
About 40 years ago when I embarked on a short "Nuclear Engineering" course, the prevailing opinion on long life waste management was, "encapsulate waste radioactive beads in glass".
This supposedly made the stuff safer, & particularly resistant to ground water, thought to be a potential risk in in long term deep subteranian storage. So what happened: too costly, too difficult, or do the powers that be not care sufficiently?
Apparantly, most vitrified HLW has stability issues. The glass tends to anneal into distinct domains with crystal boundaries, especially with ongoing decay heat. As fission products get excluded from the annealing glass, it accumulates in the interfaces and become available to travel through the material and corrode the encapsulating container.
Other issues are as you suggest. Too costly for a start. Direct disposal of intact spent fuel has the advantage (touted elsewhere by others) that the pellets are a more robust matrix and sealed in zircal jackets (not counting broken ones), and that the reactors have the handling devices to put these directly in casks with minimal future handling if those casks could be disposal-rated. It is also difficult to process into a form that leads to proliferation risks. In contrast, reprocessing results in two waste streams needing different treatment and disposal facilities. It also concentrates plutonium which then becomes a proliferation and security risk. France has reprocessed about one third of all their spent fuel, and has huge interim stockpiles of both vitrified waste and plutonium.
It seems that reprocessing is more expensive than expected, and creates two types of waste that each need more fiddling around than the original intact spent fuel. It multiplies the problems rather than solving them.
Something similar seems to happen with the noble attempts to re-use spent fuel. After reprocessing the separated plutonium is added to depleted uranium, plus a top-up from excess weapons material to make MOX.
Used MOX has a more diverse set of plutonium bombardment products, in particular U236 and it's product U232 which complicate almost every subsequent option.
Or as you suggest, they may not care. The spent fuel inventory increases annually and seems to remain in the "too-hard" basket. No one is willing to allocate the money to do it properly.
An intelligent lady with a sense of humour. Nice to see.
Dayum, the dry humour in this is vicious.
I LOVE IT!!
As one that lived in W Germany in the 80s I can totally relate to chemical exposure.
She doesn’t mean drugs.
I live on the US Gulf Coast near Houston, and there are gigantic chemical plants near me from Dow, BASF, etc. And we have some coal fired plants. Texas has a lot of wind power, but in the end our electricity in the greater Houston region is still predominantly fossil fuel based. And I would much rather live near a nuclear power plant than near a chemical plant, or our coal fired plants. Wind would be great, except there isn't room for that many wind turbines near our city.
@@alvarofernandez5118 What's the matter with coal fired plants? They don't pollute, they emit plant food.
@@vtbn53 Coal plants emit huge amounts of pollution, including radioactive particles.
@@vtbn53 yeah... nope. They emit burnt plant smoke and ash. :-)
When it comes to half lives of isotopes: any amount of a radioactive element is considered gone when it hits 5 times its half life. So something with a half life of about 5 years like Co-60 is considered gone after 25 years. Also fuel rod consumption is dependent on reactor design but a larger factor is the fuel used itself. If you have a larger amount of uranium 234 than average your fuel rods will last a lot longer. Another thing is the amount of power you’re producing and the rated temperature of your reactor. If your reactor is rated for a relatively low temperature like 300F you’ll have a longer expected core life than if it was rated for 400F. If you’re core has a positive temperature coefficient of reactivity then you’ll have to pull your control rods out to maintain your rated temperature meaning your fuel rods won’t last as long. If your reactor has a negative temperature coefficient of reactivity you wouldn’t have to move rods since the more steam you draw, the more heat you pull out of the primary, the colder it gets, the more fission events you have, the more power you get, the hotter the primary becomes until it hit equilibrium at the same temperature as before. A negative temperature coefficient of reactivity is a property of any reactor using water as a moderator where using other materials for a moderator would mean a positive temperature coefficient of reactivity. I’ve operated two reactors that haven’t needed to be refueled even though they have been operated for over 30 years.
Your humor is brilliant sabine. Just dissapointed that I can't eat fuel rods. No healthy green glow for me.
9:10 As a train fan I am very aware of that test crash but I have never seen the footage at the angles you have shown. Thank you!
Hello!
Would it be possible to explain the opposite end off the issue? Who produces "fuel" for reactors, who owns the stocks, who has possiblility to make political influence because of that e.g. on Germany and on whole EU??? Is it interesting topic for any-one?
Kind greetings for Everyone and flowers for Mrs. Hossenfelder: 💐❤
👍
Thanks for the interesting suggestion, I will keep that in mind!
@@SabineHossenfelder
Thank You 🙂
I suggested that topic because I'm so much worried about Germany and UE 😞 ❤
@@SabineHossenfelder Yes, and compare that to the stranglehold fossil fuel and "green energy" companies currently have...
@@ztheiss Is there a monopoly on solar panels?
Is there a monopoly on wind turbines?
Is there a monopoly on hydropowerplant construction?
Is there a monopoly on deep drilling for geothermal power?
There certainly is not a monopoly on fuel production for those types of energy generation; they don't need any.
The IAEA has a map on their website showing all known deposits of uranium. The EU has loads of it, even Ireland is rumored to have enough in Co. Donegal to last for centuries.
100,000 years is a time scale beyond my comprehension. Currently we cannot even prevent water companies dumping sewage into rivers or the sea.
Please remember that the reason we have natgas (and oil) in geological reservoirs under high pressure, with methane being an incredibly volatile and tiny molecule, is that nature has put a lid on it for tens of millions of years.
Please remember that fission products are soluble in water and can percolate through salt domes.
Natural gas is not water soluble.
The two examples are not comparable in practice, though nuclear boosters love to pretend.
yes we can. Its called laws.