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United States Government Science

Wanted: A Town Willing to Host a Dump for U.S. Nuclear Waste (bloomberg.com) 335

The Biden administration is looking for communities willing to serve as temporary homes for tens of thousands of metric tons of nuclear waste currently stranded at power plants around the country. Bloomberg reports: The Energy Department filed (PDF) a public notice Tuesday that it is restarting the process for finding a voluntary host for spent nuclear fuel until a permanent location is identified. "Hearing from and then working with communities interested in hosting one of these facilities is the best way to finally solve the nation's spent nuclear fuel management issues," Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a statement. The agency, in its notice, requested input on how to proceed with a "consent-based" process for a federal nuclear storage facility, including what benefits could entice local and state governments and how to address potential impediments. Federal funding is also possible, the notice said. Approximately 89,000 metric tons of nuclear waste is being stored at dozens of nuclear power plants and other sites around the country.
[...]
One such interim storage site could be in Andrews, Texas. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in September approved a license for a proposal by Orano CIS LLC and its joint venture partner, J.F. Lehman & Co.'s Waste Control Specialists LLC, to establish a repository in the heart of Texas' Permian Basin oil fields for as many as 40,000 metric tons of radioactive waste. The joint venture envisioned having nuclear waste shipped by rail from around the country and sealed in concrete casks where it would be stored above ground at a site about 30 miles (48.28 kilometers) from Andrews. But the plan has drawn opposition from Texas authorities and local officials who once embraced it as an economic benefit but have since had a change of heart. A similar nuclear waste storage project, proposed in New Mexico by Holtec International Corp., is awaiting approval by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The agency said it expects to make a decision on that proposal in January 2022.

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Wanted: A Town Willing to Host a Dump for U.S. Nuclear Waste

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  • Florida (Score:4, Funny)

    by locater16 ( 2326718 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @02:03AM (#62035541)
    Who would even notice?
    • by bussdriver ( 620565 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @02:42AM (#62035561)

      Just have Anthony Fauci say it's a bad idea and you'll need to always wear PPE and it'll be approved as soon as you show the $ that would be paid to store it.

      • by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

        The fact that this is modded insightful instead of funny is what's wrong with Slashdot these days.

      • by narcc ( 412956 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @12:52PM (#62036703) Journal

        That's silly. If Fauci says it's dangerous, the plague rats would be lining up the ingest it! They'd set up nuclear waste displays in their homes and scream at store clerks for not selling nuclear waste.

        We wouldn't need to pay them -- they would go out of their way to pay us to have access to it! They'd walk maskless into hospitals and refuse all treatment and demand access to nuclear waste instead.

        We know that this is what would happen because we've seen this happen before.

    • by fermion ( 181285 )
      Seriously though. There are many waste sites in florida, and many are in crisis. Florida is all sea water. The greatest short term danger is water, salt water, corroding the containers.
      • Dry casks corrode just sitting around, which is why we aren't already using the nuclear waste storage facility we built.

    • Re:Florida (Score:5, Informative)

      by rmdingler ( 1955220 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @08:16AM (#62035943) Journal

      Thank goodness for Florida bailing out Texas, occasionally, as the butt of the joke.

      Regarding Andrews, Tx:

      But the plan has drawn opposition from Texas authorities and local officials who once embraced it as an economic benefit but have since had a change of heart..

      The site was actually embraced by the locals as a low-level waste disposal facility... contaminated gloves, clothing, instruments, and such. Opposition really only began when the facility was upgraded to handle and store high level waste like spent fuel rods.

  • by MacMann ( 7518492 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @02:20AM (#62035543)

    I saw a YouTube video where people were discussing the state of nuclear power in Canada and the issue of waste management came up. It turns out that many communities in Canada wanted to host a waste disposal site. The reason was that there is a fund for disposing nuclear waste, and requirements for monitoring the waste that meant a nuclear waste site would create many high paying jobs.

    We have a similar situation in the USA, a fund to pay for the waste management, paid for by the nuclear power plants, requirements on the monitoring of this waste that will create many high paying jobs, and a request for communities to host these sites. I expect nuclear waste to be popular in the USA too.

    I expect people to ask me if I would want a nuclear waste site near me. There's already a nuclear waste site near me, and it appears a great many people don't even know it's there. I do in fact have nuclear waste in my backyard.

    Because the linked article is behind a paywall I didn't read it. It would be nice to read more about this so I can see if there's an option to get more nuclear waste in my backyard.

    This is a sign of the USA preparing to build more nuclear power plants. I'll often see a demand that we do something about the nuclear waste we have before we build more nuclear power plants. Once there's places to store the waste that complaint is out of the way. What's going to be their next excuse?

    We are going to see more nuclear power plants built in the USA because we are running out of power, we are running out of options, and we are running out of excuses.

    • Now's the time for you to step up and volunteer your yard as a dump. You can then be instrumental in creating a group of nuclear advocates to do the same, call yourselves something like "Glowing in the Dark Friends"
    • by fermion ( 181285 )
      Most places can live using wind and solar. For back up there is natural gas. The extremists was no fossil fuels, but really what we need to do is minimize the use of our fossil fuels. We need to be able to quickly and safely ramp up back power as needed. Natural gas plants are easy and cheap.

      In terms of nuclear waste, the issue is who is going to pay. Ultimately, it is the taxpayer, which means it will not work. Back in 1980 there was an idea to clean up about 1000 sites using a superfund. Some of the mon

      • Most places can live using wind and solar. For back up there is natural gas. The extremists was no fossil fuels, but really what we need to do is minimize the use of our fossil fuels.

        Considering that humanity's carbon footprint needs to go negative to address global warming, I wouldn't say "no fossil fuels" is extreme in any way...maybe a little idealistic if anything.

  • by VaccinesCauseAdults ( 7114361 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @02:26AM (#62035547)

    stored above ground at a site about 30 miles (48.28 kilometers) from Andrews

    Significant figures fail: it should say 50 kilometres.

    âoeAbout 30 milesâ is equivalent to âoeabout 50 kilometresâ

  • Texas and Green (Score:4, Interesting)

    by drkshadow ( 6277460 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @02:26AM (#62035549)

    But the plan has drawn opposition from Texas authorities and local officials who once embraced it as an economic benefit but have since had a change of heart.

    Texas was wholly on board, but once people started calling nuclear energy "green" -- hold up. Texas is off board. Put the brakes on this project, woah, woahhh!

  • Would be glad to have it. Plutonium and nuclear waste has made the area prosperous for 70 years. The only reason it's not considered is liberal state politics.
    • Isn't Hanford a dangerous radioactive supersite?

      • Yes, it is. One of my former coworkers at the RV repair shop who's just bailed out (got a better offer, he's a fabricator, so I imagine it was a MUCH better offer) was on the reactor site cleanup crew up here in Humboldt (which by the way was a TOTAL SHIT SHOW, he has told me some pretty amazing stories about it) and he wanted to get on the Hanford cleanup crew because apparently he likes radioactives or something. (Actually, he likes the fat paychecks associated with. And the lack of actual work done.)

  • semi-relavant info (Score:5, Interesting)

    by PinkyGigglebrain ( 730753 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @03:21AM (#62035593)

    First of calling it "nuclear waste" is not completely accurate. It is better to call them "spent fuel" as that is what they still are, fuel. In most cases the spent fuel rods are actually ~97% reusable in new fuel assemblies and only the remaining ~3% doesn't' currently have any use and needs to be sequestered for any significant time. If the existing spent fuel is recycled there will be no need to mine additional Uranium for a conservatively estimated 100 years. Even longer if we transition to Thorium at which point we can pretty much close the Uranium mines.

    The big problem with reprocessing the fuel is that the current method also concentrates the Plutonium into a weapons grade form, something the US government don't want to happen so reprocessing has been discouraged over the years. An improved method of recycling the fuel [phys.org] could open some new paths for the re-use of the spent fuel assemblies.

    Another thing that is usually missing from articles talking about all the spent fuel in the USA is context. The current amount, the product of the entire US nuclear power industry since its start would only cover a football field to a depth of aprox 3.5 meters before reprocessing so, its not exactly as big a problem as it is often presented to be.

    • by MacMann ( 7518492 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @05:23AM (#62035721)

      The big problem with reprocessing the fuel is that the current method also concentrates the Plutonium into a weapons grade form

      No, it does not. Reprocessing spent fuel rods doesn't produce weapon grade plutonium. It produces reactor grade plutonium. To get from reactor grade to weapon grade requires enrichment, the same process to turn natural uranium into weapon grade uranium.

      In most cases the spent fuel rods are actually ~97% reusable in new fuel assemblies and only the remaining ~3% doesn't' currently have any use and needs to be sequestered for any significant time.

      It has a use as fuel. The remaining 3% of fuel is "spent" when used in a light water reactor but it's usable down to about 0.5% in a heavy water reactor. The fission of this spent fuel is aided by the small amounts of plutonium in the spent fuel rods. There's been many people proposing to build new heavy water power plants to burn this "spent" fuel, which isn't so spent if in a different reactor. These plans often do not go far because morons that think there's weapon grade plutonium in the fuel clutch their pearls and faint at any mention of a new nuclear power plant. They don't want us to even burn the fuel, which is a very effective means to destroy it's utility to make bombs. These anti-nuclear morons demand something be done about the spent fuel but then get upset at any solution proposed. This tells me that they don't want to solve the problem, they just need something to complain about.

      These complaints would not be so annoying if they weren't so much bullshit.

      If the existing spent fuel is recycled there will be no need to mine additional Uranium for a conservatively estimated 100 years. Even longer if we transition to Thorium at which point we can pretty much close the Uranium mines.

      There's going to be thorium in uranium mines and uranium in thorium mines, the two do not exist separately in nature. We will be burning both as fuel for a long time.

      The current amount, the product of the entire US nuclear power industry since its start would only cover a football field to a depth of aprox 3.5 meters before reprocessing so, its not exactly as big a problem as it is often presented to be.

      That's quite likely true.

      Most of the radioactive waste that is causing problems came from weapons production but people like to blur the lines on where this comes from and blame nuclear power for this. The source of this waste was from weapons and old nuclear power plants. The best way to destroy this waste is new nuclear power. If we don't destroy it then we have to store it. If nuclear weapons bother people then we need nuclear power plants to destroy the weapon grade plutonium in them. If we bury the plutonium somewhere then someone could dig it up. If we destroy it by neutron bombardment in a fission reactor then nobody will be able to produce weapons from it.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      It's not just spent fuel, a lot of it is equipment that has become contaminated. Some of it from thorium reactors - the amount of high level nuclear waste is a serious problem with them.

      It's not just the US government that doesn't want proliferation or countries deciding that it's okay to produce weapons grade plutonium, it's most of the world. If the US starts doing it, other countries will start doing it.

      The volume of the waste isn't the issue, it's the difficulty handling and storing it for extremely lon

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

      First of calling it "nuclear waste" is not completely accurate. It is better to call them "spent fuel" as that is what they still are, fuel.

      It's a correct technical term, but it's also misleading. Spent literally means used, and unable to be used again. But if the rods are reprocessed into new fuel, you can use most of them again, which means that it's a linguistically incorrect term. Nuclear waste, however, is also a correct term. If you're not going to reprocess them, and you are just discarding them, then they are waste by definition ("eliminated or discarded as no longer useful or required after the completion of a process") and the phrase

    • >The current amount, the product of the entire US nuclear power industry since its start would only cover a football field to a depth of aprox 3.5 meters

      Of course, it could only do so very briefly...

      Describing the amount of spent fuel like that is brain-numbing stupid, because you absolutely cannot store it like that. By definition the amount of fuel in a single reactor is more than enough to reach criticality and that's not even with 100% packing density... though I suppose letting a huge lump of spent

  • Alternative (Score:3, Interesting)

    by scipiones ( 7550570 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @04:03AM (#62035627)
    I think it would be a better idea to build a nuclear waste dump in a field, mountain range or some kind of wilderness - not a town. It would be dangerous to have all that nuclear waste in a town.
    • It's dangerous no matter where you put it. This is why nuclear power is a matter of selling out the future for profits today. I say profits because it's not the best, fastest, or cheapest option, but someone is profiting from it or it wouldn't be built at all. There are easier, faster, safer, cheaper, and cleaner methods of power generation; in fact, every method but coal is literally all of those things when compared to nuclear.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      You can't just dump it. It has to be contained in a facility that is fortified against natural disasters like earthquakes and extreme weather, and secured against theft and wildlife. The UK has had problems with the latter, such as the notorious "Dirty 30" storage pool where birds would remove nuclear waste and carry it away.

      It also needs extensive monitoring equipment to be installed, to make sure that the fuel is being properly stored. Russia has already had one severe nuclear disaster at a spend fuel sto

  • .. for this... Time to put your money where your (loud) mouths are...
  • by Dog-Cow ( 21281 )

    The most logical place is Washington D.C. It's the one place you can be sure the government will actually do everything to prevent leaks or other dangers. Until the US capital is moved to a western state. Then D.C. is screwed. Not that anyone would be able to tell the difference.

  • Wouldn't you want to store nuclear waste as far away from any community as possible?

    • Because it's the American way. Store the most toxic substances known to man as close as possible to wholesome apple pie-eating American communities. The heavy metal oxides, petrochemicals & 'forever chemicals' just aren't enough.
    • by necro81 ( 917438 )

      Wouldn't you want to store nuclear waste as far away from any community as possible?

      There is one school of thought that says the way to deal with nuclear waste is to package it in as inert an environment as possible, so that even on 10^4-year time scales, it'll be safe without human intervention. This tends to imply really dry environments (deserts), and geologically stable (far interior of continental plates) which tend to have little population anyway.

      Another school of thought says that's impossibl

    • Not according to the great minds of some slashdot readers.

  • by etash ( 1907284 )
    Why does it have to be near a town? it actually has to be far from a town. US has plenty of deserts, bury it somewhere in the desert far from ANY town.
  • by geekmux ( 1040042 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @05:35AM (#62035743)

    "...restarting the process for finding a voluntary host for spent nuclear fuel until a permanent location is identified."

    When any politician implies "this is just temporary", you victims better count on that being at least a lifetime or two, and well beyond any statue of limitations.

    Standard tactic of pushing the problem just past the retirement date of every politicians career, to reap those corrupt rewards now. We The People, should know better by now, and this is the inherent problem when politics exists for politics sake.

  • Who would have thought.

  • or repeal the Price-Anderson Act. Two things that will never happen.

  • by rantrantrant ( 4753443 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @06:38AM (#62035831)
    ...obviously. The municipal dump probably wouldn't notice a few thousands containers knocking around.
  • by Qbertino ( 265505 ) <moiraNO@SPAMmodparlor.com> on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @06:48AM (#62035845)

    ... as solution for global warming" thing going so far?
    (/sarcasm)

    If God had wanted for man to use nuclear power, he'd've put a giant fusion reactor in the sky.

    • ... as solution for global warming" thing going so far?
      (/sarcasm)

      If God had wanted for man to use nuclear power, he'd've put a giant fusion reactor in the sky.

      Yes but the sun is all "good" radiation because it is natural... right? http://physicsbuzz.physicscent... [physicscentral.com]

  • by jonwil ( 467024 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @07:57AM (#62035911)

    There are large areas of land where the US set off nuclear bombs for testing during the cold war that would be a great place to store this stuff.

    The land is already somewhat contaminated by the nuclear tests so storing more waste in the area isn't going to be as big of a deal as storing it elsewhere that hasn't been contaminated at all. Its already owned by the US government and designated as a restricted area so controlling access wont be a problem. The area is (AFAIK) sufficiently geologically stable that there isn't a threat from earthquakes (at least not if you build whatever storage you are using properly).

  • Just a reminder that there's no trouble in disposing of radioactive waste with fossil fuels...because fossil fuel industry radioactive waste doesn't have to be handled like nuclear industry radioactive waste. [desmog.com] For a coal power plant, you can just let it blow out the smokestack!

  • The gift that keeps on giving.

  • by Rhipf ( 525263 ) on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @10:59AM (#62036343)

    We seem to be approximately 22+ years late to the party. We should be storing our nuclear waste on the moon by now.

    Well I guess the moon actually wouldn't be there now to store current nuclear waste so maybe it was a good reason to delay doing so.

    8^)

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