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croes 3 days ago

If they go bankrupt who is responsible for the waste?

lawlessone 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

you are :D

yikes from their FAQ:

"The plan is for the small amount of spent fuel (the volume of the spent fuel in one reactor is equivalent in size to just two Walmart gas grill propane tanks) that comes out of our reactors at the end of their duty cycle to only be temporarily stored on-site until a federal repository or interim storage solution becomes available. "

They don't even have plan while the exist now.

acidburnNSA 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

Well no one does. The feds cancelled Yucca mountain and so there's nowhere for anyone to put nuclear waste. By law it belongs to the feds.

So everyone just leaves it in the reactor's parking lot for now, in big concrete and steel dry casks.

dylan604 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> equivalent in size to just two Walmart gas grill propane tanks

Is this a real measurement in tank sizes? Why not just say two 20lb tanks? What if I bought my tank from Home Depot? Are they a different size? Do they think using Walmart makes it more relatable?

lawlessone 3 days ago | parent [-]

>Is this a real measurement in tank sizes?

That's only 0.393% the size of a football field!

Seriously though, isn't a lump of radioactive material that size actually huge?

dylan604 an hour ago | parent [-]

Just because the container is that size does not mean the fuel inside is the same size. I'd assume the majority of the container is shielding and other non-fuel material for structure.

AngryData 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I mean that is exactly what we do right now with all nuclear waste. Without a nuclear material repository there is only so much you can do. You don't want to just dig a simple hole somewhere and start tossing everyone's high level waste into it, that would just be asking for a massive disaster.

gigel82 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

That's the right question to raise up.