[ RadSafe ] Global Warming

[Peter Bossew]

"Brennan, Mike  (DOH)" <Mike.Brennan at DOH.WA.GOV> writes:
>There aren't actually a lot more isotopes after the etc.


this is true.


>, but yes, there
>are some fission fragments that have long half lives.  However, they
>represent a small fraction of the inventory of fission products in
>"fresh" spent fuel, either on an atom basis or an activity basis.  They
>also generally represent a small fraction, again on an activity or atom
>basis, of the fissile material that was consumed by the reaction (the
>exact ratio is dependent on many factors). 


small ?
99Tc: 6.05% thermal 235U fission yield
135Cs: 6.33%
129I: 0.66% only
93Zr: 6.30%

while 99Tc and 129I can be subjected to transmutation (in principle; if
someone is willing to pay for this), 135Cs and 93Zr cannot, to my
knowledge.

Has anybody calculated what a system - certainly scientifically beautiful,
on paper -  would cost (e.g. in Euro / MWh) which includes advanced
reactors, reprocessing of high burn-up fuel, actinide burning,
transmutation of fission products, and including probably decades of
development until it works large scale ? Any figures available ?

Peter Bossew



> In most cases, even with the
>long lived fission fragments mentioned, somewhere in the 300 to 500 year
>range the spent fuel will probably become less radioactive than the
>fresh fuel was, even including the unused fuel and fissile transuranics.
>It gets even better with reprocessing.
>
>So, if the assumption is that radioactive material is bad, and that we
>need to be willing to sacrifice now in order to protect less
>technologically sophisticated later generations, it is clear that the
>ethically sound choice is to use as much uranium as possible now to make
>electricity, so that there will be less radioactive material in the
>world later.
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
>Behalf Of Peter Bossew
>Sent: Wednesday, December 09, 2009 3:47 AM
>To: gstanford at aya.yale.edu
>Cc: radsafe at radlab.nl
>Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Global Warming
>
>George Stanford <gstanford at aya.yale.edu> writes:
>
>(...)
>>
>>
>>     Then the only waste would consist of fission 
>>products, which can be easily isolated in various 
>>ways for 300 - 500 years, by which time their 
>>radioactivity has decayed below any reasonable level of concern.
>
>(...)
>
>129I: half life 1.57e7 a
>99Tc: 2.11e5 a
>135Cs: 2.3e6 a
>etc.
>
>
>Peter Bossew
>
>_