
France Is Still Cleaning Up Marie Curie’s Nuclear Waste - adventured
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-28/france-is-still-cleaning-up-marie-curie-s-nuclear-waste
======
RcouF1uZ4gsC
> says Yannick Rousselet, a Greenpeace campaign leader.

Respectable publications should stop quoting Greenpeace. In my mind,
Greenpeace is really close to anti-vaxxers through their opposition of nuclear
power and especially GMO foods such as Golden Rice which would save thousands
of children's lives every year. In regards to nuclear power, it it had not
been for the stringent opposition to nuclear power over the years, a much
larger percentage of our power generation would be carbon free.

[https://slate.com/technology/2013/08/golden-rice-attack-
in-p...](https://slate.com/technology/2013/08/golden-rice-attack-in-
philippines-anti-gmo-activists-lie-about-protest-and-safety.html)

~~~
option
I grew up near Chernobyl and my parents still work there. A lot of what people
see in the media about nuclear is fear mongering lies. The recent
“documentaries” on this topic further delays any progress on fighting global
warming.

~~~
SiempreViernes
Opposition to carbon tax is the real blocker to rapid progress, more nuclear
power ranks in the "nice to have" list.

~~~
option
carbon tax is a great idea. But we still need to get clean energy from
somewhere. Reducing (energy) consumption is not a long term answer

~~~
SiempreViernes
The sun is a more logical source if you talk long term, the sun is likely to
destroy the earth before it stops being a viable source of energy.

Meanwhile nuclear uses up finite stores of fuel and exotic materials for the
containment and control systems.

~~~
ars
It's not quite that simple, to harvest the sun you need machines, and those
machines take a lot of resources to built.

You need to calculate the trade-offs of those resources vs resources used for
other types of energy. The "sun" part of the question is the least interesting
part.

~~~
fyfy18
The CO2 in the production, transport and installation of solar panels leads to
an equivalent CO2 output of 50g per kWh. This compares to 975g per kWh for
coal. Solar still wins.

[https://www.mnn.com/green-tech/research-
innovations/blogs/ho...](https://www.mnn.com/green-tech/research-
innovations/blogs/how-much-co2-does-one-solar-panel-create)

I'm currently building a house quite north at 55N. I plan to install a solar
PV system that will make the house a net-zero energy consumer (everything is
electric, no fossil fuels).

It should pay for itself in around 10 years and then continue producing
electricity for another 15 before warranties run out. After that the
electrical equipment may need to be replaced, but the panels themselves should
be fine. If it makes sense here, it can make sense almost anywhere.

~~~
ars
> leads to an equivalent CO2 output of 50g per kWh

Like I said, it's not so simple, nuclear is 66 g/kWh, and does not have
intermittency issues.

> that will make the house a net-zero energy consumer (everything is electric,
> no fossil fuels).

Are you heating with electricity as well? Because that's really bad for the
environment, even with PV. (Because if you heated with natural gas, you could
send your PV electricity to another grid consumer and avoid more hydrocarbon
fuel being burned.)

If yes, are you at least using a ground-source heat pump? (Although even there
natural gas is better - install a "gas absorption heat pump" if you really
want to minimize your emissions.)

> If it makes sense here, it can make sense almost anywhere.

In small quantities yes, but if everyone did that you need something to
generate electricity at night.

To me nuclear wins easily.

~~~
fyfy18
Oops I somehow read your comment as advocating for continued fossil fuel for
electricity generation. Yes if the choice is between solar or nuclear, then
yes nuclear is definately the better option.

We are going for an air source heat pump. A ground source heat pump will need
bore holes to be drilled as there isn't enough space for ground loops, and the
extra cost of that doesn't offset the decreased efficiency of the air source
heat pump over the life of the system. The heat pump will primarily run when
PV is generating more power than the rest of the house is consuming, and store
heated water in a tank for consumption at night.

We are building to Passive House standards. Space heating from the heat pump
will use a maximum 1000kWh of electriciy per year (worst case assuming we get
a long stretch of cold days below the operating temperature of the heat pump,
and it has to fall back to resistance heating), while the PV should output
around 9000kWh. We'll also have a wood stove as backup, but that will generate
too much heat for primary heating.

Net-zero isn't perfect as you say, but for the few winter months when we
probably won't generate enough electricity to cover heating consumption I
don't think it's that bad. Electricity generation in my country has an average
of 300g CO2/kWh.

I'd prefer not to use gas as our country imports gas from Russia, and I'd
rather not depend on them. Plus gas leakage has a massive impact on ghg.

We are in the late planning stages, so if you have any suggestions of further
reading material please let me know :-)

~~~
ars
Only suggestions I have is reconsider not running a natural gas line. Cooking
on electricity is not great, and wood is really bad for pollution.

I understand the Russia situation, but geopolitics changes all the time, and
the house is likely to stand for a long time.

Since you seem to be in Europe, and you want an air source heat pump, I would
suggest this product for your heating: Lochinvar LCGHPi-40HT.

Then instead of using your electricity to (inefficiently) run a heat pump,
send the electricity back out on the grid, while using more efficient natural
gas. And then you help CO2 emissions in a more globally way, rather than just
by your house. CO2 acts globally after all.

Even with the gas leakage, natural gas is still worth it over heating with
electricity. I think you have something like 1/5 the emissions of electricity
(and remember your PV going back on the grid reduces fuel consumption
elsewhere).

------
goda90
It's interesting that the lab is so radioactive and such, but it feels like
this article's main goal is to increase anti-nuclear sentiment.

------
wayne_skylar
Maybe this is a dumb question, but why can't nuclear waste be diluted? You get
U-235 though enrichment of naturally occurring uranium. Why is there no way to
reverse this process?

~~~
ars
You can dilute uranium that way. The issue is the radioactive material is all
other place, not concentrated. You need to dilute cements and wood, and paper,
and glass, and other materials the lab is made from.

~~~
saalweachter
Also, this is _Marie Curie 's workshop_.

I hope to god the goal of any remediation is in the service of conserving the
site and the artifacts for their historical value. If Marie Curie's notebooks
eventually end up encased in concrete somewhere "because they're
contaminated"\--

~~~
ars
> If Marie Curie's notebooks eventually end up encased in concrete somewhere
> "because they're contaminated"

They are in fact contaminated, so they are kept in lead lined boxes:

[https://www.csmonitor.com/Technology/Horizons/2011/1107/Mari...](https://www.csmonitor.com/Technology/Horizons/2011/1107/Marie-
Curie-Why-her-papers-are-still-radioactive)

------
logfromblammo
Article seems long on fearmongering and short on objectively measured facts.

> _" But radium has a half-life of 1,600 years, and there are traces of a
> uranium isotope at the Curie annex with a half-life of 4.5 billion years."_

This is the extent of the numeric data. Probably from Wikipedia. There are
traces of uranium isotope in the asphalt of your parking lot.

> _" A 1997 study concluded that pedestrians and ­residents of apartments just
> a few feet from the perimeter wall aren’t at risk of radiation poisoning,
> but officials say the place remains a hazard."_

In other words, the site is completely safe, as long as no one goes inside,
kicks up dust, and breathes it in.

~~~
iaw
What if there's a fire?

~~~
logfromblammo
Keep the firefighters out. Let it burn. Evacuate a radius plus the downwind
plume. Test for radiation before allowing people back in.

What if the whole facility is broken down and packed into drums, and the truck
shipping some of them overturns on the highway?

The known flaw has a simple, well-known workaround. It's "don't do that".
Attempting a fix has the potential to introduce additional unknown flaws.

The fact that France is doing a site cleaning now is perhaps a testament to
the dwindling size of their low-level nuclear waste site cleaning backlog?
AFAIK, their Hague processing facility only uses half its capacity on waste
from their ~95 energy reactors, and takes waste from other countries to pick
up some of the slack. A cleanup like this can keep it operating without having
to mothball excess capacity.

------
ars
> There’s no lasting solution for the most dangerous refuse from the country’s
> 906 nuclear waste sites

That is simply untrue.

If you combine
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing)
with a
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor)
you can burn up all the dangerous isotopes and safely use their energy.

You only need to store it for around 100 years, after which the radioactivity
is very low.

It's an economics problem, not a physics one.

~~~
mjevans
A political problem. The economics isn't even really an issue since it makes
more sense logically on a long term investment schedule.

------
pkaye
Can't they not put some of the waste into containment barrels and stow them
somewhere?

~~~
moftz
Where do you stow those barrels safely? Permanent storage of nuclear waste is
a tricky situation. You essentially need a very geologically inactive area
away from people but can also be properly secured against thieves.

~~~
wtetzner
Fling them into space I guess... ;)

~~~
cftorres
It wouldn't be nice if in an human exploration on outer space we find a
container full of unknown harmful waste from another civilization. That
shouldn't be our first option.

~~~
johnr2
> It wouldn't be nice if in an human exploration on outer space we find a
> container full of unknown harmful waste from another civilization.

The unshielded fusion reactor which we orbit around is likely to be a bigger
problem.

------
oneepic
>But it’s brimming with radio­activity that will be a health threat for
millennia

Millennia is a stretch to say the least... I figure we'll have a solution long
before then, as long as science is being done.

~~~
mrob
Meanwhile, coal-burning plants are still pumping toxic heavy metals into the
atmosphere (to say nothing of the CO2), which will be a health threat for
eternity. But for some reason nobody mentions how long chemical waste lasts
for.

~~~
xenophonf
Coal generates appreciable amounts of radioactive waste as well:

 _In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal
for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more
radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy...
(As a general clarification, ounce for ounce, coal ash released from a power
plant delivers more radiation than nuclear waste shielded via water or dry
cask storage.)_

[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-
more-...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-
radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/)

I'm not a huge proponent of nuclear power generation—I'd much rather we focus
on renewables (especially solar) and storage technology—but if we're going to
have radioactive pollution from power generation, I'd much rather it also be
carbon neutral. That's ignoring coal's many other environmental deficiencies
(mountaintop removal comes immediately to mind).

------
eddyg
The article seems full of FUD to me.

Today, nuclear power plants are _so_ much more advanced, safer and can even
recycle their used nuclear fuel. See the PRISM[1] reactor, for example.

[1] [https://nuclear.gepower.com/build-a-
plant/products/nuclear-p...](https://nuclear.gepower.com/build-a-
plant/products/nuclear-power-plants-overview/prism1)

~~~
herogreen
Not 100% is recycled and some of the leftovers will be dangerous for thousands
of years.

It is 2019 and neither the U.S., the U.K., France nor Switzerland have started
to dispose (= bury) their waste.

~~~
DuskStar
And yet people don't freak out over dumping radioactive materials _into the
atmosphere_ , which is what coal power plants do.

------
pmdulaney
I dislike the practice of overselling historical figures because they happen
to have been female or other downtrodden du jour, but this seems to be the
opposite phenomenon. Why blame just Marie?

