We do…
The US military sells our “spent” fuel to France who refines it and uses it.
Why do people always want to learn about nuclear energy from YouTube videos made by teenagers with no clue how nuclear power works?
Nuclear waste is reusable. Why aren’t we doing it?
Submitted 8 months ago by quoll@lemmy.sdf.org to videos@lemmy.world
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiAsmUjSmdI
Comments
givesomefucks@lemmy.world 8 months ago
quoll@lemmy.sdf.org 8 months ago
…err the video is 90% a tour of the ORANO La Hague spent fuel recycling facility… by adults.
Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Oh really?
For its part, the US Energy Department, which owns almost 50 tons of excess Cold War plutonium, contracted with the French government-owned nuclear-fuel cycle company, Areva (now Orano), in 2008 to build a MOX fuel fabrication plant. But the United States switched to a “dilute and dispose” policy for its excess plutonium in 2017 after the estimated cost of the MOX plant grew from $2.7 billion to $17 billion.
givesomefucks@lemmy.world 8 months ago
That does have most of the same words, so I could see why a search engine thought it was relevant…
But did you read it? Even just the part you quoted?
Like, that’s talking about cold war plutonium…
That’s not what used military reactor fuel is…
acosmichippo@lemmy.world 8 months ago
how much though? I was under the impression that the vast majority of US nuclear fuel is “once through” and the waste goes into long term storage.
Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Because the technology does not exist and would be prohibitively expensive to develop even if we got it to work at all.
julysfire@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Because money.
quoll@lemmy.sdf.org 8 months ago
…and plutonium
Fizz@lemmy.nz 8 months ago
Its not taking up much space, we don’t really need to reuse it at the moment.
Nomecks@lemmy.ca 8 months ago
Because of nuclear non-proloferation treaties. You can’t run a “recycling” program without also being able to make plutonium for bombs.
cordlesslamp@lemmy.today 8 months ago
Just let the government do it then. All nuclear waste should/must be handled and recycled by the state.
acosmichippo@lemmy.world 8 months ago
but it’s not true that “You can’t run a “recycling” program without also being able to make plutonium for bombs.” You need far more enrichment for weapons grade plutonium than you do for commercial fuel plutonium.
In fact, the more we use plutonium for fuel, the less nuclear waste there will be available to potentially be recycled into weapons grade plutonium in the future.