reduce, reuse, renuke?

It's clear we can't shy away from the recycling and reuse of our nuclear wastes in the name of safety any longer. As a globalized species it's time for us to take care of our responsibility. The storage of useable nuclear materials, the ones we used to call waste, is no longer an option. As we get closer and closer to expending our fossil fuels we are finally beginning to realize, that with the advances in technology and safety measures (mostly by France), that we are viably able to reduce the sizes of both high and low-level nuclear wastes and reproduce clean energy at the same time. 

The technology for uranium recovery began in 1949, and was developed in Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). However, the fear of nuclear weapons proliferation (especially after India demonstrated nuclear weapons capabilities using reprocessing technology) led President Gerald Ford to issue a Presidential directive to indefinitely suspend the commercial reprocessing and recycling of plutonium in the U.S. On April 7, 1977, President Jimmy Carter banned the reprocessing of commercial reactor spent nuclear fuel. The key issues driving this policy was the serious threat of nuclear weapons proliferation by diversion of plutonium from the civilian fuel cycle, and to encourage other nations to follow the USA lead. For a short time this succeeded essentially making the United States a power house for nuclear energy and trying to cap the market for all other countries (Xoubi, 2008: 2). What Carter and now presidents after him have failed to recognize, is that by suffocating other nations from developing their own nuclear programs the United States also succeeded in stunting the growth of the recycling component of nuclear programs. However, non-governmental companies and universities have successfully made major discoveries in the past 15 years towards the mass use and recycling of low-level nuclear wastes.

In today's world, what needs to also be dealt with is that fact that we are proliferating two very different types of nuclear waste. As a global community we have build-ups of both low-level (slightly contaminated processing materials such as gloves, filters, and uniforms) and high-level (of particular concern are two long-lived fission bi-products, both having half-life's longer than hundred of thousands of years) nuclear wastes. The laws of conservation of energy and mass say that energy or mass cannot be created or destroyed – it can only change form. 

Two companies in particular, have taken it upon themselves to use the integration of technology and research to actively find ways that are cost efficient, harmless, and safe for both humans and the environment. The French company AREVA along with Idaho University as well has the global company Cleantech and its Israeli partner Environmental Energy Resources Ltd. (EER) have made astounding developments in the processes of cleaning low-level wastes. Both companies end their decontamination and recycling processes with a very similar product involving glass or binding the irradiated nuclear material to a solid state particle which is used in aspects of industrial manufacturing. 

Retrieving enriched Uranium from low-level nuclear waste is what AREVA and Idaho University are doing together, the most fascinating aspect about their process is that it's nearly identical to what we use on our decaffeinated coffee today! Chien Wai, a University of Idaho chemistry professor, has developed a process that uses super-critical fluids (any substance raised to a temperature and pressure at which it exhibits properties of both a gas and a liquid) to dissolve toxic metals. When coupled with a unique purifying process (developed in partnership with Sydney Koegler an engineer with AREVA, and University of Idaho alumnus), enriched uranium (usable for energy) can be recovered from the ashes of contaminated materials (University of Idaho, 2008). Sure we don't torch our coffee after wards to lose the bean husk and get the flavor, but the process itself works just about the same way to obtain the leftovers of nuclear waste!

In a similar way by resulting in the reconstitution of radiated materials, EER, by using a system called plasma gasification melting technology (PGM, developed by scientists from Russia's Kurchatov Institute research center, the Radon Institute in Russia, and Israel's Technion Institute) - EER combines high temperatures and low-radioactive energy to transform waste. The reactor combines three processes into one solution: (1) it takes plasma torches to break down the waste, (2) the carbon (organic) leftovers are then essentially vaporized by the plasma heat, (3) and the inorganic components are converted to solid waste. The remaining vitrified¹ (the embedding of the irradiated material into a glassy matrix or silica) material is inert and can be cast into molds to produce tiles, blocks or plates for the construction industry. EER's waste disposal rector does not harm the environment and leaves no surface water, groundwater, or soil pollution in its wake. The main goal of EER was to help the Ukrainian government provide safer disposal methods of Chernobyl's hazardous waste. At that time, the country was looking for a way to treat its low-radioactive waste zones resulting from the Chernobyl explosion (Kloosterman, 2008). As you can easily see this way effectively and efficiently deals with the large scale clean-up issues that the Ukraine government is dealing with. 

What's more important is that we as a global community recognize that we now have the capabilities to handle the low-level mess we've created at a very fast and efficient rate. Money should not be what holds us back at this point, seen as how these two processes will nearly pay for themselves in the long run. Our difficulties come in dealing effectively with our high-level nuclear waste. Too many absurd ideas are being tossed about. Everything from storing concentrated levels of plutonium in mountains and under the sea bed, to rocketing them off into space to be taken by solar-winds to some distant planet or even the sun (Coopersmith, 2005). However ultimately what it comes down to is our personal and sincere want to fix the problem we've created. 

 

Holding us back from reprocessing is the fear mongering in favor for the displacement of our global responsibility. Some say that nuclear reprocessing and recycling will only allow room and opportunity for nuclear proliferation and terrorism (UCS, 2011). This is complete and utter nonsense. With the proper precautions we could securely contain the recycling process to just a few localities and not only take care of hundred of millions of tons of nuclear waste that has already been made, but we can assume our responsibility of following through with the technology that is coming from the processes of managing low-level nuclear waste and use them to help us find better ways of recycling and reducing our high-level waste. One way this reprocessing can be accomplished is through the development of new reactors that reuse the waste materials produced. This would then create essentially a chain that would consume the bi-products till only a small amount of highly concentrated waste material is left. Many believe this is the next step for high-level bi-products, and maybe it is, but it still leaves materials in the long-run that we are not yet prepared to deal with.

While there aren't many clear solutions to the disposal and recycling of high-level nuclear waste, one thing is for sure. We are definitely able to take care of our low-level waste, and should. Maybe what we should consider long before the decommissioning of the last nuclear power plant is investing in something besides this technology that everyone is afraid of, and has the potential to be very harmful. Why, as humans, are we always looking for the fastest way to meet our needs? Instead of investing in harmful methods that proliferate problems we don't know how to fix or can't possibly handle, why not turn to what the earth gives us completely free? Our wind, oceans, and sunlight offer us the most extensive and unimaginable amounts of energy available to us. Shouldn't we put our discovered technology to good use and completely deal with the problems we've created with nuclear fission, and at the same time look to bettering ourselves and our world through the use of completely reusable and non-harmful forms of energy?

1Vitrification (from Latin vitreum, "glass" via French vitrifier) is the transformation of a substance into a glass. Usually, it is achieved by rapidly cooling a liquid through the glass transition. Certain chemical reactions also result in glasses. An important application is the vitrification of an antifreeze-like liquid in cryo-preservation. In a wider sense, the embedding of material in a glassy matrix is also called vitrification. An important application is the vitrification of radioactive waste to obtain a stable compound that is suitable for ultimate disposal. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitrification]. May 4,2012.

Works Cited

(apologies for anyone who feel they should have been cited, this was just an exercise in personal rhetoric, please feel free to contact me with any comments or inquiries.)

Coopersmith, Jonathan. 2005. “Nuclear Waste in Space”. The Space Review. Http://thespacereview.com/article/437/1. May 3, 2012.

Kloosterman, Karin. 2008. “Nuclear Energy Breakthrough – From Atomic Waste to Recycled Inert Material”. The Cutting Edge. Http://thecuttingedge.com/index.php?article=381. May 3, 2012.

Spencer, Jack. December 27, 2007. “Recycling Nuclear Fuel: The French Do It, Why Can't Oui?”. Http://foxnews.com/story/0,2933,318688,00.html. May 4, 2012.

Union of Concerned Scientists. April 5, 2011. “Nuclear Reprocessing: Dangerous, Dirty, and Expensive”. Union of Concerned Scientists. http://www.ucsusa.org/nuclear_power/nuclear_power_risk/nuclear_proliferation_and_terrorism

/nuclear-reprocessing.html. May 3, 2012.

University of Idaho. 2008. “Readioactive Waste Recycling No Longer a Pain in the Ash”. The Science Daily. Http://sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080821213606.htm. May 3, 2012.

Xoubi, Dr. Ned. 2008. The Politics, Science, Environment, and Common Sense of Spent Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing. October. 1-10.