Hazardous waste is infinitely better than fossil fuel burning energies that put CO2 and Methane into the atmosphere at high rates.

Waste should be of no concern. It can be mitigated. We can't mitigate rising CO2 levels to any substantive degree.

Also it would only be viable to launch it into space if we could launch it far enough that it goes out of orbit range. There's already enough trash and debris in our immediate orbital range , so much that scientists are going to have to figure out at some point how to deal with it. And a real issue and crazy thing is NASA or any other space administration has to factor in all the trash and debris orbiting Earth when they plan sending things into orbit.

This post was edited by sir_lance_bb on Mar 14 2017 08:41am

as i said, the "waste to space" discussion is huge and despite all problems, one of which you pointed out, its not finished yet

i disagree on your point that we can manage waste production, its not working so far and the classic environmental pollution is for me a much bigger problem than greenhouse gases
werent there some scientists recently stating, that at the current rate it will only take a few decades until there is more plastic in the oceans than actual fish? reducing CO2 wont help us much if that happens (and there are many things much worse than plastic)
granted, its a matter of everyones own interpretation

what i am saying is that right now most renewable energy concepts do not justify the costs of money, ressources and waste compared to their returns
on nuclear energy we agree

The issues of waste just means some ecological damage and we do have the means to better store waste. A lot of problems with waste are tied into how we have disposed of it for all this time.

We could store the waste in better areas or potentially burn it or find find ways to destroy it without releasing toxic gas from it.

You compare this issue vs rising temperatures and rising CO2 levels and you should take the former in a pragmatic sense. We have so few options with runaway greenhouse gases that get out of control.

You basically choose between limiting harm vs a scenario that threatens every major ecosystem on the planet.

How do you propose we significantly ramp up nuclear production without new Fukushima/Chernobyl/etc incidents popping up at an exponentially increasing rate?
Until we have a safer nuclear technology it just isn't practical, especially in the less politically stable areas of the world.

aim_terrorist_attack_here.jpg

Chernobyl happened almost 31 years ago and the technology of nuclear now so much more complex beyond that.

Fukushima survived an Earthquake and Tsunamis and the damage dealt from it is mostly very minimal. And Fukushima isn't exactly one of the better run nuclear plants and it survived a natural disaster.

Nuclear isn't some evil boogey man where there's a threat of meltdown. And the risks of natural disasters compromising the plants should be of no concern when compared to what is happening with fossil fuel.

And considering we already have nuclear technology that is safe but there's so much taboo that nuclear expansion is hesitant.

The shroud of the cold war nuclear doom is still in people's heads. When the reality is that the fears of nuclear energy that persisted from the past is irrelevant with current technology.



These types of fears don't have any solid foundation other than a baseless fear because the past issues and fearmongering around nuclear has incorrectly shaped the view of it.

This post was edited by sir_lance_bb on Mar 14 2017 09:38am

Tbh though. I see fission power at this time as a great temporary solution with a high risk for its population.
It would be useful to reduce a bit of the CO2 production at this time. Perhaps only in America though.

Fission is not durable, it's just moving a problem. I hope we can be more ambitious than that.

This post was edited by Knaapie on Mar 14 2017 09:37am

This is probably a greater step toward non-fossil fuel energy than a massive wind farm: https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/245490-new-solid-state-battery-chemistry-glass-electrolyte-same-guy-pioneered-lithium-ion-cells

You mean: In co-operation with massive wind farms ? Thanks for linking the article, wanted to read about it when I heard the news 2 months ago.

When you rely on sun/wind, you'll need a local storage, perhaps one in every home, for when it's dark and no wind.
There is the need for peak power mitigation and more variation of the inconsistent suppliers, year round.

Small potatoes.

Unless India, China, US and other heavy weight polluters decide to take meaningful steps towards clean energy what Denmark and others like them do is meaningless.