Problems With Nuclear Waste

Radioactive or nuclear waste is the waste that is generated from nuclear reactors, fuel processing plants and research stations involved in dealing with nuclear energy. For a better understanding, these wastes/byproducts have been classified into two categories on the basis of the origin of these wastes.

1. High-Level waste: This includes mainly the spent fuel extracted from the reactors after generating electricity from it.
2. Low-Level Waste: These are mainly produced from reactor operations and from academic, industrial and medical uses of radioactive materials.

But the most potent radioactive waste is the irradiated fuel which is produced in various nuclear reactors in the nuclear cycle. The reason behind its high potency is the fact that it contains all the radioactive fission products and many radioactive elements as well including Plutonium. The major challenge in dealing with this spent fuel is that it has to be stored underwater for large periods of time to deal with the high levels of radiation and heat it emits. Recently, many countries have started reprocessing this spent fuel wherein the aim is to separate Plutonium and fissioned Uranium from the wastes and use it back as fuel. The major reason why it’s difficult to dispose of these waste byproducts is due to their very long half-lives. According to a study, it almost takes hundreds of thousands of years for the radioactivity of these wastes to reduce below the permissible levels. Since the radiation emitted even at a low intensity can have adverse effects on people and the environment thus it’s necessary to isolate these wastes.

One of the earliest methods of nuclear waste disposal was ‘Geological Disposal’ which was considered to be the safest and the most cost-effective method of waste disposal of radioactive materials by the U.S National Academy of Sciences. In this, the waste is packed in special containers and put deep under the ground. But the issue with this method is that by the time nuclear waste reaches its half-life which is usually hundreds of thousands of years, the container material is likely to corrode thus allowing the radioactive material to escape into the biosphere and degrade the groundwater sources. The escape can happen in two ways- (i) Due to the digging of deep wells near repositories the radioactive materials can find a route to come out and (ii) release of radioactive materials into the groundwater. Thus, it all comes down to how well is this method executed and how reliable can these repositories be. Adding to the issue is the uncertainty regarding the predictions which are bound to several conditions such as climatic changes, the possibility of eruption of volcanoes and alteration in the behaviour of different parts of the repository due to the constant generation of heat by the radioactive material. Also, the rapid construction of tunnels poses a risk of fracture and most importantly, no one can predict human behaviour in the future.

Due to these many uncertainties regarding the geological disposal method, even this method has been under scrutiny for the last few years. This method has also faced huge public opposition. They have opposed the concerned organisations’ plan of constructing a repository even at a farther distance. All in all the lack of a proper full-proof plan to ensure the safe disposal of nuclear wastes has led to the halting of many nuclear projects at times. In my opinion, any nuclear waste disposal method should not be implemented unless and until it is a reliable and cent per cent safe method. The impact of any possible leakage of these nuclear radiations can be devastating both to the people residing nearby and also to the environment. If such disposal methods are not available, then the strategy another way around must be to reduce the generation of these nuclear wastes. This can be done by devising suitable processes for the optimisation of the chemical processes occurring within the nuclear reactors. Research has been going in this direction for many years and scientists have come up with numerous optimisation techniques which can reduce the amount of waste generated significantly.