[geeks] Global warming, was Mr Bill?

[der Mouse]

> i'm in the camp that believes that there is -no- safe disposal for
> the high-level radioactive waste of un-reprocessed 'spent' fuel rods.

For what value of "safe"?  I'm not convinced it's that difficult to
dispose of them with no more overall damage to us or the planet than it
is to, say, dispose of the residue from burning the necessary amount of
fossil fuel to produce the same amount of useful energy.  (For example,
if the spent fuel from all existing nuclear plants were distributed
evenly throughout the ecosphere, how would the resulting radiation
level compare to the existing background radiation?)

I've never even heard of any careful comparison that actually takes
into account that nuclear powerplant "exhaust" needs to be compared not
with nothing but rather with the "exhaust" from other forms of power
generation.  All forms of energy production have prices, and I'm not
convinced nuclear isn't cost-competitive when all the costs are
tallied.

Of course, this isn't the sort of question that can have a well-defined
answer, because people will differ over which cost is the greater in
many cases (how does an X% rise in the worldwide cancer rate compare to
Y degrees of worldwide warming from geenhouse gases?).  But as far as I
can tell nobody seems to be even approaching it from that perspective.
Perhaps those studies just don't make it to any news medium I follow.

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