Nuclear waste environmental impact

Agency (EPA), which was established in 1970, the same year the first Clean Air Act was passed into law. In 1972 the Clean Water Act became law, and in 1973 the Endangered Species Act became law. Other important federal environmental legislation includes the Resource Consei vation and Recoveiy Act, passed in 1976 the Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 the Nuclear Waste Policy Acts of 1982 and 1987 and the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Acts of 1980 and 1985. From 1980 to 2000 these environmental regulations, and the enforcement efforts of the EPA, have had a much greater impact on decisions made in the energy industiy than all the policy initiatives implemented by the DOE. 

A thorough analysis and evaluation of different fuel cycles with regard to economics, environmental impacts, nuclear waste management and proliferation risk is given by the MIT (2003). 

Future improvements in the application of laboratory dissolution data to natural systems will come not (only) from additional work on laboratory kinetics, but will also depend heavily on much more comprehensive studies of surface area distribution, evolution, and accessibility to attack by fluids in natural systems, and by improved understanding of thermodynamic properties of natural fluids. Only in this way will laboratory kinetic data contribute to solving environmental problems such as nuclear waste disposal and evaluating the impact of acid deposition. 

Ewing, R. C. 2004. Environmental impact of the nuclear fuel cycle. In Giere, R. Stille, P. (eds) Energy, Waste, and the Environment a Geochemical Perspective. Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 236, 7-23. 

Much interest in the past few years has been generated in connection with problems of radioactive waste isolation in a growing nuclear economy. Many studies have been irfitiated to find the most suitable sites for waste repositories, and the environmental impact if breaches occur in such repositories. 

NRC (1982b). U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Final Environmental Impact Statement on 10 CFR Part 61 Licensing Requirements for Land Disposal of Radioactive Waste, NUREG-0945 (National Technical Information Service, Springfield, Virginia). 

The fissioning of U and Pu in a nuclear reactor produces a large number of radioactive fission products. Most of these decay to stable isotopes within a few minutes to a few years after the fuel has been discharged from the reactor and therefore pose no problem in the management of nuclear fuel wastes. There are, however, a number of longer lived radionuclides that must be considered in assessing the environmental impact of any nuclear fuel waste disposal vault in the geosphere. 

A life-cycle analysis (LCA) was also conducted (Suppiah, 2008). One objective of the LCA was to identify environmental issues associated with nuclear-produced hydrogen and determine which are the most critical. The study focused on identifying energy, materials, and waste in/out of the system for the nuclear-hydrogen plant. Sensitivity analyses were performed to investigate what future improvements should be made, and identify specific areas where significant contributions would improve the overall environmental impact. 

All methods of producing electricity have serious environmental impacts. The main objections to nuclear power plants are the fear of possible accidents, the unresolved problem of nuclear waste storage, and the possibility of plutonium diversion for weapons production by a terrorist group. The issue of waste storage becomes particularly emotional because leakage from a waste depository could contaminate ground water. Chemical dump sites have leaked in the past, so there is distrust of all hazardous wastes. 

R.C. Ewing, Environmental Impact of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle, in Energy, Waste and the Environment a Geochemical Perspective, Eds. R. Giere and P. Stille, The Geological Society of London, London, 2004. 

Spent fuel will be stored on a permanent basis once a national repository is approved. The planned nuclear waste facility at Yucca Mountain is still involved in ongoing environmental impact studies. The opening of a national long-term storage site is over 12 years behind schedule because of opposition. 

In this chapter we described some of the industrial aspects of ceramics. Ceramics make money. Unfortunately obtaining the raw materials can have some undesirable environmental and societal impacts. The environmental impact of nanomaterials is an issue that has not yet significantly concerned the ceramics industry because no one knows exactly what that impact is. But as the market for ceramic nanopowders and other nanostructures (such as wires and tubes) increases the environmental concerns will have to be addressed. Many of the grand challenges we face as a society, such as energy, the enviromnent, and health care, will require innovative technological solutions. Ceramics can play an important role in these areas, e.g., nuclear waste immobilization, catalytic conversion, and viral nanosensors. 

The classical backup to issue (a) is to involve ejqier-tise and choose directly the uncertainty distributions in such a more or less formalized way. A few historical examples of large-scale nuclear waste or environmental impact assessments did imply a structured ehcitation of expertise (Granger Morgan Henrion... 

So why does the chemical industry fare little better than nuclear energy (worse in the USA [3]) in terms of public favourability and does it matter anyway The main reasons given for unfavourable opinions are concerns over adverse environmental impact, transport, safety and waste. Less than one third of those interviewed believed that the chemical industry is con-... 

Sustainability (effective fuel utilization, development of new energy products that can expand nuclear energy s benefits beyond electrical generation, improved waste management, and demonstration of its safe long-term storage, minimal environmental impacts). 

Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL). 1994. Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the Concept for Disposal of Canada s Nuclear Fuel Waste, AECL Report, AECL-10711, COG-93-1. 

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