On 12/13/04 20:30:21, you wrote: >> Now good science tells us that we don't have any experience with >> containment of any materials with current technologies that is more than a >> few decades. Science also tells us that it is extremely risky (the risk to >> err) to simply extrapolate our short-term experience up to a few centuries >> or more. There is no scientific data about containment facilities that > need >> to work a few millenniums. This are not only technical questions... it's >> not even guaranteed that any of the current countries will still exist at >> that time to perform the required maintenance. > > Maintenance? Since when does a deep hole in the ground require maintenance?
The plan there, as with all similar planned facilities, in case you don't know, includes to "contain" the material in some sort of container. These containers are made of materials we have quite limited long-time experience with. Most of these need some sort of maintenance to prevent corrosion damage, and for all we know so far, they /will/ corrode without maintenance. This is what engineering data tells us. So no, the hole won't require maintenance, but the contents will. If it were just for a hole with nothing in it, there probably wouldn't be any protests. > Once it's full, build mini-pyramids over the site, with warnings carved into > the surfaces. The Eqyptian pyramids have lasted for thousands of years. Yes they did last, but we don't have much of a clue about what much of the stuff there means. Besides, I doubt that any current government would spend the effort to create anything that lasting. Their time horizon is something between 4 and 12 years or so, mostly. I consider it rather ingenuous to think that any governmental agency or private enterprise would seriously plan for more than 50 years -- and even more ingenuous to think that they would /act/ in advance. So the claim that all of a sudden they should be able to design and run a 10k years facility responsibly is pretty wild IMO. > the event that somehow the radioactive stuff does come back to the surface, > the area will become known in folklore as the "forbidden lands" or something > mysterious like that. Groundwater contamination is probably a much bigger problem than spreading directly to the surface. And claiming that this is a desert (now) doesn't help much with a project that's supposed to be designed for 10,000 years. > I didn't say that people shouldn't be able to protest. Just that many such > protests are simply cases of NIMBY. If someone tried to build a > Chernobyl-type reactor near my town, you can bet I would be doing NIMBY > protesting. But a safe reactor design, I would not oppose. No > inconsistency here... Well, sounds as if when you consider something unsafe (by your personal standards), you think you would do "justified NIMBY", but when others consider something unsafe (by their personal standards), they do "simple NIMBY". Not really inconsistent, just... how do I say that... maybe egocentric? I think the logical consequence of a majority not wanting to have something in their backyard is to change the technology and use something else. Why do we need stuff that nobody wants in their backyard? >> IMO the single biggest damage to the public understanding of science has >> probably be done by the "scientists" who use the term "scientifically >> proven". There is no such thing as "scientifically proven". If we all >> could at least agree on that, we probably would be a big step further >> in the proper use of science. > > I don't think I've ever heard a scientist use that phrase. I haven't heard scientists use that phrase either, but I did hear "scientists" use it :) > I have heard > marketers, advertising people, politicians, and public relations people use > the phrase. Maybe these are the people you should be blaming? I've even heard engineers use it (or similar phrases), mostly when they are convinced that they have just the "right", "objective" balance of risks and others with a different balance are just simple naysayers. Gerhard ____________________________________________________________ You are subscribed to the OT discussion forum To Post messages: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe and Other Options: http://techservinc.com/mailman/listinfo/ot_techservinc.com Browse or Search Old Archives (2001-2004): http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] Browse or Search Current Archives (2004-Current): http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]
