Nuclear waste: Asset or liability? A pragmatic view in the 21st century.

摘要

Temporary storage of nuclear waste has become a pervasive and increasingly difficult problem for U.S. policymakers because permanent disposition solutions are so politically and environmentally charged that agreement among stakeholders has proved impossible. The question is what to do with nuclear waste—the spent fuel and nuclear warheads from dismantled weapons? Is there a feasible alternative to geologic disposal?; It is hypothesized that the energy potential resident in spent fuel and dismantled warheads can be put to productive use by recycling these waste materials using existing technologies. A Notional Nuclear Power System (NNPS) was developed as the vehicle to address a resolution to the nuclear waste issue. The methodology identified five issues, defined four feasible alternatives, determined the relative importance of the issues, judged the capabilities of each alternative to contribute to the resolution of each issue, and used a quasi-statistical weighted analysis to determine the best alternative. Expert judgments were obtained from high-level managers in the field over a three-year period.; Safety and nuclear waste were the most important of the five issues considered. The NNPS earned the highest rating because it utilized the recovered plutonium (Pu) and uranium (U) from spent fuel and nuclear warheads to fuel Generation IV reactors. The United States has a choice—burn it or bury it! Should breakthroughs in the nuclear reactor technology occur beyond Generation IV reactors, further research would be warranted.