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[Gentlefish]

That letter is fire, just gotta say. I'm currently public sector myself and am so glad I'm working state instead of federal right now.

[smjjames]

I can't decide what to make of that, and for the moment will hold the claim that the president or his lawyer have made direct threats with the same skepticism I held the claim that Trump ordered Cohen to lie to Congress.

On one hand, I fully believe it's something Trump the person would do.  And I fully accept that Trump doesn't care that he's the president when he does things.  But I just can't quite believe that he would be stupid enough to make credible threats against Cohen or his family in his position.  Not even Trump.

But yet, I can't imagine Cohen would say the president or his lawyer made the threats without some evidence.  I sincerely hope he has that evidence if this is true.

Trump has gone far enough for people to accuse him of witness tampering but falling JUST short of actually breaking the law. Remember, he's been in litigation stuff most of his business career, so, he knows his way around this kind of stuff. Also, since Cohen has worked with Trump for years, he certainly knows the rhetoric he is using. So, something that might not seem like a serious threat to personal health by others, is percieved as a threat by Cohen and his family as he knows the nuances.

It might be private stuff that he is talking about rather than what's been public, we don't have the details.

I've also read before that Cohen was afraid that Trump supporters would try to hurt him because theres always those crazy fringe people, but that's not quite the same thing as claiming threats directly from Trump and Giuliani.

[Starver]

So, what's a little nuclear waste between friends?

[Trekkin]

Nuclear waste? I think you mean self-cooking Trump Steaks! Come on, I thought liberals liked recycling.

[smjjames]

I feel like that article needs a deeper explaination of what specifically is being reclassified, like are we talking about equipment that's just been heavily contaminated but can't be easily made into dirty bombs or are we talking about things like radioactive water or things like spent rods that are still radioactive enough to lethally irradate you?

It otherwise seems like it's just cutting corners because even if you reclassified spent rods as low level, that doesn't make them not radioactively lethal. Plus, without additional deeper information, it sounds like he's making that 10% of waste that is high level as low level, making the designation meaningless.

It still sounds like cutting corners regardless because the high level waste is designated as such for a reason.

[wierd]

Self cooking huh...

As in, "hey, this stuff is always very hot to the touch!" self cooking, or "Hey, if you pull out the convenient neutron capture wafer we installed, this thing goes from room temperature to molten boron in 3 seconds flat! (also, by doing so your kitchen instantly becomes a superfund site! Wait, did we say superfund? We meant superFUN!)"  ??

Inquiring minds want to know!

[Trekkin]

I feel like that article needs a deeper explaination of what specifically is being reclassified, like are we talking about equipment that's just been heavily contaminated but can't be easily made into dirty bombs or are we talking about things like radioactive water or things like spent rods that are still radioactive enough to lethally irradate you?

It otherwise seems like it's just cutting corners because even if you reclassified spent rods as low level, that doesn't make them not radioactively lethal. Plus, without additional deeper information, it sounds like he's making that 10% of waste that is high level as low level, making the designation meaningless.

It still sounds like cutting corners regardless because the high level waste is designated as such for a reason.

Per DOE G 435.1-1 II-1, 7-09-99:

High-level waste is the highly radioactive waste material resulting from the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel, including liquid waste produced directly in reprocessing and any solid material derived from such liquid waste that contains fission products in sufficient concentrations; and other highly radioactive material that is determined, consistent with existing law, to require permanent isolation.

In practice, yes, it's mostly spent fuel and early-cycle reprocessing raffinate.



EDIT:

Self cooking huh...

As in, "hey, this stuff is always very hot to the touch!" self cooking, or "Hey, if you pull out the convenient neutron capture wafer we installed, this thing goes from room temperature to molten boron in 3 seconds flat! (also, by doing so your kitchen instantly becomes a superfund site! Wait, did we say superfund? We meant superFUN!)"  ??

Inquiring minds want to know!

All levity aside, I think it's mostly the former by mass. Most of it doesn't need much more cooling than what the fuel pool provides.

[smjjames]

I fail to see how reclassifiying that stuff as low level lowers the costs because if you treat the highly radioactive stuff the same way as the safe-but-could-give-you-cancer stuff, you're going to get people killed.

[wierd]

This is a bit of a dumb question... and admittedly so.

I understand that things can be lethally radioactive without being thermally exciting. (say for instance, rapidly decaying gamma emitters, or highly bio-absorbed materials like radioactive iodines)  However, that does not sound like what is being discussed here. It sounds like they are discussing the crud left over from spent fuel rods, or the crud left over from centrifuging yellow cake uranium, and pals.  In those cases, the material emits radiation of kinds that ARE thermally exciting.

In which case, (unless it decays SOO rapidly that containment is a very serious issue), casting it into a glass containment block, and using it as a radioactive heat source for space probes looks like a potentially beneficial way to get rid of it.   Not everything you would put an RTG into needs to have humans around it. (but yeah, electronics dont like high energy particle bombardment either.)


As for the "I am TRUMP! I SMART! I save money by reclassifying glowing glass bricks the same way I classify dirty radioactive gloves, so I can just put it in a hole with some dirt on top!"  Yeah, that is pretty much what this appears to be.

[Kagus]

We really need more research done on fun ways to repurpose nuclear waste. The space-taking gamma-leaking long-term waste is really the big obstacle for atomic power, I feel.

Well, I mean, there's also the issue of not putting plants in areas with significant seismic activity or significant slav activity, but the waste management is a big deal too.

[Gentlefish]

They wanted to use the Nevada salt flats. But someone was all like nooooo after they were halfway through making it.

Plus the amount of actual waste generated is pretty freakin' small. Like one football field three feet deep small.

And can be made even smaller with proper breeder reactors.

[Telgin]

Whatever happened to thorium fueled nuclear power plants?  I was led to believe that they produced much less unusable waste, but then heard afterward that it wasn't true.  Clearly, there's some fake news going around.

In seriousness though, I'm pretty sure there were research challenges to getting there that have to be overcome, and nobody wants to build nuclear power plants in the US anymore.  Maybe somewhere in Europe.

[Kagus]

What about molten salt reactors? I tried burning salt one time, and I didn't feel particularly energized by it.

[wierd]

Thorium fueled reactors are based on a design that is all theory at this point, last I read up on it.

Basically:  "Hey, we want funding to make a test reactor that does slow conversion of thorium into a fissile form of uranium, but which does not produce weapons grade byproducts. Can we get regulatory approval? Here's our design.."


to which they always get told: "No. We wont fund that."



Molten salt is a thermal storage medium.  It melts relatively easily, but holds its heat for a long time.  Its often used with solar thermal power systems in this capacity.

[Kagus]

But what kind of salts are they even? I'm presuming not sodium salts?