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A comment on Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be. Parent comment

Re:Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be by mikeash on Wednesday April 26, 2017 @03:09PM (#14206009)
An example of this which always gets me with nuclear power is the waste problem. The fact that the waste remains dangerous for tens of thousands of years is always held up as a huge problem, completely ignoring the vast quantities of extremely poisonous chemical waste produced by other industries which lasts forever.

"This waste is dangerous." "OK, guess we'd better be careful with it."

"This waste is dangerous for the next 10,000 years." "Holy shit! We need to build a high-tech underground fortress to contain it!"

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Re:Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be by sgift on Wednesday April 26, 2017 @04:17PM (#14206584)
> "This waste is dangerous for the next 10,000 years." "Holy shit! We need to build a high-tech underground fortress to contain it!"

Time is a major risk factor. Look where we were 10,000 years ago. There is relevant chance that 10,000 years in the future no one will easily understand the danger of radiation anymore, so we have to prepare for that possibility.

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Re:Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be by mikeash on Wednesday April 26, 2017 @04:30PM (#14206678)
You seem to have missed the other half of the point I was making, which was that there's lots of non-nuclear hazardous waste which lasts forever and we don't get nearly as upset about those.
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