The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable with current technology

Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by orthecreedence on Friday September 06, 2019 @01:21PM (#20897600)

I'm excited for a space elevator almost exclusively just so we can get rid of nuclear waste. Nuclear power is the only current viable alternative to fossil fuels at scale, from my understanding. However, people are squeamish about the spent fuel...if we could take it up to space and launch it into the sun (without having to deal with the perils of escaping gravity) it would be a lot easier to get rid of.

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by jandrese on Friday September 06, 2019 @01:30PM (#20897687)

That sounds way more dangerous than just burying it in the ground. An accident in space spreads radioactive materials over some part of the Earth almost at random. An accident in a buried site stays mostly contained, with the biggest danger being contaminated groundwater.

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by orthecreedence on Saturday September 07, 2019 @03:04AM (#20902257)

OH yeah?!

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by yummypaint on Friday September 06, 2019 @03:03PM (#20898747)

Launching stuff into the sun actually takes quite alot of energy. In fact its even harder than leaving the solar system entirely.

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by LorenPechtel on Friday September 06, 2019 @02:00PM (#20898038)

Nuclear waste isn't a big deal. After reprocessing what's left will decay to ambient in 10,000 years. Every major proposal for how to deal with it will have no problem storing that.

If you're scared about plutonium from reprocessing there are two things:

1) Reactor fuel has been in the reactor for too long. It's going to have far too much Pu-240. Reactors don't care, bombs do. You can't make a reliable bomb if you have too much Pu-240.

2) Deliberately leave hot stuff in the reprocessed fuel. So long as it's not a neutron absorber the reactor won't care. However, it will leave the fuel deadly hot. The industry has the equipment to handle it (after all, it's no hotter than the spent fuel they are removing), the terrorist does not. Nobody's smuggling it out because they won't live to accomplish it, not to mention that it will set off alarms from far away.

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by Tepix on Monday September 16, 2019 @05:05AM (#20982243)

That's a lot of optimistic handwaving. If it's so easy why haven't we managed to do it in the last 70 years?

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by neaden on Friday September 06, 2019 @01:29PM (#20897684)

This sounds like a pretty bad idea. Putting radioactive material into space orbiting the earth would be pretty dangerous, and getting something from earth's orbit to the sun is not easy. I think the risk of an accident under this plan would be way higher than our current plans.

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Re:The Spaceline: a space elevator alternative achievable wi... by idbehold on Friday September 06, 2019 @01:36PM (#20897749)

But don't you still have the problem of getting the waste from the Earth's surface to the elevator and thus still have all the danger involved?

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