Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of landfill waste

Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by paulryanrogers on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @06:36PM (#31428501)

Nuclear fuel must first be mined, correct? That's not renewable and could offset the benefits somewhat. That said I imagine it may be better as a base load than dirty coal.

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by rawoke083600 on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @11:32PM (#31430368)

> That's not renewable and could offset the benefits somewhat

I don't think you realise the VAST amount of energy density in one 1kg of coal vs 1 kg nuclear fuel. "Somewhat" is not nearly the correct comparison !

"8 kWh of heat (energy) from 1kg of coal vs 24,000,000 kWh from 1 kg of uranium-235" [0]

[0] https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/fuel-comparison/

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by quickthrower2 on Thursday May 19, 2022 @12:09AM (#31430643)

Does that mean 1 tonne is enough to power the world for a year?

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by formerly_proven on Thursday May 19, 2022 @01:45AM (#31431178)

As far as I know that's pretty much exactly the amount of fissile material used annually world-wide.

The caveat is of course that for 1 kg of coal you have to dig up a lot less material than you have to for 1 kg of fissile material - U235 is around 1 % of natural Uranium, and Uranium is around 1 % of the ore.

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by fny on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @09:09PM (#31429538)

Solar panels require minerals that must be mined too. Batteries are an even greater abomination.

Nuclear waste is also extremely compact.

Unfortunately our world is not run without the consumption of resources. There are trade offs to everything.

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by shepherdjerred on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @06:45PM (#31428574)

We’re not running out of fissionable material any time soon

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by paulryanrogers on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @06:53PM (#31428636)

What are the limiting inputs? Because I imagine there is a lot to do to go from the ground to the reactor and back again?

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by peyton on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @07:41PM (#31428955)

Breeder reactors produce more fuel than they consume.

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by paulryanrogers on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @07:50PM (#31429016)

Wouldn't that violate the second law of thermodynamics?

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by cortesoft on Wednesday May 18, 2022 @08:08PM (#31429146)

It isn’t creating more energy, it is just converting non-fissile material to fissile material

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

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Re:Plastic-eating enzyme could eliminate billions of tons of... by ncmncm on Thursday May 19, 2022 @01:27AM (#31431092)

But we don't build breeder reactors. For reasons.

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