Yucca Mountain - Nuclear Energy - Can it be sent to Space?

I believe that one alternative for the use of fossil fuels would be to utilize Nuclear Energy. I know that the major concern is safety and also what to do with the waste. There is a big debate about sending the waste to Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

My question is - Why could we not send all the waste into space???
Space is several million (billion?) light years across, we could send it into space and be done with it.

Before you go crazy - think about this.......the risk is no worse than letting it sit for 10,000 years in a hollowed mountain.

What about if the shuttle blows up on takeoff and spreads the waste for miles? - Answer: What about the Atomic Bomb tests the US used to perform in the New Mexico (or Nevada - forgive me on the exact place)? Would it not spread just as much atomic radiation?

Here is my point.....we could better utilize nuclear energy, ship the waste to outer space. We will still need fossil fuels for automobiles, but the energy to power homes, buisness, plants, refineries, etc....could come from nuclear energy - thus reducing or cutting back the amount of fossil fuels. used.

Any thoughts on this??????

Originally posted by Pyrate90
My question is - Why could we not send all the waste into space???
Space is several million (billion?) light years across, we could send it into space and be done with it.

My guess is that if we do have other cosmic inhabitants in the neighborhood, I don’t think they would appreciate us dumping our garbage into space. I think Yucca Mountain is a good alternative. I know there is a lot of controversy having to do with seismic activity but I'm sure it will be ok. It has to go somewhere. I would rather have it there in a semi safe place then at out our nuclear facilities.




[edit on 7-4-2005 by Event Horizon]

Sending nuclear waste up into space on rockets is far more dangerous than storing it in a facility such as Yucca Mountain.

Not to mention the environmental damage caused by all these rocket launches. Have you seen the stats on rocket launches?

Also the cost of transport per tonnage would be prohibitively expensive when compared to cheaper and relatively safe alternatives i.e. burial in geologically stable areas.

Because of Challenger.

It'd be a monumental disaster if those wasteloads exploded in the atmosphere, ignited, and were scattered all across the world.

Yucca mountain is relatively inactive, dry, and workable.

Besides, we might discover some new technology that allows us to use the waste in some useful way. Who knows?

I trust the competance of humans and human systems to bury something in a hole in the ground a lot more than to send something dangerous into space on a regular basis.

You guys also forgot to mention that the numbers alone dont add up, imagine how much waste we can fit into one containment unit, and the weight of that, added to the weight of whatever propulsion (rocket) Basically, to get it off the ground, you couldnt get enough of the waste up in the sky to make it even worth a trip, only when we have anti gravity propulsion would doing such a thing even be plausible.

Wy not do Like Irak planned ?? And build a super cannon whit large projectiels , the planned to shoot nucleair loads whit it to other country's
so why not point it strait up and blow them in to space ??
The theory is possible , don't no about the costs or if the gas comming free after eatch reload whood be any good to nature
Maybe Jules Verne was not so far from a true solution .
just bluid big hollow projectiels a big gun and choot them in to space , it whoud be more cost effective then rockets or a space craft dropping loads in space .
I am no expert in balistic's but i can gues the outer shell will have to be pretty big to be safe but hith modern materials it shoud be possible .

you would have to be sure that such an object would not be caught in earths gravity field. can you imagine nuclear commets re-entering the atmasphere? can you say OOPS?

while we are at it lets just shoot all our garbage into space. our possible alien friends/enimyes realy would be pissed at us then. we can go from planet poluters to cosmic poluters, hmm i wonder what the fine for that would be?

personaly i don't like nuke plants, but at the moment it's our least problem causeing viable source of electricity. lets try to find a better way.

small comets burn up entering the earth atmosfere , anybody knows what happens to radio active materials outside earth gravity ??
Don't no are there ever been tests ??
i know the militairy surly did launch satelites whit somme active materials in them , i am sure not all off them still float in space .
Maybe a thing to study , droping a thing from space to earth is like trowing it in a giant oven .