Hey there! I love diving into big brain stuff, like whether we can just yeet nuclear waste into space to solve our nuclear trash problems. Sounds like a neat trick, right?but, not so fast. It’s actually loaded with more issues than you’d think.
Alright, so nuclear waste isn’t all created equal. Most of it’s pretty tame, like the gloves and tools from nuclear places that got a bit dirty. They’re no biggie and can be tossed out safely. Then there’s the middle-tier stuff, about 7%, that’s been chilling too close to the action and got all radioactive. We usually deal with it by locking it up in glass or concrete. Manageable, right? But here’s the kicker: the last 3%, the really nasty spent fuel from the reactors. Every year, we’re piling up about 11,000 tonnes of this stuff, and now we’ve got a whopping 420,000 tonnes sitting around. And for now, we’re kinda just storing it and hoping for future us to figure it out.