10,000 Year Nuclear Waste Storage Site Fails After 15 years
Plutonium’s half-life runs from days to thousands of years. concept w/Shutterstock.com
By
Bob Brewin
Maybe it’s time to develop another 10,000 year plan.
The Department of Energy’s underground nuclear waste storage plant in New Mexico was designed to safely store plutonium and other nuclear waste for 10,000 years, eons longer than recorded history.
That’s because plutonium’s half-life -- the time it takes to decay -- runs from days to thousands of years.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant fell 9,985 years short of this goal on Feb. 14, when radioactivity leaked from the site. Ryan Flynn, secretary of the New Mexico Environment Department, said a leak “should never happen . . . one event is too many.”
Maybe it’s time to develop another 10,000 year plan.
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