Rethinking Nuclear for a Green World

Gerard B has been pondering nuclear waste disposal–which probably isn’t a bad idea with all the attention that green thinking has brought on alternative fuels. Nuclear is fairly clean from an emissions perspective but there is that nagging waste to deal with.

In the earth’s mantle there is a series off convection currents that conduct heat form the core to the surface and back again. These convection currents are stable and can last for millennia. If nuclear waste could be poured into the mantle at a point where it would be carried to the core a few thousand miles down.By the time it got there it would be heated to temperatures near that of the sun and be mixed with other mantle to a point it would be so dilute that it would be no different than the background radiation that produces the heat at the earth’s core. Even if it worked its way to the top of the mantle again it would be a few kilometers below the earth and if came to the surface in a volcanic eruption would be negligible in terms of being detectable over normal background levels.These convection currents have been mapped and are well known. It could reduce the cost of decommissioning of nuclear sites and thus reduce the cost of the energy itself.

What do you think? Do-able?