A paper on the impact of poor borehole sealing on repository performance written by Stefan Finsterle, Cal Cooper, Richard A. Muller, John Grimsich and John Apps, has been published in the peer-reviewed journal Energies. The paper is available online and for download. A deep horizontal borehole repository offers strong isolation of nuclear waste. The safety afforded
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This month marks the two-year anniversary of a Deep Isolation milestone that’s worth pausing to reflect upon as we’re setting our 2021 goals. As recently as 2018, nuclear industry professionals had dismissed the idea that a newcomer could help solve the nuclear waste problem, a serious environmental challenge that has yet to be addressed globally.
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At Deep Isolation we believe that nuclear power is important for achieving a carbon-neutral future and should be deployed in conjunction with a waste disposal program. There are now about 70 advanced reactor projects being worked on in the U.S., a development that shows promise that this clean technology will be helpful in responding to
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The warmest 10 years on record have all occurred since 1998, with the top eight in the past decade. Climate change is one of society’s most pressing problems as it leads to more extreme weather, rising sea levels, arctic ice melt, and the displacement of coastal communities. While the news may seem dire, global warming
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Sixty-nine years ago something happened in a small desert town that changed the course of history. Dec. 20 will mark the anniversary of the day that the Experimental Breeder Reactor-I became the first power plant to produce usable electricity through atomic fission. The illumination of just four lightbulbs at the plant, a humble but significant
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As CEO of the nuclear waste disposal company Deep Isolation, my main focus is using innovation to solve the decades-old problem of what to do with nuclear waste. But finding solutions to the world’s toughest environmental problems is also reflected in my work with Berkeley Earth, a nonprofit that’s a widely respected source of independent
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One reason why governments worldwide struggle with implementing a permanent nuclear waste disposal solution is that they don’t adequately engage affected communities, most of which don’t want it in their backyards. In a recent episode of Deep Isolation’s podcast, Nuclear Waste: The Whole Story, social scientist Dr. Thomas Webler discusses the challenges of reaching community
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In our fourth episode of Nuclear Waste: The Whole Story we delve deeper into the downside of not having a permanent storage solution for nuclear waste. Our guest is James Taylor, General Manager of the environmental division of Bechtel’s Nuclear, Security and Environmental global business unit. Taylor talks about the long-term costs of the interim
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In the second episode of our new podcast and vlog series, Nuclear Waste: The Whole Story, we talk to nuclear energy industry veteran and Senior Director at NEI Rod McCullum about why it’s critical that commercial nuclear power companies find a permanent disposal option. Nuclear power plants provide one-fifth of the United States’ electricity annually,
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We’re proud to present the debut episode of Nuclear Waste: The Whole Story, an interview with Dr. Arjun Makhijani, an electrical and nuclear engineer with decades of experience in the nuclear waste field. We hope this series will help demystify some of the issues surrounding nuclear waste because we know it’s not something everyone understands
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