Key Issues
Disposal of Low-Level Radioactive Waste
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Beneficial Activities Create Low-Level Waste
Many socially beneficial activities use radioactive materials, producing low-level radioactive waste as an unavoidable byproduct. These activities include electricity generation, diagnosis of illness without exploratory surgery, treatment of diseases like cancer, medical research, testing of new pharmaceuticals, nondestructive testing of airplanes and bridges, hardening of materials like hardwood flooring, breeding of new varieties of seed with higher crop yields, eradication of insect pests, food preservation, ionization-type smoke detectors and dozens of other purposes.
America’s nuclear power plants are the nation’s second-largest source of electricity, generating about one-fifth of U.S. electricity—without producing greenhouse gases or contributing to air pollution.
As a byproduct of their operation, these plants generate more than half the volume, and most of the radioactivity, of the nation’s low-level waste.
The remaining low-level waste is generated by several thousand other industrial facilities and institutions that use radioactive materials—medical research laboratories, hospitals, clinics, pharmaceutical companies, government and industrial research and development facilities, universities, and manufacturing facilities.
What Is Low-Level Waste?
Low-level waste includes items such as gloves and other personal protective clothing, glass and plastic laboratory supplies, machine parts and tools, filters, wiping rags, and medical syringes that have come in contact with radioactive materials.
Low-level waste from nuclear power plants typically includes water purification filters and resins, tools, protective clothing, plant hardware, and wastes from reactor cooling water cleanup systems.
Low-level waste is solid material. It generally has levels of radioactivity that fade to levels in the general environment in less than 500 years. About 95 percent fades to these background levels within 100 years or less. Low-level waste does not include used fuel from nuclear power plants or high-level waste from nuclear weapons reactors.
Beneficial Activities Create Low-Level Waste
Many socially beneficial activities use radioactive materials, producing low-level radioactive waste as an unavoidable byproduct. These activities include electricity generation, diagnosis of illness without exploratory surgery, treatment of diseases like cancer, medical research, testing of new pharmaceuticals, nondestructive testing of airplanes and bridges, hardening of materials like hardwood flooring, breeding of new varieties of seed with higher crop yields, eradication of insect pests, food preservation, ionization-type smoke detectors and dozens of other purposes.
America’s nuclear power plants are the nation’s second-largest source of electricity, generating about one-fifth of U.S. electricity—without producing greenhouse gases or contributing to air pollution.
As a byproduct of their operation, these plants generate more than half the volume, and most of the radioactivity, of the nation’s low-level waste.
The remaining low-level waste is generated by several thousand other industrial facilities and institutions that use radioactive materials—medical research laboratories, hospitals, clinics, pharmaceutical companies, government and industrial research and development facilities, universities, and manufacturing facilities.
What Is Low-Level Waste?
Low-level waste includes items such as gloves and other personal protective clothing, glass and plastic laboratory supplies, machine parts and tools, filters, wiping rags, and medical syringes that have come in contact with radioactive materials.
Low-level waste from nuclear power plants typically includes water purification filters and resins, tools, protective clothing, plant hardware, and wastes from reactor cooling water cleanup systems.
Low-level waste is solid material. It generally has levels of radioactivity that fade to levels in the general environment in less than 500 years. About 95 percent fades to these background levels within 100 years or less. Low-level waste does not include used fuel from nuclear power plants or high-level waste from nuclear weapons reactors.
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