Re: A new nuclear option ?

[Jerry Hester <jhester@mtu.edu>]

SR. MARGARET CLARKE wrote:
> I believe that I heard on an NPR news broadcast that one of the options for
> Pu disposal was "burning"--admittedly, this was at something like 4 a.m.,
> and the newsreader may have just misread "burying"      I said "huh?????"
> and wondered what burning would accomplish other than generating a big pile
> of PuO which would then have to be vitrified and buried.  Does anyone know
> anything further about this supposed option?    M.J. Clarke, College of St.
> Scholastica, Duluth.

I heard the same thing when I was equally fuzzy minded.  I assumed that
what they really meant was that it could be used to fuel nuclear power
plants.  When you talk about fuel and power plants most minds seem to
make the assumption that something is burned.

Jerry Hester

Jerry Hester
Dept. of Physics
Michigan Technological University
Houghton, MI