Friday, December 5, 2014

Nuclear Waste Cost-Benefit



(1)  How much energy and how much money do you use to run your window air conditioner rated at 1000 watts continuously for the month of July (assume 8¢/kWh).

If you assume that coal was used to produce the electricity for your air conditioner, how much coal was burned to produce the electricity used?

How much CO2 was produced by the electricity used to run your air conditioner?


DOL:  


Radioactive isotopes are widely used in the field of medicine, in the generation of electricity, and in the military.  The use of radioactive isotopes has increased significantly over the past fifty years, leading to a corresponding increase in the amount of radioactive waste produced. The question of how to deal with radioactive waste is a topic of ongoing environmental concern.

(a)    Explain how the properties of low-level radioactive waste differ from those of high-level radioactive waste and how these properties lead to different storage requirements. For one of the two types of radioactive waste, give an example of a specific isotope that may be present in the waste, and explain how human activity generates the waste.











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