Nuclear By-Products : A Resource for the Future

Publication Date: January 1978

Publisher: Heritage Foundation (Washington, D.C.)

Author(s): Milton R. Copulos

Research Area: Energy; Environment

Keywords: Energy and environment

Type: Report

Abstract:

To a large degree, the nuclear debate has focused on the question of what to do with the by-products of nuclear fission. These by-products include a wide range of materials, both radioactive and non-radioactive, which traditionally have been viewed as waste. As a result of this attitude, considerable effort and expense have gone into the search for an optimum method of disposing of them. Recently, a new school of thought has developed. This line of reasoning suggests that these by-products may constitute a valuable resource, conceivably worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Considering these wastes in a context apart from the nuclear fission process which creates them represents a radical departure from previous views of these materials. In many ways, however, it has a parallel in the early history of the petroleum industry.