BURNING tens of thousands of tonnes of waste graphite from the UK鈥檚 nuclear power stations sounds like the last thing you should do, but that is exactly what is being considered by the UK government鈥檚 Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). If the plan is carried out, any radioactive carbon released into the atmosphere could endanger people鈥檚 health.
Nearly all of the UK鈥檚 nuclear reactors have graphite around their cores to slow down escaping neutrons and help sustain the nuclear reaction. Until now, it was assumed that the contaminated graphite would be stored or buried along with other radioactive waste.
But according to the NDA, some companies are proposing to incinerate the graphite, and the NDA has told 快猫短视频 that the idea 鈥渕ay have merits鈥�. The only problem, it says, is how to ensure the 鈥渟afe management鈥� of the radioactive carbon-14 that the graphite will contain.
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Carbon-14 poses a health risk because its half-life of 5730 years means it lingers in the environment for a long time. Incinerating graphite from the UK鈥檚 oldest 11 nuclear power stations would release about 400 terabecquerels of carbon-14. This is small compared to the large amounts of the isotope that exist naturally, mostly in the oceans. But if the radioactive carbon goes up in smoke, it would result in a global radiation dose more than 20 times greater than that from the UK鈥檚 worst nuclear accident at Windscale in 1957, which is officially estimated to have caused 260 cases of thyroid cancer.
The plan to burn graphite is regarded as 鈥渁larming鈥� and 鈥渆xtremely hazardous鈥� by Hugh Richards, the Welsh anti-nuclear campaigner who uncovered it. 鈥淭his will remind the public that they are right to be suspicious about the government鈥檚 nuclear intentions,鈥� he says.
鈥淚f the carbon goes up in smoke it would result in a global radiation dose 20 times that of the UK鈥檚 worst nuclear accident鈥�
The NDA, however, stresses that it has not yet made any decisions about how to dispose of the graphite. 鈥淎ny proposed solution will need to be assessed on health and safety and environmental grounds, and will need to be accepted by the independent regulators before implementation,鈥� says an NDA spokesman.
Other experts doubt whether incineration is practical. If the reported inventory of carbon-14 in reactors is correct, 鈥渢hen it seems unlikely that we could incinerate this amount, due to its size鈥� says Ian Fairlie, a radiation consultant based in London.
