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Why Is Nuclear Power Worth Nuclear Energy?

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Why Is Nuclear Power Worth Nuclear Energy?
When a commodity like electricity becomes easily accessible, how it operates can be overlooked. We don’t have to know how it works as long as it works. Nuclear energy powers twenty percent of world energy needs, but is it really worth it? Is the energy worth it for disasters like Chernobyl or Fukushima? I believe that it’s not. Nuclear energy should not be utilized due to issues like radioactive water and radioactive waste. Nuclear power plants operate with highly pressurized, heated water, so what happens to this water once it’s spent? Contaminated water can be released back to the environment through regulated and supervised channels that ensure the water will cause little harm. Leaks and spills are an exception, though. On Union of Concerned Scientist’s nuclear energy page, the United States nuclear plant map displays that …show more content…
There are two main types, low-level waste and high-level waste. This waste can be disposed, stored, or decontaminated. Sites for disposing are dwindling and can be insufficient. There are no setups for permanent disposal of high-level waste in the United States, and there are about eight low-level waste national disposal facilities yet around four of these actually receive waste. Additionally, there are no national repository sites. In the early 2000s, Yucca Mountain was appointed as a repository site for high-level waste and spent fuel rods, but its price was 300 million dollars from the federal government and billions from taxpayers. Yucca Mountain never became a repository site. Underground storage can also lead to contamination of groundwater which can impact humans and the environment’s food chain. Furthermore, decontamination results in even more low-level wastes and uses large amounts of water. If the waste goes untreated, though, exposure to the waste can be harmful to people. Radioactive waste and its various treatments are negative effects of nuclear

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