There's some difficult audio in here, thanks to background noise - but as with all my videos, full English subtitles are available. Volunteer translations are currently on hold while UA-cam sorts out a spam problem; hopefully they'll be back soon!
"There is little reason for digging this deep, particularly here..." It would have been awkward if they had dug their tunnels only to find that nuclear waste had already been buried there.
"But in their greed, the dwarfes dug deeper and deeper. Deeper than any before. And down there, they found something long forgotten. Something from another age of shadow and fire..."
The tone of this video is absolutely astounding. The ominous howling in the tunnels, the matter-of-fact tone of both Tom and the guest speakers, everything. It is genuinely humbling to think this facility is intended to last. Forever.
What else do you want? Rusting vessels, concrete that (hey surprise) starts falling apart? Waste at the ocean side, waiting for the next tsunami? Great idea.
@@voornaam3191 If you had paid attention to the video, the video talks about how it WON’T crumble apart because of the clay they’re using. I love when armchair scientists are confident in disproving very respected and experienced scientists.
@@voornaam3191 there is not an ocean near by. That is Baltic sea which has not enough depth to create tsunami. Bedrock is as stable as it gets on the Earth. If one must produce nuclear waste, this is the place to do so.
The end stuff reminded me of a story I read about someone's DnD game were the dungeon was actually a nuclear waste facility from a long gone civilization. All the things to warn people away, and all the skeletons around and in the dungeon, just enticed the players more
i always love the possibilitys of a D&D story, but sometimes i think im a bit special needed and couldn't keep my attention going for like 4-8 hours at a time a session.
@@Dockhead You don't need to play for that long at a time! 2 hour sessions can be just as fun as long as everyone buys into the idea of not dilly-dallying. It does mean it will take more sessions to make the same amount of progress though, so I would suggest playing weekly. Another thing that helps is to take a break every hour or so, or have a food break roughly in the middle of the session.
Ideal solution to keep it protected would be a mix of both. Completely hide it so no one has any idea what is there, but at points underground if someone were to dig have warnings and markings before they reach the actual containment facility.
I remember a cartoon where the enterpenours were digging while the scientist were dechipering the ancient text. Just when the chiper was done the other group had dug too far. Then the fun begun.
There's a very simple solution to stop people from the future digging down to 400m, bury the waste at 500m down. *Finland applauds the ingenuity - I clasp my hands together above my head and enjoy the praise heaped upon me*
The real problem is not finding locations, it's NIMBY. The New Mexico pilot plant, to test idea, was a good thing. I wouldn't have a problem with it near where I live, except that I live in Florida and it's a limestone sponge. I've had people argue with me over it, and I told them I'd be happy to have it near me if they could provide the engineering to show it's at least as good as either the pilot plant location or Yucca Mountain, because it literally is a case of location matters.
The various preparations (science, tech, social) took 30 years in Sweden, but that was concluded a decade ago. Finland is using "our" method Iirc (kbs-3; copper in bentonite in well behaved bedrock).
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that: “… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81] The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
In the documentary called "Into Eternity" the people who were designing Onkalo joked that what they should do, if they accidentally dug up a similiar copper barrel they were planning to hide themselves. Interesting doc which is worth checking out.
It's really great to see actual solutions to the problem of nuclear waste being put into effect. Nuclear energy gets a lot of flak, and the waste argument is a valid one, but with solutions like this maybe things will turn around for nuclear energy
I mean, the "solution" has been completely obvious for like, 75 years now. It's not particularly complex. There's a lot more difficult industrial waste problems out there. My own little city had a coal plant for many decades and it spread mercury everywhere. It'd be great if all that mercury was gathered up and could just be buried.
@@Sphere723but the waste that is buried here is massivly different to the waste 70 years ago. One of the biggest advancements in nuclear power was to use waste material from stage 1 reactors in dirty fission reactors. This made much less waste (upto 80%) and less dangerous waste. If we had stuck with the just "burying" it which was being done until deemed unfeasible. We wouldn't have safer reactors, or dirty fission. Nuclear power would be more expensive, qnd dangerous for the environment.
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that: “… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81] The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
they work all the time - to varying degrees. Like signs warning of various work place dangers. If you Slap a giant LIVE ELECTRICITY warning on some machine/wire, not many idiots are gonna come and touch it. They were probably more talking about 'tresspass warning' signs. They are usually not very effective deterrents. But even then most people will follow them unless they are determind to enter for some reason.
I'll start: It was a job like any other. The space elevator foundations were to be dug 400m deep in large swathes of Europe, and I was assigned to a chilly post in remote Finland. Today was supposed to be the last drilling day - in fact, I was to tunnel down and complete the final 10m excavation...
@@hgbnkbggj2915 ...when suddenly, after about 5 or so minutes, our drill had hit a large metallic object, making a clunking sound as it did. We were perplexed as to what this container was, maybe a hidden treasure of the Sami people, or and old underground bunker room? Our curiosity was growing exponentially as we drilled through the seemingly copper container, but then we had just realised...
One of my favorite proposed solutions devised for Yucca Mountain was to genetically engineer cats to change color in the presence of radiation. Then pass along stories of glowing cats signifying danger. The idea being that legends and superstitions last longer than any language or signage we could decide.
well, we, normally, know nothing about sumerians culture, but we still know it is bad luck to spill salt, maybe they were dealing with radioactive salt at that time xD
Oh yes, the idea of making up a nursery rhyme about cats changing colour and death following. I believe that could work for a few generations, but beyond that I'm not so sure.
Hiding it by leaving no traces on the surface is smart, but you should still leave warnings around the material itself! Onto the end caps, in every human language, just print the word "DEATH" over and over. Carve murals of death and suffering into the containers, then plate them with gold so that they never corrode or fall apart, then likewise surround them with people kneeling, weeping and grasping at the container, having their flesh melted and burned off. And then holding onto the container itself, a single skeleton of twisted, mutated bone racked with agony. If someone digs that up and ignores all the warnings, they get what they deserve!
If the "grave robbers" can't figure out why someone would go to those length so conceal something they might just as well be the warming sign for any other robbers.
A actually people in the future might see that as just a superstitious curse brought onto them by vengeful gods or something silly. They same way we look at curses on ancient tombs and stuff today. We see it as myth, and possibly so will they.
If the radioactive sign is still relevant in the future, that should be enough. I'd like to think there's enough horror stories regarding radiation poisoning to scare us for generations to come. No mark at the entrance but everywhere else carve the radioactive sign. Especially on the containers.
I've got to say I've never heard anyone speak with such a heavy accent and still be able to express themseves so eloquently and clearly as that Finnish lady.
@@peterimmel9642 The lady is probably at least part Fennoswede, her name is not unusual in the western part of Finland where people also speak Swedish. Source: Am Fennoswedish
Can we talk about how we used to just throw barrels of nuclear waste into the ocean a few decades ago? I'm glad there is some progress, even if it's slow.
The progress would be an actual recycling instead of literally shoving the problem under the carpet. As of now only two countries have working technology to recycle nuclear waste back into fuel, Russia and France.
@@kp5602 There are reactors that can use the "spent" fuel. Since it is still radioactive, it still gives off a decent amount of energy. The problem is speeding up the radoiactive process enough that you get usable amounts of energy from it.
It's such a weird feeling seeing you walking around the same places I have been (I visited those tunnels in a school trip) Especially when I didn't know this video was going to be in Finland. Fun surprise!
Yes, but the question was "how do we, if society collapses and all form of language is lost, say don't go here?" We wouldn't be able to put up a sign with written language on it, it wouldn't be understood. Thus why not labeling it at all (preventing curiosity) would be the greatest option.
I would keep it secret but if someone somehow made it all the way to the container.. Put skull and crossbones on the container seems dumb but at the same time might be the only solution.. pictures could be the only possible help.. but that might not even help.. but if you don’t put markers on the actual container in one way or another and just leave it blank someone will definitely try to open it.. ☠️
@@grinder12g The thing is that a skull and crossbones doesn't inherently mean "danger." It just means a skull. Does the container hold skulls? Is it made of skulls? Does it _require_ a skull? If whoever finds the container happens to worship skulls, they're going to have a problem.
@incognito burrito I hear what your saying but it is associated with poison and death.. but if someone digs it up and it’s not just sticking out of the ground from some sort of erosion I would assume they are an intelligent species and they might not understand the symbol but if they have a head with a skull in it they might get the point but like I said if you don’t mark it then it will definitely get opened if found.. but seriously what else can we do to mark it or hide it? We need to brainstorm..
But shouldn't the radioactivity have been decayed since then? Like Chernobyl radiation has apparently halved already. Which nicely matches Cesium-137 half-life too. If we're talking about thousands of years.
@singularon1 the material is different. This is high level waste aka used core components/metal not fuel. The radiation is on a whole new different realm.
The same in the U.S. at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant outside Carlsbad, New Mexico. It was constructed during the 80s. Deep underground there is a 2,000 ft salt layer that is being used to dispose of Radioactive waste. When I left there, my boss gave me a 250 million yr old salt core sample.
The shot of going into the tunnel system reminded me very deeply of the Extinction Game series of novels by Gary Gibson, about alternate timelines and people who are forced to jump between them. Read it and you'll hopefully see the scene(s) that made me think of it :P
Someone actually used Yucca Mountain as the basis for an, in all honesty rather interesting My little Pony fan story (would like to take the time to point out I am NOT a fan of the show, I founding while flipping through the TV Tropes article on “Wham Lines”).
@@metropod Do you happen to remember the name of the story? I really like MLP fanworks. The fandom got so big that there's some very nice stories out there.
Had a few lectures on storage of nuclear waste, there's so much that's misunderstood about it all and a lot of bad information out there. Glad to see a great, well informed video about it all.
How expensive is storing this waste for 100,000 years? It seems like the cost of refining radioactive material + cost of reactor + cost of building a site to store the waste, storing the waste, and inspecting the storage for 100,000 years would be more expensive than other technologies like geothermal, wind, solar, and water.
@@keco185 This is Finland. No tides, rivers are already full of dams(Also Green party hates Dams), there is no sun or wind in the winter (when you need power the most) Nuclear is the only way.
@@keco185 Most renewable sources of energy are not constant though. Wind power will not work on windless days, solar will not work at night, hydro cannot be build everywhere and comes with its own environmental impacts, and geothermal as well cannot be constructed everywhere. Nuclear can be constructed anywhere in the world and provides vast power that isnt subject to weather conditions. It really is our bets option moving forward until fusion is finally figured out.
@@keco185 Bedrock storage is relatively low maintenance and the power of an operational reactor can easily outweigh the cost. Plus if multiple reactors are built around one disposal site it can increase some efficency. Also new reactor technology can use expelled waste again.
Täällä sitä ollaan, joulukuu 2020, tämänhetkinen julkinen aikataulu kytkeä OL3 Suomen sähköverkkoon on helmikuussa 2022. Nähdään silloin 2022, tässä kommentissa, kun se ei vieläkään vittu ole valmis ::D
@@sorsax7226 "Isäni isä maksoi Olkiluoto 3:sta, isäni maksoi Olkiluoto 3:sta, minä maksan Olkiluoto 3:sta. Ja jonain päivänä sinä tulet maksamaan Olkiluoto 3:sta"
@@logitech4873 You're absolutely right. In Finnish, both "Earth" and "ground" translate to the same word: "maa". The difference being the capital letter if you're talking about the planet.
@@logitech4873 extra funfact: "maa" doesn't only mean ground, it's our word for soil, dirt, country and land.. + it's also "a suit" as in playing cards. 😅
Btw, that third nuclear reactor is one of the most expensive building projects ever. The third reactor started to be built in 2005 and got operational only as recently as 2022, but still to this day is really janky and suffers from faulty/outdated parts. It's become such a huge joke here in Finland, we think it will never be fully finished.
@@walt6518 Nah I disagree. It really does sound like music, and it really does make me chuckle at the English language to hear you take every vowel and consanant so seriously and vocalize them so deliberately. In reality, the rules of pronunciation in English are just rough guidelines. No dialect follows them properly, and it's adorable how Finnish people in particular try so hard to enunciate everything phonetically perfectly. I'm not trying to condescend, again my point is that I find it very endearing. Love ya. 🇫🇮
@@walt6518 are we not but a cavemen with a some nokia device.... have you heared of my awesome "thisplään"? "thisplään" is like this thing you never knew of.
The important thing to making the site unmarked is to make sure that there is nothing in the tunnels to mark them as human when they're filled in. If a future archeologist stumbles upon the filled tunnels, they're way more likely to excavate all the way down if there's signs of wiring and airducts preserved in the clay-- if there's no sign of humans preserved by the filling of the tunnels, it would at least keep archeologists away. But this project itself shows reasons besides archeology that people may dig deep into random swaths of the earth. And while leaving no mark on the cite itself on the surface, nothing behind in the tunnels to entice people to excavate them... if someone did randomly go that far down and find them, unless the knowledge of radioactivity is preserved, they're going to open up the clearly artificial canisters. So at that point, I think we're morally obligated to put a warning on the containers themselves. Something specific enough so that at least if the people who dig it up do know what radiation is, they'll be able to recognize what they've found. If the knowledge isn't preserved, any warning might just seem like a "danger: cursed, no trespassing" and not stop future archeologists... but chances are a container with a bunch of markings will get documented before its opened so at least the next radioactive container with "danger: cursed" markings will be left alone.
Of course the ancient Egyptian curses weren't real. However there IS that excellent documentary by Harrison Ford that shows why we don't open the Ark of the Covenant!
@@Ben-ph4pe Nah, i know it's a joke in reference to Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. However, the movie starts with the premise that the Ark of the Covenant is real, while we have abselutely no proof that it is. I thougth I could bait a theist with my comment, but you ruined it...
@@nic12344 a theist here? I'm actually surprised there are atheists of your kind on this channel, I'd be extra surprised to find religious people of the kind you referred to here.
Many of the symptoms associated with tragic stories of Egyptian grave robbers, and people exposed to the Ark of three Covenant, very much align with those of radiation poisoning. It wouldn't be surprising if the ancients were aware of "cursed" stones and used them as a way to punish those whom would seek to violate sacred or revered objects.
Some of your best videos seem to be when you're underground in an echo chamber of bad audio. Mostly because those are the places I think look the most cool.
that's... actually a really weird thought, that everything we believe in and all of these stories we enjoy, might one day be taken as fact and mythology, maybe some day something like Harry potter or The Hunger games will be taken as a true story, i've never thought of that
We'd better think of something because in 100,000 years nobody will understand the meaning of "Danger! Keep Out" no matter what language or images are used.
Dotz and that would be dumb to mark it in any way. Nobody's gonna start digging there, and if they do, they already know radiation, and it has decayed by then anyways... better to leave unmarked
@@juusto_ I didn't like it a few years ago but I have slowly accepted it. Hopefully my pronunciation will atleast be something close to standard English in 10 years too.
@@rishabhdubey374 It's a reference to a episode of Technical Difficulties 1-01 on "Matt and Tom" channel - /watch?v=3UAOs9B9UH8 Edit for clarification: copy and paste "/watch?---" part from above to google search to find it.
I love the idea of hostile architecture to prevent people stumbling upon waste. I also read an idea of having cats that glow when in presence of radiation and spreading the tradition of fearing glowing cats. So cool and dystopian
It amazes me that there are people so scientifically illiterate right now they're peddling 5G coronavirus conspiracies, and meanwhile people are out there getting things like this done.
Well at least some countries haven't abandoned all reason. The USA spent tens of billions digging Yucca mountain for this purpose and stopped due to politics, while high level waste IS STILL STORED ABOVE GROUND. Environmental activists figured a better decision than finishing safe storage, was to waste all that money and effort and just... not put the dangerous material that ALREADY EXISTS into a safer location.
Well this site sounds like one of the dumbest ideas in the history of mankind. Nuclear power plants that run on this type of nuclear waste are the next thing. Within 10-15 years there wil be a demand for nuclear waste, and these guys decide to spend billions on a site to bury the stuff permanently...
@@BamBamGT1 We'll probably find a better way to get rid of it at some point in the future. But from basic physics you can see that using this stuff is not nearly as efficient as uranium. Also in 10-15 years we'll use hydrogen. Finally. I suppose. Ok, make it a hundred...
@@BamBamGT1 My guess is we need to wait atleast 50-100 years before we can 100% use up the fuel rods. So in the meanwhile, Finland got a nice bank of fuel ready to dig up.
History of nuclear waste disposal proposals in Britain Prior to 1976 very little thought had been given to the question of how we were going to deal with the nuclear waste produced by military and nuclear electricity programmes. Some lower level waste was disposed of at sea, but most waste was simply accumulating at various nuclear sites around the country. Then a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that: “… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81] The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
Please learn from the Waste Isolation Pilot Program in New Mexico which stores low level radioactive wastes in underground salt domes. Incompatible wastes mixed causing a fire, the radioactive smoke was released to aboveground by exhaust circulating fans sending a plume across SE New Mexico and into Texas.
Oh hey, I've been in these kinds of tunnels myself in Oskarshamn, Sweden. They even have an annual footrace between the employees, beginning at the lowest point at 500m below ground and running uphills towards the surface for about half an hour.
Hey Tom, love your videos, thanks for always putting subtitles/CC's on your videos, as an hearing impaired person, it makes a world of difference in enjoying the content!
I like the idea of marking the site with spikes. It would at least look cool, and if our civilization collapses, somebody digs this up, they would learn what spikes mean. If there would be more of those sites, nobody would touch another one.
It is interesting that the nordic countries, ones that would have had to be in the past really good long term planners to ensure there food stores survived the winter still have the instinct today.
Vox made a great video called "Why danger signs can't last forever". Tom briefly mentioned the spike fields. They go into it with a bit more detail in their video. A very interesting watch.
You may enjoy the documentary 'into eternity' which is all about this site and the implications of dealing with nuclear waste. the topic of warning signs is discussed in depth. It is honestly the best documentary I have ever seen.
Did Tom check that this HOLE is reliant to the statement below.. eg safe, ..????!!! a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that: “… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81] The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that: “… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81] The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
Have you heard of the Flowers report Or Fulbeck.. google.- *Fulbeck celebrates 30 nuclear waste* sleaford post read all of the article Google Earth - Fulbeck ... it's all there *Tom's video (below ground HLW Dumping **HAPPENING NOW***) * Flowers report ( why cant *Fulbeck 1987 .(UK1st not Finland This was 30 years ago??? THIS SHOULD NEVER HAPPEN.. I was 13 lived next door in newark... we stopped this then.. I AM ON MY KNEES IN BITS... WHAT HAVE WE DONE
@@grahamfisher5436 I don't think you could have possibly formatted that comment any more confusingly if you tried. It's just a jumble of words and asterixes with absolutely no cohesion whatsoever
@@lizardlegend42 You are absolutely correct.. I have a serious brain injury However... the message is ...we are dumping something that we shouldn't .. Google.. Fulbeck celebrates 30 years nuclear waste celebrations... I hope that wherever you are in the world You are doing well..
hay??!! just thought???? if this site needs a message that they cant understand?????!!!!!!!! they should ask me to do it??????!!!!! serious brain injury.. one learnt to laugh and joke at myself.. after lots of pain... hope you and your near and dear all doing okay.. peace from the UK
Actually, theres a good chance old Egyptian tomb raiders did get 'cursed'. They dug into the Tombs of the fairly recently deceased trying to steal the treasure, only to return to their villages empty handed and feeling incredibly weak, some time later it wasn't uncommon for the entire village to begin feeling the same way and sometimes even dying out. Thats one of the reasons why the tombs are/were in fairly good condition when we dug them up again. Of course, we know the would-be grave robbers most likely caught a disease or virus from the tomb, most likely from the dead, but back then it as just an unexplained curse. In the future, someone is going to ignore our warnings and go into the nuclear tombs, only to return with radiation poisoning, which would start their own tale of curses.
It’s still a mystery to me why people are against nuclear energy. It’s one of the cleanest ways of making electricity and if the waste is handled well, even that is not going to be a problem. Finland handles it very well! 🇫🇮
Humans are irrational creatures, as Tom often says, and we get scared by both things don't understand, and things that didn't go well at times in the past... even if they do now
Hauntercry If you think about it, burning coal and gas probably caused many more deaths. It’s just that 2 accidents are a lot more violent than silent killers as pollution gases. Compare it to this: if you’re a smoker you know about the dangers. If cigarettes were totally harmless, but 1 in every 10,000 cigarettes would explode, killing the smoker, many more people would stop smoking. Even when actually smoking cigarettes is a lot more harmful. And I want to clear up; Chernobyl happened because it was an old Soviet reactor with a superior officer that made all the wrong decisions. Fukushima happened because of a giant earth quake causing a massive tsunami. Oh and only one person died at Fukushima, who got lung cancer while measuring the radioactivity. That just shows how well it was built and how well we deal with it, even with a massive tsunami!
Kalks And yet there have been nuclear accidents while not using nuclear energy for power generation. Nuclear accidents also occur at hospitals, research facilities, and military facilities...
Our rejection of nuclear power was a massive mistake, and the environment has payed dearly for it as we continue to rely on fossil fuels for our electricity
The idea of how to warn people about (and eventually, just not to indicate the presence of) the tunnels is fascinating. A really interesting problem to solve
i like how tom snoops around the visitor center at the beginning, ive collected mushrooms there just like 2 weeks ago and conquered one of the pokemon arenas :)
Ascdren you’re a dummy. Reactors and bombs are entirely separate processes. Besides, we already have thousands of actual bombs pointed at every major city in the world and we will NEVER get rid of all of them. Might as well actually get some use out of nuclear now that it’s out of Pandora’s box.
@@FoxDren No it is not! You are absolutely right about that! Luckily this Onkalo is not a nuclear bomb nor there is those inside it. After a few hundred years or so that Onkalo is more or less as dangerous as natural uranium in the ground.
I expect after 100,000 years we will have found another solution to continued long time storage of nuclear waste. Maybe you revisit if it needs to be dug up and repackaged. It is hard to say what the levels would be after 100,000 years.
How about we finish the development of molten salt reactors that have the capability of fully "burning" the nuclear waste the old style solid fuel reactors create?
@@Nightingale-eq6fg just watch all the molten salt reactor videos on youtube. look for Kirk Sorenson's The problem is when you do solid fuel reactors, is the solid fuel starts cracking and breaking apart after just 1% of the uranium is burned. In a molten salt reactor, this never happens and you can burn it all the way. Demonstrated at Oak Ridge back in the 50's.
@@gregcollins3404 thanks for the recommendation/explanation, will definitely look into the videos you suggested, and of course thanks for taking the time to reply :)
Exactly - this seems like answering the wrong question, when there's so much more energy that could be extracted from the spent fuel. Molten salt reactors seem like a great idea, I've not yet worked out what the catch is? Cost?
One of the best documentaries I have ever seen is called ‘Into Eternity’ and talks about this project, how it will take over a hundred years to finish, and just the completely absurd scale of what the people working on it have to deal with.
Maxime LENORMAND it takes that long to finish because the nuclear power plants will be generating electricity and thus fueling the economy for that time. Producing nuclear waste. Also twenty year cooling down time for the last waste.
2:19 - I know this is a super old video and Tom has likely already seen every possible criticism raised for it, but for my own peace of mind I have to say that dry cask nuclear storage is FAR more robust than a typical concrete building. The concrete formulation is different, and held to higher standards, the reinforcement is FAR greater, and crucially (I know Tom didn't imply this, but it's a common misconception) the contents aren't going to leak even IF the dry cask broke somehow. The high-level radioactive waste stored in dry casks isn't glowing green ooze, it's glass and concrete and slag from (intentionally) melted down nuclear fuel. In addition, nature has already been thoughtful enough to run an ultra-long term practical test of deep nuclear waste storage for us in the form of the Oklo natural reactor which produced roughly 100kw of thermal energy from semi-intermittent water-moderated nuclear reactions over the period of a few hundred thousand years. The fission products of which moved no more than a few centimeters in the intervening eon.
The report you're referring to was actually for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) a low level nuclear waste depository is southern New Mexico. It is a completely different than the Yucca Mountain site, a high-level waste site in Nevada.
The original plan was to have it online in 2009, so we are already a decade behind. The estimated price has also more than tripled, and according to wikipedia, the reactor currently sits as the third most expensive building in the world. For the 12 billion dollars spent, we could have built around 7 Burj Khalifas. While the covid is indeed unfortunate, I bet the project would have been delayed (yet again) either way. What a clusterfuck.
@@vladimirmartinez4546 What your logic proves, exactly? I never said people before us were not capable of doing great things. I just said that societies acquire a spectrum of skills, not just one. We have very little information about Egyptians, we do not know the level of their knowledge. This is not what I wrote, you just try to complain to get attention...
I'm here for it! Thanks God someone is finally doing it, and we can get on with reliably and safely providing the planet with energy with very little output compared to other non-renewable sources.
There's some difficult audio in here, thanks to background noise - but as with all my videos, full English subtitles are available. Volunteer translations are currently on hold while UA-cam sorts out a spam problem; hopefully they'll be back soon!
Tom Scott why is this comment from 22 hours ago
@@iamauser7125 video was uploaded in private 22 hours ago, it was just turned to public now
i dont mind really, i can still hear and understand what you're saying
What's stopping us from just dropping it down a borehole?
Can you put link to that report?
"There is little reason for digging this deep, particularly here..."
It would have been awkward if they had dug their tunnels only to find that nuclear waste had already been buried there.
In the future they'll be digging holes to store nuclear waste, only to find that there is some already there. Imagine the look on their faces.
@@Azivegu imagine if we now dig and we see a past civilizations uranium
@@captainheat2314 I'm banking on something like that being uncovered in my lifetime
@@parkerkrakowiak2990 not happening
@@hraharahra don't ruin it for us.
Tom went to Finland to film a river and shot this while waiting for the taxi to the airport...
LENTOKENTA
@@SamAronow Lentokenttä
@@patemathic suihkuturbiinialiupseerioppilas
Tom of Finland.
@@SamAronow Or, as it should be said, *LENTOKETNAAA*
"But in their greed, the dwarfes dug deeper and deeper. Deeper than any before. And down there, they found something long forgotten. Something from another age of shadow and fire..."
Down there, they found...the circus, and lots of hidden fun stuff. And losing.
They found Gandalf's mother-in-law.
@@gabor6259 lololol
@@gabor6259 seriously this made my day.
What is this from?
The tone of this video is absolutely astounding. The ominous howling in the tunnels, the matter-of-fact tone of both Tom and the guest speakers, everything. It is genuinely humbling to think this facility is intended to last. Forever.
What else do you want? Rusting vessels, concrete that (hey surprise) starts falling apart? Waste at the ocean side, waiting for the next tsunami? Great idea.
@@voornaam3191 What? What part of their message implied this is a bad solution
@@voornaam3191 If you had paid attention to the video, the video talks about how it WON’T crumble apart because of the clay they’re using. I love when armchair scientists are confident in disproving very respected and experienced scientists.
@@voornaam3191 there is not an ocean near by. That is Baltic sea which has not enough depth to create tsunami. Bedrock is as stable as it gets on the Earth. If one must produce nuclear waste, this is the place to do so.
100K years is not forever, mate
Alternate title: “Super Scott’s Origin Story”
Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood
Is it a hero or a villain origin story?
Or, how Tom got bone cancer.
@@CrushaKRool Hero! Someone has to stop Kyle from Because Science who seems to rapidly turning into a super villain.
Became a scottish super hero that can kill with insults but no one would understand the hero's tweets
so THAT'S WHY Tom took a 15 second shot of the "shortest river" in Finland last video.
No tom just happened to cross in to Olikluoto while filming the main piece the short clip.
jholotan best thanks for repeating what op just said....
Was it that short? (I havent seen the video)
wouldnt a short river just be a thin lake?
@@bouncingshot Tom mentioned that the river had a constant current, which is a constitutive stuff for a river
The end stuff reminded me of a story I read about someone's DnD game were the dungeon was actually a nuclear waste facility from a long gone civilization. All the things to warn people away, and all the skeletons around and in the dungeon, just enticed the players more
In hundred years, they will rediscover the place just to find a bunch of cannibal mutated rats in it.
I dont think you can compare this, since there arent any real stakes at DnD comparable to your litterall death. Cool story tho!
i always love the possibilitys of a D&D story, but sometimes i think im a bit special needed and couldn't keep my attention going for like 4-8 hours at a time a session.
@@Dockhead You don't need to play for that long at a time! 2 hour sessions can be just as fun as long as everyone buys into the idea of not dilly-dallying. It does mean it will take more sessions to make the same amount of progress though, so I would suggest playing weekly. Another thing that helps is to take a break every hour or so, or have a food break roughly in the middle of the session.
Noice :D
"Wow, this place looks super honourable.
I hope there are some valuable things here.
I hope some cool deeds are esteemed here!"
"Wait, why does the air taste like fork?"
So you're telling me you weren't in Finland just for the 10 second river clip?
Where was that?
@fdagpigj E I think its a reference to the 'worlds shortest river' video
No, this was a separate trip
The shortest river video was made In Joensuu which is on the other side of Finland
@@juhonikula6408 4 u
Tom "curses aren't real.."
Also Tom: *cursed with looking 22 for the rest of his life*
I'm convinced there's a portrait in his attic getting older...
Isn't that a blessing?
Lycanroc Dusk
Not if you wanna give a speech to multiple CEOs. His voice though fills the gap
"cursed"
What is "22"....?
See you all in 100,000 years when UA-cam recommends this again...
@Lil Kito 😂
I hate to break it to you but we can't actually see each other in the comments section
Lil Kito Please proceed, you have our blessings
Actually it doesn't work like that
@@nxovva possible whoosh?
Ideal solution to keep it protected would be a mix of both. Completely hide it so no one has any idea what is there, but at points underground if someone were to dig have warnings and markings before they reach the actual containment facility.
I remember a cartoon where the enterpenours were digging while the scientist were dechipering the ancient text. Just when the chiper was done the other group had dug too far. Then the fun begun.
There's a very simple solution to stop people from the future digging down to 400m, bury the waste at 500m down. *Finland applauds the ingenuity - I clasp my hands together above my head and enjoy the praise heaped upon me*
But that wouldn't stop people from digging down to 400m, although nothing would be there.
You know what would stop them from digging down 400m? Burying it 300m down. Problem solved.
@Lewis D. @Seve Garza
Now this is a big brain moment
Also, @theRPGmaster, and the joke is flying 400 m. above your head
What about 401 m
Just put a sign "small talk space"
All finns will avoid it like the plague
To quote some Finnish guys "It is dangerous and we must deal with it"
they said while shoving it underground instead of dealing with it - epic gamer move 👌😎
What happens when you crush nuclear waste in the Hydraulic Press? And here we go!...
@@Skwertydogs Look up "implosion bomb" and "criticality incident" on Wikipedia.
@@undercoversuit9475 xd amerikkalaiset kateellisia
@@bansku1137 jep.
In Norway: A deep tunnel filled with seeds to save us in the future.
In Finland: A deep tunnel designed to protect the future from us.
Evan Davis the Nordic Countries are awesome and interesting! Also Estonia is actually a nordic country
@@illuminate4622 I was told by my Estonian friend that Estonia is Baltic not Nordic. They want to be Nordic, but are not classed as it
In USA : Let's have a space army.
Am I the only one with the balls to say the seed repository is a big waste of money...
@@illuminate4622 eesti will never be nordic :(
The real problem is not finding locations, it's NIMBY. The New Mexico pilot plant, to test idea, was a good thing. I wouldn't have a problem with it near where I live, except that I live in Florida and it's a limestone sponge. I've had people argue with me over it, and I told them I'd be happy to have it near me if they could provide the engineering to show it's at least as good as either the pilot plant location or Yucca Mountain, because it literally is a case of location matters.
The various preparations (science, tech, social) took 30 years in Sweden, but that was concluded a decade ago. Finland is using "our" method Iirc (kbs-3; copper in bentonite in well behaved bedrock).
The other problem was native activism. The bad optics of the government dumping waste on native land has stopped it.
@@ferretyluv
But, literally all land in the Americas is Amerindigenous land!
"Now, if I remember my training correctly,
one of the lessons was titled, “Don’t Dig Up The Big Box of Plutonium, Mark...”" - Mark Watney
*(Does it anyways)*
I've read that. Good book.
@@KartsAgainstHumanity is it the one as a movie too
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that:
“… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81]
The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
The RTG was actually pivotal to Mark's Survival.
In the documentary called "Into Eternity" the people who were designing Onkalo joked that what they should do, if they accidentally dug up a similiar copper barrel they were planning to hide themselves. Interesting doc which is worth checking out.
Into Eternity is great. It has a real eerie feeling to it.
A really good thought provoking documentary on civilisation and our need to communicate (or not) with an unknown future.
It's really great to see actual solutions to the problem of nuclear waste being put into effect. Nuclear energy gets a lot of flak, and the waste argument is a valid one, but with solutions like this maybe things will turn around for nuclear energy
I mean, the "solution" has been completely obvious for like, 75 years now. It's not particularly complex. There's a lot more difficult industrial waste problems out there. My own little city had a coal plant for many decades and it spread mercury everywhere. It'd be great if all that mercury was gathered up and could just be buried.
@@Sphere723but the waste that is buried here is massivly different to the waste 70 years ago. One of the biggest advancements in nuclear power was to use waste material from stage 1 reactors in dirty fission reactors. This made much less waste (upto 80%) and less dangerous waste.
If we had stuck with the just "burying" it which was being done until deemed unfeasible. We wouldn't have safer reactors, or dirty fission. Nuclear power would be more expensive, qnd dangerous for the environment.
I was at a similar facility in Oskarshamn, Sweden were a guide told us "warning signs never work, ever". Best sentence I have heard this summer.
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that:
“… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81]
The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
they work all the time - to varying degrees. Like signs warning of various work place dangers. If you Slap a giant LIVE ELECTRICITY warning on some machine/wire, not many idiots are gonna come and touch it.
They were probably more talking about 'tresspass warning' signs. They are usually not very effective deterrents. But even then most people will follow them unless they are determind to enter for some reason.
@@elevown What if your glasses are fogged up.
If someone hasn't started writing a thriller novel about humans discovering this site in 100K years then... start.
I'll start: It was a job like any other. The space elevator foundations were to be dug 400m deep in large swathes of Europe, and I was assigned to a chilly post in remote Finland. Today was supposed to be the last drilling day - in fact, I was to tunnel down and complete the final 10m excavation...
@@hgbnkbggj2915 ...when suddenly, after about 5 or so minutes, our drill had hit a large metallic object, making a clunking sound as it did. We were perplexed as to what this container was, maybe a hidden treasure of the Sami people, or and old underground bunker room? Our curiosity was growing exponentially as we drilled through the seemingly copper container, but then we had just realised...
And everyone dies
The end
ending needs a bit of work but the beginning and the climax in the middle where perfect.
@@BrandonGrantSplash sounds like my love life
One of my favorite proposed solutions devised for Yucca Mountain was to genetically engineer cats to change color in the presence of radiation.
Then pass along stories of glowing cats signifying danger. The idea being that legends and superstitions last longer than any language or signage we could decide.
Why do I like this idea so much? 😂
well, we, normally, know nothing about sumerians culture, but we still know it is bad luck to spill salt, maybe they were dealing with radioactive salt at that time xD
Oh yes, the idea of making up a nursery rhyme about cats changing colour and death following. I believe that could work for a few generations, but beyond that I'm not so sure.
You heard of Canaries in coal mines? Get ready for glowing kitties in nuclear disposal sites
Has that kind of genetic engineering been done yet? Animals reacting to radiation in a way that doesn't kill them?
Hiding it by leaving no traces on the surface is smart, but you should still leave warnings around the material itself!
Onto the end caps, in every human language, just print the word "DEATH" over and over.
Carve murals of death and suffering into the containers, then plate them with gold so that they never corrode or fall apart, then likewise surround them with people kneeling, weeping and grasping at the container, having their flesh melted and burned off.
And then holding onto the container itself, a single skeleton of twisted, mutated bone racked with agony.
If someone digs that up and ignores all the warnings, they get what they deserve!
If the "grave robbers" can't figure out why someone would go to those length so conceal something they might just as well be the warming sign for any other robbers.
A actually people in the future might see that as just a superstitious curse brought onto them by vengeful gods or something silly. They same way we look at curses on ancient tombs and stuff today. We see it as myth, and possibly so will they.
Complicated things like that won't last and even if they did we have no way of knowing how whoever found it would react.
If the radioactive sign is still relevant in the future, that should be enough. I'd like to think there's enough horror stories regarding radiation poisoning to scare us for generations to come. No mark at the entrance but everywhere else carve the radioactive sign. Especially on the containers.
are you alright
I've got to say I've never heard anyone speak with such a heavy accent and still be able to express themseves so eloquently and clearly as that Finnish lady.
Problably Norwegian lady, the guy was Finnish, but I agree on your point.
@@peterimmel9642 The lady is probably at least part Fennoswede, her name is not unusual in the western part of Finland where people also speak Swedish.
Source: Am Fennoswedish
@@Lurkzz Fennoswedish? Are you attracted by magnets?
@@hazeltree7738 f e r r o
her accent was fine
Imagine on 100k years later some random vlogger tried to open this vault
Stupid vlogger gets melted by radioactive waste after opening 100,000 year old vault
shieys grand grand grand grand grand grand..... grandson
@@alonemusk2312 it would be great grandson, not grand grandson. All good though
Today we will be exploring the nuclear catacombs
A few days later
Cough cough death
Waste: Hello, goodbye.
Vlogger: *HURGH* "IT'S JUST A PRANK BRO!" *PPPPFT*
Can we talk about how we used to just throw barrels of nuclear waste into the ocean a few decades ago?
I'm glad there is some progress, even if it's slow.
Talk about yourself buddy, Ill always miss fishing out a 2 headed 3 eyed half-fish half-crab :(
The progress would be an actual recycling instead of literally shoving the problem under the carpet. As of now only two countries have working technology to recycle nuclear waste back into fuel, Russia and France.
@@mihan2d
How do you do that?
@@kp5602 the waste undergoes a tremendous amount of forced fission and added chemicals to make it into usable fuel
@@kp5602 There are reactors that can use the "spent" fuel. Since it is still radioactive, it still gives off a decent amount of energy. The problem is speeding up the radoiactive process enough that you get usable amounts of energy from it.
It's such a weird feeling seeing you walking around the same places I have been (I visited those tunnels in a school trip) Especially when I didn't know this video was going to be in Finland. Fun surprise!
you can visit this place freely?? damn
I mean Tom knows a lot about Finland /s
Why did tou visit a nuclear waste storage site on a school trip tho
@@sugma733 why not 😄 it was close
@@sugma733 I mean why not? It might have been a science trip or something
Put a sign up: *"don't dead open inside."* With a question mark.
Yes, but the question was "how do we, if society collapses and all form of language is lost, say don't go here?" We wouldn't be able to put up a sign with written language on it, it wouldn't be understood. Thus why not labeling it at all (preventing curiosity) would be the greatest option.
@@acasualescapedscp4418 /woosh
I would keep it secret but if someone somehow made it all the way to the container.. Put skull and crossbones on the container seems dumb but at the same time might be the only solution.. pictures could be the only possible help.. but that might not even help.. but if you don’t put markers on the actual container in one way or another and just leave it blank someone will definitely try to open it.. ☠️
@@grinder12g The thing is that a skull and crossbones doesn't inherently mean "danger." It just means a skull. Does the container hold skulls? Is it made of skulls? Does it _require_ a skull? If whoever finds the container happens to worship skulls, they're going to have a problem.
@incognito burrito I hear what your saying but it is associated with poison and death.. but if someone digs it up and it’s not just sticking out of the ground from some sort of erosion I would assume they are an intelligent species and they might not understand the symbol but if they have a head with a skull in it they might get the point but like I said if you don’t mark it then it will definitely get opened if found.. but seriously what else can we do to mark it or hide it? We need to brainstorm..
Archaeologists of the future are going to have a whole new concept of curses when they break open that time capsule...
Brilliant comment
But shouldn't the radioactivity have been decayed since then? Like Chernobyl radiation has apparently halved already. Which nicely matches Cesium-137 half-life too. If we're talking about thousands of years.
Aww the ancient humans left us a time capsule buried 400m underground so it would stay safe! I wonder what's inside?
@singularon1 the material is different. This is high level waste aka used core components/metal not fuel. The radiation is on a whole new different realm.
Ebin you got gursed :DDDDD
in 3 years:
LET'S RAID THE NUCLEAR CATHEDRAL IN FINLAND! THEY CAN'T EVAPORATE US ALL!
Hakkaan sua pippeliin jos yrität varastaa mun ydinjätteen
I can. DO NOT STOLE OUR WASTE!
(i am a finnish guy)
Got it. In 2022 we will raid it.
THEY CANT RADIATE US ALL!!
LMAOOO ajattelen tätä liikaa
The same in the U.S. at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant outside Carlsbad, New Mexico. It was constructed during the 80s. Deep underground there is a 2,000 ft salt layer that is being used to dispose of Radioactive waste. When I left there, my boss gave me a 250 million yr old salt core sample.
thats a really cool goodbye gift
i feel like we are setting up a very interesting scifi novel
The shot of going into the tunnel system reminded me very deeply of the Extinction Game series of novels by Gary Gibson, about alternate timelines and people who are forced to jump between them. Read it and you'll hopefully see the scene(s) that made me think of it :P
Someone actually used Yucca Mountain as the basis for an, in all honesty rather interesting My little Pony fan story (would like to take the time to point out I am NOT a fan of the show, I founding while flipping through the TV Tropes article on “Wham Lines”).
@@metropod I am really grateful that you didn't link that TV Tropes article, or another hour of my life would've been gone. :D
varana312 you’re welcome.
@@metropod Do you happen to remember the name of the story? I really like MLP fanworks. The fandom got so big that there's some very nice stories out there.
Had a few lectures on storage of nuclear waste, there's so much that's misunderstood about it all and a lot of bad information out there. Glad to see a great, well informed video about it all.
How expensive is storing this waste for 100,000 years? It seems like the cost of refining radioactive material + cost of reactor + cost of building a site to store the waste, storing the waste, and inspecting the storage for 100,000 years would be more expensive than other technologies like geothermal, wind, solar, and water.
@@keco185 is it not built to require the least possible maintenance?
@@keco185 This is Finland. No tides, rivers are already full of dams(Also Green party hates Dams), there is no sun or wind in the winter (when you need power the most) Nuclear is the only way.
@@keco185 Most renewable sources of energy are not constant though. Wind power will not work on windless days, solar will not work at night, hydro cannot be build everywhere and comes with its own environmental impacts, and geothermal as well cannot be constructed everywhere. Nuclear can be constructed anywhere in the world and provides vast power that isnt subject to weather conditions. It really is our bets option moving forward until fusion is finally figured out.
@@keco185 Bedrock storage is relatively low maintenance and the power of an operational reactor can easily outweigh the cost. Plus if multiple reactors are built around one disposal site it can increase some efficency. Also new reactor technology can use expelled waste again.
”Olkiluoto-3 will commence operation next year”
That’s the best joke I’ve heard in a while.
Se tulee aina olemaan "the next year"
Täällä sitä ollaan, joulukuu 2020, tämänhetkinen julkinen aikataulu kytkeä OL3 Suomen sähköverkkoon on helmikuussa 2022. Nähdään silloin 2022, tässä kommentissa, kun se ei vieläkään vittu ole valmis ::D
@@sorsax7226 "Isäni isä maksoi Olkiluoto 3:sta, isäni maksoi Olkiluoto 3:sta, minä maksan Olkiluoto 3:sta. Ja jonain päivänä sinä tulet maksamaan Olkiluoto 3:sta"
Care to explain the joke for a humble non Finnish person? Was it a covid joke?
@@No-uc6fg Olkiluoto 3 is a joke because the officials keep promising that it'll be finished. It will always be delayed more and more.
What a crazy challenge to keep those nuclear waste out of reach. As usual, very informative and interesting video. Thank you Tom!
what if stonehenge is just "hey we buried our ancient gods here, please don't dig down until the sun and the stars align properly with the stones"
Too bad, highway going under it.
Ancient civilizations: hide their treasures
Us: hide our nuclear waste
Not really hiding but storing
Right?
I feel like we should shoot it directly into the sun
@@ChaosBW Too expensive.
@@ChaosBW it would be easier to shoot it out the solar system, getting stuff to the sun is extremely hard
@@drunkensailor5771 Why so?
Finally somewhere safe to put the mother in law
Cast her into iron, put 5cm of copper on top and seal 400m underground. Sounds good.
storing away toxic waste
Or Donald
Boomer humor
Ok, boomer
I love this he is straight to the point and very informative.
2:49 „...represents the most ancient parts of THIS earth“ - I knew it, the Finns are from somewhere else entirely!
Thats why great Soviets could not beat them!!!!
Shhhh
"This Earth"
I knew the Finnish are aliens!
I know you're making a joke, but it's a language thing.
"Earth" and "ground" are the same word in some languages.
"Jord" in Norway
@@logitech4873 You're absolutely right. In Finnish, both "Earth" and "ground" translate to the same word: "maa". The difference being the capital letter if you're talking about the planet.
@@logitech4873 extra funfact: "maa" doesn't only mean ground, it's our word for soil, dirt, country and land.. + it's also "a suit" as in playing cards. 😅
Yes, just like the other Scandinavian, they were actually from Asgard. Thank me later
😂
So you weren't in Finland for just 15 minutes looking at rivers :D
Good content!
seconds*
Btw, that third nuclear reactor is one of the most expensive building projects ever. The third reactor started to be built in 2005 and got operational only as recently as 2022, but still to this day is really janky and suffers from faulty/outdated parts. It's become such a huge joke here in Finland, we think it will never be fully finished.
How does Tom Scott look 19 and 50 at the same time
Agreed. Also go check Engineering Explained channel and guess his age 😂
He's Aes Sedai
r/13or30
@@George-li1yv r/subsithoughtifellfor
Maybe because his actual age is close to the average between the two. hmm
I love listening to Fins speaking English. It's like music. It's a big part of the charm of the Hydraulic Press Channel.
We speak like cavemen who have only learned english for a week
@@walt6518 Nah I disagree. It really does sound like music, and it really does make me chuckle at the English language to hear you take every vowel and consanant so seriously and vocalize them so deliberately. In reality, the rules of pronunciation in English are just rough guidelines. No dialect follows them properly, and it's adorable how Finnish people in particular try so hard to enunciate everything phonetically perfectly. I'm not trying to condescend, again my point is that I find it very endearing. Love ya. 🇫🇮
@@walt6518 are we not but a cavemen with a some nokia device.... have you heared of my awesome "thisplään"? "thisplään" is like this thing you never knew of.
At this rate the degenerates are going to be talking about "Internet Relay Chat" or whatevers...
Remember when you tried to kill your fingerprints with a pineapple
r/iamveryrandom
@@Jexy00 r/foundthemobileuser
@@fareselamine8115 what
@@fareselamine8115 also, how
@@Jexy00 My guess is because "r" was capitalized, and phones tend to automatically do that
The important thing to making the site unmarked is to make sure that there is nothing in the tunnels to mark them as human when they're filled in. If a future archeologist stumbles upon the filled tunnels, they're way more likely to excavate all the way down if there's signs of wiring and airducts preserved in the clay-- if there's no sign of humans preserved by the filling of the tunnels, it would at least keep archeologists away. But this project itself shows reasons besides archeology that people may dig deep into random swaths of the earth.
And while leaving no mark on the cite itself on the surface, nothing behind in the tunnels to entice people to excavate them... if someone did randomly go that far down and find them, unless the knowledge of radioactivity is preserved, they're going to open up the clearly artificial canisters. So at that point, I think we're morally obligated to put a warning on the containers themselves. Something specific enough so that at least if the people who dig it up do know what radiation is, they'll be able to recognize what they've found. If the knowledge isn't preserved, any warning might just seem like a "danger: cursed, no trespassing" and not stop future archeologists... but chances are a container with a bunch of markings will get documented before its opened so at least the next radioactive container with "danger: cursed" markings will be left alone.
Of course the ancient Egyptian curses weren't real. However there IS that excellent documentary by Harrison Ford that shows why we don't open the Ark of the Covenant!
Because we don't even know if it exists?
@@nic12344 wooooshed?
@@Ben-ph4pe Nah, i know it's a joke in reference to Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. However, the movie starts with the premise that the Ark of the Covenant is real, while we have abselutely no proof that it is. I thougth I could bait a theist with my comment, but you ruined it...
@@nic12344 a theist here? I'm actually surprised there are atheists of your kind on this channel, I'd be extra surprised to find religious people of the kind you referred to here.
Many of the symptoms associated with tragic stories of Egyptian grave robbers, and people exposed to the Ark of three Covenant, very much align with those of radiation poisoning. It wouldn't be surprising if the ancients were aware of "cursed" stones and used them as a way to punish those whom would seek to violate sacred or revered objects.
Some of your best videos seem to be when you're underground in an echo chamber of bad audio. Mostly because those are the places I think look the most cool.
Do not unseal or you will be Finnish'd.
I'll escort myself out now
Does Finnish people eat any fermented stinky food? because that would be the perfect warning.
*scott yourself out
*Unbox Therapy has entered the conversation*
@@ancbi Nope. No nuclear waste beneath the earth nor fermented foods. Move along, sir! Move along, I said!
Do not unseal, or you'll be in Hell-sinki
Permanent storage of nuclear waste isn't difficult. Overcoming the objections of anti-nuke absolutists is the only real obstacle.
Ask Germany about Asse deposit please
Crazy to imagine how we might keep future generations away from this stuff by inventing mythology.
Are myth busters a joke to you?
@@ronaldreaghan3836 We talkin religion
Some y.a main character would decide to test the mythos and doom the world
that's... actually a really weird thought, that everything we believe in and all of these stories we enjoy, might one day be taken as fact and mythology, maybe some day something like Harry potter or The Hunger games will be taken as a true story, i've never thought of that
We'd better think of something because in 100,000 years nobody will understand the meaning of "Danger! Keep Out" no matter what language or images are used.
oh my god the plans to mark nuclear waste sites is amazing, I love when seemingly sci-fi stuff makes their way into serious literature.
Dotz and that would be dumb to mark it in any way. Nobody's gonna start digging there, and if they do, they already know radiation, and it has decayed by then anyways... better to leave unmarked
As a Swede: "aw yes, there's going to be Finns speaking English!"
As a finn I kind of hate the way many of us speak english. It just sounds so dumb but its also kind of a unique accent
Duu jyy think theers somthing fani abaut mai akksent?
@@juusto_ I didn't like it a few years ago but I have slowly accepted it. Hopefully my pronunciation will atleast be something close to standard English in 10 years too.
Does it sound weird to Swedes or something?
@Cameron It sounds funny to everyone. Even to us Finns.
How strange to think the "curse" of the tomb could one day finally be real in an unimaginable future.
The rest of the world: *Spends years figuring out a way to store high level nuclear waste.*
Finland: “Just burry it really really deep.”
If you bury deep enough, there'll be unlimited space
Just dump it into the Mariana Trench and forget ‘about it.
@@rob379lqz That will kill the species of fish and animals
Put it on rocket and send to sun!
make a moon made of nuclear waste
I love both ideas so much. Both the unmarked, hidden skeleton in the yard and the big, ominous structures warning against the horrors inside.
Did you learn the Finnish word for airfield when you were here Tom?
nice obscure reference
I really like this comment XD
You made my day. Thanks
Good reference. Really good one.
Feel free to r/woosh me but, wut?
@@rishabhdubey374 It's a reference to a episode of Technical Difficulties 1-01 on "Matt and Tom" channel - /watch?v=3UAOs9B9UH8
Edit for clarification: copy and paste "/watch?---" part from above to google search to find it.
@Tom Scott thank you
I love the idea of hostile architecture to prevent people stumbling upon waste. I also read an idea of having cats that glow when in presence of radiation and spreading the tradition of fearing glowing cats. So cool and dystopian
Fantastic work by the Fins. Great solution for long term disposal of high active waste. Brilliant engineering.
it is not a good solution... but it is the best we have.
It amazes me that there are people so scientifically illiterate right now they're peddling 5G coronavirus conspiracies, and meanwhile people are out there getting things like this done.
Well at least some countries haven't abandoned all reason. The USA spent tens of billions digging Yucca mountain for this purpose and stopped due to politics, while high level waste IS STILL STORED ABOVE GROUND. Environmental activists figured a better decision than finishing safe storage, was to waste all that money and effort and just... not put the dangerous material that ALREADY EXISTS into a safer location.
Well this site sounds like one of the dumbest ideas in the history of mankind. Nuclear power plants that run on this type of nuclear waste are the next thing. Within 10-15 years there wil be a demand for nuclear waste, and these guys decide to spend billions on a site to bury the stuff permanently...
@@BamBamGT1 We'll probably find a better way to get rid of it at some point in the future. But from basic physics you can see that using this stuff is not nearly as efficient as uranium. Also in 10-15 years we'll use hydrogen. Finally. I suppose. Ok, make it a hundred...
@@BamBamGT1 My guess is we need to wait atleast 50-100 years before we can 100% use up the fuel rods. So in the meanwhile, Finland got a nice bank of fuel ready to dig up.
History of nuclear waste disposal proposals in Britain
Prior to 1976 very little thought had been given to the question of how we were going to deal with the nuclear waste produced by military and nuclear electricity programmes. Some lower level waste was disposed of at sea, but most waste was simply accumulating at various nuclear sites around the country. Then a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that:
“… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81]
The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
Please learn from the Waste Isolation Pilot Program in New Mexico which stores low level radioactive wastes in underground salt domes. Incompatible wastes mixed causing a fire, the radioactive smoke was released to aboveground by exhaust circulating fans sending a plume across SE New Mexico and into Texas.
Oh hey, I've been in these kinds of tunnels myself in Oskarshamn, Sweden.
They even have an annual footrace between the employees, beginning at the lowest point at 500m below ground and running uphills towards the surface for about half an hour.
Hey Tom, love your videos, thanks for always putting subtitles/CC's on your videos, as an hearing impaired person, it makes a world of difference in enjoying the content!
Can't wait for their sign saying "welcome to the spicy air basement"
I like tingly dirt
I like the idea of marking the site with spikes. It would at least look cool, and if our civilization collapses, somebody digs this up, they would learn what spikes mean. If there would be more of those sites, nobody would touch another one.
It is interesting that the nordic countries, ones that would have had to be in the past really good long term planners to ensure there food stores survived the winter still have the instinct today.
"This isnt a video on wether nuclear power is good or bad"
Ohhhh just leave it to the comments. :D
IdleWorker xD
Now this was interesting. Especially the "how to warn the future generations" -part. Great video!
Vox made a great video called "Why danger signs can't last forever". Tom briefly mentioned the spike fields. They go into it with a bit more detail in their video. A very interesting watch.
You may enjoy the documentary 'into eternity' which is all about this site and the implications of dealing with nuclear waste. the topic of warning signs is discussed in depth. It is honestly the best documentary I have ever seen.
Did Tom check that this HOLE is reliant to the statement below.. eg safe, ..????!!! a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that:
“… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81]
The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
a report from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (known as the Flowers Report) raised the alarm. It stated that:
“… it would be morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.” [para 181, page 81]
The Commission recommended the formation of a Nuclear Waste Disposal Corporation to begin the search for a solution. That solution is still just as elusive today as it was twenty-eight years ago.
bury it very deeop and just blow up the entrance, their now no one can get to it.
How incredibly interesting. I've been watching you for years. Thank you Tom.
Always brightens my day when I see you've uploaded a video! Always interesting as well as informative.
Best sign even after 1000 years would be to put "Älä älä"
Ara ara~
Perkele! Siihe et koske saatana vie
Älälälälä!! Top tykkänään!
Vihdoin muita suomalaisii.
Ei saatana älä helevetissä avaa tai muuten tulee tupenrapinat
“This video isn’t about whether nuclear power isn’t good or bad. I think its good; so does Finland.”
🤣
Have you heard of the Flowers report
Or Fulbeck.. google.- *Fulbeck celebrates 30 nuclear waste* sleaford post read all of the article
Google Earth - Fulbeck ...
it's all there
*Tom's video (below ground HLW Dumping **HAPPENING NOW***)
* Flowers report ( why cant
*Fulbeck 1987 .(UK1st not Finland
This was 30 years ago???
THIS SHOULD NEVER HAPPEN..
I was 13 lived next door in newark... we stopped this then..
I AM ON MY KNEES IN BITS... WHAT HAVE WE DONE
@@grahamfisher5436 I don't think you could have possibly formatted that comment any more confusingly if you tried. It's just a jumble of words and asterixes with absolutely no cohesion whatsoever
@Walker There are currently 440 operable nuclear pover plants in the world tgose were two.
@@lizardlegend42
You are absolutely correct..
I have a serious brain injury
However... the message is ...we are dumping something that we shouldn't ..
Google.. Fulbeck celebrates 30 years nuclear waste celebrations...
I hope that wherever you are in the world
You are doing well..
hay??!! just thought????
if this site needs a message that they cant understand?????!!!!!!!!
they should ask me to do it??????!!!!!
serious brain injury.. one learnt to laugh and joke at myself..
after lots of pain...
hope you and your near and dear all doing okay..
peace from the UK
Actually, theres a good chance old Egyptian tomb raiders did get 'cursed'. They dug into the Tombs of the fairly recently deceased trying to steal the treasure, only to return to their villages empty handed and feeling incredibly weak, some time later it wasn't uncommon for the entire village to begin feeling the same way and sometimes even dying out.
Thats one of the reasons why the tombs are/were in fairly good condition when we dug them up again.
Of course, we know the would-be grave robbers most likely caught a disease or virus from the tomb, most likely from the dead, but back then it as just an unexplained curse. In the future, someone is going to ignore our warnings and go into the nuclear tombs, only to return with radiation poisoning, which would start their own tale of curses.
It’s still a mystery to me why people are against nuclear energy. It’s one of the cleanest ways of making electricity and if the waste is handled well, even that is not going to be a problem. Finland handles it very well! 🇫🇮
Ain't a mystery really. Because of the accidents.
Humans are irrational creatures, as Tom often says, and we get scared by both things don't understand, and things that didn't go well at times in the past... even if they do now
Even if almost impossible with modern standards, nuclear catastrophes are a risk that can be avoided by not using nuclear energy
Hauntercry If you think about it, burning coal and gas probably caused many more deaths. It’s just that 2 accidents are a lot more violent than silent killers as pollution gases. Compare it to this: if you’re a smoker you know about the dangers. If cigarettes were totally harmless, but 1 in every 10,000 cigarettes would explode, killing the smoker, many more people would stop smoking. Even when actually smoking cigarettes is a lot more harmful. And I want to clear up; Chernobyl happened because it was an old Soviet reactor with a superior officer that made all the wrong decisions. Fukushima happened because of a giant earth quake causing a massive tsunami. Oh and only one person died at Fukushima, who got lung cancer while measuring the radioactivity. That just shows how well it was built and how well we deal with it, even with a massive tsunami!
Kalks And yet there have been nuclear accidents while not using nuclear energy for power generation.
Nuclear accidents also occur at hospitals, research facilities, and military facilities...
I'd love to see a video tour or just footage of walking round this place, it looks so cool!
Imagine if, as they’re digging now, they find a suspicious radioactive waste from the previous civilisation that discovered nuclear energy 🤔
the heck do u mean by "suspicious"
@@thesovietkevin7275 the nuclear waste is probably a spy
*That nuclear waste is a speeh!*
Don't bother me I'm just making tf2 references..
Misty Boi cancer
Nice. Or the mothership that originally brought us here.
Our rejection of nuclear power was a massive mistake, and the environment has payed dearly for it as we continue to rely on fossil fuels for our electricity
This place is actually controlled by the SCP Foundation
There actually is a skip about a centroamerican civilization that discovered nuclear bombs based on the "This is not a place of honor" messages.
@@cailleach8416 Link ?
@@cailleach8416 link?
@@jesusmancilla6738 does it not show? From my pov it does.
Anyway, it's 4400
Ah yes, the Sane Clown Posse
The idea of how to warn people about (and eventually, just not to indicate the presence of) the tunnels is fascinating. A really interesting problem to solve
I'm so addicted to this channel and I love it:), Cheers Tom for all the vids throughout the years !
i like how tom snoops around the visitor center at the beginning, ive collected mushrooms there just like 2 weeks ago and conquered one of the pokemon arenas :)
Well done Finland for finally creating a real long term storage solution.
A long term solution is not placing nuclear Bombs waiting to happen everywhere
Ascdren nuclear waste doesn’t have the ability to explode
Ascdren you’re a dummy. Reactors and bombs are entirely separate processes. Besides, we already have thousands of actual bombs pointed at every major city in the world and we will NEVER get rid of all of them. Might as well actually get some use out of nuclear now that it’s out of Pandora’s box.
@@FoxDren No it is not! You are absolutely right about that! Luckily this Onkalo is not a nuclear bomb nor there is those inside it. After a few hundred years or so that Onkalo is more or less as dangerous as natural uranium in the ground.
I swear I've been _waiting_ for a video in this fascinating place. Great stuff.
Strange place: exists
Tom Scott: LETS JUST JUMP INTO IT
I expect after 100,000 years we will have found another solution to continued long time storage of nuclear waste. Maybe you revisit if it needs to be dug up and repackaged. It is hard to say what the levels would be after 100,000 years.
How about we finish the development of molten salt reactors that have the capability of fully "burning" the nuclear waste the old style solid fuel reactors create?
This
Molton salt reactors? What are those? And is it possible to burn nuclear waste? If you can explain I'd appreciate it, genuinely curious
@@Nightingale-eq6fg just watch all the molten salt reactor videos on youtube. look for Kirk Sorenson's The problem is when you do solid fuel reactors, is the solid fuel starts cracking and breaking apart after just 1% of the uranium is burned. In a molten salt reactor, this never happens and you can burn it all the way. Demonstrated at Oak Ridge back in the 50's.
@@gregcollins3404 thanks for the recommendation/explanation, will definitely look into the videos you suggested, and of course thanks for taking the time to reply :)
Exactly - this seems like answering the wrong question, when there's so much more energy that could be extracted from the spent fuel. Molten salt reactors seem like a great idea, I've not yet worked out what the catch is? Cost?
One of the best documentaries I have ever seen is called ‘Into Eternity’ and talks about this project, how it will take over a hundred years to finish, and just the completely absurd scale of what the people working on it have to deal with.
Maxime LENORMAND it takes that long to finish because the nuclear power plants will be generating electricity and thus fueling the economy for that time. Producing nuclear waste. Also twenty year cooling down time for the last waste.
I once watched a documentary about this. I think it's called " Into Eternity " or something like that... It's fascinating stuff! Thanks Tom!
2:19 - I know this is a super old video and Tom has likely already seen every possible criticism raised for it, but for my own peace of mind I have to say that dry cask nuclear storage is FAR more robust than a typical concrete building. The concrete formulation is different, and held to higher standards, the reinforcement is FAR greater, and crucially (I know Tom didn't imply this, but it's a common misconception) the contents aren't going to leak even IF the dry cask broke somehow. The high-level radioactive waste stored in dry casks isn't glowing green ooze, it's glass and concrete and slag from (intentionally) melted down nuclear fuel.
In addition, nature has already been thoughtful enough to run an ultra-long term practical test of deep nuclear waste storage for us in the form of the Oklo natural reactor which produced roughly 100kw of thermal energy from semi-intermittent water-moderated nuclear reactions over the period of a few hundred thousand years. The fission products of which moved no more than a few centimeters in the intervening eon.
The report you're referring to was actually for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) a low level nuclear waste depository is southern New Mexico. It is a completely different than the Yucca Mountain site, a high-level waste site in Nevada.
Tom: “and it’s due to go online next year”
*COVID-19 has entered the chat*
The original plan was to have it online in 2009, so we are already a decade behind. The estimated price has also more than tripled, and according to wikipedia, the reactor currently sits as the third most expensive building in the world. For the 12 billion dollars spent, we could have built around 7 Burj Khalifas. While the covid is indeed unfortunate, I bet the project would have been delayed (yet again) either way. What a clusterfuck.
Just in case, people who have the technology to dig that deep would also have the knowledge of what radiation is.
Egypt's pyramids were constructed 4500 years ago, 4400 years later we learned how to use electricity...
We were digging mines that deep long before we knew how to make lightbulbs
@@vladimirmartinez4546 What your logic proves, exactly?
I never said people before us were not capable of doing great things.
I just said that societies acquire a spectrum of skills, not just one.
We have very little information about Egyptians, we do not know the level of their knowledge. This is not what I wrote, you just try to complain to get attention...
Just because people have the technology to dig that deep, it doesn't mean that they would have the the knowledge of what radiation is
I complain to get attention? I think you need attention, I'm not attacking you, I'm sorry if I offended you, just chill :)
I dont know why you keep popping up in my recommendations but i enjoy it all. Thank you!
Can’t wait till Uncharted 5000 comes out and we find out this was actually an ancient city!
how about indiana jones and the tomb of slow and inevitable death?
The snow speaks Finnish and now nuclear waste will speak Finnish
Avery the Cuban-American why are you everywhere?
How do I see you below 2 different videos within just an hour, commenting how snow either speaks Finnish or "Greenlandic"?! 😂😂
Finland - be afraid, be very afraid
Perkele?
2:35 It's always fun to see Finnish text or hear Finnish on an English video
I'm here for it! Thanks God someone is finally doing it, and we can get on with reliably and safely providing the planet with energy with very little output compared to other non-renewable sources.