Technology

59495 readers

3114 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

Follow the lemmy.world rules.
Only tech related content.
Be excellent to each another!
Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
Politics threads may be removed.
No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

199

Google signs deal for nuclear energy to power AI datacenters. (newsukraine.rbc.ua)

submitted 1 month ago by TheOne@lemmy.blahaj.zone to c/technology@lemmy.world

54 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] BlackLaZoR@fedia.io 14 points 1 month ago (2 children)

highly problematic because it's hazardous and radioactive?

Thing is, there's very little of that waste, with much less impact than say, burning coal.

Also, it's highly radioactive only when taken fresh out of reactor - this waste is stored in pools, until it decays. What you're left is weakly radioactive, long term waste that needs to be buried for a long time.

[–] bitwolf@lemmy.one 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Adding to this. The waste has been used to fuel subsequent reactions and could be used to produce more power

[–] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I mean they seem to be still figuring this out... But isn't the whole SMR harardous waste after it got decommissioned? That depends a bit on the technology used. But that'd be a huge pile of mildly radioactive steel, plumbing and concrete in addition to the depleted fuel, which is highly radioactive. And as far as I know the re-use to get the rest of the energy out also isn't solved yet. I mean obviously that should be done. Only taking out parts of the energy and wasting the rest isn't very efficient. Sadly that seems to be exactly what we're doing in reality.

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

much less impact than say, burning coal.

Why compare to coal, not wind & solar + batteries.

[–] BlackLaZoR@fedia.io 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Because wind and solar don't have the on-demand capacity. Even with batteries, you can't count on them to deliver power reliably

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Maybe the AI training could be paused until the sun comes out again.

Coal and nuclear are not on demand either. Only hydro and gas offer any real flexibility.