Long term waste problems from electricity production

Abstract Probabilistic risk assessments are developed for high level waste, low level. waste, and radon emission problems from nuclear power, for chemical carcinogens and radon emissions from the ashes produced in coal burning, from chemical carcinogens released in the eventual disposal of photovoltaic cells, and from the effects of coal burning in producing and deploying photovoltaic arrays. The cancer risk per quantity ingested or inhaled is taken from standard sources, and the transfer rates from the ground to human ingestion are derived from geochemical analogs. Results are given in deaths per GWe-yr obtained from integrating effects over many millions of years, and only over the next 500 years. It is found that wastes from nuclear power cause thousands of times fewer deaths than do the wastes from coal burning and photovoltaic electricity generation. Mining uranium for nuclear fuel reduces future radon exposures, thereby saving hundreds of times as many lives as will be lost from nuclear wastes.