There will always be drawbacks

Being an electrical engineer and consequently little more than a layman on matters nuclear, I was therefore most interested in Kelvin Kemm’s excellent article in Business Report of September 8 (Nuclear power is the only sensible way to go). It was lucid, and despite my innate wish of wanting a completely pollution-free method of generating electricity, which was economically viable at the present state of our evolution, I could not think of any suitable alternative.

Having read many reports on solar, hydro and wind energy to provide for mankind’s electrical needs, there seemed always to be drawbacks to whatever method was considered as alternative or supplementary to coal-fired power stations.

We are thus left with the problem of how best to dispose of our nuclear waste safely after its job has been done, in as pollution-free a way as possible.

An obvious solution would no doubt be to bury it at the bottom of the deepest disused mine shaft. However, it strikes me that there may yet be a way of taking advantage of what radiation there is left in the nuclear waste material.

Word has it that the best means of doing this is to dig a deep hole at an isolated uninhabited spot near the Namibian border, lay on an accessible store of water next to the waste material and voila! a source of “heavy water”.

Science fiction perhaps? I stand to be corrected on this, but to me an interesting thought nevertheless. The law of conservation of energy would still apply. FRANK VAN VLOTEN, KWAZULU-NATAL