Editing Radioactive waste (section)

=== National management plans ===
{{See also|High-level radioactive waste management}}
[[File:Grüne protests against nuclear energy.jpg|thumb|Anti-nuclear protest near a nuclear waste disposal centre at [[Gorleben]] in northern Germany]]
Sweden and Finland are furthest along in committing to a particular disposal technology, while many others reprocess spent fuel or contract with France or Great Britain to do it, taking back the resulting plutonium and high-level waste. "An increasing backlog of plutonium from reprocessing is developing in many countries... It is doubtful that reprocessing makes economic sense in the present environment of cheap uranium."<ref>[[#Vandenbosch|Vandenbosch]], p. 247.</ref>

In many European countries (e.g., Britain, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland) the risk or dose limit for a member of the public exposed to radiation from a future high-level nuclear waste facility is considerably more stringent than that suggested by the International Commission on Radiation Protection or proposed in the United States. European limits are often more stringent than the standard suggested in 1990 by the International Commission on Radiation Protection by a factor of 20, and more stringent by a factor of ten than the standard proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the [[Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository]] for the first 10,000 years after closure.<ref name="Vandenbosch">[[Radioactive waste#Vandenbosch|Vandenbosch]], p. 248.</ref>

The U.S. EPA's proposed standard for greater than 10,000 years is 250 times more permissive than the European limit.<ref name = Vandenbosch /> The U.S. EPA proposed a legal limit of a maximum of 3.5 [[millisievert]]s (350 [[millirem]]) each annually to local individuals after 10,000 years, which would be up to several percent of{{Vague|date=March 2014}} the exposure currently received by some populations in the highest natural background regions on Earth, though the United States Department of Energy (DOE) predicted that [[Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository#Opposition|received dose would be much below that limit]].<ref>U.S. Federal Register. 40 CFR Part 197. Environmental Protection Agency. [http://www.epa.gov/radiation/docs/yucca/yucca_mtn_rule_fed_reg_version.pdf Public Health and Environmental Radiation Protection Standards for Yucca Mountain, Nevada; Final Rule]. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110202133701/http://www.epa.gov/radiation/docs/yucca/yucca_mtn_rule_fed_reg_version.pdf|date=2011-02-02}}.</ref> Over a timeframe of thousands of years, after the most active short half-life radioisotopes decayed, burying U.S. nuclear waste would increase the radioactivity in the top 2000 feet of rock and soil in the [[United States]] (10 million km<sup>2</sup>) by approximately 1 part in 10 million over the cumulative amount of [[Natural radioactivity|natural radioisotopes]] in such a volume, but the vicinity of the site would have a far higher concentration of artificial radioisotopes underground than such an average.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Cohen, Bernard L. |journal=Interdisciplinary Science Reviews |volume=23 |pages=193–203 |year=1998 |url=http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/Perspectives_on_HLW.htm |title=Perspectives on the High Level Waste Disposal Problem |issue=3 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120204034450/http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/Perspectives_on_HLW.htm |archive-date=2012-02-04 |doi=10.1179/isr.1998.23.3.193 |bibcode=1998ISRv...23..193C |access-date=2011-05-30}}</ref>

==== Mongolia ====
After serious opposition about plans and negotiations between [[Mongolia]] with Japan and the United States to build nuclear-waste facilities in Mongolia, Mongolia stopped all negotiations in September 2011. These negotiations had started after U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy [[Daniel Poneman]] visited Mongolia in September 2010. Talks took place in Washington, D.C. between officials of Japan, the United States, and Mongolia in February 2011. After this the [[United Arab Emirates]] (UAE), which wanted to buy nuclear fuel from Mongolia, joined in the negotiations. The talks were kept secret and, although the [[Mainichi Shimbun|''Mainichi Daily News'']] reported on them in May, Mongolia officially denied the existence of these negotiations. Alarmed by this news, Mongolian citizens protested against the plans and demanded the government withdraw the plans and disclose information. The Mongolian President [[Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj]] issued a presidential order on September 13 banning all negotiations with foreign governments or international organizations on nuclear-waste storage plans in Mongolia.<ref>The Mainichi Daily News (15 October 2011), [http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111015p2a00m0na023000c.html Mongolia abandons nuclear waste storage plans, and informs Japan of decision], {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111018044814/http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111015p2a00m0na023000c.html|date=2011-10-18}}.
</ref> The Mongolian government has accused the newspaper of distributing false claims around the world. After the presidential order, the Mongolian president fired the individual who was supposedly involved in these conversations.