It can, but itll be expensive. Like really expensive.Animal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 05, 2021 4:35 pmso, that's kind of what i was thinking. Its uranium and radium that naturally occur in the raw materials. But nuclear power plants use Uranium and some of that uranium ends up in the cooling water that cools the fuel rods. And they have ways to filter that radiation from the water. Why won't those methods work the same on this water?
Radioactive water is treated with carbon and reverse osmosis. When dealing with water with low total dissolved solids, like the water cooling nuclear fuel rods, its not an issue. You filter the water, dispose of the water by pumping it deep underground or dissolve in a larger body, like the ocean. The now loaded filter material being osmosis membrane or carbon get tagged as nuclear waste, canned and stored.
The issue with these gypsum ponds is the total dissolved solids are enormous and filtration isn't practical. Dissolve plaster in water and pass it through a Brita pitcher, it wont make it long at all. You would have to centrifuge the solids from the water, and removing fine particles from the water would require very specialized centrifuges with massive air containment and filtering, just an absolute nightmare and not the least bit portable. Who wants radioactive water trucked through your town or floated up on shore in a boat? Then everything it touches is now contaminated. How about a 100 million dollar centrifuge that is only used once, is now contaminated its self, and too expensive to dismantle and store as it is contaminated?
It can be done but a logistical nightmare that only billions can solve.
Realistically the best option is identify an area nearby that can be drilled to depths far below the water table, pump this shit into it and hope it doesn't migrate. There has already been sinkholes formed under similar ponds and it collapses in and massively contaminates the water table. Get it deeper and cross your fingers, or cross your fingers and hope the sinkhole capital of the states doesn't swallow it.