Q & A With James Lovelock

British newspaper The Independent has published a Q-and-A session with environmentalist James Lovelock (author of the Gaia theory) during which he answered a couple of queries from readers about nuclear waste:

Q: What should we do with all this nuclear waste that we do not know how to keep safe?

A: There is more nonsense and downright lies told about nuclear waste than any other topic. To start with, there is very little of it; it is far, far less dangerous than the carbon dioxide waste that will, if we don't take care, kill nearly all of us. Much is made of the fact that it will still be there in a thousand years; what nonsense, we are lucky that it decays at all. If it were like mercury waste, which is equally deadly, it would be there for ever. Incidentally, why are there not government commissions for the disposal of mercury or carbon dioxide waste?

Q: Why did you say that you would be happy to bury nuclear
waste in your back garden?

A: I would be happy to have the nuclear authorities build a concrete pit on my land and put some high-level nuclear waste in it. It gives off heat that could be used for hot water and central heating. It would be entirely safe and a waste not to use it.

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