WheThrow the Nuclear Waste

> That idea is a good suggestion. One technological impediment,
> however, is that they must be BURIED in a subduction zone and as far
> as I know, those are mostly in deep ocean. Those under large land
> masses are buried too deep for easy access. If there are any readily
> accessible subduction zones, I'd like to hear about them.
>

The deep ocean subduction zones might be accessible via deep-water
ROVs, though. Let's see, the Atacama trench (off the coast of Chile
and Peru) is about 8 km deep at maximum, and is subducting at a rate
of 10 cm/year or so. Hmm, never mind, the current limit for ROVs is
about 3 km. Still, that's less than a factor of 3 -- I'd be surprised
if we couldn't conquer that depth in ten years or so.

A bigger obstacle would be overcoming the (possibly valid) objections
that waste disposal there could disrupt unique ecosystems --
subduction zones almost certainly host the highest-pressure biospheres
on Earth. It might also be hard to prove that material couldn't leach
out into the open ocean before it was fully sucked under.

Best,
- Joe