At Fukushima, these tanks are attached to the outside of the reactor's containment structure. The pools are deep – typically the fuel lies under 25 feet of water. Although the concrete-and-steel containment is designed to trap radiation leaks, there is no such protection for pools outside. When the U.S. reactors were built, everyone assumed the government would open a national storage center to handle the tons of radioactive spent fuel from nuclear plants. The proposed Yucca Mountain site in Nevada never opened, so the old fuel sits at nuclear plants across the country. Many plants have been operating for 20 years and have tons of used fuel in cooling pools.
Se non vi basta questo ecco un articolo del Washington Post sulla contabilità lasca delle scorie nucleari negli Stati Uniti. Così, per fare un po' d'analisi dei rischi economici senza cravatte in tono.