Syllabus Coverage: NFC4.4, NFC4.5, NFC4.6
The presence of actinides and long-lived fission products in irradiated fuel produces problems in terms of very long-term storage (over thousands to hundreds of thousands of years). Since future conditions for humanity are essentially unpredictable over such timescales, considerable research and public debate has focused on how to safely isolate radioactive waste from the biosphere.
The ICRP has made radiation protection recommendations regarding long-lived radioactive waste in their Publication 81 (1999).