I would say...
...that you are now on a place -
- where we have buried something from you to protect you.
And we have taken great... pain -
- to be sure that you are protected.
We also need you to know -
- that this place should not be disturbed.
And we want you to know -
- that this is not a place for you to live in.
You should stay away from this place, and then you will be safe.
I am now in this place where you should never come.
We call it Onkalo. Onkalo means "hiding place".
In my time it is still unfinished -
- though work began in the 20th century when I was just a child.
Work will be completed in the 22nd century, long after my death.
Onkalo must last 100000 years.
Nothing built by man has lasted a tenth of that time.
But we consider ourselves a very potent civilization.
If we succeed, -
- it will most likely be the longest lasting remains of our civilization.
If you, some time far into the future, -
- find this, what will it tell you about us?
Once mankind started to use nuclear power to generate electricity -
- it was obvious that we would also generate some waste -
- which has to be treated so that it doesn"t... harm anybody.
And you can"t make nuclear waste go away.
You cannot make nuclear waste harmless.
So... several ways of how to get rid of the waste were explored.
Send it in a rocket out to the sun.
It disappears; it will never make harm to anyone.
But how to ensure that the rocket doesn"t explode on the launch pad?
Or sinking it to deep sea...
We would never be able to claim -
- that we can safely put something into the bottom of the oceans.
Because still we have an impression -
- that the oceans are really the mother of all life.
It"s not a safe way of handling spent nuclear fuel or radioactive waste.
How much waste exists in the world today?
Totally?
I am not quite aware.
I would say between 200000 and 300000 tons.
Somewhere between these two.
We already have enormous amounts of nuclear waste.
If this waste spills out into nature it will cause death and destruction.
Large areas will become uninhabitable for a long, long time.
Did that happen? Are there forbidden zones with no life in your time?
A hundred years ago, just three human generations ago, -
- when radiation was first discovered, -
- we didn"t understand that it was very dangerous.
But we noticed that it can be useful and we started to work with it.
Radiation is a sort of energy which can penetrate deep into your body -
- and harm your health. But it is an invisible danger.
We have no sense for it: You cannot see it, feel it or smell it.
And still it may even kill you.
Radiation may be described as small packages of energy.
And when they hit the genetic code, the DNA molecule, they can break it.
If you have a very serious whole-body exposure you don"t feel anything -
- until one hour or so afterwards when you start to feel nausea, -
- and you may vomit, and you may think you have got food poisoning.
In between you may feel better. After two weeks you start to bleed.
You have diarrhoea and fever.
And after a few weeks you may even die from this.
Radiation can also leave a trace in you.
It can change the genes. Mutate the genes.
It may cause malformation or disease or dysfunction.
So: Beware! Never stay in an area with an enhanced radiation level.
And never, ever touch upon a strong radiation source!
So we are storing the waste today above ground in water pools.
The reason why it"s kept in water -
- is that water creates a shield for radiation.
Keeping the waste in tanks -
- is probably possible for the next ten years, 20 years, 100 years.
1000 years...?
You just can"t guarantee stable conditions above ground -
- for instance... for...
...well... for one hundred years, let alone thousands of years.
These storages need surveillance.
They need power in order to cool the water pools.
They need maintenance.
But we can"t keep this waste forever in the water pools.
There"ve been two world wars during the last 100 years.
The world above ground -
- is unstable.
We have to find a permanent solution. Or a safer solution -
- in the long run.
My civilization depends on energy as no civilization before us.
Energy is the main currency for us.
Is it the same for you?
Does your way of life also depend on unlimited energy?
What we must do is to take care of the waste from nuclear power plants.
More and more, societies that are using nuclear power -
- are realising that they have to do something.
We obtained the energy. We have used the energy.
Of course it is our mission to also take care of the waste.
There is no way of doing nothing.
This is something which ought to be the responsibility of all citizens.
Irrespective of whether they like nuclear power or not.
Linking the issue of nuclear waste with nuclear power -
- could easily divert attention from the material which we have -
- and must somehow handle in a responsible way.
Not to harm future generations.
This tunnel feels like a time capsule sometimes.
When you arrive in the morning -
- it may be sunny, almost like summer outside.
When you come out again at the end of the day -
- it may have snowed like hell.
The weather will have changed completely, -
- and you think "How long did I actually spend in the tunnel?"
And likewise: You go to work and it"s dark, -
- and when you come back up after work it is dark.
And it feels like time has stopped.
Five, four, three, two, one, fire!
Final disposal of spent nuclear fuel -
- hasn"t been implemented anywhere so far.
We are forerunners in this field.
And we are dealing with very, very long time frames.
Meaning that this repository should last at least 100000 years.
100000 years is beyond our understanding and imagination.
Our history is so short in comparison.
How is it with you?
How far into the future will your way of life have consequences?
That"s what we really want to prove: That we can isolate the waste -
- from human beings and other live organisms for 100000 years.
We have come to a conclusion -
- that the bedrock, the Finnish bedrock -
- 1.8 billion years old -
- is the medium that we can predict far into the future.
At least 100000 years ahead.
A very important factor is that the repository is self-contained.
We shouldn"t have to guard it in the future.
It should just be able to be left.
And that"s a necessity. Because conditions on the ground will change.
The conditions down in the rock will be stable.
But on the surface you never know what"s going to happen.
There could be wars, there could be an economic depression.
At the surface the clock runs very fast.
In the rock it goes very, very slowly.
It"s the most stable environment we know of.
Olklluoto, Eurajokl has been chosen
- as the slte of the dlsposal faclllty for spent nuclear fuel.
Onkalo.
Where are you now on the plan?
We"re here somewhere.
Then we"II start widening this area. More, more, a bigger area comes.
Like a big cave, or...
An unimaginable big cave... it"s like a big city underground.
The repository acts like a cocoon, if you like, a Russian doll.
With barriers that complement each other.
If one barrier might fail -
- other barriers are able to mitigate all the consequences.
The flnal dlsposal faclllty wlll be constructed In stages -
- and decommlssloned In the 2100s.
When It Is ready-
- a thlck concrete closure Is cast at the tunnel mouth.
We will fill the chambers of Onkalo with nuclear waste from Finland, -
- one little country in the north.
After one century we will seal Onkalo for all eternity, -
- just like the tombs in the Pyramids were sealed -
- never to be opened again.
The safety of disposal shall not be dependent -
- on any active management, or active surveillance, -
- or any acts of human beings to be safe.
So it has to be fully passive.
The repository will be closed down; it will be back filled.
The idea of this back filling is to return the conditions -
- to those which prevailed before we excavated the tunnel.
There will be forests, there will be houses.
Hopefully there will still be people, -
- not perhaps the same persons who were there from the beginning.
But perhaps their children and grandchildren -
- will still live and use the land.
We always bring up the question of the Ice Age -
- as some kind of very dramatic change -
- in the situation. And of course it will have an impact.
If we look at our assumptions and scenarios -
- it will happen within 60000 years from now.
So everything... disappears...
...disappears from here when the ice comes.
Everything gets frozen, the vegetation will die -
- and then this will be more like a... tundra.
Would it be forgotten during an ice age?
Yes, I think it would be forgotten in such a case.
If you were a person evaluating this concept from the outside -
- what would you be afraid of?
Nothing.
Once upon a time man learned to master fire, -
- something no other living creature had done before him.
Man conquered the entire world.
One day he found a new fire, -
- a fire so powerful that it could never be extinguished.
Man revelled in the thought -
- that he now possessed the powers of the universe.
Then in horror he realised that his new fire could not only create, -
- but also destroy. Not only could it burn on land, -
- but inside all living creatures, -
- inside his children, the animals, all crops.
Man looked around for help but found none.
And so he built a burial chamber deep in the bowels of the earth, -
- a hiding place for the fire to burn ...into eternity.
You are now in the tunnel.
This place is not a place of honour.
No esteemed deeds are commemorated here.
You should not have come here.
You are heading towards a place where you should never go.
What is there is dangerous and repulsive.
The danger will still be present, in your time, as it is in ours.
Please turn around and never come back.
There is nothing here for you. Go no further.
My personal belief -
- is that no human intrusion will take place at any time scale ever.
We recognized that this could happen. That you might find and open Onkalo.
We refer to it as "human intrusion".
We don"t want this to happen because you may get hurt.
But most of all -
- we are afraid of human intrusion because if Onkalo is opened, -
- the waste will no longer be isolated from all living organisms -
- and we will have failed.
In fact we consider you the main threat to the safety of Onkalo.
If someone in the future is able to dig down to the repository -
- it will probably be a civilization of the same kind as we have.
In such a case they would also be knowledgeable -
- to know that this is radioactive material.
I think that"s the most probable scenario but l"m not so sure.
It could be another situation.
I think if someone found a facility like that in the future -
- they might interpret it as something religious.
A burial ground.
Or a treasure.
If we look at the pyramids, -
- we cannot really say that we understand everything -
- about the significance of their erection.
But we can assume that this could be the same -
- for our repository.
It will be interpreted the same way as we interpret the pyramids.
There is no clear understanding and it is quite possible -
- that we will not be understood by the future, -
- especially by the distant future.
What if someone finds the repository?
How should they know what it is?
They should have some measuring tools to measure the radiation.
What if they don"t have that?
Then they"II have to make a chemical analysis.
What if they can"t do that?
Then they cannot do the drilling either.
Ancient civilizations have done remarkable things.
Look at the mining industry in Sweden -
- in the 16th century; they went down several hundred meters.
We must realize that the future scenarios -
- are notjust hi-tech or very low-tech stone-age scenarios.
We have scenarios in the middle -
- where people may drill but may not understand, -
- may not have the technology to understand what they meet.
The Roman empire was born, lived, prospered, and died.
Similarly also the West will go through the same kind of phases.
Being born, flourishing, developing, crumbling, and dying.
What do we know about society in 300 years?
Virtually impossible to say anything.
We might expect society as we know it -
- to exist for 50 years more. For 100 years.
If you are convinced of what will happen then, -
- let"s put the question on 300 years, 500 years" time.
Then the darkness thickens.
We know that society changes very fast.
Could we imagine a society in the future -
- where science and technology did not matter as they matter for us?
Well, that is of course entirely possible.
They might go up in technology, they might go down.
And we don"t really know. If we assume something in the future -
- they could go back to the Neanderthal.
I think it is the changes that we will... get short for.
The design and the construction, the implementation has to be done -
- so that no knowledge is necessary for the future.
So that it can be safe also in the case -
- that people have lost the knowledge.
We used to have a joke.
"When we start the digging for the repository -
- the first thing we will experience is a copper canister -
- of exactly the same kind we want to place ourselves."
Of course you would start to think: "There must be a reason for this."
You have the scenario of the hidden treasure.
You have the idea that something is there, that it is valuable.
People would start to dig for it.
You could have the scenario where people even know -
- it"s dangerous. But it"s also valuable at the same time.
Could the waste also in the future have the value of gold or even more?
Well, just to answer the question honestly, yes, it could.
It is a treasure.
There is a lot of copper, uranium, plutonium... It could be valuable.
What is unpredictable is human behaviour.
Who knows why people might come and drill a hole?
There must be a reason to start to dig down 500 metres -
- in just average ordinary rock!
But what could prevent them from doing that?
I wouldn"t know.
Could it be that the knowledge of what"s there is incomplete?
- Of course. - What if a sign said "Don"t drill"?
That might be a case for, let"s say, a certain period of a time at least.
- What do you mean? - If you put a marker...
They"re called markers.
So this is a concept that...
It"s an idea which has been been thought over.
An area where disposal has been made -
- could be marked using markers.
The obvious marker is an object with text on.
Just like a rune stone.
This is a typical marker -
- with messages repeated in different United Nation languages.
General information about the area, and more detailed information also.
And that in turn is part of a whole marker system -
- where you might have more detailed information yet -
- if you went to another place at that same site.
There would be a message kiosk, for instance.
It is a more detailed message than the one on the monolith.
Further on you"d have messages like a small library in carved rock.
Perhaps underground.
What would be the content of the information?
To say that this is not an important place; it is a place of danger.
Stay away from the site. And not disturbing the site.
We will leave written information for you -
- in all the major languages of our time.
Will you understand any of them? Can you read?
And that"s of course a mind-boggling scenario.
How do you communicate?
We won"t speak the same language. They won"t have the same symbols.
We have to find something very general.
This is where the cartoon comes in, -
- with low sophistication but a robust message.
This is an attempt to give you a feeling, -
- rather than a detailed message.
Intuitively you would expect people to react to something frightening -
- better than to a detailed message.
Forbidding blocks, "Landscape of Thorn", -
- landscapes that would get you to feel -
- that this is something which is wrong, -
- this is something not inviting.
When you opened Onkalo, did you see "Landscapes of Thorn?"
Did it make you hesitate?
Or maybe curious? What drove you to enter?
Was it the scars we left on the surface? Or a rumour?
In terms of emotional information, -
- there was an interest in a picture by Edvard Munch, "The Scream".
To portray something that was negative.
It shows the feeling of despair.
It is very clear to the observer that it"s not something good.
But do you think this will be clear to all ages, all times?
I think it has a fair chance, yes, I do.
- It"s universal? - Universal for humans.
We are not sure how to overcome the problem -
- of leaving markers to warn you.
Messages from long-Iost civilizations were found in our times -
- but it took years to understand the language and the signs.
Some, we still cannot read.
If we put something that is not completely understandable -
- and the future people don"t understand what it means -
- they"II want to find out. People are curious.
Take the example of the rune stone in Norway found face down.
It has a requirement that no one should move this...
"It should not be touched by misguided men".
But of course this warning was not supported by archaeologists.
They disregarded it completely.
So this is a quite probable fate -
- of a marker in the distant future.
If we put those markers there, -
- it"s not clear that they understand the point that it"s dangerous.
And even if they understood, they still may want to know what it is.
Then there is the philosophical point -
- that some people think that it would be better to forget, -
- because then it would be less likely -
- that anybody would hit exactly the repository.
It has been discussed to let the facility be forgotten.
Yes, I guess there are two schools here.
Those who think you have to leave markers on the ground -
- and those who say it would be better to walk away -
- and forget about the site.
Do you actually think -
- that leaving markers creates a higher risk of intrusion?
Well, I would say so, yes.
Personally -
- I don"t see the situation as severe if the site is forgotten over time.
But how is it possible to create oblivion and forgetting?
How is it possible to make a facility like Onkalo disappear from...
Well, you say it, you say it, it"s not very easy.
When the burial chamber was complete -
- man laid his new fire to rest, and tried to forget about it, -
- for he knew that only through oblivion would he be free from it.
But then he started to worry -
- that his children might find the chamber -
- and awaken the fire from its sleep.
So he bade his children to tell their children -
- and their children"s children too -
- to remember forever -
- to consign the burial chamber to oblivion.
To remember forever to forget.
Some of the main principles included in the legislation -
- are firstly, limit the burden on future generations, -
- so we should not impose undue burdens on future generations.
The second principle is the protection of future generations.
That means the safety level for future generations -
- should not be lower than we are enjoying currently.
And the third principle -
- is that we should pass information about the repository -
- to future generations.
Our law states that we must inform you about Onkalo:
Maybe you will need to enter -
- if we"ve overlooked something or if repairs are required.
Were our calculations and assumptions accurate?
Did we make mistakes? Is that why you are here?
Knowledge transfer... what does the law say about it?
I don"t think it says anything yet.
- Are you sure? - No.
It is required in law that assessment is made.
But it is not popular.
Many people react to it. They think it"s too ambitious.
It requires that each generation -
- let"s say -
- looks at whether the system is adequate.
But the legislation says that you should pass on the information.
It doesn"t talk about generations.
It says that it should provide -
- the repository information in a permanent manner.
"In a permanent manner". That"s the phrasing.
What do you think they mean by that?
I think you should ask them.
Because we"ve just talked about the problems of that.
"Permanent" is too strong a word to use here.
And what about the people who work with these things?
They get the scientific disease, so to say.
It"s all routine for them. They have "the task".
- I don"t really understand. - I don"t think anybody does.
Responsibility is moved to the state -
- after they"ve decided -
- that this has been now done in an acceptable way.
So the Finnish state is responsible for passing on information?
- Into the future? - Yes, yes.
Does that mean that when you deliver the information about the facility, -
- it is in a way -
- that is comprehensible for all future generations to understand?
No, no. There is no requirement of making that comprehensible -
- for all future generations; it depends that it"s in Finnish.
We have no archives with information on nuclear waste yet.
If we build archives future societies and new generations -
- must maintain the information and update the language.
But can we count on continuation for thousands of generations?
What if people starve and suffer?
What if there are wars or floods or fires?
The archives have the same requirements -
- as our interim storages. Requirements we cannot guarantee.
After all, this is why we are building Onkalo.
The point is that the safety of the disposal and the repository -
- is not dependent on these records.
But then why is this law needed?
I don"t know.
The legislators have decided that the record -
- shall be handed over to state. But it doesn"t say more than that.
So the idea is that the archive of today should last for a period -
- but then be renewed by next generations?
Yes. Each generation should consider -
- if the archiving method is appropriate for the future.
Do you think this will happen?
Yes. I hope so, at least!
Can we learn anything from the past -
- that may help us communicate 100000 years into the future?
Usually, when we look at these time scales we go back in time.
Obviously, when you go 100000 years back in the past, -
- we come to our ancestors in Africa.
And we also cover our ancestors in Europe -
- in the form of the Neanderthal man.
And you realise that we have very little in common.
How would you make a parallel -
- from people hunting a mammoth with spears?
It is difficult to explain to these people something with nuclear waste.
We cannot assume that people or creatures in the future -
- will really understand very much.
But they might have different kinds of senses than we have?
Yes. Senses, appearances, needs, and knowledge.
Everything goes away. There is no one true statement that will survive.
Do you basically trust the future generations?
We are trying to do Onkalo -
- as independent of human nature as possible.
Because we can"t predict -
- exactly how the humans will behave in the future.
It is very difficult to answer that question.
Because... trust... and that aspect also...
I cannot say that I trust but I cannot say that I don"t trust.
It"s an open question, -
- whether it"s a possibility -
- that anyone will interpret anything at all in this time scale.
I have to say -
- that the quick answer is nobody knows anything at all.
If we cannot rely on markers and archives how will you know?
Maybe our legends will reach you -
- by being told over and over from generation to generation -
- like ancient legends have reached us?
Were you warned about Onkalo through legend?
Did your parents tell you stories -
- about the fire in the chamber deep in the bowels of the earth?
The chamber you must always remember to forget?
Onkalo is our very first permanent repository for nuclear waste.
But when Onkalo is sealed -
- it will hold only a fraction of the waste we have.
We must build many Onkalos far from earthquakes and volcanoes -
- to keep the waste away from the surface of the earth.
We must build many more chambers we hope to hide from you.
Do you think it"s reasonable to talk about a nuclear renaissance?
Many people seem to think so.
And many politicians believe that nuclear energy is needed...
...to curb the CO2 emissions from electricity production.
If we"re going to take the people in China and in India -
- to the same level as the western countries in the next twenty years -
- you have to start three new nuclear reactors a day.
Spent fuel is considered as a material that could be reprocessed.
It could be used again.
We shouldn"t reprocess it.
Due to the fact that in such a case -
- the plutonium, which is extracted in the reprocessing process -
- could escape, and be used for fabricating bombs.
There has been research into transmutation -
- in the hope that the waste could be made harmless.
- Is that a possibility? - Theoretically yes.
But in practice probably never.
We will never be able to do away with all the nuclear waste in that way.
So there is no way around nuclear waste?
At the moment nobody"s found a way around it.
If you want to use nuclear energy, we will have nuclear waste.
I am not so sure that nuclear energy is the solution.
Maybe in the short term. That"s my personal view, too.
But I don"t think it"s sustainable in the long run.
- Maybe for the next decade. Century. - Why do you think so?
Because we won"t have enough uranium.
It"II be just like the oil.
I think we all can agree that oil isn"t a sustainable solution.
And we will come there with the uranium assets, too.
Running out of energy sources -
- could lead to very unstable conditions globally -
- because those last energy sources will be competed for -
- and this can even lead to wars between nations.
The point with the permanent disposal is that it"s permanent.
It"s put underground permanently and you never change it.
We have coined the term "decisions under uncertainty".
And that is clear in the nuclear waste issue.
There are decisions under uncertainty.
When you do a project like this you must state what you know, -
- and you must state that you know what you know that you don"t know.
And also what you don"t know that you don"t know.
Could you now try to address the audience?
I mean the future audience, the far future audience?
I personally have a strong belief -
- that no human intrusion will take place ever into Onkalo.
But if I am wrong...
I would love to be able to meet you -
- and to try to communicate with you.
This is probably the only testimony of our time...
You are now entering a repository with spent nuclear fuel...
- It must be stored in a safe place. - It should not be disturbed.
Don"t go there. It"s dangerous. It"s radioactive.
You can"t see it. You can"t smell it.
- Don"t touch anything. - Go back up to the surface.
Take better care of our world than we did.
You will be safe if you stay away from it.
Good luck.
You have now gone deeper into the tunnel.
And you have reached a place where you should never have come.
Down here radiation is everywhere.
You do not know it, but something is happening to your body right now.
It is beyond your senses.
You feel nothing. You smell nothing.
An invisible light is shining right through you.
It is the last glow of my civilization, -
- that harvested the powers of the universe.
A vast black sleep
Descends upon my llfe
Sleep, all hope
Sleep, all deslre!
I no longer see anythlng
I lose my memory
Of the bad and the good
Oh, the sad story!
I am a cradle
Rocked by a hand
In the depths of the vault
Sllence!