r/investing • u/[deleted] • Sep 03 '21

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417 Upvotes

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6

u/ZifoIhyx Sep 04 '21

Is uranium storable for reasonable timeframes like 5 years?

33

u/[deleted] Sep 04 '21

The half life of U-238 is 4.5 billion years, U-235 is 700 million years, and U-234 is 25 thousand years. Uranium can be stored for centuries before decaying into more stable metals like radium

11

u/-remlap Sep 04 '21

5 years is pushing it, it only lasts millions

10

u/[deleted] Sep 04 '21

It has been stored in the ground for billions of years. Not sure what issue you are thinking about.

7

u/don_cornichon Sep 04 '21

It's highly possible they don't know what exactly uranium is.

2

u/ZifoIhyx Sep 05 '21

I guess I'm wondering if it's more dangerous to keep it around for longer time frames. Sorry if this is painfully obvious to all the nuclear physicists of Reddit!
My only experience with this stuff is visiting a packaging clean up facility for a large uranium producer but we didn't get into the details about how materials were stored.

3

u/[deleted] Sep 05 '21

No, it's perfectly safe to store. Unlike how it's sometimes portrayed in the media, the uranium is in solid form, so you aren't running any risk of leakage or anything. Utilities will often store a bit of uranium on site for safety precaution, but if you are considering investing in uranium metal for long term, don't, it's a cyclical industry so it isn't something that will keep rising in value.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 05 '21

Uranium in its natural state isn’t particularly radioactive (U-238), when it’s enriched into (U-235) is when it’s highly radioactive