What might you have encountered on an ordinary day in Sweden 100,000 years ago? According to the historical almanac that would put you in the Stone Age, and in some parts of the world mammoths and sabre toothed tigers would be wandering about. In southern Europe you might run into humanoid beings hunting and gathering in the forests.
But in Sweden you would be unlikely to catch sight of either mammoths or humanoids, because the land was experiencing an ice age. Southern parts of the country were covered by inhospitable tundra and the farther north you went you would be walking on ice. And it would get colder yet.
Every 10,000 years that passed thereafter would bring you closer to the climax of the Ice Age 24,000 years ago. That is when the whole of northern Europe was covered by glacial ice. About 15,000 years ago this ice receded and was followed by a period of warmth. It was toward the end of this period that the history of Sweden was first recorded – from the stories of the Vikings, Gustav Vasa, to Sweden's period greatness and the Welfare State.
And what might you encounter on an ordinary day in Sweden 100,000 years from now, in the future? For most companies today this question is totally irrelevant, but for the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (SKB) it is important. We are responsible for the safety of the final repository for spent nuclear fuel. This repository must be safe for at least 100,000 years. Our analyses must cover periods as long as a million years.