Fukushima Radioactive Fallout Nears Chernobyl Levels 537
0WaitState writes "The cumulative releases from Fukushima of iodine-131 and cesium-137 have reached 73% and 60% respectively of the amounts released from the 1986 Chernobyl accident. These numbers were reached independently from a monitoring station in Sacramento, CA, and Takasaki, Japan. The iodine and cesium releases are due to the cooking off of the more volatile elements in damaged fuel rods."
Sensational! (Score:2, Insightful)
More sensationalist bullshit. Get this off slashdot, please.
I don't doubt the claim, I do doubt the presentation. Have some respect.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Is it too early to discuss movie deals involving giant radioactive zombies, animals & fishes?
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Funny)
You rang?
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
With a purposeful grimace and a terrible sound
He pulls the spitting high-tension wires down...
You know, I once came up with the notion that if you wanted an *incredibly* loud speaker, and had a large budget, you could encode music into detonating det cord by varying its radius and thus the force of its pressure wave. Depending on how thin you can make the cord, a normal length song would take a couple dozen to a couple hundred tonnes of explosives (not cheap), but you would have the volume to broadcast across a huge area.
I was then thinking of, "What song would be best to play to people out of the blue, no warning, as part of a crazy art project?" And then it hit me: Godzilla by Blue Oyster Cult. In Tokyo Bay. As you inflate a Godzilla parade float in the water with helium, causing it to rise up and out of the water head-first (ultimately releasing it to float away over the town).
Re: (Score:3)
You know, I once came up with the notion that if you wanted an *incredibly* loud speaker, and had a large budget, you could encode music into detonating det cord by varying its radius and thus the force of its pressure wave. Depending on how thin you can make the cord, a normal length song would take a couple dozen to a couple hundred tonnes of explosives (not cheap), but you would have the volume to broadcast across a huge area.
Please, please, please send this to the Mythbusters.
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Insightful)
From TFA:
The amounts being released, he says, are "entirely consistent" with the relatively low amounts of caesium and iodine being measured in soil, plants and water in Japan, because so much has blown out to sea. The amounts crossing the Pacific to places like Sacramento are vanishingly small – they were detected there because the CTBT network is designed to sniff out the tiniest traces.
"Relatively low amounts" in Japan. "Vanishingly small" amounts elsewhere. Yeah, they're really sensationally hyping this one up. /sarcasm
I don't doubt the claim, I do doubt the presentation. Have some respect.
So you think the claim is true, but it should not have been presented? Reporting simple facts now is sensationalism? They should have had enough respect to simply not report it? (No doubt you'll claim they could have been presented in a less sensational manner, which is utterly ridiculous considering, but whatever. Clearly any reporting of these facts at all would be considered sensationalist by you.)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is the title: "Fukushima radioactive fallout nears Chernobyl levels"
The headline is actually worse than sensationalist: It's an outright lie. Fallout of Cs-137 and I-131 are at near Chernobyl levels, but the fallout, as a whole, is far far less than Chernobyl.
Re:Sensational! (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Sensational! (Score:4, Interesting)
Inside Chernobyl's Sarcophagus - BBC Horizon (1996): http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=B98ECEE5D787AABE [youtube.com]
This is an amazing and terrifying retrospective, and a must watch for any fan of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games.
The containment might crack (Score:3)
The containment might crack, because the pressure inside is high and the hydrogen explosions might have damaged the structure. Also there are no special containment structures below the core a.k.a. core catcher, just the containment itself.
The only safe thing about the plants is that this is happening elsewhere, in Japan.
I would point you to a source, like the current TEPCO press release, but it fails to tell of the "smaller" explosions, which obviously did happen considering the damage to the outer structu
Re: (Score:3)
That's not exactly true. A hydrogen explosion did disperse some of the core contents, but the majority melted through the floor of the reactor and ended up in ducts and maintenance passages. All areas of the facility under the reactor are filled with it. Google search for 'corium.'
All of the reactors probably did melt down. A meltdown isn't scary. TMI had a 50% meltdown, and none of it even escaped the pressure vessel. Don't play so much STALKER.
Re: (Score:3)
Your statement is so wrong that it is fractally wrong. There is not a level at which your statement is not wrong.
Google "Chernobyl" "elephants foot".
Read up on the ruins of the reactor- it's a HUGE problem. The concrete coating is rotting and there isn't money to build a new one.
When you are done- read this site: http://www.angelfire.com/extreme4/kiddofspeed/index.html [angelfire.com]
It's really cool- a Russian lady on a ninja motorcycle goes on annual trips through the area, takes photos, and Geiger counter readings.
It
Re: (Score:3)
I recall reading that story was bullshit -- civilians are not allowed to go there alone. She went in tours like everyone else.
Re: (Score:3)
Only 3.5 ton of the fuel blew into the air. Now fukedupshima had 50x more fuel blown up.
You reckon that's bad? Wait 'till Oyster Creek goes up. That's the same design reactor as Fukushima, but has triple the waste lying around. Its containment is already corroded and leaking tritium like a sieve.
Re: (Score:3)
Hopefully (yeah right, by now it should be clear that used car salesmen have have an infinitely greater ethical superiority over the nuclear industry) .... Hopefully, engineers aren't covering up flaws in the containment like the Japanese engineers on reactor 4:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-23/fukushima-engineer-says-he-covered-up-flaw-at-shut-reactor.html [bloomberg.com]
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
The problem is the title: "Fukushima radioactive fallout nears Chernobyl levels"
The headline is actually worse than sensationalist: It's an outright lie. Fallout of Cs-137 and I-131 are at near Chernobyl levels, but the fallout, as a whole, is far far less than Chernobyl.
Yes, and fallout *at those particular stations*. To compare the overall fallout from Chernobyl (implied by the sensationalist title), they would need to factor in the distance from the sources (Chernobyl is much farther away from those stations) as it applies to wind/weather dispersion patterns as well as half-life of those isotopes.
Junk science journalism FTL.
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
The half-life of I-131 is 8 days, and effectively all of the volitiles have burned off at this point. Early this week, levels in Tokyo briefly reach levels where a baby in arms shouldn't be drinking (formulae made with) tap water - but it was only about twice safe levels for a baby, and no risk at all for those over 40. In a week that problem will have solved itself natually.
I'm sure there someone, somewhere who somehow didn't hear the warnings and a baby now has a slightly elevated risk of thyroid cancer. That's not a good thing, but it's unfair and sensationalist to compare that to Chernobyl. As my friend in Japan wrote
For us, we think (a) these amounts shouldn't matter and (b) our activated carbon filtration systems will take care of this, but carefully consumed wine and beer this evening just to be safe
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
Quite true. Only the volatiles (Cs-137, I-131, etc) make it any significant distance from a nuclear disaster. The non-volatile elements end up attached to or as part of larger particulate matter and are generally deposited within 100km of the accident -- aka, significant amounts wouldn't even make it to Tokyo if the winds at the time of release were pointing straight at it.
A lack of those means it's less likely Fukushima will involve a permanent exclusion zone around it, but the overall health effects for regions beyond will be similar to that for Chernobyl after adjusting for prevailing wind direction.
Note that this accident isn't even close to over. There's several times as much nuclear decay waste products at Fukushima #1 as there were at Chernobyl, only a small fraction of those have been released into the environment so far, and the disaster is still clearly ongoing. There will almost certainly be more volatiles released by Fukushima than Chernobyl when this is done. The question is how kind will the winds be over the coming months and whether there will be even more "oh noes".
Re: (Score:3)
Right, those were isotopes "everybody was worrying about" in Europe.
You forgot to mention that except for immediate vicinity those isotopes produced no effect on health as long as people did not grow food on contaminated soil -- and even that affected about a hundred miles radius. So unless by "Europe" you mean Khoiniki, Bragin, Narovlya and Vetka, it was mostly bullshit.
(I lived in Gomel at the time -- about 80 miles from the power plant, and was completely unaffected by it).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Citation please yourself. There's a distinct lack of conclusive evidence in either direction because controlling for such large population based studies on something that varies so much with other factors is extremely difficult. Nuclear proponents often cite this absence of evidence as evidence of absence. Nuclear opponents counter that barring research to the contrary, due caution requires assuming that the same
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Funny)
The article uses scientific notation to give the radiation release in becquerels.
It is impossible to be sensationalist when using scientific notation!
Re:Sensational! (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, yeah, your fancy exponents, but try using percentages!
From TFA:
"Similarly, says Wotawa, caesium-137 emissions are on the same order of magnitude as at Chernobyl. The Sacramento readings suggest it has emitted 5 Ã-- 10^15 becquerels of caesium-137 per day; Chernobyl put out 8.5 Ã-- 10^16 in total -- around 70 per cent more per day."
Yeah, seventy percent. The same 70% by which 85 is 70% more than 5.
WTF, NewScientist? The error's in the original article too, but this is the sort of mistake I expect from the mainstream media. A pop scientist publication should be smarter than this.
In total (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah they conveniently forget that this was never the problem at Chernobyl. Both Iodine and Cesium are only dangerous if you ingest significant quantities of them. Additionally they have halflives measured in hours ... Meaning these clouds are completely harmless after half a day passes.
The problem at Chernobyl was release of Uranium and Plutonium [oecd-nea.org] in clouds, which then spread around the site, and irradiated everything. They will keep irradiating everything for eons. Soviets managed to vaporize about 3.5% of
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sensational! (Score:4, Informative)
He's correct on everything else though, and the reason why those clouds are generally harmless to population is because they tend to rain microscopic amounts of radioactive cesium as it cools. Cesium-137 is dangerous if breathed in as small particles that get stuck in the lungs (iirc).
Iodine 131 is even safer. It's risks are based on the fact that thyroid gland tends to vacuum all the iodine in the body, including isotope 131 where it irradiates your body from inside for a long time. Of course, that requires significant ingestion of such iodine in the first place, which most typically comes with significantly contaminated water. Again, amount needed is fairly significant, and ones measured on the microscopic levels are barely notable to the human and animal bodies, and are several tens of orders of magnitudes lower then total ionising effect of background radiation on sea level.
Essentially you're far more at risk of getting cancer if you move to live 500m higher from sea level then from radiation in Fukushima if you don't live in Japan at the moment. The main risk in Chernobyl has been that essentially entire heavy part of radioactive isotopes of table of elements got into atmosphere. This is obviously not the case with Fukushima.
P.S. And please, don't even DARE flying. That's incredibly dangerous, you get irradiated!
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
"Of course, that requires significant ingestion of such iodine in the first place, which most typically comes with significantly contaminated water."
Milk.
Chernobyl results showed that cows eating the contaminated grass had almost all the radioactive iodine in the milk and children who drank that milk got sick.
Apparently 90% of the children thyroid cancers could have been prevented if the government had issued a warning not to drink milk.
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
And those thyroid cancers - while exceedingly unpleasant - killed about 40 people.
Nuclear is not 100% safe. Nothing is. It does happen to be about 4,000 times as safe as Coal [typepad.com] though, measured in terms of human deaths per megawatt generated.
Re: (Score:3)
40 that were counted. Anyone who has ever read the Pravda knows that figures emanating from Soviet officialdom must be taken with a very large dose of (iodized) salt.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
*raises hand*
OH OH OH!
RAIN!
*looks around looking very pleased with himself.*
Re: (Score:3)
So the longest term impact of Chernobyl is more politicians?
Imaginary deity help us all!
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Interesting)
No, he's not. I went one step further and followed his link. Proof by Ghost Reference. It does not say what he claims it does.
The main reason why elements with low half lives are dangerous is precisely *because* they have low half lives. U-238 is all over the bloody planet, but with a half life similar to the age of the planet, it poses little threat. Iodine poses the primary threat initially after a nuclear accident, followed by cesium and strontium over time. The Chernobyl exclusion zone may be opened for development and agriculture again up once the cesium and strontium decay sufficiently.
What sort of ridiculous-looking hat are you pulling your figures from, like your "500m higher" one? Fukushima City's radiation levels are ~100 times their normal background level -- and they're 30km *west* (against the prevailing winds) of the reactor. Tokyo today is at 4x their normal background, and they're *150km* away and tangential to the prevailing winds. And the accident is still ongoing, and will be for quite a while. And we're talking about external radiation, not inhaled/ingested particulate, which is orders of magnitude worse for the body than radiation from external sources (like most background radiation, like the radiation from X-rays, like the radiation from flying, etc).
Could you please put down the nuclear power pom poms for just a minute and enter the real world where this is a serious disaster having a serious effect on a first-world country?
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Funny)
"Spending a year close to Fukushima itself will have ZERO observable health effects."
Go for it. I'm sure they could use your assistance there.
Warning! Prospective alert. (Score:5, Informative)
Death toll from Earthquake and tsunami 10,000+
Death toll from the reactor accident so far 0.
Re:Warning! Prospective alert. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear disasters are disasters in slow motion. Apart from initial explosions and the like, there's no good reason any sizeable number of people in an informed populace has to die because there's plenty of time to react. That doesn't mean you can ignore them or that they don't cause tens or hundreds of billion dollars in damages. You have to put forth heroic efforts to try to stop a catastrophe from becoming a megacatastrophe. You have to order the evacuations. You have to destroy produce and milk. You have to leave areas closed off to settlement and larger areas to agriculture. You have to find new water supplies. You have to seal off any sources of further radiation leakage, whatever the cost. And so on, all depending on the scale of the accident.
Everyone focuses on deaths with nuclear accidents, but apart from the sudden explosion/etc deaths and the deaths caused by a poor response to the disaster, nobody has to die in even a major nuclear accident. They're just really freaking expensive to deal with, in terms of containment, in terms of ruined property, and in terms of protracted economic damages.
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Insightful)
Both Iodine and Cesium are only dangerous if you ingest significant quantities of them. Additionally they have halflives measured in hours
No.
I-131 8 days.
Cs-137 30.2 years.
The problem at Chernobyl was release of Uranium and Plutonium in clouds, which then spread around the site, and irradiated everything.
In the long term the problem was the Cs-137 [unscear.org].
Does it really need to be said that the Japanese lost control of exactly 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000% of their nuclear fuel.
If exposure of the rods and burning off of radioactive isotopes is zero loss of control, then stabbing someone is zero loss of blood unless they die.
Wanna bet the author of this story is a "green scientist" ?
The only thing I'd bet is that you're thoroughly annoyed that an out-of-date power plant has demonstrated that humans need to try much harder when deploying nuclear power. You're deliberately polarising it as greens vs nuclear advocates when it's really the desire for safe nuclear power vs the desire for maximising profit at inappropriate risk.
Re: (Score:3)
the desire for maximising profit at inappropriate risk.
So you think we need to do a lot more work before we deploy wind farms? Considering that over the last ten years there have been 44 deaths worldwide associated with wind farms and 7 deaths worldwide related to nuclear power plants (I'm not sure if this number includes the current situation) if nuclear power is not yet safe enough, then wind power has a long way to go.
Re: (Score:3)
Well if you want to look at mining deaths, 100,000 people have been killed in the US alone mining coal.
More people were killed building the hoover dam than in all nuclear power accidents worldwide to date.
The largest hydro electric disaster is thought to have killed up to ten thousand people.
More people die in the US oil patch every year than have died from all nuclear power accidents worldwide to date.
More radiation is released by a single coal burning power plant than any nuclear one.
Nuclear power isn't s
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Sensational! (Score:4, Insightful)
And some air masks too. Who wants some?
There was also a hysteria for the mad cow disease, but my wife did not buy anything, we merely rode the car through pools of soapy water back then (near farms)
The problem when the media says apocalypse is coming once a year, and we're still there the next year is that we pay less attention the next time.
Re:Sensational! (Score:5, Funny)
you don't want to see any Slashdot story about it that's not a glowing endorsement
There's enough glowing endorsements for nuclear power around Fukushima already.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It's not like there's a culture of honesty and openness in the US nuclear power industry.
More than a quarter of U.S. nuclear plant operators have failed to properly tell regulators about equipment defects that could imperil reactor safety, according to a report by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s inspector general.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/a-quarter-of-us-nuclear-plants-not-reporting-equipment-defects-report-finds/2011/03/24/ABHYa2RB_story.html?hpid=z2 [washingtonpost.com]
Re: (Score:3)
...idiot anit-nukers have created such a hostile anti-nuke environment...
Right now it appears reactor #3 is creating the hostile anti-nuke environment, but we should also keep our eyes on 2 and 4.
really guys? (Score:3, Insightful)
[I don't think I need to explain why "nearing chernobyl levels" is a ridiculous description...]
Re: (Score:3)
Actuaries.
In that light, I'd like you to read the cold-hard-numbers evaluation of the insurance companies number-crunchers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price-Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act [wikipedia.org]
The nuclear fission industry has its own special insurance law in the U.S.A. in order to "Privatize the profits, socialize the losses" [wikipedia.org].
Presumably because otherwise, there wouldn't be a nuclear fissio
Fear-mongering Technobabble (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Redundant)
Re: (Score:2)
OMG, we're all gonna die!
Don't worry, it's a well-known fact that radiation exposure will bring you back as a zombie.
And since everyone else will be zombies too, you won't have to worry about what kind of impression you'll make. (That hot chick's ears will be falling off too.)
Re:Fear-mongering Technobabble (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
Apocalypse! ... :)
We've all been there.
The same old trips, why should we care?
It's do or die.
Hey, I've died twice!
Misleading summary (Score:5, Insightful)
From TFA:
That's a really important difference. It means the total release of radioactive material is far smaller. And the iodine, at least, is a lot less scary than the sort of stuff you get from fuel particles -- it has a half-life of only 8 days, so there's no real long-term environmental threat from that. (The cesium is rather worse -- half life of ~30 years.)
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Informative)
It's ridicolous fear-mongering to post that we're at so-and-so percentage-level with regard to release of 2 specific radioactive substances, without mentioning that this in no way implies that we're even close to similar in general.
Like you point out, in particular iodine is a short-lived and thus mostly local problem (and even local radiation-levels have been very modest this far). Half-life of 8 days means that it's more than 99% gone in 2 months and 99.99% gone in 4 months and so on. (basically add a 9 every month)
There may yet be larger releases, but -this- far we've got ~20.000 dead due to earthquake and tsunami, and ~0 dead due to radiation released from the powerplants.
Re: (Score:3)
There may yet be larger releases, but -this- far we've got ~20.000 dead due to earthquake and tsunami, and ~0 dead due to radiation released from the powerplants.
Several people have radiation sickness from high exposure already, high doses have been recorded up to 40km away, and radiation kills long term (unless it's a massive dose), so that's not a very useful statistic. It is useful to know what levels of radiation have been released.
Unless fuel ponds or a reactor burns fully this disaster won't be comparable to Chernobyl, and it's unlikely to get that bad, but we should not play down its impact, which is likely to be hugely expensive over the long-term, given the
Re: (Score:3)
Yes it is a critical situation, but not as bad as this hype
The "Several people" are workers at the plant ....
Radiation in this case is mostly Iodine, which has a short halflife but is dangerous if ingested, not because of the whole body effects of the radiation (which are minimal) but because it is concentrated in the thyroid ... this is why short term avoidance of tapwater was advised
Caesium is usually distributed all over the body and is expelled natuarlly and so is less worrying in small doses ...
40 yea
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Informative)
Several people have radiation sickness from high exposure already, high doses have been recorded up to 40km away, and radiation kills long term (unless it's a massive dose), so that's not a very useful statistic. It is useful to know what levels of radiation have been released.
All of these points are, I believe, at least hyperbole, and at worst outright scaremongering.
While it's true several plant workers have been taken to hospital for monitoring after receiving acute doses higher than safety recommendations (>100 mSv), this is many times lower than the typical onset of "radiation sickness". The safety threshold is chosen as the limit of detectability for increased cancer risk over a lifetime, which puts it on the order of 1 or 2 percent increase in lifetime risk of cancer. Given they're doing very valuable work, this is not that dramatic a risk - the risk to other emergency responders in the wake of the tsunami is probably much greater.
With regards to the "high" doses 40 km away, these need to again be put in perspective - it is "high" compared to the local background (although often only 50 to 100% more than usual, barring localised spikes), but there are places in the world where natural radiation is almost 100 times greater than the typically quoted "background dose", and people live there just fine. Combined with the fact that most of this radiation is short-lived Iodine isotopes, a ballpark estimate suggests that people living outside the plant would only see a dose of 1 mSv or less by the time the iodine had decayed away, even if they ignored all the simple safety precautions which can be taken to reduce that further. These doses are well known not to cause any significant increase in cancer risk - long term or not.
And your suggestion of a Chernobyl-style sarcophagus being required is still rather unlikely. Since it appears none of the reactors have actually melted down or suffered a substantial failure in containment in the immediate vicinity of the rods themselves, it's quite likely that they'll be able to take them through a more or less normal shutdown and decommissioning once proper cooling is restored, and the storage implications will be no more serious than if they reached their natural end-of-life. Indeed, if they weren't already near or past their expected end-of-life, they could probably be fairly readily repaired, refuelled, and set running again within a relatively short timeframe. (Indeed, there's talk that this is being considered for Reactors 4 through 6, although that may turn out to not be politically viable).
I'm not denying it's a serious issue - but in the perspective of tens of thousands dead, and many times more homeless and short on food and other supplies, it really shouldn't be dominating headlines in this way.
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Insightful)
Since it appears none of the reactors have actually melted down or suffered a substantial failure in containment in the immediate vicinity of the rods themselves, it's quite likely that they'll be able to take them through a more or less normal shutdown and decommissioning once proper cooling is restored ...
Actually, the high I-131 and Cs-137 levels pretty well indicate that at least a partial meltdown has occurred. We'll only know for sure once we're able to crack them open and see what's inside, but my money's on it looking a lot like the TMI leftovers. With a mess of corium casserole inside, they're not going to just pop the lid off and pull the fuel bundles like any other shutdown. It'll be years before they peek inside, and years more before they've finished scraping the slag out. That's much better than Chernobyl where angry flaming core got spooed everywhere, but it's hardly a "normal" decommissioning.
Re: (Score:3)
http://www.angelfire.com/mo/radioadaptive/ramsar.html [angelfire.com]
"Ramsar, in northern Iran has some inhabited areas with the highest known natural radiation levels in the world."
"The radioactivity of the high background radiation areas (HBRAs) of Ramsar is due to Ra-226 and its decay products, which have been brought to the surface by the waters of hot springs. There are more than 9 hot springs with different concentrations of radium in Ramsar that are used as spas by both tourists and residents."
"According to the results of the surveys performed to date the radioactivity seems primarily to be due to the radium dissolved in mineral water and secondarily to travertine deposits having elevated levels of thorium combined with lesser concentrations of uranium "
but that isn't the interesting part.
this is.
"The preliminary results of cytogenetical, immunological and hematological studies on the residents of high background radiation areas of Ramsar have been previously reported (Mortazavi et al. 2001, Ghiassi-Nejad et al. 2002 and Mortazavi et al. in press), suggesting that exposure to high levels of natural background radiation can induce radioadaptive response in human cells. Lymphocytes of Ramsar residents when subjected to 1.5 Gy of gamma rays showed fewer induced chromosome aberrations compared to residents in a nearby control area whose lymphocytes were subjected to the same radiation dose. Despite the fact that in in vitro experiments lymphocytes of some individuals show a synergistic effect after pretreatment with a low dose(Mortazavi et al. 2000), none of the residents of high background radiation areas showed such a response. "
yes, when exposed to long term high levels of radiation these peoples cells adapted and ramped up their DNA repair mechanisms.
These people can survive radiation better than most.
now of course it's not magic, if you're out in the cold a lot you'll adapt to it a bit and your body will deal better with it. the same with heat or sunlight or etc etc.
it can still be overwhelmed but we do have mechanisms for dealing w
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Interesting)
radiation kills long term (unless it's a massive dose)
That is commonly accepted thinking, but is apparently incorrect.
Quotes are from Lawrence Solomon: Japan’s radioactive fallout could have silver lining [financialpost.com].
Sometimes reality is surprising.
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Insightful)
If by "high" doses you mean "doses that may, perhaps, increase your lifetime risk of getting cancer by a single-digit percentage" then yes.
I'm not saying this is ignorable, or not serious. I'm saying that this far, it seems likely that the harm to human health from the nukes, will be a tiny fraction of the damages resulting from the earthquake and tsunami.
i.e. if there where zero nuclear powerplants in the affected area, the number of dead and seriously injured people would've been essentially identical.
Japan has suffered a huge catastrophy. Nuclear powerplants has this far gotten a huge fraction of the attention, while actually causing a miniscule fraction of the deaths and injuries. This *may* change if we get a larger release of radioactive substances, offcourse.
Re:Misleading summary (Score:5, Insightful)
I suspect more people are going to wind up getting cancer and dying from smoke inhalation from all the gas, wood, and coal heaters they're using due to the rolling blackouts, than from radiation from this accident. In other words, the loss of electrical generating capacity due to the Fukushima Daiichi plant being offline is probably going to kill more people than the radiation it emits. But death by radiation is more exotic and makes a better story than death by long-term smoke inhalation, so the media splashes it all over their headlines.
Statistically, if you compare the safety of each power source in terms of deaths per TWh generated, this accident would have to kill something like 10,000 people in order for nuclear to lose its title as safest power generation technology (wind is currently second safest - yes, wind power has killed more people Watt-hour for Watt-hour than nuclear). This obsession people have with worst case scenarios is skewing their judgment into making the wrong decision on how safe the technology is. Just like how plane crashes make people think planes are more dangerous than they really are, or how big lottery prizes make people think it's worth buying a ticket when it really isn't.
Re: (Score:2)
Or the radioactive carbon and other material that came from the burning graphite in the Chernobyl reactor. That burned for what, two weeks straight?
But it seems like it has been contained now (Score:5, Funny)
"turning a possible Chernobyl into a mere Three Mile Island"
Re: (Score:3)
Like all other moments in life, there is a Simpsons quote that sums it up:
Sorry, but you also have to provide an xkcd and a reference from LoTR or Dr. Who.
Total Meltdown (Score:2)
FTA: "Chernobyl a huge fire released large amounts of many radioactive materials, including fuel particles, in smoke. At Fukushima Daiichi, only the volatile elements, such as iodine and caesium, are bubbling off the damaged fuel." So, it's not on fire but... well what does this mean?
Re: (Score:2)
and more importantly, what is a China Syndrome called when it happens in Japan???
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I believe the term is "partial meltdown", where the fuel rods get hot and unstable, but do not go goey like cheese under the grill. From the little I remember from university metallurgy is that essentially these rods are alloys, primarily U-238 but with other stuff entering the mix when the uranium undergoes fission, alloys are known change phase under heat and certain metals bubble out or condense depending on their chemical properties.
Total meltdown is where the rods turn into liquid and drip down into a
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
There is zero risk of supercriticality.
Look, I'm sure the risk is small; it may even be "infinitesimal" but it isn't zero. Consider for example a situation where the containment vessel is cracked (as has already happened) and that crack leads to the uranium going down into one particular area of the vessel. Consider also the situation where the bottom of the vessel has been filled in with other material (dried up salt from sea water?) forcing a change in configuration.
There are reasons to believe that a stable critical mass will not be reached; it's incredibly difficult to do and the uranium will tend to blow it's self apart immediately that happens meaning that no real nuclear explosion will happen. However, a little more humility and a whole bunch more circumspection would really help you maintain credibility for when you want to persuade people that the modern "safe" nuclear plants really are safe.
That's the trouble. Nuclear plants are held to a massively high standard of "safe" already.
Did you know, for example, that Coal kills 4,000 (not a typo) more people per wattHour than Nuclear does [typepad.com]? But its a slow, boring kind of killed, like the 40,000+ who die every year in automobile accidents in the US alone, not the fun exciting kind of killed that you get every couple of years when an airliner crashes and kills 200 folk halfway around the globe, making national news.
To have a meaningful discussion you
Re:Total Meltdown (Score:4, Insightful)
So does this mean the reactor has officially "melted down"?
No, but the press has.
This is only referring to the cesium and iodine. I find even those figures suspect considering that Chernobyl literally ejected it's core directly into the air. Especially given the rather unalarming radiation measurements all around the area.
Re: (Score:2)
Something did melt because TEPCO measured neutron radiation which indicates a small amount of fission.
What and how much is anybody's guess.
Re: (Score:2)
Habemus papam (Score:5, Funny)
Interview with Chernobyl cleanup director (Score:5, Interesting)
Full translated interview:
17/03/2011 Rafael Poch, Berlin Correspondent
Andreyev: "In the nuclear industry there are no independent bodies" "The most dangerous reactor in Fukushima is 3, because it uses a fuel of uranium and plutonium," said Yuli
He spent five years at Chernobyl. Spetsatom was deputy director of the anti-Soviet body nuclear accidents and knows very well how the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) works.
Yuri Andreyev (1938) is one of the most knowledgeable in this area. To Fukushima includes four scenarios of varying severity, from mild to very severe.
"In Fukushima, the most dangerous reactor is three, because it uses MOX fuel more plutonium uranium that France is being used experimentally in two Japanese plants," says this expert.
In 1991 everything fell apart in Moscow. The salary of deputy minister of atomic energy, the position he was offered Andreyev, not enough for anything. The Academy of Sciences of Austria was invited to lecture and eventually settled in Vienna as adviser to the minister of environment, universities and the IAEA itself.
Chernoby is still surrounded by lies, says. The accident was not the responsibility of plant operators, as stated, but a clear design flaw in the RBMK reactors result of cost savings. Proper design of those Soviet reactors required a large amount of zirconium, a rare metal, and a maze of pipes, special techniques for welding of zirconium, stainless steel and huge amounts of concrete. It was a fortune, so they decided to save money, said Andreyev.
One of the resources of savings was to feed the reactor with relatively low enriched uranium, since uranium enrichment is a complicated and expensive. This increased the risks and was contrary to the rules of safety, but supervision in the USSR nuclear part of the Ministry of Atomic Energy. Something similar is happening today with the IAEA, as the UN agency "depends on the nuclear industry," said Andreyev, under which lies and secrets of Chernobyl are now fully present in Fukushima.
Security, money, irresponsibility
"Those who design nuclear power plants are pending on two things: safety and cost. The problem is that security costs money. If you spend too much on nuclear power plant it is not competitive. The accident at Three Mile Island is the perfect example. After the accident was to improve security in a convincing way to avoid repetition of the accident both plants more expensive, they lost all meaning. For thirty years in America was not built a single reactor. Chernobyl was all very complicated but also had to do with economics. Academician Rumyantsev showed that we had to close all RBMK reactors. Simply ignored. There are always people interested in hiding something ... "
What are they hiding?
They lend themselves to compromise on security in exchange for selfish considerations. In the USSR for the cost of uranium enrichment in Japan simply for money. The location of central Japan, near the sea is the cheapest. Emergency generators are not buried and, of course, were flooded instantly .... Behind all this there is corruption. I have no proof, but will not take long to appear. How can I design a nuclear power plant in an area of ââhigh seismic risk, near the ocean, with emergency generators at the surface?. Wave arrived and everything was out of service. There is no error, this is a crime.
What problems do you see wi
Re: (Score:2)
I find your Babelfish to be unintelligible: Apparently, they're translating from Russian to Spanish to English.
Much is lost.
Would a native Spanish speaker care to contribute a better translation of the linked and translated article, or (much better) a native Russian speaker care to find the interview in its original dialect and convert it (even in brief) to English in one step?
Please?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Here. I've tried to do a better translation from the Spanish article, which is actually quite well-written
Andreyev: "In the nuclear industry there are no independent organisms"
"The most dangerous reactor in Fukushima is 3, because it uses a fuel that combines uranium and plutonium," he states.
He spent five years at Chernobyl. He was vice-director of Spetsatom, the Soviet body for the fight against nuclear accidents, and he knows deep internals of how the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) works.
Yuri
Relevant arXiv paper (Score:3)
For those who don't know, the University of Washington has one of the best nuclear physics programs in the US.
Turns out they do detect trace amounts of iodine-131 in the air, but nowhere near Chernobyl levels.
http://arxiv.org/abs/1103.4853v1 [arxiv.org]
Bottled water and meltdown (Score:5, Informative)
Reporting live from Tokyo (well, just on the outskirts, but def. part of the greater Tokyo area):
People here have bought up massive amounts of bottled water, though apparently the level of radioactive iodine has fallen below the maximum legal limit for infants (which is one third for that of adults). Milk is also in short supply. Two days ago, two supermarkets near me had no milk, or plain bottled water. (Haven't looked since then.)
On the subject of meltdowns, there is no "official" meaning to the term. But, I would say that at least a couple of the reactors have "melted down" (I haven't really been paying attention to the news, so I don't know if any of the others have or not). Anyway, fun facts, the "precautionary" safe limit of 80 KM set by the US government (and then the Australian government), for folks, was apparently worth setting. At least one village outside the 30 KM radius has had really high levels of radioactive iodine get into the water.
Me, I'm staying in Tokyo until things get really bad. But, I imagine, at least a couple of million of the other residents would also want to leave at that time too. So...
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/fukushima-raised-level-6-ines-scale-now-officially-more-serious-3-mile-island [zerohedge.com]
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/radioactive-iodine-fukushima-seawater-highest-ever-reactors-5-and-6-now-leaking-too [zerohedge.com]
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/run-rated-fukushina-radiation-release-par-and-some-cases-greater-chernobyl [zerohedge.com]
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/japan-nuclear-agency-radiation-level-fukushima-reactor-no-2-its-highest-level-recorded-so-fa [zerohedge.com] (has neutron beam detai
Fukushima (Score:3, Insightful)
There are immediately several posts expressing scepticism about this story. You people need to set that instinct aside for a moment. I am not [slashdot.org] an anti-nuke hysteric. Allow me the benefit of the doubt.
Recent reports from Japan are trending towards large amounts of contamination. Levels of Caesium and Iodine in the sea are very high. Soil samples are turning up large amounts of contamination. Tokyo tap water (200 km away) is contaminated. Vegetables in Hong Kong are accumulating Caesium that exceed limits. I have been monitoring Kyodo and NHK news and the degree of contamination being reported is disturbing.
Today's events include severe radiation burns on two workers, acknowledgement of containment failure in No.3 (MOX reactor,) an increase of the evacuation radius from 20 to 30 km and an order to greatly increase radiation monitoring at the site. Unexplained bursts of various gases have been forcing worker evacuations throughout the week. Fukushima didn't end when the news cycle cut over to Libya.
Fukushima has been releasing vapour directly into the atmosphere from reactor pressure vessels in which fuel damage has occurred. There is no precedent for that procedure in the history of nuclear technology, there has been no opportunity to directly measure the contamination of these releases, so there is no credible information on the actual amount of contamination being released from these vessels. There is no credible information on the amount of spent fuel that was lofted by the spent fuel pool fires. There is no accounting of the amount of contamination flowing off the site due to the use of water cannons.
DO NOT discount reports of contamination. DO NOT dismiss out of hand comparisons of Fukushima with Chernobyl.
I can't find a way to sugar coat that. Sorry.
Re:Fukushima (Score:5, Insightful)
DO dismiss out of hand comparisons of Fukushima with Chernobyl. Because they're completely different events, at differently designed nuclear power plants, with a completely different level of response from the local authorities. Even in the absolute worst case scenario, Fukushima will never be anywhere near as bad as Chernobyl was in terms of deaths, long term damage to the environment or cost & duration of cleanup.
Re: (Score:2)
No, sounds like they're finally feeding water into it which is allowing boil off and so some radiation release. Two very different hings. Do not conflate it with the fact the are fixing things and it's under more cooling control than left alone.
Levels of cesium and iodine are from direct runoff and in the direction of venting. The levels are still nothing to worry about unless you're in the direct area. Tap water was being fed by the Edo river from the north into Tokyo's water. That's just another red her
Re: (Score:2)
I am not an anti-nuke hysteric.
I'd kind of like to be a pro-nuke non-hysteric, but alas, it seems that our species lacks either the brains or the willpower to use designs that are proof against earthquakes and Soviet-quality engineering, or to plan ahead on what we're going to do with all the spent fuel and other nasty sh*t that you wouldn't want them dumping in you back yard.
Re:Fukushima (Score:4, Informative)
Things are slowly getting better. It wasn't the best two weeks, but life in Japan goes on as normal. That said, I'm down in Kyoto, which is pretty far from it all.
Re:Fukushima (Score:5, Insightful)
DO NOT discount reports of contamination. DO NOT dismiss out of hand comparisons of Fukushima with Chernobyl.
I can't find a way to sugar coat that. Sorry.
The scary contamination in Tokyo is between 0.3% and 1.5% of the radioactive exposure you get from smoking one cigarette. Scary, isn't it?
before cigarettes became Radioactive... (Score:3)
The scary contamination in Tokyo is between 0.3% and 1.5% of the radioactive exposure you get from smoking one cigarette. Scary, isn't it?
You didn't say why cigarettes are radioactive. As I recall, in WWII the government took the tobacco industry's usual fertilizer (urea) to make explosives. The tobacco industry switched to Rock Phosphate, which they liked better anyways because it could be mined with a caterpillar instead of collected with farm hands.
Re: (Score:3)
It's all Iodine and Caesium. These are highly dangerous radioactive materials ... for an incredibly short period of time.
Stop parroting this shit, for crying out loud! It's almost as bad as the media hyperventilating in the opposite direction. I'm as pro-nuke as they come, and this just makes all of us look like ignorant fools.
Repeat after me: Cs-137 has a half-life of 30 years. Maybe that's an incredibly short period of time in comparison to the natural radioisotopes that decay on geological timescales, but it sure as hell isn't for the people.
Braindamage? (Score:3, Insightful)
This article is full of errors major errors, including the title/conclusion.
They're typically off by about a factor 10; they seem to have ignored the exponent when calculating the percentages they use to conclude Fukushima is nearing Tsjernobyl levels. Where they state that Tsjernobyl put out 70% more caesium-137 than Fukushima, it's actually 1700%. Where they state that Tsjernobyl put out 50% more Iodine-131 it's actually 1400%. These numbers are based on the readings provided by the article.
Apart from that the comparison simply makes no sense for a 1000 other reasons. Remote detectors for airborne radioactive particles cannot reliably provide an indication of what the reactor put out, especially given the fact that Tsjernobyl was a fire releasing all kinds of aerosols while Fukushima releases mostly gasses that probably get carried much futher by the wind and do not pollute the grounds in the perimeter of the reactor as much as Tsjernobyl.
Furthermore, Tsjernobyl started out with explosion that probably released a huge quantity of especially iodine in one big blast, not leaving quite that much for the "aftermath" (which this article makes a comparison with). Also, what they fail to mention is the deadly mix of compounds other than iodine and caesium released by Tsjernobyl.
This is nothing like Tsjernobyl and it will not become anything like it either. Stop the FUD please.
Re:Braindamage? (Score:5, Informative)
They are comparing a per-day value from Fukushima to a 10-day value from Chernobyl, that's why there's a factor of 10 difference, and they have taken it into account.
Except they took measurement from TWO DAYS... (Score:3)
One done in USA and the other a day later in Japan AT THE BEGINNING OF THE INCIDENT - and then extrapolated that over 14 days until they had amounts close or over those in Chernobyl.
http://newsroom.ctbto.org/ [ctbto.org]
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,14938445,00.html [dw-world.de]
"The estimated source terms for iodine-131 are very constant, namely 1.3 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the first two days (US station) and 1.2 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the third day (Japan)," the institute said in a German-language statement posted on Wednesday on its website.
"For cesium-137 measurements, (the US station) measured 5 x 10^15 becquerels, close, while Japan had much more cesium in its air. On this day, we estimate a source term of about 4 x 10^16."
If they keep counting long enough they'll top Hiroshima as well. Then again, so will my room on the other side of the planet.
Slashdot Sensationalism Nears The Sun Levels (Score:3)
Title says it all.
Coal power plants emit more radiation than nuclear (Score:3)
Re:Banana? (Score:5, Insightful)
And the "something" that just doesn't work is Slashdot fact-checking.
Re: (Score:3)
Please don't spread crap and tell me I'm going to die because I'm deliberately refusing to "follow orders".
Additionally, don't spam it anonymously (so we can at least block you out if we so wish), and at least have the decency to do less advertising of your church in your post than linking to a "relevant" article - I mean, come on - keyword spamming?
The really *annoying* part of evangelism such as this is that if you'd just posted the link without all the crap attached to it (from the keyword spamming and d
Re:Chernobyl: wild animals and rapid evolution (Score:5, Insightful)
Could you describe the difference between evolution caused by increased radiation and evolution caused by what ever else? Evolution is just changes and nothing more. Stuff happens and sometimes it turns out to be something that changes things.
No, evolution is not just changes. Evolution is the effect of long term adaptation of a population to the environment through the combined effects of mutation, natural selection and reproduction. Mere mutation alone doesn't give you evolution.
The speed of evolution is not directly proportional to the mutation rate. If the mutation rate is too high, beneficial mutations are quickly swamped in harmful mutations, and unable to contribute to an increased chance of reproduction. What does speed up evolution is a change in environment. I bet Chernobyl will result in organisms in the area being more resistant to radiation and radioactive pollution.
Re: (Score:3)
"The SI system uses the unit of becquerel (Bq) as its unit of radioactivity. One curie is 37 billion Bq. Since the Bq represents such a small amount, one is likely to see a prefix noting a large multiplier used with the Bq as follows
Then think about
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/summary-key-health-threats-fukushima-radioactive-substances [zerohedge.com]