People were killed by Three Mile Island & other nuclear disasters

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/7/2007/1613

People were killed by Three Mile Island & other nuclear disasters

November 18, 2007

One of the biggest lies ever told in American industrial history is that "no one died at Three Mile Island."

In the frenzy to get public funding for still more nuclear reactors, some industry backers now say no one has ever been killed by the nuclear industry AT ALL.

These absurd statements reflect atomic energy's desperate need for federal loan guarantees, which have been slipped into the Energy Bill now before Congress. After fifty years of proven failure, no private sources will invest in this lethal, expensive technology.

Meanwhile billions are pouring into the booming business of green power, including wind, solar power and increased efficiency. These technologies are not only profitable and clean, they don't kill people.

And the reality is that people have, in fact, been killed by the fallout from atomic power, and not just at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl.

...

In 1979, human error caused the melt-down at Three Mile Island Unit Two. The reactor's owners immediately denied there was any melting of fuel. This was a lie. Robotic cameras later showed that at least a third of the fuel had melted.

The owners said there was never a danger of a major catastrophe. That was a lie. The plant was very much at the brink of an apocalyptic radiation release.

The owners ridiculed those---among them Pennsylvania's Secretary of Health---who desperately warned that local citizens should be evacuated, especially to protect pregnant women and small children. The governor finally ordered just such an evacuation, but later fired his long-time friend at the Department of Health, who had advocated the evacuation, and who warned of damage from TMI's stealth radioactive fallout.

TMI's owners denied that its releases harmed anyone. But the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has admitted to Congress that nobody knows how much radiation escaped or where it went.

Official statistics showed a huge jump in infant death rates in Harrisburg in the three months after the accident compared to the numbers for the previous two years. State statistics showing heightened cancer rates were quickly altered. The state's tumor registry was abolished. Evidence showing downwind health effects was suppressed.

But an investigative team from the Baltimore News-Herald uncovered a massive epidemic of death and disease among the area's farm and wild animals.

In early 1980, I reported from ground zero on a ghastly epidemic of human death and disease. Based on a horrifying series of house-to-house interviews, I found cancer, heart attacks, respiratory problems, skin lesions, cataracts, a metallic taste in the mouth, hair loss, birth defects and everything else you'd expect from a major radiation release was everywhere to be found.

With three other researchers, I spent two years investigating these and other parallel epidemics at nuclear facilities throughout the United States. Our findings were published in 1982 by Dell/Delta in a book called KILLING OUR OWN (www.ratical.org/radiation/KillingOurOwn/KOO.pdf) that showed a similar death toll throughout the nuclear fuel cycle---especially at uranium mines, mills and enrichment facilities---and at weapons production plants, waste storage pools and much more.

At TMI, 2400 central Pennsylvania families filed a class action lawsuit seeking justice. But the federal courts have never allowed their case to be heard.

Studies by Steven Wing of the University of North Carolina have confirmed the TMI death toll. Researcher Joe Mangano and others have used the government's own statistics to show a heightened cancer rate in the region. Parallel studies have correlated radioactive emissions with infant death rates, cancer rates and other health epidemics around other operating reactors.

...

[bbinacan]

1. I wonder how many people

have died from the mining of coal and the exploration for petroleum.

[RaleighNCDUer]

4. Do you really wonder

or are you just trying to change the subject?

The difference is, THOSE numbers exist. The radiation deaths are being hidden, deliberately. Do you wonder why?

[bbinacan]

44. I do really wonder.

What's the problem with asking?

[RaleighNCDUer]

45. Because whenever anyone brings up nuclear related deaths to a

pro-nuke person, that person invariably brings up the number of death caused by coal, as if that made the nuke deaths acceptable.

So I hope you'll pardon my suspicion.

[bbinacan]

48. Yes I am pro-nuke

and my question is a legitimate one. I don't find nuke deaths any more acceptable than those related to other energy producing areas. I'm looking for perspective. France has done a damned good job with nuclear power.

Or as Bush and Carter like to call it, nookier.:evilgrin:

[OKIsItJustMe]

49. France

France still hasn't found a way to dispose of their waste and even the French people don't believe expanding Nuclear power (or "nucular" as President Carter was wont to say) should be a priority:

http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/french_shun_nuclear_energy_choose_conservation/

...

Only 35 per cent of respondents think developing nuclear power should be a priority for France, and 61 per cent think this should not be the focus of the country’s energy policy.

...

One of the key differences between France's program and ours is that ours is (and would continue to be) a hodgepodge system, with multiple companies building and operating plants built to multiple designs. The French have a central agency which built and operates a system of largely uniform reactors.


As for the question of how many people have been killed by fossil fuels. It really isn't relevant. I doubt anyone here is advocating building coal plants rather than nuclear plants.

However, while I think just about everyone is well aware of the hazards faced by coal miners (for example) nuclear (fission) proponents insist on pretending that there is absolutely no hazard involved in nuclear energy.

[bbinacan]

50. Take away the nuclear plants

in France and I think you'll hear a different tune. I see nuclear power as only a stop-gap measure that will give us time to advance the technology for alternative energy sources.

[losthills]

51. Renewables technology is already here.

Money spent on Nuclear Power is money diverted from where it should be spent-- on Solar and Wind Power.

And it's more money spent to sicken our citizens and degrade our environment.

[OKIsItJustMe]

53. I sympathize

However, we cannot simply shut down all of the US Nuclear Plants tonight.

What we can do is route subsidies to make alternative power more attractive for new construction.

[losthills]

55. There seems to be some confusion here...

Evidence has been presented that the nuclear power industry is causing people to die of a smorgasboard of cancers at every stage of their operations-- including radiation leakage from the plants themselves that endangers populations living immmediately downwind.

That is reason enough to shut them all down-- now.

[OKIsItJustMe]

59. Nope, no confusion

Nuclear power provides roughly 20% of the electricity used in this country.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/nuclear/page/nuc_generation/gensum.html

If we shut them all down tonight, tomorrow would be a very difficult day.

[losthills]

64. Electricity is not worth a single human life.

We lived just fine without it for many thousands of years.

It's a convenience, not an essential.

No one needs to die for electricity....

[GliderGuider]

68. That's one of the most egregiously stupid statements I've read here.

"We" lived just fine without it for many thousands of years. How many of "us" lived just fine without it for thousands of years? I'll give you a clue - less than a billion at any one time lived without it for thousands of years. For most of those thousands of years there were mere hundreds of millions living without it. There are now 6.6 billion of us.

The electricity requirements for food refrigeration alone guarantee that electricity is more than a "convenience" to most of those 6.6 billion people.

[losthills]

69. Lots of people in this world live without it.

It's not worth dying for.

Power can be generated without killing people. Nuclear power is killing people and it should be outlawed.

[GliderGuider]

70. Power can't be generated without killing people.

6,000 coal miners die every year. Two million people die from air pollution caused from, among other things, burning coal for electricity. There have even been fatalities from wind power.

I know you're afraid of nuclear power, but to try and justify your opposition to that source by saying that humanity doesn't need electricity damages your credibility.

[losthills]

76. It's a luxury and not a necessity.

I stand by that statement.

No other power source even comes remotely close to the dangers of nuclear power. I have never heard anyone in this forum promote coal, but if we had as many nuclear plants as coal plants we would truly be living in hell.

The statement that power can't be generated without killing people does not ring true to me, my friend. You might want to take that one back. We do have safe and sane alternatives...

[NickB79]

77. "if we had as many nuclear plants as coal plants we would truly be living in hell"

Yeah, I can taste the brimstone every time I drink a wine produced in France (80% of electricity generated by nuclear power). It must be torture to live there.

Same thing when I eat imported Japanese candy that my friend brought back from his vacation (over 50% of electricity generated by nuclear power).

It must be horrible having to live in those primitive shitholes, surrounded by all that nuclear power.

[Nihil]

79. Lots of people in this world die without it.

Many (most?) of the "lots of people in this world" who are living without it
at the moment are not doing so out of choice and, given that choice, would
willingly embrace the opportunity to have electricity make their life a bit
more comfortable (not to mention longer).

We're not talking iPod chargers here: they want electricity to light their
homes and to pump water, not just to recharge the batteries on their Tesla ...

> Power can be generated without killing people.

Maybe it can but it isn't - not if you adopt your measure for assigning deaths
to a particular generating method.

> Nuclear power is killing people and it should be outlawed.

Coal, oil & gas power is killing people and should be outlawed.
Cars are killing people and should be outlawed.
The insatiable demand for money is killing people and should be outlawed.

Dumbass blanket statements are killing people - often because they have
been turning *into* laws & policies ...

[OKIsItJustMe]

71. "Electricity is not worth a single human life."

(As I said) "I sympathize." However, the absence of electricity would directly lead to the deaths of many many people.

Consider, just for starters, people who depend on some sort of dialysis machine, or some sort of "life support."

Imagine what would happen if electric trains and subways stopped running. No elevators, no refrigerators, no telephones...

At this point, slightly more than half of the US population lives in cities. Without electricity, you may as well evacuate them right now (but where to?)

Civilization (as we know it) would collapse, and it would not do it gracefully.


Yes, our ancestors lived without electricity. Yes, people still live without it. What percentage of "Americans" do you believe would survive the loss of it today?

[OKIsItJustMe]

54. Notice I did not say the French wanted to do away with their nuclear plants

However, they don't believe their priority should be in further developing nuclear power.

For one thing, they don't know how to deal with the waste.

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=31466

France's Nuclear Waste Heads to Russia

Julio Godoy* - Tierramérica

PARIS, Dec 17 (IPS) - France sends thousands of tonnes of nuclear waste to Russia each year, but the details are shielded by a decree of "national security" in order to block debate on the issue, says the environmental watchdog group Greenpeace.
"This kind of traffic of nuclear waste between Western Europe and Russia has gone on for more than three decades already, and allows the big nuclear energy companies, like Electricité de France, to store their radioactive waste at extremely contaminated sites in Siberia," Greenpeace-France spokesman Grégory Gendre told Tierramérica.

On Dec. 1, some 20 activists from the environmental group tried unsuccessfully to block a 450-tonne shipment of depleted uranium from the port of Le Havre, 360 km northwest of Paris, on the Atlantic coast, to a radioactive material enrichment plant in Russia.

According to the study "La France nucléaire", published in 2002 by the World Information Service on Energy (WISE), each year the French nuclear station Eurodif, situated on the banks of the Rhone River, 700 km south of the French capital, produces 15,000 tonnes of depleted uranium.

Most of that waste is of no further use, and is simply stored at the nuclear plant. Today there are an estimated 200,000 tonnes of this nuclear material being warehoused there.

But 30 to 40 percent of Eurodif's depleted uranium -- 4,500 to 6,000 tonnes annually -- is sent to Russia, where it undergoes "enrichment" to turn it back into fuel for nuclear power plants. Just one-tenth of that uranium returns to France, and the rest remains in Russia, stored in inadequate conditions, say the environmental activists.

Greenpeace also warns that the uranium shipments are made using conventional Russian transportation, without appropriate safety and security measures, along a route that passes through major cities like St. Petersburg and Tomsk, and along the coasts of Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Norway and Finland.

...

[Scriptor Ignotus]

10. exploration for petroleum

and the exploitation of petroleum producing countries. Oil has killed millions more than nuclear ever will.

[kestrel91316]

35. Oil isn't the subject under discussion. Nuclear is.

[Scriptor Ignotus]

41. i know it wasn't about oil

but it was about nuclear power killing people. oil has killed far more, although way more indirectly. therefore, nuclear has a certain advantage over oil, despite the dangers of radioactivity and meltdowns.

if that wasn't the subject of discussion before, it should be.

[RaleighNCDUer]

46. Give it a chance - it will catch up. nt

[Name removed]

34. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[BornagainDUer]

2. NBC, owned by General Electric-heavy into nuke energy technology--

did a TV show on TMI called "What happened?" (~1993). Not one of these lawsuits was mentioned in the program. I just remembered that.

[ClayZ]

3. My parents worked at Hanford from 1946

to 1968. They eventually retired and moved back there. My mom has had 4 separate unrelated types of cancer and my dad has cancer of the esophagus. They filed and were paid on claims for my mom on two types and my father for one.

Richland highschool mascot is an BOMB! No wonder I am nutz!

It has been horrible to go through these illnesses with them. My brother died of leukemia at the age of 53. He was diagnosed with cancer of a lymph node first when he was 12.

The nearest towns to Hanford, Richland, Pasco and Kenniwick WA, are growing by leaps and bounds. Each time we visit there are LOTS more new homes, restaurants, shopping centers, churches, etc. All brand spanking new. Housing is very inexpensive, compared to Seattle. It makes me think SOMETHING is really going on down there.

YIKES!

[GliderGuider]

5. People always die when high-density energy sources are involved.

According to WHO, 2 million people a year die from air pollution primarily caused by burning fossil fuels.
Over 6,000 people die in coal mining accidents every year, and over 10,000 contract black lung disease.
People die in refinery and pipeline fires.
Lumberjacks die cutting trees for firewood.
Homeowners die in gas explosions, electrical fires, fires from wood stoves.

Every energy source carries risks. Uranium is special in one way, though. Along with its real risks it carries a crushing burden of paranoia and fear.

Oil and gas is now starting to run out. We have less than 10 years to get as much other energy in place as possible, or dying from radiation will be the least of anyone's worries.

[vallie_h]

8. Don't Forget Chernobyl

They nearly exposed the core during the meltdown in Chernobyl. We all would have been screwed if that had happened. The Ukranians sent people to their certain death in order to prevent the exposure of the core.
http://www.greens.org/s-r/10/10-11.html


Nuclear energy is NOT an option. I can't believe Sen. Obama was even considering it when he answered a debate question the other night. Where are the No-Nukes folks? I looked up to them when I was a kid.

[GliderGuider]

11. OK, so what IS the option?

Oil is already getting expensive, and it's started to become scarce here and there as well. That situation is not going to improve. Natural gas is going to follow oil down the global depletion slope in less than ten years, and it's going to run out even faster. All the good hydro sites in the world are already in use. Coal is already killing us with CO2 and particulate emissions. You and others say nuclear power is off the table. Where does that leave humanity?

We will need to replace or add about 30% of the world's total energy use within 10 years, counting the depletion of oil and gas as well as growing demand. Where will it come from?

[jpak]

19. Stick your fingers in your ears

There is no such thing as renewable energy

There is no such thing as renewable energy

There is no such thing as renewable energy

There is no such thing as renewable energy

There is no such thing as renewable energy

There is no such thing as renewable energy

:evilgrin:

[phantom power]

22. "renewables have no external costs! renewables have no external costs! renewables..."

What will the environmental and human health costs be for manufacturing 150x10^18 joules (per year) worth of wind and/or solar power?

Last week, I noticed with interest that although the ExternE people came up with a "fully" externalized cost for wind power that was competitive with nuclear power, they came right out and admitted that they had not counted the costs of manufacturing the wind turbines.

That's a major omission. It really bothers me to see people treat the "renewables versus nuclear" debate as if it's a no-brainer, when nobody even has a figure for the external costs of actually manufacturing renewable energy infrastructure. Calling it "clean energy" just because it is clean while it's operating is an enormous blunder.

[OKIsItJustMe]

24. How much radioactive waste is created by an operating wind turbine

How many low-level radiation releases will there be from a solar panel?

These are vitally important questions which must be answered!


Seriously though. There are costs to building the infrastructure to support wind farms or solar farms. Do you believe they are greater than the costs to build a nuclear plant? (disregarding the whole question of mining, refining and disposing of the fuel.)

[phantom power]

26. The short answer is "I don't know." Consider this...

To replace the energy output of one gigawatt reactor, you must manufacture 1000 3-megawatt wind turbines. The turbines, the blades, the towers, the concrete footings, etc. Mine the materials, machine the metals, transport all the hardware and install it, etc. Furthermore, if you wanted to balance the power output, you must manufacture a commensurate amount of energy storage. Again, mining the materials, etc...

And once you have them installed, there are maintenance costs (just like for any other kind of machinery, including nuclear plants), and disposal costs at end-of-life, etc.

Again, not even the ExternE project attempted to account for all of this.

Environmental impact is environmental impact. I do not consider environmental impact from radiation to be any better or worse than environmental impact from other kinds of industrial activities. 100 deaths from radiation are not worse than 100 deaths from pollution caused by manufacturing wind turbines.

So. Do you know that wind or solar power are "better" than nuclear power? If you do know, how do you know?

[GliderGuider]

25. I've also had an email exchange with an aeronautical engineer

He is concerned that turbine blades are not being designed or tested for representative conditions:

Have been reading some structural engineering reports on wind turbines and the more I read the more I think their problems are unsolvable. There are about five different forces acting on the blade, there are vibration problems caused by the movement of the tower itself, the passage of the blade past the tower, the drive train and the vibrations in the generator itself. The weight has to be limited because of centrifugal forces or it would tear itself to bits and this limits the strength that can be put into them. It is a known fact that a flywheel cannot be designed over a certain weight for a certain speed because of this.

As the blade is a virtual copy of an aircraft wing or propeller the same forces apply. The maximum co-efficient of lift is at about 16 degrees which is when you reach the critical angle of attack and the wing stalls. The same thing happens with a turbine blade and this produces what they call stall flutter - well imagine a downburst out of a thunderstorm, the wind would be going in all directions and changing this angle of attack which the blade can't avoid. Big stress and bang, it breaks. They are now talking of designing turbine blades with a diameter of 120 metres - these people have no idea of thunderstorm forces and the Die Spiegel article states that the design engineers underestimated the forces. Allianz had over a thousand damage claims for 2006 alone.

He's forwarded me some photographs of blade and tower failures that look pretty disturbing. I'm not an aeronautical engineer, so I can't pass judgement on what he's saying, but if he's right, this does not bode well for MTBF or O&M costs as turbines are installed in riskier high-wind locations.

I have yet to see a full life cycle analysis of large turbines, but I did a bit of digging on the weekend, and found some MTBF figures just for the power electronics and gearing that were in the 18,000 to 24,000 hour range. That doesn't look too bad, but when you have thousands of the things installed you'd better be prepared for some hefty maintenance costs - one PPT I came across showed about half the cost of electricity coming from maintenance. If the blades and towers are more vulnerable than has been publicized, that only make the picture muddier.

[OKIsItJustMe]

29. What's the worst case scenario?

Badly engineered wind turbines throw hot metal hundreds of meters, perhaps setting fire to surrounding vegetation. (That's about as bad as I can imagine; how about you?)

Now, what's the worst case scenario for the failure of a nuclear plant?

[GliderGuider]

30. The worst case scenario

is not the failure modes of the turbines or their consequences.

The worst case scenario is that the maintenance costs of large arrays of turbines turn out to be much higher than predicted, resulting in slower penetration of wind power into a depleting global energy picture. The resulting inability of wind power to plug the growing energy gap caused by the decline of oil and gas supplies prompts many countries to ramp up their coal generation, resulting in 3 million deaths per year world wide from air pollution instead of the current 2 million.

Or perhaps you win the global debate outright and people don't invest in either coal or nuclear power. Then the decline in oil and gas supplies means that the developing world especially starts to run short of affordable electricity. That shortage further damages their economies, making it impossible for them to afford the higher priced fertilizer they need to grow food. The result of that miscalculation is tens or hundreds of millions of dead in Africa and South Asia by the middle of the century.

That's the worst case scenario, not a thrown blade somewhere in North Dakota.

[OKIsItJustMe]

31. Let's be realistic

We're not going to run the entire world on wind turbines tomorrow (if ever.) Wind farms will grow in number and size (presumably) over time.

Early generations of wind turbines will almost certainly be improved upon. They will fail, and their manufacturers will analyze the failures and figure out how to improve them, or perhaps more simply, where best to erect them.

Experience will be gained over time on how best to maintain them, and what their weak points are. New models will be introduced, and will be used in new installations, and to replace older models as needed.

This improvement will be accelerated by having large numbers of them in place. (Perhaps a certain failure only affects one turbine out of 1,000. Put up 10 turbines, and you may not see it. Put up 10,000 of them, and you're almost certain to.)

[GliderGuider]

32. So if wind isn't going to plug the energy leak caused by oil and gas depletion, what is?

The good hydro sites are all in use. PV is likely going to face feedstock limits in the near future unless a miracle happens. CSP is still in its infancy, so it will face the same kinds of teething problems as wind is going through now. That leaves us with coal and nuclear. I really don't like that choice, but for the sake of the planet I know which one I'd make.

[OKIsItJustMe]

33. A variety of sources

Even if you decided to run the entire world on fission, it wouldn't happen overnight. It would take decades. Then there's the practical matter of the shortage of Uranium.

Oh sure, in theory you can reprocess the fuel (even the French haven't gotten that down yet.)

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v439/n7076/full/439509b.html

Nature 439, 509-510 (2 February 2006) | doi:10.1038/439509b

Recycling the past

The reprocessing of nuclear fuel is an idea that should be laid to rest.

Plans to revive nuclear power are stirring on both sides of the Atlantic. In Britain, Tony Blair's government has been making upbeat noises about the need to replace existing nuclear power plants to fend off both national dependence on foreign sources of energy and global warming.

In the United States, however, President George Bush is said to be contemplating a step that will revive public concern about the link between nuclear energy and nuclear weapons — and could ultimately set back any prospect of reviving the former.

When it is released next week, Bush's 2007 budget proposal is expected to include a provision that would start to revive nuclear-fuel reprocessing. That would end a three-decade-old strategy in the United States that has sought to sever the connection between nuclear power and nuclear weapons.

Nuclear-fuel reprocessing aims to reduce the volume of spent nuclear fuel that has to be disposed of safely by recycling it for use in new types of nuclear reactor. But the recycling involves separating components that can readily be used to build nuclear weapons.

Of the countries with significant nuclear power capacity, the United States and Germany abandoned reprocessing early on, and Britain, having ditched the fast-reactor design that would burn the recycled fuel, looks set to follow suit. Japan is trying to build a reprocessing plant, but only France has stuck resolutely with fuel recycling. An official study commissioned by the French prime minister found recycling to be costly, however, and France has not yet managed to 'close' its fuel cycle by finding a place to put its waste.

...

The case for a nuclear power revival has ben well rehearsed. The global panic induced by the 1979 performances of Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas in The China Syndrome — and inflamed by the real-life version released at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania 11 days later — is beginning to die down. European memories of the 1986 Chernobyl accident are also fading.

Perhaps more to the point, the case now rests not on the specious grounds that nuclear energy will be immensely cheap, but on the rather more solid supposition that it is less bad than the alternatives. With coal causing global warming, oil and gas equated with dangerous energy dependency on outside suppliers, and renewable sources unable to produce the gigawattage that we apparently require, nuclear power is firmly back in the picture.

Yet the waste issue will need to be addressed before any ground is broken for a new nuclear power station in either Britain or America. Britain abandoned plans to build an underground waste repository in the north of England in 1997, and a report due this summer from a consultative panel, the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management, is only the first step in the search for a new approach. In the United States, the outlook for the Yucca Mountain project is uncertain, and the proposed repository there is, in any case, too small to meet forecast needs.

...

At this time there is no "Silver Bullet."

[GliderGuider]

36. At this time there is no "Silver Bullet."

Exactly. We will use every source at our disposal (including some really stupid ones that look like sources but aren't, like ethanol). That will include nuclear fission and coal. In that case, common sense would seem to dictate that activists get busy ensuring that all the power plants of any description that do get built are as safe and effective as possible, and that we organize ourselves to need as few of them as possible.

The big concern for me is that we pay attention to what is truly important. Twenty years ago it looked like energy supplies weren't going to be a bottleneck, so we had the luxury of enshrining our personal dislikes into policy without worrying that doing so might lead to tens of millions of deaths through ripple effects on agriculture. Things are different now. Like it or not, it's time we all grew up and did some math.

[OKIsItJustMe]

37. "Twenty years ago it looked like energy supplies weren't going to be a bottleneck..."

To some of us it did.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/filmmore/ps_energy.html

Primary Sources: The President's Proposed Energy Policy

Jimmy Carter delivered this televised speech on April 18, 1977.

Tonight I want to have an unpleasant talk with you about a problem unprecedented in our history. With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes. The energy crisis has not yet overwhelmed us, but it will if we do not act quickly.

It is a problem we will not solve in the next few years, and it is likely to get progressively worse through the rest of this century.

We must not be selfish or timid if we hope to have a decent world for our children and grandchildren.

We simply must balance our demand for energy with our rapidly shrinking resources. By acting now, we can control our future instead of letting the future control us.

...

I know that some of you may doubt that we face real energy shortages. The 1973 gasoline lines are gone, and our homes are warm again. But our energy problem is worse tonight than it was in 1973 or a few weeks ago in the dead of winter. It is worse because more waste has occurred, and more time has passed by without our planning for the future. And it will get worse every day until we act.

The oil and natural gas we rely on for 75 percent of our energy are running out. In spite of increased effort, domestic production has been dropping steadily at about six percent a year. Imports have doubled in the last five years. Our nation's independence of economic and political action is becoming increasingly constrained. Unless profound changes are made to lower oil consumption, we now believe that early in the 1980s the world will be demanding more oil that it can produce.

...

[GliderGuider]

38. OK, I'm confused

You know energy is going into decline, you've known about it since Carter's sweater and solar panel days. You know there are no silver bullets, and that we'll need every energy source we can get our hands on to keep huge numbers of people from dying. You know that coal is killing the biosphere and us as part of it. But you're still anti-nuclear? Or have I misread your position? What part do you think nuclear should (or will) play in the coming mess?

[OKIsItJustMe]

39. Nuclear power is (at best) a stop-gap measure

I would not advocate building more coal plants. We know the downside of that.

I also would not advocate building more fission plants. We already have more waste than we know what to do with. Even if we did know what to do with it, uranium supplies are far from infinite. Converting to fission is jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

The sad fact of the matter is that we cannot turn our installed base of plants of either type off tomorrow. We need to make the very best use we can of the alternatives we have, while working as hard as we can to improve them and develop others.

We've put it off for 30 years. It's way past time to get serious.

Fusion remains tantalizingly out of reach. Personally, I'd like to see us send more megabucks that way.

At this time, wind energy is inexpensive enough that it's (finally) getting adopted fairly widely. As the price of oil goes higher, solar's market penetration is increasing as well. The two dovetail nicely (one providing more power when the other provides less.)

So, for now, I think we need to be focusing efforts on wind and solar (in its many forms.)

However, the most important thing for us to do now (as it was in the 70's) is to use the energy we have more wisely.

[GliderGuider]

40. OK, that clarifies things, thanks.

A lot of how this unfolds will depend on the decline rates of oil and natural gas, and what sectors of the global economy that decline hits hardest. It could be that we have almost enough electricity already. If the the big hit is in transportation fuels, and the decline outpaces our ability to switch personal transportation to electricity, we may just have to adapt to less movement. Goods can be shipped by electric rail and ship, which is very efficient and relatively quick to build one we get going.

The thing that gives me the willies is what could happen to fertilizer prices as natural gas supplies dwindle.

[OKIsItJustMe]

42. One nice thing about hydrogen...

Many of our current vehicles can be converted to run on hydrogen with relatively little effort. This can be done much more quickly, easily and cheaply than converting the entire fleet to electricity. Once again, the technology to do this has been known for many years.

Assuming (and it's a very big assumption) you have sufficient supplies of electricity and water, producing hydrogen is "easy."

As for fertilizer... yeah that's a problem alright. (One of many which give me "the willies.")


It's an exciting time to be alive!

[jpak]

27. The range of values reported by ExternE for each energy technology...

Wind 0.4 - 3.3 mECU/kWh

Nuclear 2.5 - 7.0 mECU/kWh

PV 0.6 - 8.1 mECU/kWh

Biomass 1.7 - 127 ECU/kWh

Natural gas 4 - 80 ECU/kWh

Oil 38 - 189 ECU/kWh

Coal 8 - 240 ECU/kWh

These were all life cycle assessments - the only thing one can conclude is that the external costs of renewables and nuclear are very low and similar, and the external costs of fossil fuels are orders of magnitude higher...

[TheWraith]

75. And when you're willing to pony up the cost, be my guest.

Somewhere between 3 and 8 trillion dollars, plus 750,000 square miles, and strip mining a couple of states for the needed materials. Hey, what's a little catastrophic ecological damage as long as we can ignore the real cost?

[Turbineguy]

61. Your point

if I understand correctly, is good. We don't have the time or money for poorly thought out schemes that waste effort.

The nuclear debate has been completely polarized to the point of getting us nowhere. Instead we should be looking to solve the problems (which are well known) of nuclear power and not invent fear and plots.

[Scriptor Ignotus]

12. then be prepared for wars with Iran and Syria and

Saudi Arbia down the line. Nuclear power is an important part of a diversified non-petroleum based energy infrastructure. There have been significant gains in technology and safety features in the past 30 years.

Nuclear power is obviously not without its problems, but think of a world in which oil is not as critical as it is today.

[Turbineguy]

62. Chernobyl

is what happens when political expediency trumps basic physics.

[Olney Blue]

6. Even now, most Americans do not realize there was a meltdown at TMI.

[Omaha Steve]

7. K&R

great post.

[bananas]

9. "the report, if published in its entirety, would have destroyed the civilian nuclear power industry"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickover

Following the Three Mile Island (TMI) power plant partial meltdown on March 28, 1979, President Jimmy Carter commissioned a study, "Report of the President's Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island (1979)," chaired by John G. Kemeny, then-president of Dartmouth College. It is claimed in an affidavit signed by Jane Rickover, the Admiral's daughter-in-law, that in her recollection of the Admiral's opinion "the report, if published in its entirety, would have destroyed the civilian nuclear power industry." According to her sworn statement, Rickover persuaded Carter to have the report diluted. She also reports that in November 1985, eight months before his death, "that he had come to deeply regret his action."<30>

[Bobbieo]

13. The Western 'Downwinders' are still dying from cancer related illnesses

[Igel]

14. "Baltimore News-Herald"?

Not "Baltimore Sun" or "Baltimore News American"? "Baltimore News-Herald"?

Never heard of it.

Google shows precisely 3 hits: This article. http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Baltimore+News-Herald%22&num=20&hl=en&lr=lang_cs%7Clang_en%7Clang_fr%7Clang_pl%7Clang_ru&c2coff=1&filter=0

Sniff, sniff. :shrug:

[PADemD]

15. Could the article be referring to the Baltimore Herald?

http://thebaltimoreherald.com/index.php

Baltimore Herald Baltimore 1873-? OCLC 22167260

http://speccol.mdarchives.state.md.us/msa/speccol/catalog/newspapers/cfm/dsp_title.cfm?CurrentPage=6&letter=B

[dbackjon]

16. Funny stuff

Great fiction.

If this was anything but an anti-nuke fantasy, it would be all over the papers - you can't cover all those deaths/disease up.

Passing off lies as news is a major no-no, and should let to a banning from the board.

[Massacure]

17. Rofl, what a great source of info. There is obviously NO bias.

"People were killed by Three Mile Island & other nuclear disasters"

"Nukes are back and so are we"

"The genius doctor who diagnosed Nuke Power's deadly disease"

"Astonishing tower collapse screams "No New Nukes!!""

""Nuke Nuggets" glow for the Senate's radioactive rip-off"

"Do the neo-cons need Karl Rove when they can count on the Democrats?"

"Radioactive "bailout-in-advance" opens fierce new war over nuke reactors"

"Nuke PR flacks do the Kashiwazaki quake dance"

"The earthquake that screamed "NO NUKES!!!" "

"King CONG in California declares total "New Nukes" war against Solartopia"

:eyes:

[OKIsItJustMe]

18. Report Doubts Infant Death Rise from Three Mile Island

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9D06E3D61239F932A15750C0A967948260&n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/Subjects/B/Babies

March 21, 1981

REPORT DOUBTS INFANT DEATH RISE FROM THREE MILE ISLAND

MISHAP
UPI

In a final report, the Pennsylvania Health Department said today that radiation released in the accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant near here on March 28, 1979, did not cause the deaths of infants or fetuses.

The department said the epidemiological report indicated that no deaths had been caused either by the radioactivity itself or by emotional distress in pregnant women who might have been traumatized by events surrounding the accident.

''There is no evidence to date that radiation from the nuclear power plant influenced the rise or fall of death statistics,'' said George Tokuhata, director of the State Bureau of Epidemiological Research.

Dr. Tokuhata said his conclusions were based on a final report by the State Health Department, issued last month, on Pennsylvania's vital statistics for 1979. Infant Mortality Rates Compared

A special report on infant and fetal deaths was condensed from the report and released today. The study took into account statistics from within a 10-mile radius of the still-disabled plant at Three Mile Island.

The report said that the infant mortality rate in a 10-mile radius of the nuclear plant was 19.3 per 1,000 live births for the first three months of 1979, remained at 19.3 for the next three months, and declined to 12.7 from July through September. For the last three months of the year the rate was 13.4.

The department's 1980 release of raw figures showing a numerical increase in infant deaths near the Three Mile Island plant stirred a controversy. Dr. Tokuhata said final figures now indicated that there had been no rise in the infant mortality rate in the 10-mile radius of the plant.

...

[OKIsItJustMe]

20. Three Mile Island: Health Study Meltdown

http://thebulletin.metapress.com/content/t0778475220w1365/fulltext.pdf

September/October 2004 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

...

After the meltdown one would have expected to see some articles featuring local health statistics especially statistics relating to the very young. The developing fetus and infant are much more susceptible than adults to the effects of ionizing radiation. In addition, reports of elevated disease rates in the youngest residents near the plant quickly surfaced.

Pennsylvania Health Commissioner Gordon MacLeod publicly stated that downwind from the plant the number of babies born with hypothyroidism jumped from nine in the nine months before the accident to 20 in the nine months after.

MacLeod reasoned that the thyroid gland was affected by the large amount of thyroid-seeking iodine 131 released from the plant. He also emphasized the increase in deaths of infants within a 10-mile radius, as did Ernest Sternglass, a University of Pittsburgh physicist. In the six months after the accident, 31 infants living within 10 miles of the plant died, more than double the 14 deaths during the same six-month period the previous year.

Vital Statistics of the United States, an annual volume issued by the National Center for Health Statistics, showed that the 1978–1979 rate increase in Pennsylvania exceeded the national increase in three crucial categories: infant deaths, births under 3.3 pounds, and percent of newborns with low Apgar scores. In Dauphin County, where the Three Mile Island plant is located, the 1979 death rate among infants under one year represented a 28 percent increase over that of 1978; and among infants under one month, the death rate increased by 54 percent.

But no articles were published. MacLeod was fired by Gov. Richard Thornburgh just six months after taking office; Sternglass was described by health officials as an alarmist.

...

[OKIsItJustMe]

21. Deadly Deceit

http://multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/issues/1990/06/review.html

...

Deadly Deceit is a terrifying book. By investigating patterns and deviations in overall death rates, infant mortality rates and other measures of national health, Jay Gould and Benjamin Goldman have uncovered convincing evidence that low-level radiation releases from nuclear power and weapons facilities are having a much more serious and often lethal effect on public health than previously acknowledged. They also offer evidence of a conscious attempt to distort and cover up information which might have made the dangers of low-level radiation known to the public. Though it deals with technical issues, the book is written accessibly and, because of the crucial importance of its subject matter, deserves a wide readership.

Gould and Goldman begin by examining the aftermath of the Chernobyl accident. They show that in June 1986, one month after the Chernobyl fallout reached the United States, the U.S. infant mortality rate was 12.3 percent higher than the previous June. Mortality levels also increased for the elderly and people with infectious diseases. They conclude that the deaths of 40,000 people in the United States were accelerated by the low-level radiation exposure caused by the Chernobyl accident.

The explosion and ensuing fire at the Chernobyl plant spewed huge amounts of radioactive contaminants into the air, with fallout subsequently registered even in the distant United States. The areas of the United States with the least rainfall in May 1986 had the lowest concentration of radioactive iodine-131 in milk and experienced no change in mortality. The Pacific Northwest, which experienced the heaviest rainfall, had the highest concentrations of iodine-131 and the biggest increase in mortality.

Gould and Goldman also report an unprecedented drop in landbird hatchings in California (a decline of approximately 60 percent) and skyrocketing rates of infant mortality in Europe (which received a much higher dose of radiation than the United States) in the months following the Chernobyl fallout.

The authors argue that most scientists underestimate the lethal effects of radiation because they extrapolate backwards from the high levels of exposure experienced in Hiroshima after the United States dropped the first atomic bomb, assuming, for example, that one-tenth as much radiation will have one-tenth the effect. These scientists do not consider the potential differences between the effects of low-level and high-level radiation.

Deadly Deceit's findings indicate that radiation's impact is "supralinear," which means that it has a proportionately more deadly effect at low levels than at high ones. In Europe, for example, post-Chernobyl radiation levels were 100 to 1,000 times higher than in the United States, but mortality rates rose only 10 times more than in the United States. Other scientists have drawn similar conclusions from their own work, most notably Dr. Abram Petkau, who hypothesized that "low-level radiation generate(s) highly toxic charged oxygen molecules known as 'free radicals' that can destroy cell membranes much more efficiently at low dose rates than at high ones." The implications of the "Petkau effect," validated by Gould and Goldman, are horrifying. It means low doses of radiation, which the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the nuclear industry have been dismissing as relatively harmless for decades, are far more lethal than previously considered.

Gould and Goldman use other case studies to buttress their argument. They conclude that infant mortality peaked in the areas downwind of Three Mile Island shortly after the overheating plant released large amounts of iodine-131 and other fission gases in 1979. They also find that radiation levels in milk rose significantly in the summer after accidents at the Savannah River nuclear weapons plant in South Carolina in the early 1970s, and infant mortality and total mortality peaked during the same periods.

The authors suggest that releases of low-level radiation have had a significant effect on mortality in geographically distant areas through the contamination of milk. They demonstrate a frightening correlation between the operation of the Peach Bottom nuclear power plant in milk-producing Lancaster, Pennsylvania and infant mortality in the mid-Atlantic region, especially in Washington, D.C. Even with demographic and socioeconomic factors taken into account, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, D.C. fell behind the rest of the country in infant mortality after Peach Bottom started operating in 1966. The evidence in Deadly Deceit suggests that the decline can be attributed to milk contaminated by Peach Bottom and consumed in these cities. (Fifty percent of the milk sold in the mid-Atlantic region comes from within 50 miles of Peach Bottom.) When the NRC closed down Peach Bottom in May 1987, "infant mortality in D.C. returned to about the same rate as in the rest of the U.S. for the first time since the reactor station began operating in the mid-1960s," dropping from a peak the previous month of three and a half times higher than the rest of the nation.

In their most far-reaching hypothesis, the authors explore the correlation between atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons in the 1950s and a levelling off of infant and total mortality rates. This flattening, they explain, runs counter to the historical trend in which both infant and total mortality rates have declined with improvements in nutrition, sanitation and medicine. In the 1950s and 1960s, however, the trend stopped. They attribute this to the fallout from atmospheric nuclear weapons tests, which the National Resources Defense Council has calculated as equivalent to 40,000 Hiroshima bombs in the period 1945-1962. "The cumulative difference between these expected rates and those actually observed comes to some nine million excess deaths ."

...

[OKIsItJustMe]

23. Killing Our Own - Chapter 13 - Animals Died at Three Mile Island

http://www.ratical.org/radiation/KillingOurOwn/KOO.pdf

...

Dr. Robert Weber fits the Norman Rockwell image of a country veterinarian. Of gentle countenance but powerfully built, Weber wore his western-style hat and handlebar mustache into the lavishly paneled hearing room of the Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission, where, in March of 1980, public testimony was being heard on the accident at TMI.

Though the intricacies of debate over curies, millirems, and isotopes meant little to Weber, he had a pretty clear idea of what was happening to the animals of his clients. And when the PUC finally held hearings, just shy of a year after the accident, Weber came straight to the point. Ever since the accident, he said, he was getting calls to treat stillbirths among pigs near TMI at the rate of two per week. Normally he treated two such cases per year. He had been practicing out of Mechanicsburg since the 1940s and had never seen an epidemic like it.

Hormones that usually aided the pigs in dilation had failed to work. And that spring of 1980 he was having to do two caesarean sections per week on local goats and sheep, also an extraordinary rate.

...

In mid-May the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture (DOA) decided to conduct a study of its own. The department’s information director, John Nikoloff, told us that the survey was done in two days—May 23 and 24—and that it involved ten department staff, two of whom were veterinarians. Nikoloff said that one hundred person-hours were devoted to interviewing one hundred farmers. According to the survey only five of them complained of abnormal problems.

...

In a four-page feature written primarily by investigative reporter Laura T. Hammel, The News-American charged that not 5 percent, but at least 40 percent of the farmers listed in the DOA survey complained of problems with plants and animals that dated not just after the accident, but to the opening of TMI-1.

Dairy farmer Joseph Conley (a cousin to Charles, whom we interviewed earlier) told The News-American ... Shortly after the 1979 accident two of his cows aborted, ten of his calves died soon after birth, his cats wouldn’t breed, and his own family began acting so sickly and sluggish that he packed up all his belongings and moved to another county. But the DOA listed him as having "no problems."

Richard Bailey, who raised cattle at York Haven, thirteen miles from TMI, was also listed as having no problems. But he told The News-American that within two months after the accident he lost six new calves in a row. A seventh was born a midget. Prior to the accident he had lost only ten calves to stillbirths in more than thirty years of farming.

Russell Whisler of Manchester, who was also listed in the DOA survey as having no problems, said he had lost two ewes and four lambs from abnormal pregnancies following the accident—and that the state knew it. "They asked us what we had, and we told them," he said.

Jane Ressler of Elizabethtown, who complained of four horses suffering stiff, swollen joints just after the accident, was also listed as having no problems. She told The News-American, "We’ve had lots of problems. I never talked to anyone from the government, and neither did my husband. But I would have liked to."⁷

According to reporter Hammel, at least thirty-five farmers listed in the survey said their views had been misrepresented. At least three said they told state inspectors they were having problems and were listed as having none. And a number of animal inventories in the survey were grossly inaccurate.

...

Had the NRC investigated more thoroughly, it might have found some important evidence. In early 1981, two years after the accident, Dr. Robert Weber, the Mechanicsburg vet, told us the plague of birthing problems among pigs, goats, and sheep had come to an end. "Since the plant’s been shut," he said, "there are no down cows or animals with hypertension or mental conditions over there. There’s been a decline in everything that we had a lot of last year. I hardly get a call to go over there any more."

...

[OKIsItJustMe]

28. Killing Our Own - Chapter 14 - People Died at Three Mile Island

http://www.ratical.org/radiation/KillingOurOwn/KOO.pdf

...

In December of 1979, Sternglass carried his conclusions much further. In a paper delivered to the Fifth World Congress of Engineers and Architects at Tel Aviv, he said that data from the U.S. Bureau of Vital Statistics showed that there were "242 deaths above the normally expected number in Pennsylvania and a total of 430 in the entire northeastern area of the United States," a rise of clear statistical significance. The linkage with TMI was clear because "large amounts of radioactive Iodine-131 were released from the plant" and the peak of infant mortality came within a matter of months thereafter. The greatest rises took place near the plant, with effects decreasing as a function of distance away from Harrisburg.

He backed up his case by analyzing the amount of radiation to which pregnant women downwind might have been subjected. Accepting minimum official estimates, Sternglass calculated that the doses of radioactive I-131 alone could have been on the order of one hundred millirems to individual pregnant women in the path of the plume. Such doses, he said, were clearly capable of causing rises in infant mortality.¹⁶

Using federal statistics, Sternglass then demonstrated that Pennsylvania’s infant death rate in July was the highest of any state east of the Mississippi that month (except for Washington, D.C.), although Pennsylvania usually has one of the lowest rates in the nation. He went on to say that a similar rise was evident in infant-mortality rates in northern New England—where wind had carried fallout from the plant—as opposed to southern New England, where it had not.¹⁷

The hypothesis was confirmed by the fact that infant-death rates began to fall again after the accident. This, he said, was predictable because embryos in utero who were too small to have developed a thyroid, or who were conceived after the accident, would not have been affected by their mothers’ ingestion of radioactive iodine.

But I-131 was not the only radioactive element released from TMI—nor were infants the only humans likely to be harmed. Strontium 90, cesium 137, noble gases, and other disease-causing isotopes may also have escaped. Overall, said Sternglass, increases in cancers, leukemia, and a wide range of other diseases were "likely to occur." The Three Mile Island accident, he predicted, "will turn out to have produced the largest death toll ever resulting from an industrial accident, with total deaths from all causes likely to reach many thousands over the next 10 to 20 years."¹⁸

...

But in fact the infant-mortality statistics around TMI only became public in the winter of 1980, when Dr. MacLeod—who had since returned to the University of Pittsburgh—began receiving calls from his former colleagues. Anonymous members of the department told MacLeod that the state was suppressing statistics that indicated a rise in infant-mortality rates near TMI. Alarmed by what MacLeod termed a "restrictive policy" on health data, he released the numbers in a pulpit address at Pittsburgh’s First Unitarian Church. That, in turn, forced the Department of Health to make the figures officially public.²⁵

And the numbers apparently confirmed the public’s worst fears. In the six-month period following the accident, in a ten-mile radius around TMI, thirty-one infants had died. In 1978 the number was only fourteen; in 1977 it had been twenty. Tokuhata told the Times the apparently sharp rise in infant deaths in 1979 was not significant because that was an absolute number, not a rate of deaths against live births. Times reporter Jane Brody paraphrased him thusly: "When the 31 infant deaths were considered in relation to the number of live births, no statistically meaningful difference was found."²⁶

But in fact, said Sternglass, these "preliminary" figures showed an infant-death rate within that ten-mile radius of 7.2 per 1000 live births in 1978; in 1979, after the accident, the number had risen to 15.7 per 1000—a more than doubling.

The numbers for infant-death rates within a five-mile radius of TMI—though small—were even more damning. In 1978 the rate had been 2.3 infant deaths per 1000 live births; in 1979, after the accident, it was 16.2—a jump by a factor of seven.²⁷

But the state had an explanation. At a press conference in April of 1980 Dr. H. Arnold Muller, who had taken MacLeod’s place as secretary of health, announced that the TMI-area infant-death rates showed "no statistically significant difference in the mortality rate than for the state as a whole."²⁸ To support its case the state introduced a racial factor. Black people, it said, are known to suffer a higher rate of infant mortality than whites. Thus the presence of large numbers of blacks in Harrisburg—some of whom had been counted into the figures for the ten-mile radius around TMI—had made the local infant-mortality rates seem unduly large. As Tokuhata was paraphrased by Jane Brody in the Times: ". . . when analyzed without taking into account Harrisburg, where the large black population ordinarily has a much higher infant mortality rate than the rest of the region, the rate for the population living within 10 miles of the plant was the same as that for the state as a whole" (our emphasis).²⁹

The analysis was deceptive.

The charge that TMI had killed nearby infants had nothing to do with a comparison with the state average. It had been based on comparing death rates in the same area from the spring and summer of 1977 and 1978—before the accident—against those of the spring and summer of 1979—after the accident.

To subtract the figures for black people from the 1979 statistics without doing the same for 1978 and 1977 would have made sense only if they had all moved into Harrisburg the day of the accident.

...

[Heywood J]

43. The problem I see there is corruption and dishonesty,

as opposed to a technological thing. I see utility companies eager to avoid liability, so they cover things up. I see regulatory agencies in the pocket of such companies. I see owners that cheap out whenever they can to save a penny.

It would seem to be human greed and corruption that cause such incidents to be as bad as they are, as opposed to the technology. I lived for decades surrounded by three of the largest nuclear complexes on the planet, gone camping in the shadow of the cooling towers every year, and I'm still here. On the other hand, I also lived near a coal power plant, one of the largest single point-sources of air pollution (Nanticoke Generating Station) on this continent, as well as the Erie Shores wind farm.

Given the choice, I'd probably prefer not to have my air fouled every day the plant is in operation, or in the summer when temperatures and humidity are above 95. To be sure, though, fission power does have drawbacks such as storage of waste and attractiveness to attack. Much work needs to be done in the field of fission power to make it sustainable.

[OKIsItJustMe]

47. "Corruption and dishonesty"

I see utility companies eager to avoid liability

Utility companies, yes, and governments. However, they're clearly covering up a risk.

When you see the sort of numbers games they played, you know it's a government cover-up.

To subtract the figures for black people from the 1979 statistics without doing the same for 1978 and 1977 would have made sense only if they had all moved into Harrisburg the day of the accident.

...

... I lived for decades surrounded by three of the largest nuclear complexes on the planet, gone camping in the shadow of the cooling towers every year, and I'm still here. ...

I have friends who've smoked for 30+ years, and are still here. Is smoking safe?

[Heywood J]

63. "I have friends who've smoked for 30+ years, and are still here. Is smoking safe?"

We're not talking about smoking. Theoretically, if the plant is as dangerous as you claim, then I, having been in a position of risk these many years, should be showing signs. The people who live in the nearby towns should be showing symptoms. Those plants have been running for nearly thirty years.

Utility companies, yes, and governments. However, they're clearly covering up a risk.
When you see the sort of numbers games they played, you know it's a government cover-up.

Which is exactly what I said - a coverup is a corruption and dishonesty problem.




I'm having difficulty keeping track of the thread now. It would be sufficient to link to the NYT articles in archives, as opposed to quoting so many paragraphs that it both violates the copyright rules and makes things cluttered.

[Bread and Circus]

52. we need brazillions of reactors!!!

[phantom power]

56. Well, actually 4,000 would be ample.

[Bread and Circus]

57. but what about those brazillions of exajoules we need?

[phantom power]

58. Humans currently use a bit over 400 exajoules each year.

Which could, in principle, be supplied with about 4000 1-gigawatt nuclear reactors.

For various reasons discussed in detail by Paul Chefurka, I suspect that relatively few of those 4000 reactors will ever be built, although I note gloomily that those same reasons will prevent relatively little of those 400 exajoules from being replaced by any means. Nuclear, wind, solar or otherwise.

But anyway, the number you should memorize is "400 exajoules per year." That is what humans currently use. And it provides a good baseline for thinking about energy usage.

[Bread and Circus]

65. damn, and I checked brazillions on the energy test :(

[Name removed]

72. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[bananas]

67. 2004: 471EJ/y = 15TW = 15,000 1GW reactors

To handle peak load on each continent, you'd probably have to double that,
unless you have a global grid connecting the east and west hemispheres.

Not sure where you got 4,000 reactors from - maybe you're talking about electricity only?
Don't memorize 400EJ/y or even 471EJ/y, 2004 was three years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_resources_and_consumption

In 2004, the average total worldwide power consumption of the human race was 15 TW (= 1.5 x 1013 W) with 86.5% from burning fossil fuels.

According to the US Energy Information Administration's 2006 estimate, the estimated 15TW total energy consumption of 2004 was divided as follows, with fossil fuels supplying 86% of the world's energy:
Fuel type Power in TW<1> Energy/year in EJ
Oil 5.6 180
Gas 3.5 110
Coal 3.8 120
Hydroelectric 0.9 30
Nuclear 0.9 30
Geothermal, wind,
solar, wood 0.13 4
Total 15 471

[DU911]

60. Nuclear energy related cancer and death is a myth

If you believe "Researcher" Joe Mangano, and others like him, you probably would believe just about anything. Because, in order to accept their biased claims, you would have to believe in a vast conspiracy that includes all credible medical and health investigators. Ask yourself, why do you want to believe the Joe Mangano's? You have to accept their claims on faith. So why do you want to believe them?

The article says: "...the federal courts have never allowed their case to be heard."

Well, of course not. If someone claimed that you turned their brain into peanut butter, and tried to sue you, do you believe the court should allow their case to be "heard" without any credible evidence?

Studies that have correlated radioactive emissions with infant death rates, cancer rates and other health epidemics around other operating reactors, are nothing more than anti-nuclear propaganda:

The Radiation and Public Health Project (RPHP), which Mr. Mangano represents, was founded in 1995 to “study the links between low-level radiation and world-wide increases in diseases,” an allegation that has not been supported by mainstream scientists. RPHP was founded by two anti-nuclear activists, Ernest Sternglass and Jay Gould, who alleged a link between breast cancer and nuclear facilities. Gould was a statistician and Sternglass, a radiation physicist. Neither man is an epidemiologist. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the National Institutes of Public Health (NIH) have conducted studies which found no link between nuclear plants and cancer. The allegations made over the years by Gould and Sternglass have been widely discredited. None of their claims have been peer-reviewed or substantiated by state and/or federal health authorities. In fact, criticism of their theories dates back to the mid-1960s.

“Ionizing radiation emissions from nuclear facilities are closely controlled and involve negligible levels of exposure for communities near such plants. Although reports about cancer case clusters in such communities have raised public concern, studies show that clusters do not occur more often near nuclear plants than they do by chance elsewhere in the population.” American Cancer Society: Cancer Facts and Figures 1999

“The correlation between infant mortality and radiation from Peach Bottom (nuclear power plant), which Dr. Sternglass asserts exists, is not supported by the information presented. A preliminary review of this information by several Maryland agencies indicates that this information does not merit a detailed review. I am also concerned that inaccurate information such as that presented by Dr. Sternglass is continually used to misinform the public, and to promote emotional, rather than rational, responses.” Letter from David Carroll, Governor’s Chesapeake Bay Coordinator, State of Maryland, Office of the Governor, Aug. 15, 1988

“The state Health Department’s director of Epidemiological Research labeled a two-part magazine article written by nuclear-power opponent Dr. Sternglass as ‘highly inaccurate to the extent of creating unnecessary fear in the minds of Commonwealth Citizens. Dr. Sternglass’ words have the potential of creating fear, apprehension, stress, and even panic among the residents of central Pennsylvania. This is totally irresponsible and the Department of Health regrets that the public has been subjected to such unfounded statements from Dr. Sternglass,’ Dr. George K. Tokuhata said.” Health Department Responds to Sternglass Allegations, news release, Pennsylvania Department of Health, April 20, 1981

“Dr. Sternglass’ concern about nuclear warfare and fallout is shared by all. By misinterpreting the available data and subjecting himself and science in general to ridicule or suspicion, he may inadvertently be hampering the attainment of some of the goals he considers important. The Committee shared his concern but not his methodology or conclusions.” Committee on Environmental Hazards, American Academy of Pediatrics, April 15, 1970

“In essence, Sternglass and Gould followed an old and discredited style of epidemiological analysis-unsystematically selecting data sets and analyses that fit one’s thesis, and ignoring or explaining away other findings. Public health data are so rife with selection biases and other distortions that even the most experienced practitioners often go astray. Epidemiology is not a field for amateurs.” Sly Statistics by Paul Meier, professor of Biostatistics, Columbia University.


In contrast to Mr. Mangano’s view; many credible scientists have found evidence that low-levels of radiation are actually healthy for humans, for example:

“In 1983 a group of 180 apartment buildings was completed in Taiwan. Somebody had made a serious mistake. They had mixed into the concrete a considerable amount of highly radioactive cobalt-60.

“This meant that ultimately, for a period of between 9 and 20 years, 10,000 people lived in buildings so radioactive that when it started they were receiving an average of 74 millisieverts of radiation per year, a level that declined thereafter because cobalt-60 has a half-life of 5.27 years. Compare this with the rate of 0.5 mSv above background--the normal maximum exposure for radiation workers--or a total of 15 mSv, the maximum safe limit for land fit for habitation, according to US government standards.

“With the LNT theory, which is currently in use worldwide for assessing nuclear risks, there is no lower limit for the level at which radioactivity is lethal for humans (hence the term "no threshold"). So these buildings, inhabited for a decade and a half before the radioactivity was traced and measured, should be the site of a truly massive cancer death rate – They aren't.

“A thorough and methodical tracing of all the 4000 families by a team led by W. L. Chen of Taiwan, director of medical radiation technology at Taiwan's National Yang Ming University has resulted in an unequivocal and spectacular result. Cancer rates of people who had lived in those highly radioactive buildings are down to 3.6 per cent of prevailing Taiwanese rates.” Radiation Thresholds, New Scientist magazine, October 30, 2004. The full report was published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons - Volume 9, Number 1 - Spring 2004. The report is available in English on www.jpands.org/vol9no1/chen.pdf

And my favorite: “Health Hazards Associated with Interviewing Antinuclear Activists”, www.philrutherford.com/Activist_Health_Hazard.pdf

[Name removed]

66. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[philb]

73. Gov't statistics and studies also show higher cancer around nuke plants in NJ, etc.

there was a previous thread on this

[TheWraith]

74. Now if only that were true, there would be actual evidence behind it.

Of course, nobody can turn up a single body of someone who's death was directly traceable to Three Mile Island. And every credible medical researcher--in this case, credible meaning relying on science, not anecdotes and hyperbole--every credible medical researcher say that there's been no excess deaths directly attributable to the release from TMI.

This is conspiracy theory crap, relying on hearsay, innuendo, and unsupported claims, nothing more.

[Nihil]

78. "The people don't want truth, they want NEWS!"

(A classic line from "The Assassination Bureau Ltd")

> This is conspiracy theory crap, relying on hearsay, innuendo, and
> unsupported claims, nothing more.

... but still good enough to get 16 recs from people who want (or even
*need*) to believe that it is true ...

:shrug: