Earthquake off Japan

[Simon_Jester]

Picking tectonically stable mountains in the middle of a million or so square kilometers of varying grades of desert, where the words "water table" are somewhere between myth and rumor, helps a lot with the issue of waste storage. "Just bury it in a mineshaft" is not enough, but storage in mineshafts is a fairly viable option if you do it right.

As to the fisheries, there was a lot of this sort of thing in the early days of the nuclear industry- in many cases, there simply was no policy on waste disposal, or at least no standardized version of the modern methods (dry cask, fuel pond, underground repository, and so on)

That said, I'm honestly not sure how effectively radioactive contamination would ruin a fishery. Wildlife tends to do all right in areas like the Chernobyl exclusion zone when it comes to reproduction- they don't care very much about elevated cancer rates. So it would mostly come down to whether the fish are edible, or are rendered inedible due to uptake of radioisotopes. Which I don't know much about.

[His Divine Shadow]

It was the private industry, but the facility was supposedly state run. And now recent studies have revealed a 300% in cancer and leukemia increase in those areas, but of course such dumps are still "supposedly safe".

From what I've read the numbers of people are so small that simple coincidence cannot be ruled out.

And I thought the German nuclear industry was incompetent, but this takes the grand prize for stupidity. Hey, let us ruin our fishing grounds. Nothing wrong with that....

Well according to this they aren't ruined:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/nort ... 595021.stm

[Thanas]

It was the private industry, but the facility was supposedly state run. And now recent studies have revealed a 300% in cancer and leukemia increase in those areas, but of course such dumps are still "supposedly safe".

From what I've read the numbers of people are so small that simple coincidence cannot be ruled out.

Maybe. Hell of a conincidence though considering the same things are observed around other nuclear facilities, like the notorious Brunsbüttel reactor.

[Broomstick]

On the other hand, cancer rates around Three Mile Island are actually lower than the statistical average...

[Steel]

Cancer rates around power stations and power lines and many industrial facilities are essentially guaranteed to be higher than average. It is incredibly rare for this not to be true.

This is due to the fact that places next to power stations or power lines are shitholes and people are much more likely to be poor and exposed to various lifestyle and other factors that increase risk of cancer. Simply living under a power line 'gives you a higher risk of cancer' whether it is on or not. Pretty sure an iron pylon sculpture is not inherently carcinogenic, however.

[Thanas]

This is due to the fact that places next to power stations or power lines are shitholes.

Clearly you have never been to Asse.

[Lonestar]

This is due to the fact that places next to power stations or power lines are shitholes and people are much more likely to be poor and exposed to various lifestyle and other factors that increase risk of cancer. Simply living under a power line 'gives you a higher risk of cancer' whether it is on or not. Pretty sure an iron pylon sculpture is not inherently carcinogenic, however.

Did you know that the most visited State Park (in terms of automobile visits, there is more foot traffic at Grayson highlands) in Virginia is Lake Anna State Park? The entire lake was created to be a cooling reservoir for the North Anna Nuclear Generating Station. What land that isn't owned by the Virginia's DNR and Dominion Power is la-de-da lake homes. Of course, I haven't heard anything about "elevated Cancer Rates" there.

[Simon_Jester]

I think Steel's point has something to it even if we can all think of examples of upscale housing near a power line or industrial facility. While places like that exist, there are a lot of places where lower-class housing coexists with industry or things that the upper middle class just don't want in their backyard. If there's a correlation between class and cancer rates, and a correlation between living close to industry*, we would expect to see elevated cancer deaths around industrial facilities whether those facilities were polluting or not.

You could still control for the effect, of course, in a statistical analysis.

*Including power lines and nuclear plants

[His Divine Shadow]

On the other hand, cancer rates around Three Mile Island are actually lower than the statistical average...

I've seen green organizations claim there are 500% increases infact (yes they're boldfaced lies). Likewise I am reminded of the claims of cancer clusters around powerlines and transformer stations.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Could it be the cancer rates around 3-mile island are lower because everyone near it during the incident MOVED?

[Broomstick]

Or perhaps, with fewer emissions during normal operations than a coal plant, perhaps people there are exposed to fewer carcinogens.

Or perhaps, fearing a greater cancer risk, people there are doing things that might actually lower their risk.

Or perhaps, it's just a statistical fluke, the counterpart to inexplicable "cancer clusters" found elsewhere.

The 1991 Columbia study found no physical health effects from TMI. Cancer rates peaked in the area in 1982 or 1983, but radiation induced cancer takes longer to appear than the three years between the accident and that peak, which may have increased in part due to more cancer screening due to radiation fears finding cancers early.

A 2006 study showed childhood leukemia rates around TMI rising from below the regional and national average to at the national average.

Health statistics show thyroid cancer rates in the TMI county to be at the expected average - two neighboring counties acutally had higher rates of this cancer.

The study often used by those claiming high casualty rates was actually performed by two local residents who went door to door asking people if they felt the accident had made them sick - it was highly unscientific with no controls for bias and is the only one showing high rates of illness. Can't help but think there might have been an agenda there.

[Steel]

Did you know that the most visited State Park (in terms of automobile visits, there is more foot traffic at Grayson highlands) in Virginia is Lake Anna State Park? The entire lake was created to be a cooling reservoir for the North Anna Nuclear Generating Station. What land that isn't owned by the Virginia's DNR and Dominion Power is la-de-da lake homes. Of course, I haven't heard anything about "elevated Cancer Rates" there.

Thanks for these examples.

These are excellent examples of how 'place is a shithole' is in fact more important than 'place is next to nuclear plant' for predicting cancer rates. Unfortunately we cant base our extrapolation off just your nice place with no cancer or Thanas' nice place with more cancer.

If we imagine that cancer occurs at some random background rate, and then on top of that there are effects that either increase or decrease cancer rates. So we might see some effect for being near a power station and an effect for living in a shithole or nice neighbourhood, and perhaps there is an interaction between neighbourhood and proximity to power plant (eg nice neighbourhoods experience no increased cancer rates, but shitty ones do).

There are various statistical tests that can actually determine if a set of proposed factors actually do significantly affect cancer rates, in what way, and if the various factors interact. There could also be various other factors that dominate the ones we test, such as background radiation levels due to radon, which vary significantly depending on location.

ANOVA is one such test (I eagerly await the statistics police...) which can do the above for a specific type of dataset.

The point is that just mentioning that there is an increased cancer risk near power plants does not imply that the increase:

i) Exists (ie is significant)

ii) Is not (partly or entirely)due to the presence of other factors - here the fact that proximity to a power plant is well correlated to a place being 'a shithole' with associated elevated cancer risk due to that.

[TimothyC]

The 1991 Columbia study found no physical health effects from TMI. Cancer rates peaked in the area in 1982 or 1983, but radiation induced cancer takes longer to appear than the three years between the accident and that peak, which may have increased in part due to more cancer screening due to radiation fears finding cancers early.

I've got a friend who has studied public health issues, and that is the reason that he gave for the decrease in cancer rates.

[Broomstick]

The hibakusha in Japan are another group that defies common wisdom - I've met many people who assume their children have a higher rate of birth defects than average, and they don't (though overall hibakusha have fewer children than average). While there was a spike in cancer and other radiation related diseases up to 20 years after the bombings those alive now actually have a slightly greater than average life expectancy.... possibly due to constant health monitoring, access to medical care, extensive screening, and those still alive possibly having better genes than average when it comes to resisting cancers.

Again, these public health issues are more complex than they appear, and certainly more complex than the average person understands.

[PeZook]

Additionally, I do not like the implication that questioning nuclear power equates to being pro-coal (although there are studies showing coal radioactivity pollution is vastly overstated).

While one certainly doesn't imply your opinion on the other, by arguing nuclear power should be abandoned, you are de fact arguing to keep coal power plants in operation instead, as no country on Earth can actually make the switch from fossil fuels to green energy very quickly.

Since, you know, the technology to make renewables able to replace coal is simply not there.

So every nuclear plant that gets decomissioned means a fossil fuel plant has to take over. The proper sequence should be to get rid of coal power first, gradually replacing it with nukes which, while still carrying their own dangers, are much more environmentaly friendly than coal in all respects, especially if they're of designs that can burn what we used to consider nuclear waste, reducing the need to mine new fuel. China actually seems to be doing something like that: they're building many different reactor types, that can sometimes produce fuel for each other extending the use of each fuel bundle a lot.

Now, the second step is to get rid of nukes as soon as proper technologies become available and proven (might take a good long while, though) This way you reduce CO2 emissions immediately, reduce coal mining (which destroys entire ecosystems daily), reduce coal ash storage areas, reduce emissions of radionuclides into the atmosphere...

Combine this with energy conservation measures, and you have a win.

The politics of it are another matter, yeah: it's soon going to become nigh impossible to begin large-scale nuclear projects in most western countries.

[someone_else]

Combine this with energy conservation measures, and you have a win.

Cutting energy consumption (in ways we already know) is painfully complex (if feasible at all) and much more expensive than anything else you care to look at.
That's mainly because to do that you have to deal with your whole population and check that they follow your directives, since you will have to actively fight your own culture's most idiotic ways of thinking (Pickups and SUVs are "American", government that tells you what to do is BAD, just to cite some well-known ones of the US, but every country has its own peculiar stupid things).

You see politicians doing it? I don't.
No nukes = more gas and coal for everyone until renewables catch up (if they can catch up anyway). Period.

[PeZook]

Cutting energy consumption (in ways we already know) is painfully complex (if feasible at all) and much more expensive than anything else you care to look at.
That's mainly because to do that you have to deal with your whole population and check that they follow your directives, since you will have to actively fight your own culture's most idiotic ways of thinking (Pickups and SUVs are "American", government that tells you what to do is BAD, just to cite some well-known ones of the US, but every country has its own peculiar stupid things).

Yes, but some things can be done relatively painlessly, like banning incadescent lifebulbs, enforcing mileage standards on cars (HAH, yeah, good luck doing that in the US ),or forcing appliance producers to comply with power conservation standards.

It a supporting effort, but a worthy one. We've been fighitng human stupidity for two decades to reduce smoking rates ; It's working, if slowly. Same for making people recycle their waste: another fight which seemed hopeless, but is gaining some ground.

[Pendleton]

While one certainly doesn't imply your opinion on the other, by arguing nuclear power should be abandoned, you are de fact arguing to keep coal power plants in operation instead, as no country on Earth can actually make the switch from fossil fuels to green energy very quickly.

Since, you know, the technology to make renewables able to replace coal is simply not there.

A bit of clarification on my stance. My recent hard look at nuclear energy doesn't preclude new plants being built. I even endorse newer plants being produced, since designs created in the last couple of decades are more efficient, safer and generally less polluting (although there will still be large CO2 emissions from construction and mining). A lot of coal could be replaced by CCGT plants, given there are still ample supplies of gas in many areas where coal is consumed because of historical reasons. The big problem is moving from fossil fuels to renewables entirely, that is, not shifting from coal to gas because coal is running low of good quality deposits.

This comes with the mandatory reassessment of our way of life as it stands. We can't make such a large transition and boost our growth at the same time, which is what makes such shifts an act of necessity when it's too late, rather than a planned move via foresight. Look at oil prices today, and how little we have in the way of a way to transition off of it. It is clear that very powerful people are not going to allow a paradigm shift of such proportions when it impacts their bottom line, which sadly is how the world works for the most part. That, and political popularity contests.

[Magis]

No element becomes another element through neutron capture. Plutonium is formed by Uranium capturing a deuteron.

You're stupid. Plutonium-239 is formed from Uranium-238 by neutron capture followed by Beta-decay. So yes, technically no new element is formed by neutron capture, however, it's simpler to say it was created by neutron capture, because the capture is required for the transmutation. There are no deuterons being captured to create plutonium.

Uranium that captures a neutron then emits a beta particle becomes Neptunium239. Which can then decays to either Plutonium or Protactinium.

I don't know why you're being so clumsy as to mention "Uranium" as though Uranium was an isotope. When U-238 captures a neutron, a U-239 compound nucleus is formed that decays entirely into Np239. Np239 does not decay into Plutonium or Protactinium; it decays only into Pu-239.

[Simon_Jester]

Any random uranium atom is very likely to be U-238; I'd call it a perfectly acceptable slip of the tongue under the circumstances.

[JohnKPlisskin]

Is anyone else disgusted or annoyed with most of the American media coverage (locally or nationally) being about how this will affect America? When one of the local top stories about the disaster involves nothing but how an (one, singular, uno) American died in the tsunami I find it rather despicable. Sure, it's a terrible loss for their family, but they weren't even a local to the area! And when they're running headlines about how "Radiation is falling in California! IT'S IN OUR RAINWATER! OH NOES!" not mentioning that to get get the same dose of radiation as an international flight you'd have consume 153-some-odd liters of water in a day.

Gah, I don't know, maybe it's just an excuse to rant, but it's aggravating. There's real human tragedy going on there, and a few fascinating stories of personal heroism going on.

[aerius]

Is anyone else disgusted or annoyed with most of the American media coverage (locally or nationally) being about how this will affect America?

I'm in Canada but we get a few American stations up here so I see what's been reported. Let's just say it took a hell of a lot of restraint to keep from throwing the remote through the TV, the coverage was goddamn sickening, 99.9% of it was anti-nuke hysteria and after the first day or 2 they stopped covering what was going on in the rest of the disaster area. Other than the CBC the Canadian stations aren't that much better and after the first few days I gave up and stopped watching the news and kept up to date on the disaster through various internet sources.

[Bakustra]

I have a question regarding nuclear waste, how dangerous would it actually be to drill open and walk into a typical nuclear waste underground cave say 10.000 years from now? Would I turn into a sizzling corpse or would I increase my possibility to get cancer by some miniscule percentage?

Assuming that everything remains intact, then you'd simply increase your chance to contract cancer by a certain, fairly small amount. If it didn't remain intact, then you'd be at major risk for thyroid cancer from exposure to radioactive iodine and you'd have a significantly greater risk from greater physical contact with the waste. All this is assuming you don't touch anything and don't stay there for extended periods. This is after the expected lifetime of a nuclear waste depository has ended, you realize, which makes this not really a fair question.

If you opened one up today, you would not do as well, though you wouldn't turn into a sizzling corpse unless you were exposed to a spent fuel rod before cooling was completed, in which case you'd die from the megarems of radiation burning you inside and out, and if you touched the thing, it'd burn your arm off from its sheer heat. It takes a lot of radiation to kill someone, but nowhere near as much to heighten the risk from cancer or essentially ensure that they'll contract it at some point.

[Broomstick]

Is anyone else disgusted or annoyed with most of the American media coverage (locally or nationally) being about how this will affect America?

I'm in Canada but we get a few American stations up here so I see what's been reported. Let's just say it took a hell of a lot of restraint to keep from throwing the remote through the TV, the coverage was goddamn sickening, 99.9% of it was anti-nuke hysteria and after the first day or 2 they stopped covering what was going on in the rest of the disaster area. Other than the CBC the Canadian stations aren't that much better and after the first few days I gave up and stopped watching the news and kept up to date on the disaster through various internet sources.

This is why I mostly pay attention to the NHK news feed we get on the TV a few times a week at one of our local PBS stations (we have three public broadcast stations in my viewing area, and one of them prides itself on about 3 hours a day of foreign news from foreign sources, rotating among a dozen or so countries)

I mean, locally I forgave them for their reporting on likelihood of the same happening to US nuclear plants because the Chicago area has six (maybe more) of them and that is a reasonable question to ask - hey, could that similar looking plant down the street have a similar problem? But, as pointed out, we just aren't at risk for tsunami of any sort, much less a 10 meter one, and if by some miracle Lake Michigan HAD generated such a wave none of the functioning plants are close enough to the big lake to get hit. (there are at least two decommissioned reactors that are closer to the big lake, but as they haven't generated power in years there's no residual heat and zero risk of melt down - it would be more a problem of waste on site winding up in the water. Still not good, but no explosions at least). Our plants are designed for, if I recall, greater than an 8.0 quake and have had the safety upgrades recommended after TMI installed.

Basically, the reporting in my area (Chicago) seems to spend 5 minutes on "people are still homeless, the reactor is still leaking, crisis continues" and moves on to other stuff. There are some concerns about Toyota factories in the area being forced to shut down due to supply problems but hey, that is at least somewhat relevant. I don't think Japan has been mentioned on the local news here for about two weeks, except for a couple charity drives. The national news has had more, but seems to be pulling back from Japan saturation. Thank goodness.

[Sea Skimmer]

And I thought the German nuclear industry was incompetent, but this takes the grand prize for stupidity. Hey, let us ruin our fishing grounds. Nothing wrong with that....

The British piped high level nuclear waste directly into the Irish Sea; Russia piped it into a small creek (flow was IIRC under 1000 cubic meters of water per hour) which eventually got to the ocean and had to be lined with barbed wire for hundreds of kilometers. Russia later upgraded to pumping the waste into a closed lake, rather then a creek draining to the ocean. Radiation levels at the discharge pipe were almost instantly fatal. Throwing stuff down a mineshaft is downright sensible.