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Los Alamos Lab: We're OK, You're OK
The fires which have been burning as a result of what was intended to be a controlled burn hit Los Alamos, site of the renowned National Laboratory, especially hard. Some have questioned the safety of the lab after this trauma; In addition to being the research site for the first atomic bomb, Los Alamos has remained an important lab for top-secret technology. It's also the site of the nation's 'only active plutonium facility.' According to an AP story, the lab thought that letting reporters tour the facility was the best way to defuse fears that the fires had brought a risk to public health. Hope they're right.
Actually, I just took a class in Nuclear Engineering, we concentrated a lot on the public's fear of nuclear facilities. The public is completely ill-informed when it comes to anything nuclear. People fear that waste will get spread around-the waste is stored in steel containers that can survive a train hitting them plus being doused in jet fuel and lit on fire (I saw a film of it.) Everyone always talks about Three Mile Island happening again: The radiation released to the public from TMI was less than the radiation the public got from their houses on that day. I think the government needs to develop a program to educate people on exactly how safe nuclear power is-France is 80% powered by it, but we haven't built a plant in 10 years because the public is ignorant.
Colin Winters
Having once worked at a National Lab (PNNL, operated by Battelle) I can say that if LANL is anything like where I worked, they're not lying. Nuclear material is handled very carefully and a forest fire is the least of their worries.
There are other issues with the Natl labs (namely, national security) that aren't all that great - but I don't think fire is going to be a problem.
(yes, I was certified as a level 1 rad worker, and no it wasn't my main focus - I was a computer tech who had to go into rad zones from time to time. if you think an old Quadra 605 is slow now, it feels ten times as slow when you're surrounded by geiger counters and have a quota as to how long you would be allowed to stay there)
- Jeff A. Campbell
- VelociNews (http://www.velocinews.com)
- Jeff
As big as this fire was, it still did not clear out all the debris lying on the forest floor. New Mexico's forests have been protected for the last 150 years and its only recently that fires have been allowed to burn.
Its only recently that forest managers realized that forest fires are a somewhat regular occurence neccesary to clean out the debris and allow trees to be properly spaced by killing off weaker trees. If you take a look at tree rings from a really old tree you can see a regular pattern of fire and then this big gap when our forest service actively fought forest fires.
Unfortunately, we cant just get rid of the debris overnight, so regular, perhaps even aggressive, controlled burning is necessary. The debris left behind from 150 years of fire control may prove to be a big problem if we continue to have record hot summers(due to global warming, but that's another story).
The Albuquerque Journal is a great reference for donations, BTW, as the entire city of Los Alamos had to be evacuated, about 500 homes were destroyed(out of a population of 11,000) so there are many people are in need.
No, Thursday's out. How about never - is never good for you?
This sounds almost religious. You claim that those who have studied it have been 'brainwashed' by the heathens. You claim that the [religious] public can never be wrong. Yes, it is right to burn heathens at the stake. It couldn't be that we're ill-informed; It must be THEIR fault.
How many times has the public been wrong on some religious craze.. From power lines cause cancer (300 million spent, on a rumor), to breast implants (billions in lawsuits, and no evidence), to expelling students for wearing smelly aftershave. (Yes, this happened a couple of weeks ago.) These are such critical dangers that we must be protected from. The public can't be wrong in protecting us from smelly aftershave!
Here's a clue: EVERYTHING is dangerous. It's just a matter of degree.. Burning coal for electicity puts more radioactivity into the air than nuclear power does. Oil tankers can run aground. Refineries can blow up. Flying cross-country once a week give you the equivalent radiation of 10 whole-body X-rays a year.
You can't religiously claim that forbidding the use of fire is right, just because it could accidently burn down your neighborhood.
Nuclear energy is just another kind of fire, the fire of the burning atom trying to turn itself into iron.