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Fukushima Radioactive Fallout Nears Chernobyl Levels
0WaitState writes "The cumulative releases from Fukushima of iodine-131 and cesium-137 have reached 73% and 60% respectively of the amounts released from the 1986 Chernobyl accident. These numbers were reached independently from a monitoring station in Sacramento, CA, and Takasaki, Japan. The iodine and cesium releases are due to the cooking off of the more volatile elements in damaged fuel rods."
From TFA:
That's a really important difference. It means the total release of radioactive material is far smaller. And the iodine, at least, is a lot less scary than the sort of stuff you get from fuel particles -- it has a half-life of only 8 days, so there's no real long-term environmental threat from that. (The cesium is rather worse -- half life of ~30 years.)
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And the "something" that just doesn't work is Slashdot fact-checking.
DO dismiss out of hand comparisons of Fukushima with Chernobyl. Because they're completely different events, at differently designed nuclear power plants, with a completely different level of response from the local authorities. Even in the absolute worst case scenario, Fukushima will never be anywhere near as bad as Chernobyl was in terms of deaths, long term damage to the environment or cost & duration of cleanup.
From TFA:
The amounts being released, he says, are "entirely consistent" with the relatively low amounts of caesium and iodine being measured in soil, plants and water in Japan, because so much has blown out to sea. The amounts crossing the Pacific to places like Sacramento are vanishingly small – they were detected there because the CTBT network is designed to sniff out the tiniest traces.
"Relatively low amounts" in Japan. "Vanishingly small" amounts elsewhere. Yeah, they're really sensationally hyping this one up. /sarcasm
I don't doubt the claim, I do doubt the presentation. Have some respect.
So you think the claim is true, but it should not have been presented? Reporting simple facts now is sensationalism? They should have had enough respect to simply not report it? (No doubt you'll claim they could have been presented in a less sensational manner, which is utterly ridiculous considering, but whatever. Clearly any reporting of these facts at all would be considered sensationalist by you.)
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
DO NOT discount reports of contamination. DO NOT dismiss out of hand comparisons of Fukushima with Chernobyl.
I can't find a way to sugar coat that. Sorry.
The scary contamination in Tokyo is between 0.3% and 1.5% of the radioactive exposure you get from smoking one cigarette. Scary, isn't it?
Could you describe the difference between evolution caused by increased radiation and evolution caused by what ever else? Evolution is just changes and nothing more. Stuff happens and sometimes it turns out to be something that changes things.
No, evolution is not just changes. Evolution is the effect of long term adaptation of a population to the environment through the combined effects of mutation, natural selection and reproduction. Mere mutation alone doesn't give you evolution.
The speed of evolution is not directly proportional to the mutation rate. If the mutation rate is too high, beneficial mutations are quickly swamped in harmful mutations, and unable to contribute to an increased chance of reproduction. What does speed up evolution is a change in environment. I bet Chernobyl will result in organisms in the area being more resistant to radiation and radioactive pollution.
I still have some liquid soap left from last year's flu hysteria.
And some air masks too. Who wants some?
There was also a hysteria for the mad cow disease, but my wife did not buy anything, we merely rode the car through pools of soapy water back then (near farms)
The problem when the media says apocalypse is coming once a year, and we're still there the next year is that we pay less attention the next time.
Both Iodine and Cesium are only dangerous if you ingest significant quantities of them. Additionally they have halflives measured in hours
No.
I-131 8 days.
Cs-137 30.2 years.
The problem at Chernobyl was release of Uranium and Plutonium in clouds, which then spread around the site, and irradiated everything.
In the long term the problem was the Cs-137.
Does it really need to be said that the Japanese lost control of exactly 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000% of their nuclear fuel.
If exposure of the rods and burning off of radioactive isotopes is zero loss of control, then stabbing someone is zero loss of blood unless they die.
Wanna bet the author of this story is a "green scientist" ?
The only thing I'd bet is that you're thoroughly annoyed that an out-of-date power plant has demonstrated that humans need to try much harder when deploying nuclear power. You're deliberately polarising it as greens vs nuclear advocates when it's really the desire for safe nuclear power vs the desire for maximising profit at inappropriate risk.
Nuclear disasters are disasters in slow motion. Apart from initial explosions and the like, there's no good reason any sizeable number of people in an informed populace has to die because there's plenty of time to react. That doesn't mean you can ignore them or that they don't cause tens or hundreds of billion dollars in damages. You have to put forth heroic efforts to try to stop a catastrophe from becoming a megacatastrophe. You have to order the evacuations. You have to destroy produce and milk. You have to leave areas closed off to settlement and larger areas to agriculture. You have to find new water supplies. You have to seal off any sources of further radiation leakage, whatever the cost. And so on, all depending on the scale of the accident.
Everyone focuses on deaths with nuclear accidents, but apart from the sudden explosion/etc deaths and the deaths caused by a poor response to the disaster, nobody has to die in even a major nuclear accident. They're just really freaking expensive to deal with, in terms of containment, in terms of ruined property, and in terms of protracted economic damages.
Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?