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."

Comments

Misleading summary

[znu]

From TFA:

The difference between this accident and Chernobyl, they say, is that at Chernobyl a huge fire released large amounts of many radioactive materials, including fuel particles, in smoke. At Fukushima Daiichi, only the volatile elements, such as iodine and caesium, are bubbling off the damaged fuel.

That's a really important difference. It means the total release of radioactive material is far smaller. And the iodine, at least, is a lot less scary than the sort of stuff you get from fuel particles -- it has a half-life of only 8 days, so there's no real long-term environmental threat from that. (The cesium is rather worse -- half life of ~30 years.)

Re:Misleading summary

[Solandri]

I'm saying that this far, it seems likely that the harm to human health from the nukes, will be a tiny fraction of the damages resulting from the earthquake and tsunami.

I suspect more people are going to wind up getting cancer and dying from smoke inhalation from all the gas, wood, and coal heaters they're using due to the rolling blackouts, than from radiation from this accident. In other words, the loss of electrical generating capacity due to the Fukushima Daiichi plant being offline is probably going to kill more people than the radiation it emits. But death by radiation is more exotic and makes a better story than death by long-term smoke inhalation, so the media splashes it all over their headlines.

Nuclear powerplants has this far gotten a huge fraction of the attention, while actually causing a miniscule fraction of the deaths and injuries. This *may* change if we get a larger release of radioactive substances, offcourse.

Statistically, if you compare the safety of each power source in terms of deaths per TWh generated, this accident would have to kill something like 10,000 people in order for nuclear to lose its title as safest power generation technology (wind is currently second safest - yes, wind power has killed more people Watt-hour for Watt-hour than nuclear). This obsession people have with worst case scenarios is skewing their judgment into making the wrong decision on how safe the technology is. Just like how plane crashes make people think planes are more dangerous than they really are, or how big lottery prizes make people think it's worth buying a ticket when it really isn't.

Re:Banana?

[an unsound mind]

And the "something" that just doesn't work is Slashdot fact-checking.

Re:Sensational!

[osu-neko]

From TFA:

The amounts being released, he says, are "entirely consistent" with the relatively low amounts of caesium and iodine being measured in soil, plants and water in Japan, because so much has blown out to sea. The amounts crossing the Pacific to places like Sacramento are vanishingly small – they were detected there because the CTBT network is designed to sniff out the tiniest traces.

"Relatively low amounts" in Japan. "Vanishingly small" amounts elsewhere. Yeah, they're really sensationally hyping this one up. /sarcasm

I don't doubt the claim, I do doubt the presentation. Have some respect.

So you think the claim is true, but it should not have been presented? Reporting simple facts now is sensationalism? They should have had enough respect to simply not report it? (No doubt you'll claim they could have been presented in a less sensational manner, which is utterly ridiculous considering, but whatever. Clearly any reporting of these facts at all would be considered sensationalist by you.)

Re:Fukushima

[Anonymous Coward]

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?

Re:Sensational!

[Hazel Bergeron]

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.

Re:Warning! Prospective alert.

[Rei]

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.