Fukushima: Japan will have to dump radioactive water into Pacific, minister says
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
Having plenty of numbers and data is great, specially for making reports and speeches, but maths are not the only tool that a human brain can use. Often logical reasoning is powerful enough.
Is a fact that radioactivity kills people. No need to demonstrate it statistically. We have enough empirical evidence.
Is a fact also that radioactivity is bioaccumulative.
We don't need a single "four", "seven" or a "twelve" to understand that dumping a bioaccumulative poison in a coastal area inhabited by millions and that provides a considerable part of the diet of this people, is definitely not a good idea.
The idea that they are getting short of space is ridiculous. The area around the central is not exactly crowded at this moment. To me is obvious that they are getting sort of money, not space, and trying disperately to find excuses to save at any cost, and pass the problem to other.
Are you sure?
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-45423575
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/es/diccionario/ingles/get-a...
Not sure he died because of Fukushima: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/09/06/no-the-ca....
Anyway, we are discussing one case. Nobody died during the crisis and after 8 years there is only this case, and this is the second worst nuclear disaster. I am not saying that nuclear is the best, but it is way safer than how people think it is. And definitly way safer than other ways of producing electricity.
This is a very vague and inaccurate statement. Some radioactive substances bioaccumulate, while others do not.
For example, caesium -137 could be a problem for bioaccumulation, but tritium is not.
That is false. Or at least very inaccurate.
High levels of radioactivity kills people. In Europe we receive ~5 mS per year, ~10 in the US. Pilots and radiography doctors are at ~20-50 mS/year. Nobody dies because of this. You could double this background radiation and nothing would happen.
So now the question to ask is: how much do they want to dump, and what would be radiation received by the animals and humans around this place. With this we can discuss tradeoff and make an informed decision.
Most importantly, for such important matters[1], you should not run away screaming as soon as you hear the word "radioactive", but rather think and make decisions based on facts, not fears.
[1] In a context of global warming, a way to produce electricity with virtually zero CO2 is pretty cool. Compare France vs Germany: there is a 7x factor in the CO2 produced (dont take my word on that, go check the numbers yourself). Until we know how to store electricity, our best bet is nuclear, not intermittent solar or wind.
It's a fact radioactivity kills people over certain thresholds. This is the same as saying water kills people or potatoes kill people. Radioactivity itself is not bio accumulative. Some radioactive particles are bio accumulative.
Your post shows a staggering amount of misinformation which is exactly the reason we need hard numbers.
Actually, no. It is highly unlikely that 100 tons per day (steady state rate) of this water being introduced to the Pacific would make a meaningful difference to anyone.
Bear in mind that mixing 100 tons of water with a single cubic kilometer of water is a dilution factor of 10,000,000x. The ocean contains a LOT more than 1 km^3. ;-)
To educate you a bit about low levels of ionizing radiation (hormesis):
>> In a Chinese study which has compared area with average radiation exposure of 2.31 mSv/y with a similar area with 0.96 mSv/y average exposure, the cancer mortality rate was lower in the high-background group (High Background Radiation Research Group 1980). However, this difference was statistically significant only in the oldest-aged group (40–70 years of age), i.e., in those individuals who have the greatest lifelong exposure to high background levels of radiation. In the other large-scale Chinese study, the cancer mortality rate was lower in the area with a relatively high background radiation (74,000 people), while the control group who lived in an area with low background radiation (78,000 people) had a higher rate of cancer mortality (Wei et al. 1990). In a similar Indian study, the cancer incidence/mortality rates was significantly less in areas with a high-background radiation level than in similar areas with a low background radiation level (Nambi and Soman 1987).
"Radiation Hormesis: Historical Perspective and Implications for Low-Dose Cancer Risk Assessment" https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2889502/
Is not so simple. There is not such thing as "one ocean", the sea is composed of several water masses, that are layered and often travel thousands of miles without mixing with the rest. In some parts this water is streamed directly again the coast in a narrow band that extends 1000 Km long so instead to face the open sea your water visits each small village in the coast one by one. At other times of the year the same water will travel to US. It depends a lot of the location, wind, month, year, etc...
But people don't want to hear this normally.
The only water that's fairly static is deep, cold water. If some of the Tepco contamination goes in that direction, it'll be even better, since it won't be nearly as radioactive by the time it surfaces again...
And we are not taking in mind that deliberately contaminating the ocean is typified as a environmental crime in most countries, this radioactive water is lethal to marine organisms but... whatever. They are allowed to do anything they want.
Is a fact that water kills people. 100% of people who drink water will eventually die, and people who try to breathe it usually die even sooner.
There is a lot of things that can kill people but I doubt that Fukushima's people will find any relief adding one more risk to the list.
Check also his other threads, it's a gold mine
Alaska, British Columbia and the rest of US West Coast will eat the garbage shaped as fishes, by courtesy of sea currents, (and is obvious that nobody cares). Strange times.
> [using groundwater] to prevent the three damaged reactor cores from melting
> [built] a frozen underground wall to prevent groundwater reaching the three damaged reactor buildings [which reduced the flow]..to about 100 tonnes a day.
> the prime minister..assured..that the situation was “under control”.
Not convinced.
The thing I find most interesting is that even the Fukushima fishermen agree that dumping the water will be harmless, but they are still very opposed to it because they think consumers will be irrationally scared and not buy fish caught in the Fukushima region.
> Over the course of our long conversation, Sawada frankly acknowledged that the scientific consensus indicates very low risk if the water is released. “It’s not a question of scientific understanding,” he said. “We understand that tritiated water is released from other nuclear power plants in Japan and around the world. But we think it will be impossible for the public in general to understand why tritium is considered low risk, and expect there will be a large new backlash against Fukushima marine products no matter how scientifically it is explained.” I pointed out that the [fishery] coops agreed to the release of the subdrain and bypass water from Daiichi, and asked what was different about this. He pointed out that in those cases, the water is pumped out before it is contaminated, and the public seems to understand that the contamination levels are already very low.
[1] https://blog.safecast.org/2018/06/part-1-radioactive-water-a... [2] https://blog.safecast.org/2018/06/part-2-radioactive-water-a... [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20304208
This seems like it might be a nice source of tritium for tritium deuterium fusion reactors? I am quite sure I am missing some fairly critical elements here... but it certainly would be lovely if that was the solution. (I mean, there are not exactly a lot of fusion reactors... heh).
https://www.nuclearsolutions.veolia.com/en/our-expertise/tec...
Just kidding. Wasn’t there a calc a while back that the concentrations are actually that bad? ie in some cases barely noticable against background radiation
Even if it is actually bad...I don't see any other options? Maybe massive oil tankers to transport it & dump it in a desert somewhere?
Fundamentally, whether or not that reasoning is unethical or wrong is up to the reader. I don't feel like disadvantaging my descendants because it's convenient for me is the right thing to do, but looking at the state of the world right now I doubt the majority of people feels that way (or even cares to think about it). Given that that is the case, sure! Dump it somewhere convenient.