Even just as a matter of rhetoric and persuasion, I think trying to argue that Chernobyl wasn't all that bad isn't the route you want to go in reassuring people.
Fukushima is very different but I agree with others that we should wait at least a couple of weeks till we make any conclusions
Speaking of jumping to conclusions: Germany just started to shut down 7 nuclear power plants because of Fukushima...
Seriously, study after study by various international organisations have come to the same conclusion.
See these links for the reports.
Of course other power sources pollute the environment, too, but they can be improved as well, for example by installing better filters.
There are still areas in Germany were wild pigs have to be tested for radioactivity, as some of them are too fond of radioactive mushrooms.
(lang=de: http://www.zeit.de/2010/46/U-Strahlende-Wildschweine?page=al... )
One could obviously argue about the term "much impact". Having cancer ia a pretty bad experience even if you survive. Same with abandoning your hometown etc.
Nevertheless the outcome of Chernobyl seems to be far less dramatic than most people believe. At least if this study by Greenpeace is wrong (estimating almost 100,000 deaths): http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/features/che...
I wonder how you can claim that when, depending on who you ask, the figure varies between 50, 50000 and "hundreds of thousands".
The figures you cite are from IAEA, which arguably is quite a biased source. Let's also not forget that it's very difficult to track and correlate the health of >600k people over 20+ years - even if you try to do it in best honesty.
As a counter-point, here's a study[1] that claims ~1 million deaths and according to wikipedia: "draws on previously classified post-Soviet records and reports by Eastern European scientists and medical experts that have largely been ignored by the IAEA and UNSCEAR".
I haven't read it, it may be fear mongering material. But then again, if really only 4050 people were affected, why is everyone making such a big deal about it?
[1] http://www.nyas.org/Publications/Annals/Detail.aspx?cid=f3f3...
They're making a big deal for 2 reasons. First it WAS a big deal. What happened is nothing to sniff at. So making a big deal over Chernobyl is no problem.
Second, the problem is that the anti-nuclear movement is trying to make people believe that it was much worse than it was, in an attempt to use irrational fear to bolster resistance against nuclear.
These are people who have no problem with lies, to them the end justifies the means, they will do anything they can, including breaking laws to stop nuclear power. I've seen this in Ireland not only with nuclear but with the building of a gas plant, a small group of radicals broke into the facility numerous times doing whatever damage they could. And this was just for gas.
Sorry, but I think you're contradicting yourself here. First you say 4050 people affected and totaling "only" 90 deaths is not a big deal (which I would agree with) - and now you say the opposite?
If it was commonly agreed that the number of casualties was that low then I really don't get why even the pro-nuclear parties refer to it as the dramatic event that is to be avoided at all costs. Your average earthquake affects and kills more people than that...
Second, the problem is that the anti-nuclear movement [...] in an attempt to use irrational fear to bolster resistance against nuclear
I keep hearing that, but I'm really wondering what are the motivations here?
Yes, there are some environmental nut-jobs who will argue for the sake of it, but those are usually easy to spot. However, on top of that there is also a non-negligible number of more or less credible scientists and first-hand witnesses (doctors, nurses) who question the figure of ~4000 affected. When I see an interview with a nurse on TV who reports about entire villages in the area dying out because they can't make children without birth-defects, then I can't help but ask: Why should she make this up? Who is paying her to tell us lies?
And then, on the other side of the spectrum, we have a multi-billion dollar industry and entire countries depending on the perception that nuke plants are "safe enough".
I'm not claiming to have the definite answer. I just don't understand where people like you are taking their confidence from.
I get my confidence from my understanding of nuclear energy. I'm not a nuclear scientist, but if your even remotely technically inclined(or just make an effort to understand) the basics are not hard to learn.
Most people think it's beyond their ability to understand how nuclear works so they don't even try, it might as well be black magic to them. It's then really easy to scare them with nuclear horror stories, and no amount of facts can undo that because they haven't got the fundamentals to understand those facts.
Did you know that in 1957 there was a fire in a military nuclear reactor in the UK burning for 2 days before it was shut down? Much of this burned nuclear material was passing almost freely into the atmosphere with not a single dangerous dose of radiation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windscale_fire
Or in another accident in 1961 three operators were killed(not by radiation), one of which was stuck to the ceiling with debris from the initial explosion. The rescue team used meat hooks on sticks to retrieve the body(in parts), being able to spend less than 57 seconds in the area. The bodies were so radioactive that they had to be berried in lead caskets.
Oh, I think I do have a basic grasp.
However, I'm not sure how your two stories relate to either Chernobyl or a potential meltdown in Japan at all.
Are you trying to suggest that nuke plants are inherently harmless, because even fires can burn in them for 2 days without anything bad happening?
I guess it boils down to that I have a different understanding of the risks of nuclear plants - physics aside. People like you (sorry for generalizing) repeatedly claim that a meltdown is a normal and planned failure-mode. The core melts, the containment catches the radioactive blob, it cools down, all is well.
This sounds nice in theory. My problem is that it doesn't jibe at all with what we hear from japan these days. It doesn't sound like they're following a boring disaster-plan. It sounds more like they're pretty much in panic-mode. But perhaps this is just the media-spin, we'll know in a few weeks...
100% pure green hysteria. ~10.000 died because of the tsunami. Who died because of Fukushima? None so far.
(Though I agree that shutting down power plants in Germany right now is illogical.)
There are ways to achieve a mean world GDP, or at least a standard of living similar to ours at a much lower rate of single-use resource consumption, but we're at a local optima. Civilization is a greedy search algorithm.
All else being equal, I wouldn't mind moving close to a nuclear plant. The thing is, power plants (in general) are built in less hospitable places. So it's never "equal" to begin with.
I mean, this earthquake has already killed thousands (and there will be more earthquakes in the futures). The power plant? I think a few have died from the hydrogen explosions, but none from radiation poisoning.
So the measures being taken are in fact neither hasty nor unplanned.
Not because of Fukushima, but pending elections..
The effects of the Chernobyl catastrophe are still being felt today—whole towns
lie abandoned, and cancer rates in people living close to the affected areas
are abnormally high
But it turns out that the radioactive cloud may have a silver lining. Recent
studies suggest that the 19-mile (30-kilometer) "exclusion zone" set up around
the reactor has turned into a wildlife haven.
> So what Chernobyl has taught us?
> That nuclear energy is the safest source of energy currently available. The Chernobyl disaster was the worst we can imagine a nuclear power plant. In addition, Chernobyl defied every rule of safety. This property was one big scandal. But that's not all. Following the outbreak of the reactor were released into the atmosphere huge amounts of radioactive substances, which reached even to Antarctica. And what? And nothing. Killed 31 people - less cluttered than in January hall in Chorzow. Dangerously contaminated was less than a square kilometer of land.That's it!
What if we took the average number of fatalities per gigawatt-hour generated for coal and compared that to the worst-case ever scenario for nuclear, Chernobyl? Does anyone have these figures? I think we could all really use them to put this whole thing in proper perspective.
Chernobyl was the worst possible nuclear accident. It caused between 50 and 5000 early deaths. As a major industrial accident, it was only average. It pales in comparison to the 1984 Bhopal disaster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster
It took a long time to convince myself of this, but it really is quite obvious: because of the energy density difference of ~ 1,000,000 between fission and everything else, just about everything you'd care to measure about fission is going to be at least an order of magnitude better. That's because the amount of energy we're interested in is roughly constant, so the upper bound on destruction is roughly the same, but the material flows for fission are a million times smaller.
Actually, appropriate use of fission should increase the demand for energy somewhat, and this would be a very good thing.
Just correcting an error/omission.
I realise The Register may have published the story before the relevant Japanese authorities abandoned their face-saving pretence that there weren't going to be any further problems, but that doesn't mean this kind of denialism masquerading as scientific counterargument deserves any more credence than the doomsday prophecies spreading elsewhere. Particularly when it's written by a layman masquerading as an authority whose last article was entitled "Balanced, neutral journalism is RUBBISH and that's a FACT" :-)