=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL’S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #201
—October 3, 1990—
News and resources for environmental justice.
——
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
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NUCLEAR FALLOUT FROM SADDAM HUSSEIN.
[Continuing our review of MULTIPLE EXPOSURES BY CATHERINE
CAUFIELD. Page numbers given in our text, below, refer to Ms.
Caufield’s book.]
The NEW YORK TIMES recently called for greater U.S. reliance on
nuclear power plants to generate electricity. The nuclear
industry has seized upon Saddam Hussein as an excuse to peddle
its wares more aggressively, and the TIMES is helping out. The
TIMES says America should go nuclear in a big way because we need
to get off the oil binge and because the problem of catastrophic
nuclear accidents has been solved by new plant designs. In older
nuclear power plants, catastrophic releases of radioactivity
could occur when the nuclear fuel got too hot and melted, burning
a hole in the outermost protective shell of the plant, or perhaps
allowing an explosion to occur. Radiation releases at Three Mile
Island and at Chernobyl both resulted from core meltdown (though
at Three Mile Island the outermost protective shield remained
intact).
The TIMES says the core melt problem has been solved in a new
generation of nuclear plants–plants that the nuclear industry
calls “inherently safe.” The TIMES seems to like this phrase and
repeats it often.
Even if this optimistic view of modern nuclear plants were
correct, which is by no means assured (see RHWN #145), there
would still be good reason to discourage the spread of nuclear
power.
Catastrophic releases of radiation are not the only problems that
make nuclear power plants dangerous; an even larger danger is the
routine, small doses of radiation that occur to workers and to
the public alike as a nuclear plant goes about its business of
generating steam and electricity. Even if nuclear power plants
never released large amounts of radioactivity at one time, the
cumulative radiation exposures they entail would make them much
more dangerous than the available alternatives (biomass, wind,
and solar).
The nuclear “fuel cycle” begins when human beings mine uranium
from a mile or so below the surface of the ground; the uranium is
then crushed (“milled”) into sand. The sand is chemically
processed to extract uranium, which is then sent to a factory
where it is turned into fuel pellets, which are then packaged
into rods, which are bundled together and inserted into the core
of a reactor. The rods are allowed to “go critical”–which is to
say, they are encouraged to undergo the same reactions that occur
inside an atomic bomb, though inside a power plant everything is
closely controlled to avoid an explosion. The uranium fuel
undergoes nuclear fission, heats up, boils water which makes
steam, which turns a turbine to make electricity. Meanwhile, the
fuel rods are “fissioning,” and making not only heat but also
many new radioactive elements that weren’t there to begin with,
like strontium-90 and cesium-137 and plutonium239. These useless,
highly dangerous, and unwanted byproducts are “radioactive waste”
and they must be put somewhere for the duration of the hazard,
which in some cases is several hundred thousand years.
Another kind of radioactive waste, which many people (including
the editors of the TIMES) tend to forget is the uranium mine and
mill wastes that remain heaped on the desert because there isn’t
anyplace else to put them. (They are mined as rock, then crushed
into sand and after they are crushed their volume is so large
that they don’t fit back in the same hole they originally came
out of, besides which putting them back into the ground would be
expensive and would obstruct further underground digging, so
there is no place to put them except in a big pile on the desert
where they blow around with the wind, wash away with the rain,
and exude radioactive radon gas for thousands of years into the
future, causing deadly exposures all the while. There are already
191 million tons of radioactive uranium wastes heaped on the
desert in the southwestern U.S., literally blowing on the wind;
they contain little uranium but much radium (about 100 times the
amount of radium found in average rock). U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that the people living near
these piles have a one-in-a-thousand chance of fatal lung
cancer–a risk 1000 times greater than the risks EPA usually
calls “acceptable.” (Pgs. 75-88, 202-207.)
The people who mine uranium have been treated as a disposable
commodity. The U.S. Public Health Service says the death rate
from lung cancer is five times greater among uranium miners than
among the population as a whole. The average age of uranium
miners who die of lung cancer is 46. (Pg. 78.)
A problem affecting even more people is the radiation exposure
that accompanies the routine operations of a nuclear power plant
and its associated “fuel cycle.” The public is exposed somewhat;
workers are exposed somewhat more. As radioactive fuel and wastes
are created and handled and transported and stored, many people
are exposed a little. Inside the plant itself, a broken pipe
spills a puddle of radioactive water, which someone mops up. Then
the pipe is fixed or replaced. Each operation exposes workers a
little more and creates a little more radioactive waste, which
must be packaged and shipped somewhere by someone. Exposures add
up.
The unit of measurement for radioactivity is the rem. One person
exposed to one rem of radiation creates an exposure of one
person-rem. The size of a nuclear power plant is measured by the
plant’s capacity to produce electricity. A large plant is rated
at 2 billion watts, or 2 gigawatts, meaning it could light 20
million 100-watt light bulbs continuously. Such a plant operating
for one year will produce 2 gigawatt-years of electricity.
The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic
Radiation (UNSCEAR) estimates that one gigawatt-year of nuclear
electricity produces 467,500 person-rem of dose-commitment; this
means that running a 2-gigawatt nuclear plant creates conditions
that will eventually lead to 467,500 x 2 = 935,000 person-rems of
exposure each year it remains in operation (pgs. 163, 202).
According to the International Commission on Radiation Protection
(ICRP), which is the most prestigious standards-setting group for
the nuclear industry–this will cause fatal cancers in 116 people
per year and will cause 75 serious genetic defects per year (pgs.
163, 202). If this typical nuclear plant operated for 25 years,
it would thus kill a total of 25 x 116 = 2900 people and would
cause 25 x 75 = 1875 serious genetic defects. For every fatal
cancer, there will also be 1.5 to 2 non-fatal cancers caused; so,
conservatively, we can estimate that 25 years of operation of a
2-gigawatt nuclear power plant will cause 1.5 x 2900 = 4350
non-fatal cancers (skin cancers and thyroid cancers, for
example); these costs of operating a nuclear power plant will
accrue far into the future (pgs. 163, 183).
These are rock-bottom estimates, straight from the heart of a
standards-setting agency of the nuclear industry, the ICRP.
Another international organization, established to track the
health of humans who survived the bombings of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki (called the Radiation Effects Research Foundation),
during the 1980s published a series of reports indicating that
the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been exposed to about
10 times less radiation than was previously thought; since
current estimates about radiation danger to humans are largely
based on the experiences of these Japanese people, this means
that current estimates of the hazards of radiation are roughly 10
times too low (pg. 164). If this is the case (and there is now a
great deal of evidence that it is), this means that operating a
2-gigawatt nuclear power plant for 25 years will kill 29,000
people, not 2,900 people, and will cause an additional 43,500
non-fatal cancers, not 4,350 non-fatal cancers. If the genetic
damage increases proportionately with the cancer risk (very
likely a good assumption), 18,750 serious genetic defects will be
caused by operating a nuclear power plant for 25 years, not
merely 1,875 serious genetic defects.
We must not let Saddam Hussein stampede us, or the TIMES lead us,
down this dark, dangerous path.
Get: Catherine Caufield, MULTIPLE EXPOSURES, CHRONICLES OF THE
RADIATION AGE (NY: Harper & Row, 1989). Another good book
(despite its age), filled with useful information, is: The Union
of Concerned Scientists, THE NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE [Revised edition]
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1975).
–Peter Montague, Ph.D.
Descriptor terms: catherine caufield; NEW YORK TIMES; nuclear
power plants; three mile island; chernobyl; meltdown; radiation;
occupational safety and health; uranium; radioactive waste;
radium; radon; lung cancer; mortality; exposure; unscear; un
scientific committee on the effects of atomic radiation;
radiation effects research foundation; hiroshima; nagasaki;
nuclear weapons;