5 ms·

I am one of the "panicky" ones and I want to explain my point of view. When I was a kid, living in the equivalent of Kentucky, a nuclear accident in the equiva

I am one of the "panicky" ones and I want to explain my point of view. When I was a kid, living in the equivalent of Kentucky, a nuclear accident in the equivalent of the Bahamas made it so we couldn't eat wild berries from the woods anymore. Now a middle aged man over 30 years later, sheep from my home area still measure levels of radioactivity too high for human consumption. That's why I feel most options are better than nuclear power, for any purpose except perhaps space probes.

_ph_ 9y ago
Here in Bavaria, every single wild boar shot still has to be checked for radioactivity, quite a few have to be destroyed for too high radiation values. Equally, it is recommended not to eat too many mushrooms from the forest. All of this due to the Chernobyl accident more than 30 years ago.
- smsm42 9y ago
  I have very hard time believing anything harmful can get from Chernobyl to Bavaria and still be dangerous by now. I think it's just overreacting. There are millions of people living between Chernobyl and Bavaria, including cities such as Kyiv (3 mln people, less than 100km from Chernobyl), and there seems to be no sign of mass morbidity and mortality from any of radiation related causes. Makes it kinda hard to believe there is still danger in 1400km away.
  - _ph_ 9y ago
    No believing involved, this is just science and using geiger counters. Here is the relevant link: https://www.bfs.de/DE/themen/ion/umwelt/lebensmittel/pilze-wildbret/pilze-wildbret.html https://www.bfs.de/DE/themen/ion/umwelt/lebensmittel/pilze-w... The thing is that there are long living isotopes in the upper soil of the forests. As they are long living, they have not decayed yet enough and are not going to in the next decades. Something does not need to kill 80% of the population to be a significant health risk. With the isotopes relevant in Bavaria, they are only dangerous when eaten. So there is nothing dangerous about living in those regions. However mushrooms tend to aggregate the radioactive particles and so do the wild boar eating from the mushrooms. Not every animal is contaminated, but every single one has to be scanned for radiation, before they can be eaten, and quite a few have to be destroyed every year.
    - andai 9y ago
      What was done about the same issue in agriculture? Was the soil replaced? Edit: Now I'm wondering (and doubtful) if the same precautions were taken in the rest of Europe.
      - _ph_ 9y ago
        This article: http://www.umweltinstitut.org/themen/radioaktivitaet/tschernobyl/lebensmittelbelastung.html http://www.umweltinstitut.org/themen/radioaktivitaet/tschern... claims, that the Bavarian soil used for agriculture tends to not transfer radioactive particles quickly into plants. It seems the soil was also deeply plowed to distribute the particles amongst a large volume of soil. The situation in forests is different, as the trees captured more particles than the open farmland, and the soil is not plowed, leading to still high particle concentrations in the top layer. Bavaria had been contaminated the most, other parts of Germany have less residual radiation - the weather situation (wind, rain) created very inhomogeneous distribution back then. I found this map about the distribution: http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/gz54e7a9f2.png http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/gz54e7a9f2.png
        andai 9y ago
        Wow thanks for sharing that!
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
    - smsm42 9y ago
      The article says: 200 grams of mushrooms with 3,000 becquerel cesium-137 per kilogram corresponds to a load of 0.008 millisievert . This corresponds to the radiation load on a flight from Frankfurt to Gran Canaria. And: If wild game or wild growing fungi are consumed in conventional quantities, the additional radiation load is comparatively low, but it is avoidable. In other words, there is no danger to one's health - no more that one is exposed to by living regular life and being subject to various low-level radiation sources present in the environment. The regulations have very low acceptable level, just to be safe, but there is very little actual danger from the levels present right now. From Wikipedia[1]: For comparison, natural radiation levels inside the US capitol building are such that a human body would receive an additional dose rate of 0.85 mSv/a. So, working in a granite building for about 4 days is as dangerous as eating a meal of "contaminated" mushrooms. Thousand of people do the former every day. Or about the same as one dental xray. I think my conclusion that it is done out of overabundance of caution still seems to be correct. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert
petra 9y ago
If you look at the seriousness the human race dedicated to creating safe nuclear energy, it looks almost comical:we settled on the first technology we found(pressured water reactors), because it fitted best for the requirents of the Navy at the time, not because it offered the best safety for citizens, far from it.And than, in the name of safety, we created an environment that prevented from new designs to become commercialized. Why wasn't it safe ? Because that type of reactors creates a lot of high pressure radioactive gassses , and in the case of an accident, those gases spread far. But we now have reactors types that (a) can't physically blow up , their temperature is limited, and (b) contain very little to no radioactive gasses , so even in the worst case scenario, we'll be just left with an enclosed pool of radioactive material, which is safe. So please don't judge nuclear by it's past.
- ZenoArrow 9y ago
  > "But we now have reactors types that (a) can't physically blow up , their temperature is limited, and (b) contain very little to no radioactive gasses , so even in the worst case scenario, we'll be just left with an enclosed pool of radioactive material, which is safe." Interested in learning more about these reactor types. I hear different reactor names discussed, but I'm not sure what's right on the cutting edge.
  - petra 9y ago
    I think moltex is among the best.
- vlehto 9y ago
  It's practically impossible for any type or reactor to "blow up". Nuclear weapons are very different from reactors. The most dangerous types of reactor is graphite moderated ones. (Because graphite burns lot more readily than water.) Practically all of the actually severe accidents happened with those. They have not been built since Chernobyl.
PhasmaFelis 9y ago
That's a real problem, but it's still orders of magnitude less harmful than coal. (Also, as a Kentuckian I'm curious what "the equivalent of Kentucky" is.) :)
- mcv 9y ago
  Nobody is denying that nuclear is less harmful than coal. But for future investments, the comparison should be with solar and wind.
- seszett 9y ago
  > Also, as a Kentuckian I'm curious what "the equivalent of Kentucky" is. He's probably in Eastern or Northern Europe and talking about Chernobyl.
sandstrom 9y ago
Some (myself included) would trade some radioactive sheep and berries for intact ice on the poles. I also want to transition to clean energy, but I'm much more afraid of global warming than nuclear disasters.

_ph_ 9y ago

Here in Bavaria, every single wild boar shot still has to be checked for radioactivity, quite a few have to be destroyed for too high radiation values. Equally, it is recommended not to eat too many mushrooms from the forest. All of this due to the Chernobyl accident more than 30 years ago.

smsm42 9y ago
I have very hard time believing anything harmful can get from Chernobyl to Bavaria and still be dangerous by now. I think it's just overreacting. There are millions of people living between Chernobyl and Bavaria, including cities such as Kyiv (3 mln people, less than 100km from Chernobyl), and there seems to be no sign of mass morbidity and mortality from any of radiation related causes. Makes it kinda hard to believe there is still danger in 1400km away.
- _ph_ 9y ago
  No believing involved, this is just science and using geiger counters. Here is the relevant link: https://www.bfs.de/DE/themen/ion/umwelt/lebensmittel/pilze-wildbret/pilze-wildbret.html https://www.bfs.de/DE/themen/ion/umwelt/lebensmittel/pilze-w... The thing is that there are long living isotopes in the upper soil of the forests. As they are long living, they have not decayed yet enough and are not going to in the next decades. Something does not need to kill 80% of the population to be a significant health risk. With the isotopes relevant in Bavaria, they are only dangerous when eaten. So there is nothing dangerous about living in those regions. However mushrooms tend to aggregate the radioactive particles and so do the wild boar eating from the mushrooms. Not every animal is contaminated, but every single one has to be scanned for radiation, before they can be eaten, and quite a few have to be destroyed every year.
  - andai 9y ago
    What was done about the same issue in agriculture? Was the soil replaced? Edit: Now I'm wondering (and doubtful) if the same precautions were taken in the rest of Europe.
    - _ph_ 9y ago
      This article: http://www.umweltinstitut.org/themen/radioaktivitaet/tschernobyl/lebensmittelbelastung.html http://www.umweltinstitut.org/themen/radioaktivitaet/tschern... claims, that the Bavarian soil used for agriculture tends to not transfer radioactive particles quickly into plants. It seems the soil was also deeply plowed to distribute the particles amongst a large volume of soil. The situation in forests is different, as the trees captured more particles than the open farmland, and the soil is not plowed, leading to still high particle concentrations in the top layer. Bavaria had been contaminated the most, other parts of Germany have less residual radiation - the weather situation (wind, rain) created very inhomogeneous distribution back then. I found this map about the distribution: http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/gz54e7a9f2.png http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/gz54e7a9f2.png
      - andai 9y ago
        Wow thanks for sharing that!
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - smsm42 9y ago
    The article says: 200 grams of mushrooms with 3,000 becquerel cesium-137 per kilogram corresponds to a load of 0.008 millisievert . This corresponds to the radiation load on a flight from Frankfurt to Gran Canaria. And: If wild game or wild growing fungi are consumed in conventional quantities, the additional radiation load is comparatively low, but it is avoidable. In other words, there is no danger to one's health - no more that one is exposed to by living regular life and being subject to various low-level radiation sources present in the environment. The regulations have very low acceptable level, just to be safe, but there is very little actual danger from the levels present right now. From Wikipedia[1]: For comparison, natural radiation levels inside the US capitol building are such that a human body would receive an additional dose rate of 0.85 mSv/a. So, working in a granite building for about 4 days is as dangerous as eating a meal of "contaminated" mushrooms. Thousand of people do the former every day. Or about the same as one dental xray. I think my conclusion that it is done out of overabundance of caution still seems to be correct. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert

petra 9y ago

If you look at the seriousness the human race dedicated to creating safe nuclear energy, it looks almost comical:we settled on the first technology we found(pressured water reactors), because it fitted best for the requirents of the Navy at the time, not because it offered the best safety for citizens, far from it.And than, in the name of safety, we created an environment that prevented from new designs to become commercialized. Why wasn't it safe ? Because that type of reactors creates a lot of high pressure radioactive gassses , and in the case of an accident, those gases spread far. But we now have reactors types that (a) can't physically blow up , their temperature is limited, and (b) contain very little to no radioactive gasses , so even in the worst case scenario, we'll be just left with an enclosed pool of radioactive material, which is safe. So please don't judge nuclear by it's past.

ZenoArrow 9y ago
> "But we now have reactors types that (a) can't physically blow up , their temperature is limited, and (b) contain very little to no radioactive gasses , so even in the worst case scenario, we'll be just left with an enclosed pool of radioactive material, which is safe." Interested in learning more about these reactor types. I hear different reactor names discussed, but I'm not sure what's right on the cutting edge.
- petra 9y ago
  I think moltex is among the best.
vlehto 9y ago
It's practically impossible for any type or reactor to "blow up". Nuclear weapons are very different from reactors. The most dangerous types of reactor is graphite moderated ones. (Because graphite burns lot more readily than water.) Practically all of the actually severe accidents happened with those. They have not been built since Chernobyl.

PhasmaFelis 9y ago

That's a real problem, but it's still orders of magnitude less harmful than coal. (Also, as a Kentuckian I'm curious what "the equivalent of Kentucky" is.) :)

mcv 9y ago
Nobody is denying that nuclear is less harmful than coal. But for future investments, the comparison should be with solar and wind.
seszett 9y ago
> Also, as a Kentuckian I'm curious what "the equivalent of Kentucky" is. He's probably in Eastern or Northern Europe and talking about Chernobyl.

sandstrom 9y ago

Some (myself included) would trade some radioactive sheep and berries for intact ice on the poles. I also want to transition to clean energy, but I'm much more afraid of global warming than nuclear disasters.