5 ms·

One thing to mention is that nuclear power plants do not emit radiation. So, sure, coal power plants emit more radiation, and bananas too.

maxerickson 7y ago
There's enough radiation released as a result of the activity of operating nuclear plants for your emphasis to be a bit off. "usually do not directly emit radiation" is pretty defensible.
- credit_guy 7y ago
  > There's enough radiation released as a result of the activity of operating nuclear plants "An operating nuclear power plant produces very small amounts of radioactive gases and liquids, as well as small amounts of direct radiation. If you lived within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant, you would receive an average radiation dose of about 0.01 millirem per year. To put this in perspective, the average person in the United States receives an exposure of 300 millirem per year from natural background sources of radiation." [1] https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/radiation/related-info/faq.html#9 https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/radiation/related-info/faq.htm...
  - CapriciousCptl 7y ago
    I think they're referring to the radiation emitted because of nuclear plants, like nuclear accidents at Marcoule, Fukishima, Paks, etc, transport and waste disposal and so on.
    - credit_guy 7y ago
      The meme that coal plants emit more radioactivity than nuclear power plants originated with this Scientific American article [1] (linked somewhere else in this thread too). The article has the title "Coal Ash Is More Radioactive Than Nuclear Waste". The comparison is obviously preposterous, nuclear waste is probably trillions of times more radioactive than coal ash. When SA realized the mistake they added an explanation just at the end of the article that states "As a general clarification, ounce for ounce, coal ash released from a power plant delivers more radiation than nuclear waste shielded via water or dry cask storage." (emphasis mine) By adding the qualification "shielded" the comparison becomes meaningless. Brazil nuts, bananas, beer, carrot juice and drinking water [2] all release more radiation than shielded nuclear waste. Nowhere in the SA article they compare coal ash with Chernobyl of Fukushima. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-... [2] https://www.thoughtco.com/common-naturally-radioactive-foods-607456 https://www.thoughtco.com/common-naturally-radioactive-foods...
  - lsb 7y ago
    That 0.01 millirem is roughly 1 Banana Equivalent Dose, the radiation you get from eating a banana. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose
    - Gibbon1 7y ago
      Does spreading this bit of nonsense around make you feel guilty?
philipkglass 7y ago
This is not actually correct. See this NRC publication "Radioactive Effluents From Nuclear Power Plants: Annual Report 2008." https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1036/ML103620452.pdf https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1036/ML103620452.pdf Power reactors discharge a small amount of radioactive material into the environment under normal operating conditions. See figures 4.1 through 4.12 in the report. The Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station in Arizona [0] released 1844 curies of radionuclides in a year from gaseous, liquid, and particulate discharges. In SI units, that's 6.8 * 10^13 becquerels. According to the World Nuclear Association, a kilogram of coal ash contains about 2000 becquerels of radioactive material [1]. In 2012, the United States coal fleet generated about 110 million tons of coal ash [2]. In 2012, the United States generated 1514 terawatt hours of electricity from coal [3]. That puts the coal ash radioactive burden to the environment at roughly 1.45 * 10^11 becquerels per TWh of electricity generated in coal plants. The Palo Verde annual radioactive effluent discharge of 6.8 * 10^13 becquerels from an average of 32.3 TWh electricity generation [0] comes to 21 * 10^ 11 becquerels per TWh of electricity. Its radioactive discharge to the environment is significantly higher than the average discharged via coal ash to produce an equivalent amount of electricity. However, before getting alarmed, see figure 2.1 in the NRC Radioactive Effluents report that I linked at the beginning of this post. Even though nuclear plant effluent adds more radiation to the environment than coal ash does, industrial sources of radiation (including nuclear plants) account for about 0.1% of general population radiation exposure. Natural background sources add up to about 50%. So the marginal danger of radioactive exposure from normally operating nuclear plants or coal ash dumps is very small. People who say that coal plants emit more radiation than nuclear plants are not helping to counter "radiophobia." They are in fact attempting to exploit "radiophobia" to stir up fear over a very minor aspect of coal's environmental harms. (And coal really is an environmental disaster in many other ways.) Worse, people making this argument are not even correct about the underlying numbers. Many of them are just parroting a Scientific American article [4] which itself is a misleadingly garbled retelling of an actual research report [5] [6]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_... [1] http://www.world-nuclear.org/uploadedFiles/org/Features/Radiation/1_RadiationandRadioactivity(2).pdf http://www.world-nuclear.org/uploadedFiles/org/Features/Radi... [2] https://www.epa.gov/coalash https://www.epa.gov/coalash [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States#Electricity_generation_by_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States#El... [4] "Coal Ash Is More Radioactive Than Nuclear Waste" https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-... [5] "Radiological Impact of Airborne Effluents of Coal and Nuclear Plants" https://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 https://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 [6] Detailed examination of what the authors were actually reporting in "Radiological Impact of Airborne Effluents of Coal and Nuclear Plants" via my past comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14466887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14466887
LatteLazy 7y ago
I'm very confused how anyone can claim nuclear plants don't emit radiation...
- pas 7y ago
  The typical plant by itself just sits there producing heat, and it's well shielded so emits no radiation. If we look at all the NPPs (so we factor in all the accidents) and average out then we get a higher number. And if we look at a full lifecycle analysis (so from uranium oxide mining to plant building, to long-term nuclear waste storage, and/or reprocessing and whatnot), then we'll get an even higher number. But all of that is quite meaningless, because the real question is health impact anyway.
  - LatteLazy 7y ago
    So not a single gamma ray is escaping during normal, correct operation?
LegitShady 7y ago
coal power plants dont emit any bananas at all.
- crispinb 7y ago
  Citation?

maxerickson 7y ago

There's enough radiation released as a result of the activity of operating nuclear plants for your emphasis to be a bit off. "usually do not directly emit radiation" is pretty defensible.

credit_guy 7y ago
> There's enough radiation released as a result of the activity of operating nuclear plants "An operating nuclear power plant produces very small amounts of radioactive gases and liquids, as well as small amounts of direct radiation. If you lived within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant, you would receive an average radiation dose of about 0.01 millirem per year. To put this in perspective, the average person in the United States receives an exposure of 300 millirem per year from natural background sources of radiation." [1] https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/radiation/related-info/faq.html#9 https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/radiation/related-info/faq.htm...
- CapriciousCptl 7y ago
  I think they're referring to the radiation emitted because of nuclear plants, like nuclear accidents at Marcoule, Fukishima, Paks, etc, transport and waste disposal and so on.
  - credit_guy 7y ago
    The meme that coal plants emit more radioactivity than nuclear power plants originated with this Scientific American article [1] (linked somewhere else in this thread too). The article has the title "Coal Ash Is More Radioactive Than Nuclear Waste". The comparison is obviously preposterous, nuclear waste is probably trillions of times more radioactive than coal ash. When SA realized the mistake they added an explanation just at the end of the article that states "As a general clarification, ounce for ounce, coal ash released from a power plant delivers more radiation than nuclear waste shielded via water or dry cask storage." (emphasis mine) By adding the qualification "shielded" the comparison becomes meaningless. Brazil nuts, bananas, beer, carrot juice and drinking water [2] all release more radiation than shielded nuclear waste. Nowhere in the SA article they compare coal ash with Chernobyl of Fukushima. [1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-... [2] https://www.thoughtco.com/common-naturally-radioactive-foods-607456 https://www.thoughtco.com/common-naturally-radioactive-foods...
- lsb 7y ago
  That 0.01 millirem is roughly 1 Banana Equivalent Dose, the radiation you get from eating a banana. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose
  - Gibbon1 7y ago
    Does spreading this bit of nonsense around make you feel guilty?

philipkglass 7y ago

This is not actually correct. See this NRC publication "Radioactive Effluents From Nuclear Power Plants: Annual Report 2008." https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1036/ML103620452.pdf https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1036/ML103620452.pdf Power reactors discharge a small amount of radioactive material into the environment under normal operating conditions. See figures 4.1 through 4.12 in the report. The Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station in Arizona [0] released 1844 curies of radionuclides in a year from gaseous, liquid, and particulate discharges. In SI units, that's 6.8 * 10^13 becquerels. According to the World Nuclear Association, a kilogram of coal ash contains about 2000 becquerels of radioactive material [1]. In 2012, the United States coal fleet generated about 110 million tons of coal ash [2]. In 2012, the United States generated 1514 terawatt hours of electricity from coal [3]. That puts the coal ash radioactive burden to the environment at roughly 1.45 * 10^11 becquerels per TWh of electricity generated in coal plants. The Palo Verde annual radioactive effluent discharge of 6.8 * 10^13 becquerels from an average of 32.3 TWh electricity generation [0] comes to 21 * 10^ 11 becquerels per TWh of electricity. Its radioactive discharge to the environment is significantly higher than the average discharged via coal ash to produce an equivalent amount of electricity. However, before getting alarmed, see figure 2.1 in the NRC Radioactive Effluents report that I linked at the beginning of this post. Even though nuclear plant effluent adds more radiation to the environment than coal ash does, industrial sources of radiation (including nuclear plants) account for about 0.1% of general population radiation exposure. Natural background sources add up to about 50%. So the marginal danger of radioactive exposure from normally operating nuclear plants or coal ash dumps is very small. People who say that coal plants emit more radiation than nuclear plants are not helping to counter "radiophobia." They are in fact attempting to exploit "radiophobia" to stir up fear over a very minor aspect of coal's environmental harms. (And coal really is an environmental disaster in many other ways.) Worse, people making this argument are not even correct about the underlying numbers. Many of them are just parroting a Scientific American article [4] which itself is a misleadingly garbled retelling of an actual research report [5] [6]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_... [1] http://www.world-nuclear.org/uploadedFiles/org/Features/Radiation/1_RadiationandRadioactivity(2).pdf http://www.world-nuclear.org/uploadedFiles/org/Features/Radi... [2] https://www.epa.gov/coalash https://www.epa.gov/coalash [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States#Electricity_generation_by_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_States#El... [4] "Coal Ash Is More Radioactive Than Nuclear Waste" https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-... [5] "Radiological Impact of Airborne Effluents of Coal and Nuclear Plants" https://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 https://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 [6] Detailed examination of what the authors were actually reporting in "Radiological Impact of Airborne Effluents of Coal and Nuclear Plants" via my past comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14466887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14466887

LatteLazy 7y ago

I'm very confused how anyone can claim nuclear plants don't emit radiation...

pas 7y ago
The typical plant by itself just sits there producing heat, and it's well shielded so emits no radiation. If we look at all the NPPs (so we factor in all the accidents) and average out then we get a higher number. And if we look at a full lifecycle analysis (so from uranium oxide mining to plant building, to long-term nuclear waste storage, and/or reprocessing and whatnot), then we'll get an even higher number. But all of that is quite meaningless, because the real question is health impact anyway.
- LatteLazy 7y ago
  So not a single gamma ray is escaping during normal, correct operation?

LegitShady 7y ago

coal power plants dont emit any bananas at all.

crispinb 7y ago
Citation?