3 ms·

I live in one of the mentioned countries (Kazakhstan) very close to one the major (unenriched) uranium processing plants. It's in the very east of the country c

I live in one of the mentioned countries (Kazakhstan) very close to one the major (unenriched) uranium processing plants. It's in the very east of the country close to the border with China, you'll easily find information about it if you're interested. It most definitely is causing problems, but you will not hear about it because: a) nobody gives a flying fuck about us, especially our own government, and b) very little research is being done because nobody important is interested in doing it. Most of the money made by destroying our health and environment goes to Switzerland (i.e. Glencore), and they have no incentive to care about us. I read one study by a grad student who managed to escape from here to a French university, and she used a scanning electron microscope to find very high levels of heavy metal pollution -- including uranium -- in tree leaves all around the plant. That's about it. And here's a personal anecdote of what the reality is here: when I was in college, I was working for a few months with a group of researchers that were testing novel techniques of reducing particulate pollution from a local coal power plant. While we did see some positive results, the emission values (both before and after) were significantly higher than what is permitted by government emission standards, about 8-10 times as much. So we were "asked" (and complied -- you don't really say no to these things) to reduce numbers to acceptable levels and publish that. This makes for a pretty piss-poor study if you ask me, it's not really science. edit: and here's this beauty at close range: https://0x0.st/8QZm.jpg https://0x0.st/8QZm.jpg https://0x0.st/8QZS.jpg https://0x0.st/8QZS.jpg

roenxi 2y ago
I worry this is going to come off as overly combative; but you haven't gotten to the meat of my complaint here. What is the harm you are objecting to vis a vis the uranium? The only actual evidence you're proffering is that there is heavy metals pollution "all around" the processing plant. That isn't much to go on. What sort of distances are we talking about? What does "very high" mean?
- throwaway1298 2y ago
  Sure, I was too impulsive myself, but it's really difficult to read dismissive comments when people all around you lose 10+ years of life expectancy to this "non-problem" just so that some guy in France can have his nuclear energy for cheap. I think this is the study; I read it as a proper full-length thesis, but it also seems to have been condensed into a short paper: https://sci-hub.se/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1470160X17303643 https://sci-hub.se/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/art... I'll look around a bit more for the original.
  - roenxi 2y ago
    Are there any mines involved in this study? There don't seem to be any mines involved here. I'm not even sure that most of the damage is being done by the Uranium processing, we seem to be looking at a heavy industrial district. I can't figure out where their colour scale comes from but it seems the high Uranium concentrations are quite localised to near the Uranium processing plant and the area is a witches brew of pollutants from all sorts of horrible industrial activities. I wouldn't choose to live there, I give you that. Not convinced it is relevant to nuclear power debate though. The studiers seem to be drawing attention to the toxicity of the lead-zinc plant. This goes to the core of my complaint against the anti-nuclear people. I think ignoring the Ag, As, Ba. Be, Co, Cr, Sb & Zn - and all the other elements in the study - and myopically focusing on the U is really misunderstanding what an industrial district does. They are unhealthy places.

roenxi 2y ago

I worry this is going to come off as overly combative; but you haven't gotten to the meat of my complaint here. What is the harm you are objecting to vis a vis the uranium? The only actual evidence you're proffering is that there is heavy metals pollution "all around" the processing plant. That isn't much to go on. What sort of distances are we talking about? What does "very high" mean?

throwaway1298 2y ago
Sure, I was too impulsive myself, but it's really difficult to read dismissive comments when people all around you lose 10+ years of life expectancy to this "non-problem" just so that some guy in France can have his nuclear energy for cheap. I think this is the study; I read it as a proper full-length thesis, but it also seems to have been condensed into a short paper: https://sci-hub.se/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1470160X17303643 https://sci-hub.se/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/art... I'll look around a bit more for the original.
- roenxi 2y ago
  Are there any mines involved in this study? There don't seem to be any mines involved here. I'm not even sure that most of the damage is being done by the Uranium processing, we seem to be looking at a heavy industrial district. I can't figure out where their colour scale comes from but it seems the high Uranium concentrations are quite localised to near the Uranium processing plant and the area is a witches brew of pollutants from all sorts of horrible industrial activities. I wouldn't choose to live there, I give you that. Not convinced it is relevant to nuclear power debate though. The studiers seem to be drawing attention to the toxicity of the lead-zinc plant. This goes to the core of my complaint against the anti-nuclear people. I think ignoring the Ag, As, Ba. Be, Co, Cr, Sb & Zn - and all the other elements in the study - and myopically focusing on the U is really misunderstanding what an industrial district does. They are unhealthy places.