How harmful is nuclear radiation? It depends on the dose received.

[kowalskil]

How harmful is nuclear radiation? It depends on the dose received.

Tsunami-related Fukushina accident will probably renew debates about nuclear electricity. Such debates should be based on what is known about negative effects of nuclear radiation. Numerical data below should be useful in that context.

The effect of penetrating radiation on a person depends on the dose received. The common unit of dose is Sievert (Sv). Smaller doses are expressed in milliseverts (mSv) or microseveret. The old unit of dose, rem, is also used widely (1Sv=100 rem)

A dose of 10 Sv will most likely results in death, within a day or two.
5 Sv would is kill about 50% of exposed people.
2 Sv can also be fatal, especially without prompt treatment.

0.25 Sv = 250 mSv is the limit for emergency workers in life-saving operations.
0.10 Sv = 100 mSv dose is clearly linked to later cancer risks.
0.05 Sv = 50 mSv is the yearly limit for radiation workers.

0.004 Sv= 4 mSv typical yearly dose due to natural radiation (cosmic rays, etc).
0.003 Sv= 3 mSV typical dose from mammogram

The one day dose, due to Fukushima accident, at a distance of 30 miles from the damaged reactors, was reported (on 3/16 and 3/17) as 0.0036 mSv. I do not have data on doses, probably very large, received by those who worked near or inside reactors. But I have no doubt that each of them was carrying an individual dosimeter. No deaths due to radiation have been reported in Japan, as far as I know. Many lives, however, were lost in Chernobyl, by those who worked to minimize damage.

Ludwik Kowalski
Professor Emeritus
Montclair State University, USA
.

[Mikal]

CRUCIFIXION ECONOMICS

We whip the child until it cries, and then we whip it for crying.—Edmund Burke

All in the name of the power structure—‘we were jettisoned into a ‘theory of constraint’ necessary for what they called ‘responsible growth’—those who deem themselves wielders of power are just as inextricably caught in its webs as the supposedly powerless.’—Michael Foucault

The ending pain is inevitable as we are all overwhelmed by ongoing building waves of crisis—modern crisis seems to be a many handed monster and were caught in one of its grips to face that Nuclear power might not be a global truth or even a theory.

‘The King’s head was not taken off because he was King, nor the Lords laid aside because they were Lords….but because they did not perform their trust.’—Oliver Cromwell, 1653

Trust is as much the glue of civilization as it is the glue of every society. TRUST IS ABSENT RIGHT NOW…it has been breeched contaminated and has crumbled away no differently than the nuclear structure shown collapsing as the minutes and hours tick by.

Is all this shrouding the crisis in a ‘fog’ and lack of details about true radiation levels at the facility, really governmental/corporational over-concern of industry repercussions???

Here is a former GE engineer speaking out…..

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.p...t=va&aid=23764


Regards Mikal

[labelwench]

The accounts and details coming out of Japan in regard to the nuclear situation are so variable as to deny any absolute knowledge or understanding of the circumstances, save that they are changing hour to hour, and that the ground gained seems not to be where it is needed most.

I have only the accounts to base any opinion upon, and I trust none of them. My opinion and perception thus far is that the circumstances are not good, and shall have an effect that will be felt around the globe at the human, political and economic levels for a long time to come.

In that regard nothing has changed, as it is the ever repeating story of history.

Change is the very underpinning of existence, both the positive and negative aspects contributing.

[Mikal]

Hi Ludwik…..upon hearing today that Japan has dumped around 10 thousand tons or 2.4 million gallons of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean…I thought of you.

As a retired nuclear physicist I would imagine that you might understand this far more than most of us. I was wondering if you have any thoughts on this or any words of wisdom you could share with us.

Kind regards Mikal

[kowalskil]

Hi Ludwik…..upon hearing today that Japan has dumped around 10 thousand tons or 2.4 million gallons of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean…I thought of you.

As a retired nuclear physicist I would imagine that you might understand this far more than most of us. I was wondering if you have any thoughts on this or any words of wisdom you could share with us.

Kind regards Mikal

To answer this question I would need some quantitative information.

a) How strongly radioactive the water was (in terms of Bk per cubic meter)?
b) What was the total volume of that radioactive water?
c) What is the radioactivity of water (again in terms Bk per cubic meter) at several distances from the site, for example, 10 km, 100 km, 1000 km ?

I am sure that these numbers are know to Japanese nuclear engineers.
Bk is a unit of radioactivity (in this case of the level of contamination). It should not be confused with Sv, used to describe the received dose density.

Ludwik
.
.

[Mikal]

Thank you Ludwik....at least thats one fact that I can look out for and nice to know that BK should not be confused with Sv.
Sorry to sound so ignorant here but does BK stand for something??

I suppose I asked you a somewhat impossible question but I guess thats one of our main problems here being lack of transparency in the forthcoming information out of Japan. I suppose also I am wondering what that much radiated water what level of contamination could do to the eco systems in the ocean and then again maybe it has no affect. This I am not sure of at all.

I do thank you for your quick response and if you get any quantitative info that helps you understand I would kindly ask you if you could drop it here for the benefit of us all.


Kind Regards Mikal

[kowalskil]

Thank you Ludwik....at least thats one fact that I can look out for and nice to know that BK should not be confused with Sv.
Sorry to sound so ignorant here but does BK stand for something??

I suppose I asked you a somewhat impossible question but I guess thats one of our main problems here being lack of transparency in the forthcoming information out of Japan. I suppose also I am wondering what that much radiated water what level of contamination could do to the eco systems in the ocean and then again maybe it has no affect. This I am not sure of at all.

I do thank you for your quick response and if you get any quantitative info that helps you understand I would kindly ask you if you could drop it here for the benefit of us all.


Kind Regards Mikal

Sorry for Bk; it should have been Bq. Units in physics are very often named after famous scientists. Ci, for example, the old unit of activity was named after Marie Curie, Bq is named after Becquerel, with whom she shared one of her two Nobel prizes, N, the unit of force, is named after Newton, etc.

Ludwik
.
.

[Mikal]

Thanks for the explanation Ludwik. Now I just found this excerp in the Los Angeles paper.....

Even as the government asserted that the release of the radioactive water into the sea would not pose an immediate threat to humans, health ministry official Taku Ohara said the ministry was considering drawing up radioactivity food-safety standards for fish after high radiation levels were detected in a sand lance, a bottom-feeding fish, caught off the coast of Ibaraki prefecture. Nuclear experts have assumed that radioactive iodine, which has a brief half-life, would become diluted in the ocean and decay too quickly to be detected in fish, but Monday's finding has raised doubts about that, said Ohara.
According to the health ministry, the sand lance had 4,080 bequerels per kilogram of radioactive iodine. "We think the level found poses no immediate risk to people's health but the point is moot anyway because all sand lance caught in Ibaraki were disposed of," said Ohara. By comparison, the level of radioactive iodine in the fish was twice as high as the limit for vegetables. Currently there are no standards for radioactivity in meat, eggs, fish and grains.


Now here they mention this Bq...does this sound bad to your knowledge????


Regards Mikal

[kowalskil]

Thanks for the explanation Ludwik. Now I just found this excerp in the Los Angeles paper.....

Even as the government asserted that the release of the radioactive water into the sea would not pose an immediate threat to humans, health ministry official Taku Ohara said the ministry was considering drawing up radioactivity food-safety standards for fish after high radiation levels were detected in a sand lance, a bottom-feeding fish, caught off the coast of Ibaraki prefecture. Nuclear experts have assumed that radioactive iodine, which has a brief half-life, would become diluted in the ocean and decay too quickly to be detected in fish, but Monday's finding has raised doubts about that, said Ohara.
According to the health ministry, the sand lance had 4,080 bequerels per kilogram of radioactive iodine. "We think the level found poses no immediate risk to people's health but the point is moot anyway because all sand lance caught in Ibaraki were disposed of," said Ohara. By comparison, the level of radioactive iodine in the fish was twice as high as the limit for vegetables. Currently there are no standards for radioactivity in meat, eggs, fish and grains.


Now here they mention this Bq...does this sound bad to your knowledge????


Regards Mikal

4000 Bq/kg is indeed very small, especially for isotopes with relatively short half lives. I would not hesitate carrying a radioactive source in my pocket, for couple of weeks, if its activity were as small as 40,000 Bq. The older unit of activity, Ci stood for

37,000,000,000 Bq. In other words 4000 Bq stands for about 0.0000001 Ci, or 0.1 microcuries. Measuring activity in Bq is like measuring driving distance in inches. One mile is nearly 60,000 inches.

Ludwik

[Mikal]

Okay Ludwik, that helps alot, makes it somewhat clearer to understand. I think a big problem right now is that nobody is explaining information like that to anybody, then you see all those big numbers and it just seems enormous when in nuclear language it is not. Thank you for expanding on that for me.

Another thing I am wondering about. Is it possible to explain what happens to 'radiated water' when they dump it into the ocean at levels such as today??

Regards Mikal