To put it into perspective. A couple of years back around 100meter (eyeball from TV screen) from the damaged building was measured at 9 microSieverts (uSv), about that of a trans-atlantic flight. Around 0.1 in Paris and 0.2 in New York (or London, forgot which). That is the low end. At the high end, Guarapari in Brazil is 20+.
You still don't understand, do you? I'm not sure how many more ways it can be explained.
9uSv in what form and over what time? On a aircraft it is mostly things like cosmic rays and solar radiation that is not being absorbed by the atmosphere. It hits you for the duration of the flight, and most of it is absorbed by your skin so your organs are protected. When the aircraft lands that's it, no more exposure.
At Fukushima the source of the radiation is tiny particles of various elements in the soil, on the wind and in the wildlife. You know how if you don't clean your house for a while dust builds up? Some of that is dust from outside, and near Fukushima Daiichi it contains much higher levels of radiation than most places. You know how dust causes allergic reactions in many people? That's because it gets inside their bodies. Once this material gets inside your body it sits there emitting radiation indefinitely, and because it is inside you the normal barriers that protect your organs like skin and flesh don't help.
Can you understand the difference now? Background radiation from things like rocks or radiation from transient sources like air travel or x-rays is very different to the type of exposure you would get from living near Fukushima Daiichi. It's a good job the authorities stop people like you from living there, for your own safety.
Mr. Chan,
I would be impolite if I merely ignore you. I was going to reply to your earlier post but I have no idea what you are talking about. Besides, it is just wrong to argue about something "I suspect you mean". If we are to discuss, I rather discuss something you actually said.
I didn't reference Fukushima since I don't know the value and trend there. As you read correctly, I was referring to Chenobyl. 9uSv day-in, day-out, 24 hours per day. So what? 640000 live in Denver Colorado, they get 12uSv day-in, day-out, 24 hours per day. There are people who find it worth-while to go to the beach at Guarapari getting 30uSv, and over 100,000 people live in the town getting 20uSv day-in, day-out, 24 hours per day. In either Guarapari or Denver or any high elevation, apparently, people there feel they have other bigger problem to worry about. If radiation is the sole worry, people will be safer moving from Denver to Chenobyl.
You said we accumulate radiation, I failed to see how. Yeah, we can store energy in the form of fat. But I don't know how
human store and accumulate high energy particles. What does the human body use to contain the particles? I suspect you mean
the damage is accumulative. DNA change is more than merely accumulative. It is even inheritable. So what? By itself, DNA doesn't copy perfect. As long as the damage is not beyond that of natural level, (Denver vs Chenobyl, 12uSv vs 9uSv), who cares? There is no point in worrying about one tea-spoon of sugar in your coffee while consuming sugar-cane by the dozen, is there?
You said we can store potassium separately and make it "relatively harmless". I can't figure out what potassium you are talking about, how and why? K40 is what I was referring to. I know all the main organs of the human body and I don't know any organ specifically for radioactive material.
I suspect you mean liver - that is where we store our junk. But alcohol and "yellow liver" probably kill far more of us than radioactive liver.
You worry about radiation absorbed into/by the ground. Why? if it is absorbed, done, gone. The energy is gone - unless it happens to hit something that could store and re-emit the energy later. The contamination that you worry about is some what valid - as long as we don't dig it out and spread it in tiny packages around town/the-world, there is no issue. Even if it does spread, when the original dose is of limited energy, the re-emitted dose of energy cannot exceed that of the absorb energy unless it hits fissile material. (Or the material has energy-ready-to-emit, which could have been emitted by many other means.) So, worst is over and it is on a downward curve defined by the half-life. Another, surprise surprise. You add up
all the nuclear waste created by nuclear power and that would be less than the nuclear waste created by coal. To make that decision, one has to learn that almost anything you dig out of the ground is to some extend radioactive. The earth itself is a giant nuclear reactor.
Yes, I really don't get what you are saying. But I understand where you are coming from. There is indeed no need to incur more risk than necessary. My position is:
except when the act of avoiding the risk is causing more damage than the "avoided" risk could have caused. This is where my negative sentiment about our lack of education in how to judge. Comparing one risk verses another, comparing one damage verses another, comparing the cost of avoid one risk (thus reducing resources for other risk) so forth.
We have departed far enough from the original topic. [Edit: moved to where it belongs... touch pad moved by cursor by mistake]
Besides, it is just wrong to argue about something "I suspect you mean". If we are to discuss, I rather discuss something you actually said. If you start a new thread, I would be happy to join in. It would be impolite to ignore you, it would be impolite to hijack a thread also...
Rick
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