Plutonium spill in Boulder, Colorado has spread

Gainclone

@10- I love the Host. It’s a fantastic movie.

woolie

This entire thread is concerning trace amounts, micrograms, that may have carried past the site of the initial spill, which involved in total about a quarter of a gram.

Of course, we should not ignore the irony of the full-on proliferation freakout here over an accident that occurred in the process of developing better antiproliferation tools.

I think the burden is on Takuan to demonstrate a real risk to humans outside the lab in this particular instance.

And let’s keep military and civilian uses of nuclear technology separate. The lack of safety involving weapons production is a byproduct of lack of liability, or national urgency and a necessary risk, depending on your perspective.

Man On Pink Corner

The sort of alarmism in this BoingBoing headline is responsible, I believe, for a lot of people who’ve died of cancer and emphysema from coal emissions over the years since nuclear power became practical.

It shouldn’t be encouraged.

One of my favorite science anecdotes is the story of Ralph Nader’s attempt at cultivating hysteria over plutonium toxicity:

One man, Dr. Bernard Cohen, went so far as to volunteer to eat as much plutonium as Ralph Nader would caffeine in an attempt to demonstrate the folly of the severe toxicity claims. Mr. Nader refused the challenge. … Dr. Cohen, a tenured research professor at the University of Pittsburgh, stated that he had calculated his risk from the challenge as less than that of a typical draftee during World War II. Dr. Cohen feels that wise use of nuclear energy is as important as winning the war.

So is it a good idea to be careless when handling radioactive heavy metals? No. Was there any reason to jump to conclusions and assume evil intent when public officials tried to reassure people that there was no real danger in this situation? Probably not.

Does mindless fearmongering have negative consequences? Yeah, I’m pretty sure it does.

eustace

Takuan, is there any reason to think that the reports you quote in dailycamera.com are inaccurate? It sounds from them like the amount was small, spills have been cleaned up, and possibly affected people are having their health monitored. If the NIST is to be believed the material was being used to research improved radiation detectors.

Doesn’t the link you just posted answer your questions in #72 above?

There doesn’t seem to be anything in this story that has anything to do with the nuclear power industry, or nuclear weapons labs, or nuclear medicine, for that matter.

Takuan

I think the burden is on people that handle plutonium to do it without spilling it everywhere.
Demonstrate real risk? I could show you x-rays in a few decades time of the lucky winners and you still say “nope, can’t prove it was the Pu.”

Why should civil and warfare uses be separate? The risk to humanity is the same. If anything, there is less oversight of civil uses.

Antinous

In what universe are those who are careless with micrograms careful with kilograms? This is a sentinel event.

Skullhunter

@ Takuan:

The Chairmen were relieved that nobody was injured in the incident and that the risk from radioactivity from the 0.25 grams of plutonium was very low. However, the Chairmen were troubled that the details of the incident have changed since the Committee was initially briefed on June 10th.

Why Takuan, if I didn’t know better that would almost sound like someone tried to lie about the incident. Surely that’s not the case; we must simply be looking at it through the lens of our dogmatic ideological purity and luddism.

Antinous

The sort of alarmism in this BoingBoing headline is responsible, I believe, for a lot of people who’ve died of cancer and emphysema from coal emissions over the years since nuclear power became practical.

That is a Cause/Effect wormhole of intergalactically transdimensional proportions. Also, FYI, there’s nothing particularly alarmist about the post.

spazzm

Plutonium isn’t that poisonous. Chemically, it’s a heavy metal so yes, it is poisonous, in the same way that lead and mercury is poisonous.
Plutonium is radioactive, but it emits alpha radiation which cannot penetrate the skin, or even a sheet of paper.
Thus the only way to get cancer from plutonium is to inhale or eat it.

And, despite the media hype, plutonium is not the most poisonous substance known to man:
“Other substances including ricin, tetrodotoxin, botulinum toxin, and tetanus toxin are fatal in doses of (sometimes far) under one milligram, and others (the nerve agents, the amanita toxin) are in the range of a few milligrams. As such, plutonium is not unusual in terms of toxicity, even by inhalation. In addition, those substances are fatal in hours to days, whereas plutonium (and other cancer-causing radioactives) give an increased chance of illness decades in the future. Considerably larger amounts may cause acute radiation poisoning and death if ingested or inhaled; however, so far, no human is known to have immediately died because of inhaling or ingesting plutonium and many people have measurable amounts of plutonium in their bodies.”

eustace

Until I hear that it has escaped the lab somehow I’m going to give the scientists at NIST the benefit of the doubt. I WANT them to have access to the materials they need for research – as others have pointed out, this is bad stuff but not the baddest. And we aren’t talking about some secret bioweapons facility or Bond movie supervillian lair; these people make better instruments for other scientists. They’re the good guys, really.

Skullhunter

Wow, so far it looks like anyone who doesn’t accept that nuclear power is absolutely safe as houses and poses no real threat of any kind is being labeled as some sort of wide-eyed babbling Luddite.

So does anyone know exactly when the “greening” of nuclear power began? How exactly did it come about that an industry that still can’t adequately provide containment for the waste it’s made up until now suddenly become the hope for an environmentally friendly future?

Takuan

just a little longer….

Man On Pink Corner

#15: That is a Cause/Effect wormhole of intergalactically transdimensional proportions. Also, FYI, there’s nothing particularly alarmist about the post.

I’m not sure I follow your argument. Do you disagree that environmental concerns (OMG 3MILEISLAND!!!3!! CHERNOBUL!!!) have resulted in a smaller number of nuclear power plants than would otherwise have been built in the US?

spazzm

The sort of alarmism in this BoingBoing headline is responsible, I believe, for a lot of people who’ve died of cancer and emphysema from coal emissions over the years since nuclear power became practical.

When I mention that switching from coal to nuclear power would decrease, not increase, the amount of radioactive exposure to the general public I always get blank stares or incredulous exclamations.

People are shockingly uneducated about these matters.

Antinous

Eustace,

Stupidity terrifies me far more than malice. The evil at least try to tidy up their messes.

Takuan

“NIST has alerted the city of Boulder and city waste water treatment plant personnel to this new information. The discharge from the sink enters the sanitary sewer system. While the exact amount washed down the drain is not known, the entire original plutonium-containing sample was approximately Â¼ gram. NIST is conducting studies to determine a better estimate of the amount of radiation discharged.”

Cpt. Tim

I’m curious was this sarcastic?

“Boulder city officials say there is nothing to be afraid of. All is well.”

If so, would you prefer the opportunistic fear mongering that is the normal habit of news organizations when scary words are thrown about?

are you participating?

Antinous

I just think that you took a not particularly alarmist post and turned it into BoingBoing Causes Cancer – film at eleven. Which is sort of alarmist if you think about it.

gzuckier

“Plutonium isn’t that poisonous. Chemically, it’s a heavy metal so yes, it is poisonous, in the same way that lead and mercury is poisonous.
Plutonium is radioactive, but it emits alpha radiation which cannot penetrate the skin, or even a sheet of paper.
Thus the only way to get cancer from plutonium is to inhale or eat it.”

coincidentally, that’s the only ways to get killed by poison as well.

Cpt. Tim

just an added fyi, alpha radiation can cause cancer.

bad password

this is such an interesting discussion! thanks, takuan. I’ll be sure to write my congressman and show him some of these links about the dangers of nuclear power.

woolie

Skullhunter, you’re implying that spent nuclear fuel is being spread about like fertilizer. Can you show me where any significant amount has been released into the environment? kthx.

No one is arguing that nuclear is the so-called “greenest” energy, which is some vague ideological litmus test that changes from day to day, but rather that anyone with even introductory concepts of physics and chemistry can demonstrate quite easily that nuclear energy is however our best choice for non-GHG electricity on a large scale with 95%+ availability/capacity.

There are of course engineering and regulatory issues with nuclear power, but the first is hardly insurmountable and should rather be viewed as a challenge that can be won by human ingenuity, and the second should be seen through the lens of participatory democracy in action. I don’t see how either of these things are intractable (hardly even major challenges given the other problems faced down in thousands of years of human civilization). Once you’ve demonstrated the physics, engineering feasibility, and resource availability required to replace all existing GHG-producing energy production with heat produced from the splitting of nuclei, and compare the cost of doing nothing to the unquantifiable but likely world-changing damage that will be caused by climate change, the arguments against using nuclear energy look more and more driven by an anti-science or anti-technology ideology, e.g. luddite.

gzuckier

“When I mention that switching from coal to nuclear power would decrease, not increase, the amount of radioactive exposure to the general public I always get blank stares or incredulous exclamations.”

I bet the folks at Chernobyl really goggle their eyes at you when you tell them.

woolie

Takuan, it hasn’t really been spilled everywhere — every release of radiation from a nuclear facility brings such an onslaught of investigation, paperwork, retraining, etc. — that this inconsequential accident involving microgram quantities has somehow become national news.

How much radiation was ultimately released during last year’s earthquake in Japan? A few hundred bananas worth. The issue dominated the nuclear/antinuclear news for weeks, with several cameos (as the villain of course) in international news outlets.

Are you certified to work with radioactive materials? Do you know what happens when there is a spill or release, or even the probability one may have occurred? Do you wear a dosimeter at your job? I’ll assure you that anyone who handles radioactive materials knows the grave personal responsibility they bear for the safety of the environment and the safety of others. And fyi, the vast majority of accidental release of radioactive materials is in nuclear medicine, not nuclear power.

Antinous

I bet the folks at Chernobyl really goggle their eyes at you when you tell them.

Don’t make fun of the mutants!

Takuan

well, guess that was long enough to count his rifles. I’ll be back with my measured reply.

Jake0748

Geez, I’m batting .000 today. First of all, you guys are correct about toxicity, of course ricin and other nerve agents are many times deadlier than plutonium.

And second, my references to Annie Hall were all wrong (although, I believe the quote was correct). The character who lived in LA was named Rob, and his nickname for Alvy Sanger (Allen’s character), was Max. Not that anybody cares about this…just babbling, move along… nothing to see here….

woolie

ps. I forgot to add. nuclear medicine using material produced in nuclear reactors.

randomcat

#21 “coincidentally, that’s the only ways to get killed by poison as well.”

Actually, some mercury compounds will kill you if a single drop touches your skin.

Antinous

I’ll assure you that anyone who handles radioactive materials knows the grave personal responsibility they bear for the safety of the environment and the safety of others.

Do you also believe that all security personnel are properly trained to identify bomb-making materials? Have you been avoiding the news for the last fifty years? People in positions of responsibility routinely do the cheap and easy thing even if it means endangering the lives and health of the community.

Antinous

some mercury compounds will kill you if a single drop touches your skin.

And yet, elemental mercury can be ingested without harm. It’s used in healthcare to weight certain kinds of nasogastric tubes when reaming out obstructions.

bzishi

Plutonium behaves oddly when it is in a fine grained form. People who have worked with plutonium have noted that you have to be extraordinarily careful to prevent spreading contamination as plutonium has a tendency to end up places where workers swear that they haven’t touched. Every story that I have ever read of plutonium contamination discusses how workers found that it spread around to other surfaces almost randomly, which is uncommon for most radioactive spills. Now add in the pyrophoric nature and the political issues and you can see why plutonium is the nightmare spill for any radiological technician.

Anonymous

Takuan go read “A 37-year medical follow-up of Manhattan Project Pu workers” instead of spewing stuff out of your ass and onto the forums.

“0.06 grams… one little particle inhaled is pretty well a sure cancer[...]”

No.

The calculation is quite trivial using the BEIR report and the LNT hypothesis. You need to inhale about 1 mg of Pu-239 or ingest 6 grams(!) of disolved Pu-239 to cause a cancer on average.

This calculation is also quite wrong because the LNT model massively overstates cancer risk at low dose rates. Again, read the Manhattan PU worker report.

“[...]how many dead people is that .06 grams?”

Assuming someone drinks 0.06 grams of soluble plutonium-239 salts and assuming the LNT model is correct(it’s not) the chance of getting intestinal or liver cancer is 1%. In reality, where the LNT model is incorrect, where untreated sewage is not drunk and most plutonium is in the form of insoluble PuO2, none.

GamebizGirl

“Contamination has since been found on the floor and tabletops, consistent of the spread of plutonium by hands and shoes, the agency said.”

Yes, but WHO’S floor and tabletops was it found on?

Moon

#1 – I thought I saw once in the Guiness Book (great source, I know), that plutonium is considered the most poisonous known substance per unit of weight. So maybe it doesn’t take that much to be a “significant amount”.

Also – Why are these “officials” ALWAYS saying stuff like “there is nothing to be afraid of” and “there is no danger to the public”? Do they really think that anyone believes them?

The radioactivity in plutonium can barely penetrate the top layer of the skin. The only way it can do any damage is to lodge itself in the lungs or stomach and remain there for long periods of time, and then only if it’s a relatively large amount. I’m assuming that the amount on these bozos’ hands was a tiny amount. Plutonium is an alpha ray emitter, which because it is such a large particle, has a difficult time penetrating.

Moon

Jake, I thought it was ALBY Singer!

:D

Takuan

DU. Depleted uranium. Tons thrown around in Bosnia etc, The Gulf War, Iraq, Afghanistan.
“Safe” DU made from nuclear industry waste contaminated with plutonium, americium and neptunium – none of which are “safe”. Straight from commercial reactors to the military to the lungs of the vet living next to you.

Village Idiot

Why was Homer handling plutonium in a facility with sinks whose drains were plumbed into the city sewage system?

Doh!

Jake0748

Crap – even my correction was wrong. I’m gonna give up and go to bed now.

enginerd94303

#14: Yes, I agree that the poster Mark could have done a little research on this. But that’s not the demographic of BB. In fact, doing research and posting an unbiased and truthful view of the “spill” would probably make BB get a bunch of hate mail from the organic food wackos. In fact, he had to craft the title to include “spill” and an ominous police state overtone at the end so he would appease his base. Don’t worry, Mark’s not completely science illiterate, he’s just trying to run a business.

However, most of the wackos who are against nuclear power live in nice places full of other white people and are fine with our power coming from burning coal and releasing it into the air that the brown people who pick their crops, build their buildings, and clean the shit stains off their toilets have to breath. So why should they want nuclear. So why would they want clean and cheap energy again?

Takuan

half the world’s supply of medical isotopes
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSN0643926820080606

Antinous

you, Takuan, are being hysterical, even trollish.

Piffle. The principal source of hysteria in this thread is from those who treat nuclear science like a religion. Plutonium is a significantly hazardous material. The US government and private industry have unimaginably bad track records when it comes to ensuring public safety. Scientists are notoriously afflicted with tunnel vision when it comes to the implementation of science. None of this means that nuclear energy is a bad option. What it does mean is that there must be many safeguards, checks and balances put into place before it’s widely used.

The argument that more people die in car accidents than nuclear ones? Absurdly disingenuous. The mental Twister that’s being displayed here in an attempt to bully commenters who are advising simple caution is not a testament to either honesty or intellectual ability. This kerfuffle started with a commenter accusing BoingBoing of being responsible for cancer. Get your own arguments together before you accuse Takuan of being a troll.

spazzm

I bet the folks at Chernobyl really goggle their eyes at you when you tell them.

It would be interesting to know how much radioactivity the world population has absorbed from coal fired power plants, compared to how much it has absorbed from Chernobyl.
One would have to set a reasonable timeframe, of course – since 1950, perhaps? Or since the day before the Chernobyl accident?

How many have died in coal mining accidents?

Let me deal with the obvious objections right away:
O: Modern coal mining techniques are safer.
A: Modern nuclear reactors are safer. So if we discount past coal-mining accident on this ground, we must also discount past nuclear accidents.

O: Uranium has to be mined too.
A: Yes, but you have to mine a lot less uranium than coal to get the same amount of energy.

O: Carbon sequestration means sequestration of most or all of the radioactive contamination from coal-fired powerplants.
A: Carbon sequestration is not yet practical. It may be practical and viable in 10 years time, but we need solutions to global warming now. Modern nuclear reactors are safe and available today.

O: Chernobyl proved that radioactivity will always get out.
A: Chernobyl was an poorly designed, inherently unsafe reactor. In the Chernobyl design, if the controls system fails the reactor will explode. Modern reactors are fail-safe. This means that if something goes wrong, the reactor cools off. There’s no possibility of a steam explosion.

O: I don’t believe that.
A: Well, maybe you can read up on pebble bed reactors and their safety features, then provide us with a plausible scenario of how the laws of physics will fail and cause a PBR reactor to explode, Chernobyl style.

O: Even if the reactor is safe, terrorists could fly a plane into it.
A: Terrorists could also fly a plane into a hydroelectric dam, flooding the downstream communities. Does that mean we should not build dams? Should we refrain from building schools because they make tempting terrorist targets?

Takuan

http://archive.greenpeace.org/comms/nukes/chernob/rep02.html

Mark Frauenfelder

@enginerd94303: I own stock in two nuclear power companies. I’d put a pebble bed reactor in my spare bedroom but the ominous police state won’t let me.

Takuan

Monju video
http://file.sunshinepress.org:54445/monju-nuclear-accident-1.wmv

Takuan

gee, I guess we should call it “freedom sugar”.

Plutonium is dangerous. It is and should be extremely highly restricted in all its possession and handling. These people and their organization should be heavily sanctioned. Downplaying the seriousness of this incident is the start of a very slippery slope which ends in a place where unnecessary cancers are “acceptable”. It also hangs around for a very long time.

There was a time not so very long ago when this threat didn’t even exist. Many of us remember it.

Takuan

Chalk River betrayal
http://www.ccnr.org/paulson_legacy.html#dis

Falcon_Seven

I think reading this whole thread just gave me cancer.

woolie

You can argue for nuclear power without endorsing the use of DU in munitions, Takuan. Don’t muddy the issue if you don’t have responses.

In fact, is this your style generally? Do you throw up generic antinuclear links in response to any statement? I’m not even going to grant that GP is a credible source in this discussion, but take a look at their list anyway. First, it looks like about half are military related, so I’ll throw them out to start. Most of the rest of items do not involve any release of radiation (ex: 20-1977: Temperature increase at Rancho Seco nuclear power plant). If you actually happen to understand how a reactor operates, and how the fission products are generated and where they are stored, you can further see that most of the other leaks are almost certainly of very small quantities. GP doesn’t list any units or quantities (typical for antinuclear activists) so it puts the burden on the other side to go dig through the literature and actually show they are inconsequential.

And sure, you can cherry pick anecdotal data point to prove anything. Are there occasionally accidents that resolve in disability or death? Sure, in every industry. Workers routinely fall off the top of wind turbines and die. A few years ago there was a nuclear fuel handling accident in Japan. But for the particular incident you cite, you should also point out the follow up studies on the workers 30 years later did not show increased mortality. And these are occupational risks, not risks to the general public. So what is overall (worker+public) fatality rate, normalized to TWh, for nuclear? Believe it or not, it’s lower than wind, coal, etc. (ExternE study)

Anyway, it’s no fun having to type out an entire paragraph with sourced information each time you throw up a link. End of discussion.

Antinous

Plutonium doesn’t kill people: people kill people. Unfortunately people design nuclear power plants. More frighteningly, people (if you want to refer to politicians that way) set the budgets for safety in nuclear power plants. People read porn and eat ham sandwiches when they should be watching the dials. Or are underpaid workers with access to radioactive materials (see above post) somehow magically more responsible than other underpaid, over-responsibilitatified workers? Also, we have these little things in California called earthquakes. You trust private industry or the US government to understand, enact, pay for and maintain nuclear safety?

Takuan

Tobacco

Asbestos

lead in gasoline

Start with those three. Go study the history of their discovery by man and their subsequent use and eventual abandonment as Bad Ideas. Pay especially attention to the sayings and writings of those who initially profited from their widespread sale and use. There is not one thing that the nuclear power business is saying that I have not heard before.

I am not going to take on the task of completely educating anyone in the history of man’s relationship with radioactives, our evolving medical understanding, the arms race and atmospheric testing, the intelligent and cautious use of statistics, the dark side of human nature , the time limits of the best materials we have versus the life span of nuclear materials, the actual accident record, the secret, immoral testing on humans and the actual need we have for energy NOW. It took too damn long to acquire my own knowledge and it’s too much work to hammer it into resisting ears. Just understand that I will oppose at every turn in the probably vain hope that the bulk of humanity will eventually come to its senses.

woolie

Antinous, building a society that required people to hold responsibility for the safety of others was a decision made a long time ago. To reverse it would require more or less complete dismantlement of technological civilization as we know it. Fortunately, redundancy is an effective solution to negligence, and transparency a winning tool against corruption.

woolie

And you know, it is depressing, that it is antinuclear rhetoric and regulation that is going to cause a negative impact on human health…

I’d love to see the stern resolve of an antinuclear activist when he’s told his options for diagnosis and treatment have been greatly diminished due to low availability of necessary medical isotopes.

Takuan

45 more reactors, is that the trade-off? A cooler globe that glows? How about less SUV’s doing laps around turf farms in the desert and T-shirts instead of moronic clown suit “business attire” that requires air conditioning?

spazzm

You trust private industry or the US government to understand, enact, pay for and maintain nuclear safety?

I’m not saying we should or should not, I’d just like to point out that private industry or the US government is already trusted to understand, enact, pay for and maintain safety for the following dangerous technologies:

Cars
Trains
Planes
Boats
Dams
Water purification
Disease control

If your point is that they’re not doing a good job and that all potentially dangerous technologies should be managed by non-profit NGOs, then you may well have a point.

If your point is that nuclear technology should be treated differently from other possibly dangerous technologies, then I think you need to qualify that distinction.

Antinous

I’m not anti-nuclear power. I’m anti-accusing Mark of causing cancer because he posted a story about careless disposal of radioactive material. Pink took a particular story and turned it into a global accusation of wrongdoing. The post is an appropriate cautionary tale, not alarmist hysteria.

ill lich

I have heard it said (although I have no proof that it is a valid claim– chemists/physicists help me out here) that a “thimble-full of plutonium is enough to kill every human on Earth.”

So what exactly is a “small amount” then?

Considering that the population of the human race continues to grow,

Considering that more and more “third world” populations desire electricity,

Considering that the only way to completely meet this growing need for energy is the building of more nuclear power plants (solar, wind, etc. just won’t do it all), resulting in more nuclear waste,

I see nothing but trouble ahead.

noen

I second Takuan’s suggestion that while not the most toxic substance on earth it’s pretty damn dangerous. It’s insidious, highly toxic in very small amounts and spreads easily. In fact, it’s extremely dangerous for 25,000 years. Minimizing that danger is just as irresponsible as exaggerating it.

Takuan

Shame. We have raised a generation that sees no wrong in despoiling the Earth since we started the job so well.

amuderick

Every reader on this blog has a much more potent radiation source in your their home…the smoke detector.

Did you know that each contains a fission waste byproduct of the nuclear industry? The artificially created Americium-241 is incredibly toxic in the same way as Plutonium. It emits *55 times* as much radiation for the same weight. To quote the EPA, “Americium-241 tends to concentrate in the bone, liver, and muscle. It can stay in the body for decades and continue to expose the surrounding tissues to radiation, and increase your risk of developing cancer. ”

Each smoke detector contains about 1000 nanocuries of material(about 200 million picograms!). Every day it releases 2.5 billion radioactive particles directly into our homes in addition to hundreds of millions of high-energy gamma rays. Then, it leaves behind billions of non-natural Neptunium-237 atoms. Neptunium’s half-life of over 2 million years means that eventually it will find its way into our environment and human bodies.

Hundreds of millions of these devices have been disposed of in landfills or dumps as unregulated waste.

Wait…

See how easy it is to load straight facts into scare-inducing spin? The only worry I have about my smoke detector is that it won’t go off in a fire. The device saves more than 1000 Americans each year for minimal cost.

Health Physics and Nuclear Sciences are complicated, use lots of statistics, and are hampered in their research (rightly) by an inability to actively experiment on humans. That leads to massive safety margins such that, a spill of a size which requires disclosure and cleanup is, by all odds, at least a million times smaller than that which would cause any real danger. This alone leads to massive fear and misperceptions in the general public.

Take a look at the research on Chernobyl which considers the percentage of medical conditions caused by anxiety over radiation exposure vs. the actual radiation itself.

Dr. Bernard Cohen had a lot of things to say about radioactivity that people still aren’t ready to accept. Specifically, the mantra ‘no amount of radiation is safe’ may not just be wrong, but overzealously enforcing it may actually cause more disease.

Red Leatherman

The Sun is a source of radiation. More than once I remember hearing that you would be likely to recieve more radiation from the Sun than inside the boat (nuke powered submarine).
nonetheless, I prefer to drink my espresso and Dr. Bernard Cohen can drink all the plutonium he wants. His calculated odds being equivilent to the life expectancy that the typical draftee during World War II dosen’t sound all that great to me.

Takuan

why does the nuclear power business follow the big tobacco model?

LeavingHalfway

I’ll make sure to let you all know when I die of plutonium poisoning.

Antinous

Oh, come on! What could possibly be dangerous about the trace radiation in smoke detectors?

Takuan

tell us again how ionizing radiation is good for us

Kibble

“When I mention that switching from coal to nuclear power would decrease, not increase, the amount of radioactive exposure to the general public I always get blank stares or incredulous exclamations.”

That will be true, right up until the point when a major spill of radioactive waste, such as the millions of gallons of radioactive water that is stored in tanks at many nuclear facilities (with no long-term plan for its disposal) occurs, and we let the genie out of the bottle, permanently.

And that’s not even counting the possibility of a Chernobyl-style accident, or something even worse.

If *that* happens, then a major chunk of our country will be off-limits, effectively forever.

It is true, from what I understand anyway, that plutonium as a radioactive material is not nearly as dangerous as others, such as those created in explosions and controlled fission, which are *extremely* dangerous.

But the lower toxicity of plutonium doesn’t mean nuclear energy is safe.

It isn’t.

One other thing, an offer to eat plutonium is about as credible of an argument for the safety of nuclear energy as wearing a big red nose, giant shoes and an orange wig.

Takuan

what can over a decade of spin do?
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg14119101.400-lets-have-a-cup-of-nice-safe-plutonium-.html

Takuan

heh! I remember the boy scout.Went on to a navy nuclear career, with every expectation of dying young

richard schumacher

OhMyGHODDD!! Plutonium is almost as dangerous as botulism toxin!! You know, that stuff that middle aged-women have injected into their faces in outpatient clinics.

amuderick

@antinous,

First, I have read the book ‘Radioactive Boy Scout’ and it contains so many factual errors and ludicrous suppositions it is an embarassing piece of ‘journalism’. Really. Terrible.

Second, David Hahn seems to have some real problems. While I don’t know for sure what is wrong with his face, I can guarantee you it has nothing to do with radiation. Instead, consider crystal meth? Perhaps that ties in with his bizarre obsessive behaviours described in your link.

@Takuan,

I implore you to investigate Dr. Cohen’s research in more depth. This is a good start:
http://www.ajronline.org/cgi/content/full/179/5/1137

Also, the Health Physics Society, whose profession is the study of radiation’s effects on the human body, has a statement on radiation exposure:
http://hps.org/documents/risk_ps010-1.pdf

Lastly, returning to the topic at hand, the HPS position statement on Plutonium is enlightening:
http://hps.org/documents/plutonium_ps006-0.pdf

Antinous

Why do I feel like I’ve landed on Anacreon?

Takuan

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/6420ap_wa_hanford_lawsuit.html

Takuan

read the Health Physics Society position statement on plutonium. Read it. Now read it again. Do you understand that what is NOT said is as important as what is said? Go look up thorium and radium hazards and history. Read the statement as carefully as you read a contract to purchase a house. Get back to me.

Village Idiot

Quote from Woolie: And you know, it is depressing, that it is antinuclear rhetoric and regulation that is going to cause a negative impact on human health…

I’d love to see the stern resolve of an antinuclear activist when he’s told his options for diagnosis and treatment have been greatly diminished due to low availability of necessary medical isotopes.

What was “rhetorical” about spilling plutonium down a drain that was connected to the sewer system? I think the gist of many people’s points is that although the physics may be understood and the safeguards are always improving, nuclear tech is still something that has to be implemented by human beings, creatures who do things like store plutonium in a breakable container then spill it in the sink and get it on themselves.

The second paragraph is an insulting, unbased generalization about people; the idea that someone who opposes nuclear technology would suddenly swing 180 degrees out of purely selfish intent in the scenario you created is a kind of trolling.

Quote from Mark (#57)I searched google images for Hiroshima and saw a photo of a man with sores that looked just like the radioactive boy scouts’. I didn’t know they had cyrstal meth back in the 1940s, Amuderick.

Actually, crystal meth was around in the 40′s, but probably not in Japan. It first appeared on the streets in parts of the US in the 50′s. And meth itself doesn’t cause those symptoms anyway, solvents and impurities do.

Mark Frauenfelder

I searched google images for Hiroshima and saw a photo of a man with sores that looked just like the radioactive boy scouts’. I didn’t know they had cyrstal meth back in the 1940s, Amuderick.

Takuan

http://media-newswire.com/release_1068007.html

brownbat

Freakonomics talked a bit about radiation this week as well, and how the media habitually treats it like “scary future science stuff,” even though it’s been around for decades, and way safer than all the other science we use (think electricity).

On an average, there were 120 entries per year on motor vehicle accidents, which kill 50,000 Americans each year; 50 entries per year on industrial accidents, which kill 12,000; and 20 entries per year on asphyxiation accidents, which kill 4,500; note that for these the number of entries, which represents roughly the amount of newspaper coverage, is approximately proportional to the death toll they cause. But for accidents involving radiation, there were something like 200 entries per year, in spite of there not having been a single fatality from a radiation accident for over a decade.

It’s like journalists look out at the teeming millions, but only see those people predicting doomsday scenarios from the Hadron collider.

I’m not sure where this story fits in with all that, surely you haven’t suddenly gone anti-future on us, eh Mark? ;)

Village Idiot

(Don’t know why half the quote ended up non-italicized even though I closed the italics after the 2nd paragraph, making my post potentially confusing… but whatever)

Takuan

What makes it very clear that there are people who
who should not be entirely trusted in matters of public safety and health is their ready willingness to use questionable tactics in pushing their agenda.
Conflating the Higgs boson project with legitimate concern over commercial, profit driven interests in building more nuclear power plants is more than a giveaway. I would call it accusation, trial and legitimate conviction in one breath.

We may be being cornered into an increase to the hazards of the nuclear industry by our current circumstances. Very well. But there is a moral outrage committed, a veritable crime against our descendants in allowing the shortsighted to get away with lying, downplaying real risks and ignoring physical and medical facts. There is NO NEED TO LIE. People WILL accept heightened risks and the selling out of their grandchildren’s birthright to a clean planet in order to temporaily maintain their unsustainable, ludicrously overpriviledged lifestyle choices.

Don’t make it worse than it has to be by lying.

jphilby

It is a well-established fact that Pu is a potent carcinogen (for hundreds of thousands of years). A speck the size of a dust mote floating in the sunlight, inhaled and trapped in the lung, causes cancer in lab animals with near certainty.

It’s man-made, extremely dangerous, and hundreds of tons of it exist. Everyone needs to know that. Thanks for the reminder.

Takuan

oh, please continue Woolie.

Secret_Life_of_Plants

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Wetterhahn
vs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_McCluskey

Takuan

back to the specifics: Who were these people? What exactly were they doing with it? Will it happen again? Was there any real need for this accident? Have controls slipped? Disappeared even? We all have an absolute right to know.

No has yet properly answered how six thermonuclear cruise missiles were “mislaid” either.

Anonymous

I think a lot of people are missing the point here. Plutonium is a fissile material, this means you can make atomic bombs out of it. You can’t do that with the uranium that’s in the rocks and dirt all around us (uranium in the dirt is the source of the radon gas that’s filling our homes). Plutonium is regulated by international non-proliferation treaties. When plutonium was being worked with at Rocky Flats, which was just down the street from Boulder, the buildings were inside of a double fenced area with anti-aircraft emplacements on their roofs and guard towers.

Plutonium is radioactive, pyrophoric (will easily catch fire on contact with oxygen) and worth more than gold. The big question here should be, who was responsible for letting this stuff escape?

Takuan

just post lolcats, it makes the same sense

Anonymous

Apparently, trace amounts of Plutonium were also found on the researchers nostrils and spread around their gums.

Secret_Life_of_Plants

P.S.

I am freaked out about alot of things…GMO foods, spraying pesticides on a community to get rid of a moth, heck, I even think wall-to-wall carpeting and plastic water bottles are bad ideas! But nuclear power is probably one of the better things we could do for the environment, if it wasn’t too late.

There is a really informative downloadable podcast about this from the SETI Institute’s radio show “Are We Alone” which you can get on iTunes for free or download free from here:

http://radio.seti.org/past-shows.php

It is the October 29, 2007 stupidly-titled show
“Mot’am I’m Atom”. I think it might even discuss the faces of death looking / reactor building boyscout, but that might have been another podcast I was listening to the same week. Still it is very informative about the actual risks.

I actually listened to that podcast walking through the Forest of Fontainebleau in France where they use significantly more nuclear power than the US and do it responsibly and safely. In fact I think their biggest health concerns are protecting their agriculture from Monsanto etal.

woolie

Oh, it’s just an honest, open question. Medical isotopes don’t pop out of the ether. Are you willing to go to the wall to deny others and potentially yourself access to vital medicine to maintain ideological purity? I ask the same question of christian faith healers, homeopathic partisans, dominionists who reject the fruits of scientific justification, etc. It’s a valid question for anyone who advocates dogmatic positions in the face of all rational evidence to the contrary.

I’ll reiterate that congress demanding investigations over microgram quantities released is pretty convincing evidence that it’s not an every day occurrence. Posters have still yet to quantify the risk to human life caused by release of trace amounts of material. A dollar and hour spent on irrational, excessive fear of the consequences of this accident is a dollar and hour that isn’t spent on something that might yield real dividends in human health, e.g. aids prevention in africa.

Moon

Plutonium is a lot less dangerous than you think. Unless you breathe a significant amount, it probably won’t hurt you at all.

They don’t say how much was on the hands of these “employees”, but I doubt it was too much, because anyone working with plutonium generally has to go through a lot of radioactivity detectors, which would be blaring all over the place if it was a significant amount. Not to mention the security alarms that would have gone off.

Takuan

and may we assume you have no personal stake in this?

randomcat

The fact that this residue was rinsed off someone’s HANDS might be a clue as to the real danger that the public and the environment have been exposed to in this case…

woolie

This thread has a disturbingly high level of wrongness per line. Plutonium is dangerous as a bomb making material; as for chemical toxicity, it’s small fry stuff. Most of us are in constant contact with alpha emitters every day, radon gas released from subterranean uranium decay makes up the majority of our background radiation dose. Don’t forget other natural radiation sources… cosmic rays, K-40 in bananas, medical X-rays, etcetc. I’d be more worried about a mercury spill or release of chlorine gas, both of which happen frequently all over the world.

People hear the words “radiation,” or “nuclear,” or “plutonium,” and sprint to see who can make the most hysterical statement.

Stefan Jones

Two volunteers for the clean up already!

eustace

Where does the isotopes washed down drains bit come from? Did I miss that link?

Takuan

“Traces of plutonium spilled last week at the National Institutes of Standards and Technology in Boulder have been found in a laboratory sink, where the radioactive chemical may have washed into the cityâ€™s sewer system, NIST said in a news release Tuesday.”

Takuan

http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_9654671

noen

I do hear two, even three different discussions going at once. The ambiguous crosstalk and resulting confusion doesn’t help. I see this happen a lot here and other places where people talk past one another, use imprecise words, vaguely defined concepts, all with a healthy does of emotion. Nothing gets resolved and people come away not even knowing what the argument was about. I don’t have a solution for that, wish I did. The best discussions that I’ve seen on difficult topics have been on the PhysOrg forums where the moderator is a total Nazi. Deleting any post that is disrespectful or slightly off topic. I don’t think we can do that here.

When I was young I was very gung ho about science, I think I still am but I’m more skeptical about exaggerated claims that others make. So in this instance, about this particular spill, I’m not inclined to believe the claims that “It’ll be just fine”. If I lived down stream from the spill I’d be pretty damn worried about the next one. I mean, people do realize that sewage gets treated and the treated water gets dumped into a river from which people downstream get their drinking water? So yeah, micrograms of PU, probably not a major health concern. But what about the next one? If you lived downstream would you be happy with a pat on the head saying don’t worry?

Just to round this out, I agree with Lovejoy that if we wish our civilization to survive we need to switch to some kind atomic energy. What I’m not very confident in is the ability of our current political structures (or corporations for that matter) to competently manage dangerous technology. We need accountability and transparency in and the ideologues and C students out of government. Europe, esp France, does seem to be able to handle difficult tech like atomic energy calmly and rationally like adults. America seems to be too stupid to even run the appliances anymore.

Takuan

some things take more time than others

whysteriastar

Sounds to me like Doc Brown is in business.

Beryllium

Hrm. This sounds like a superhero/supervillain origin story, except much scarier.

The Adventures of Sewer Urchin vs. the Dark Dank Monster!

Takuan

what were they doing with plutonium?

Jake0748

#1 – I thought I saw once in the Guiness Book (great source, I know), that plutonium is considered the most poisonous known substance per unit of weight. So maybe it doesn’t take that much to be a “significant amount”.

Also – Why are these “officials” ALWAYS saying stuff like “there is nothing to be afraid of” and “there is no danger to the public”? Do they really think that anyone believes them?

Jake0748

One of my favorite all-time movie lines is when Woody Allen’s character in Annie Hall goes to LA to visit his friend Max. They are driving around in a convertible and Max puts on all this stuff to protect himself from the sun, goggles, metallic-looking hood, etc. And Woody says: “Are we driving through plutonium?”.

arkizzle

Has anyone mentioned the possibility of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?

Maybe someone can get to Boulder and drop some shelled-reptiles into the sewer system?

Gainclone

I read:

At the National Institutes of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colorado has been found on the floor and tabletops.

GET THE COLORADO OFF THE FLOOR AND TABLETOPS.

Nelson.C

Antinous @68:

What it does mean is that there must be many safeguards, checks and balances put into place before it’s widely used.

I agree with this utterly.

Antinous

My biggest concern is twenty year old power plants combined with a Congress that’s not interested in nuclear power. Governments don’t have a good record of follow-up.

Chevan

>It took too damn long to acquire my own knowledge and it’s too much work to hammer it into resisting ears.

Then why are you still here?

If you’re not willing to back your arguments up any more forcefully than by saying “Trust me guys, I know my shit,” why should we listen to you?

RobK84

That’s very similar to the opening scene of The Host. I certainly hope the plutonium doesn’t find its way into a lake.

Is there a Cloverfield, Colorado?

eustace

I’m back from a dinner where I was able to ask some chemists what they knew about plutonium spills. They inform me that while the radioactivity emitted by plutonium is a minor concern, CHEMICALLY the stuff is incredibly poisonous – a distinction that I think we missed earlier (well, I know I did). All the more worrisome as a spill, of course.

Antinous

Someone else also mentioned its pyrophoricity, which was swept under the rug. Wikipedia actually uses plutonium to illustrate pyrophoricity.

Nelson.C

Takuan, my love, not everyone involved with the nuclear industry is a liar out to destroy the planet. Not everyone who tries to avoid hysteria about the subject is a liar.

The truth of this incident is that it has produced no detectable risk. The plutonium in the sewers of boulder is much less dangerous to anyone than the rubbish that is disposed of down there daily by the citizens of Boulder, or the germs that breed there. By the time the isotopes are dissolved and carried away to wherever the sewer water goes, it will be indetectable.

It is also true that this should never have happened. Plutonium should not be kept in glass containers, and it should only be handled by facilities that can cope with accidental spills without contaminating the environment, the same as any other hazardous material. It should no more be washed into the sewers than a spill of mercury would be.

Plutonium is a poison. Worse than a chemical poison, it doesn’t get used up when it poisons, but remains poisonous for very long time. It should be treated with respect, not with carelessness, still less with hysteria.

It hurts me to say it, but you, Takuan, are being hysterical, even trollish. Not everyone who disagrees with you is wrong. You’re better than this.

Takuan

0.06 grams… one little particle inhaled is pretty well a sure cancer, how many dead people is that .06 grams?
http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008/jun/24/plutonium-washed-down-sink-below-legal-limits/

Takuan

I’ll deal with a point at a time. Make one.

TheBpem

Jake, I believe you have Plutonium confused with Polonium, that is the most toxic stuff per weight. Polonium is what was used to kill the Ex-KGB agent in England a while back.

Takuan

http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008/jun/20/udall-demanding-documents-answers-about-plutonium-/

randomcat

#3 – I’d rather clean up plutonium than asbestos.

#7 – That’s because it’s heavy. REALLY heavy. And yes, really poisonous, like many heavy metals. But not necessarily fatal, even if injected.

From this article:

“In 1992, five years after happening upon the initial documents, Welsome was finally able to piece together the identity of one of the victims: “CAL-3″ was an African-American railroad porter named Elmer Allen of Italy, Texas. Allen had received a hypodermic needle loaded with plutonium on July 18, 1947, for what was then believed to be cancer and had his leg amputated at midthigh. He had told a friend that the doctors had “put a germ cancer in his leg.” Allen died in 1991 knowing nothing of his role in the experiments.”

Maybe we should round up all the geezers in Russia with plutonium pacemakers.

Takuan

http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008/jun/13/more-plutonium-found-nist/

Takuan

http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008/jun/10/plutonium-spilled-nist/

Takuan

so, so safe. US$925,000,000.00 settlement worth of “safe”
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hBkJ3aIgzkDuDnAxnqGIvT4VykvQD912V6F00

spazzm

The radioactive boy scout (David Hahn) was never in contact with plutonium. He never had access to plutonium.
His radiation sores, if that is what it was, all stems from stuff we have around us all the time: Smoke detectors, glow-in-the-dark watches, camping lanterns and gun sights.

Takuan

only in Colorado
http://www.riles.org/paper7.htm

Takuan

mmmm yummy money
http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1704599/

Skullhunter

Skullhunter, you’re implying that spent nuclear fuel is being spread about like fertilizer.

I implied no such thing. I said that those producing the waste don’t seem to have the ability to adequately and safely deal with the waste produced by their industry.

Can you show me where any significant amount has been released into the environment? kthx.

Why do I get the feeling that the question involves possibly moving goalposts? For instance, I could mention that the Hanford Nuclear Reservation has been contaminating the area around itself for decades with both accidental and intentional releases. I’m sure the follow up would be something along the lines of “well that’s from weapons production”, as if nobody could ever then manage to cock up the storage of waste from power production.

I could also mention the contamination caused by uranium mining in the American Southwest, but I get the impression I’d be told “that’s in the past, we’re smarter now” or some such.

For the record, I’m not as much anti-technology as I am a realist about the ability of human beings to screw up in dangerous fashions and the tendency of industry to both enable and cover up said screwups. But that is a lovely strawman you’ve built, making people out to be either fanatics or just plain stupid and uneducated for questioning the safety of nuclear power. Recognizing that industry has a pretty solid track record of putting profit ahead of safety (both worker and consumer) isn’t anti-science fanaticism or ill-educated knee-jerking. It’s realizing that usually when the same kind of people responsible for a current problem come to you shouting “I have the solution for the current problem and it’s quick and easy and readily available!” usually they’re full of shit and they’d like you to buy some of it.

Plutonium spill in Boulder, Colorado has spread

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