Perilous
Times
Fukushima: Monitoring the Invisible Nuclear Death
Tuesday 26 April 2011
by: Marguerite Kahrl and Kathleen Sullivan, Truthout
Sous chef Eric Fricker, of La Bernadin restaurant, checks fillets
of red snapper for radiation, in New York, April 5, 2011.
Restaurant owners are taking all precautions to be sure their
seafood is safe, following the earthquake in Japan. (Photo:
Librado Romero / The New York Times)
In many ways, the nuclear threat has become a nuclear reality. In
a time when decisive action is called for, it is hard to know who
to believe and how. Many people lack the information necessary to
evaluate the temporal effects of radiation. People are receiving
contradictory messages regarding how to respond to the ongoing
technological failures and releases of radiation at the Fukushima
Nuclear Power Plant in northern Japan.
Questions arise such as: What do people need to know? What do
radiation measurements mean? At what level does radiation exposure
become dangerous to humans and other life forms? How do we
mitigate the effects of radioactive exposure? What are the
differences between immediate and long-term effects?
Making the Invisible Visible
Dr. Karl Z. Morgan, the father of health physics, was a long-time
member of the nuclear establishment. He worked on the Manhattan
Project and also at the Oak Ridge nuclear weapons plant in
Tennessee. He later became an opponent of nuclear weapons and
power production when he realized that the US nuclear industry was
suppressing the dangers regarding radiation exposure. Dr. Morgan
pioneered research that suggests there is no safe level of
radiation. More recently, the National Academy of Sciences report
on "Health Risks From Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing
Radiation" (BEIR VII, 2006), asserted that there is no "safe"
radiation dose and that any dose of radiation may be harmful.
If there is no safe level of radiation exposure and if human
beings by nature make mistakes, then shouldn't we phase out
technologies that exceed our physical and moral capacity to
contain and control them?
We need to be aware that many people in the media and governments
are confused about "safe levels." It may be that this confusion
does not stem from ill will, fear management or protection of
assets, but from the reality that the majority of us simply do not
understand radiation. Radiation is invisible to our senses, and
for so long, has been invisible to our moral imaginations. We must
learn to see it, contain it and guard it from the biosphere.
There are many conflicting reports in Europe, in the US and in
Japan. US and UK officials are currently moving foreign nationals
out of Tokyo. Japanese authorities have taken a different
approach. These conflicting responses are creating suspicion,
disorientation and fear.
The situation at the Fukushima nuclear power plant is still
unfolding and we cannot yet know the outcome. If the reactor
starts to suddenly release more radiation, and the winds prevail
toward Tokyo, it might become more difficult for people to
evacuate. Foreign nationals are leaving now because it is easier
for their governments to get them out before a greater disaster
occurs. Measurable levels of radioactive iodine have been detected
in milk and spinach up to 65 miles from the Fukushima site, while
trace amounts of radioactive iodine have been detected in the
Tokyo metropolitan area's tap water. Given this exposure, it is
imperative that parents with small children leave these areas,
because children are more susceptible to radioactive iodine while
their thyroid glands are developing.
It is true that we live with radiation everyday. Radiation
naturally comes from the sun and from the earth. We are exposed
through x-rays, on airplanes and through nuclear medicine, which
can be life saving for those suffering from cancer. But natural
radiation and the nuclear medicine of human-made radiation are not
the same as the radioactive isotopes used for nuclear weapons and
nuclear power production. Even though there was exhaustive (and
often inhumane) research conducted on atomic bomb survivors after
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we still don't fully understand the latent
and direct effects of radiation exposure, let alone
inter-generational anomalies. That is why we should always employ
the precautionary principle. The precautionary principle,
developed as an international environmental standard at the
Wingspread Conference Center in the 1990s, states, "when an
activity raises threats of harm to human health or the
environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some
cause and effect relationships are not fully established
scientifically."
Monitoring the Situation
Today, unprecedented quantities of data are easily available in
cloud computing networks. The open-source movement is providing
ever-expanding access to this data via dynamic new software and
hardware platforms. At the same time, much important data in the
world is also being privatized or withheld from public access.
The lack of public disclosure of radiation levels around many
nuclear facilities is one such example. We believe this
information must be made available to the general public so that
these sites can be more effectively monitored.
Transparently publishing this data on open servers can accomplish
this goal. In much the same way that the business sector is moving
toward a uniform and open mechanism for publishing regulated
financial data, radiation data should be similarly published. In
that way, the power of an informed citizenry can be brought to
bear on the crucial task of monitoring the inherent dangers of
radioactivity.
Shortly after the Fukushima disaster, a real time Geiger counter
for Tokyo was uploaded to the Internet on Ustream. It ran for
several days with over two million followers, but at the time of
writing, the channel [3] has been taken offline.
Each link in the nuclear fuel chain releases radiation and creates
nuclear waste. This process begins with mining for uranium,
whether that is for the production of nuclear power or weapons.
Uranium use in reactors creates fissile materials that can be used
to make nuclear weapons. Grave accidents, such as the unfolding
radioactive tragedy at Fukushima, can be avoided if nuclear power
is phased out. To protect future generations and life on earth, we
must abolish nuclear weapons, stop the production of nuclear power
and become guardians of our radioactive legacy.