Today is the december solstice, when, the sun, appearing to travel
along the ecliptic,
reaches the point where it is the farthest south of the celestial
equator. In the northern hemisphere
days are shortest and nights longest while the
opposite occurs in the southern hemisphere.
This ratitorial heralds the presence on
rat
haus reality of
Poisoned Power, the classic lay-person's
primer explaining precisely what the health costs of nuclear power plants
are, as well as describing the historical development of nuclear power
in the U.S and how an entire industry was
"
misled
in their belief that some safe amount of radiation truly exists".
The costs to health, never honestly acknowledged or adequately discussed
by nuclear industry proponents, affects not only ourselves and our
children, they impact all mammals, fish, birds, insects, reptiles, plants,
trees, bacteria, and everything else we share this irreplaceable home
with. Even more serious, the on-going damage to the collective planetary
DNA gene pool is increasing and deepening the burden all life yet
unborn will have to bear, nothing less than the future of all.
What
is it that actually justifies such costs?
Poisoned Power:
The Case Against Nuclear Power Plants
Before and After Three Mile Island
by John W. Gofman,
M.D., Ph.D., and Arthur R. Tamplin, Ph.D.
Containing the complete combined contents of the 1971 and 1979 editions.
Welcoming the sun spinning into view above the east-southeastern
horizon at dawn on November 18th, i was struck by how close
it already was to the southern-most point it reaches on the December
Solstice and wondered what would be most appropriate to prepare for
this ratitor's corner. The Nuclear Energy Institute's full-page
glossy ad in the November Atlantic, laden with the falsehoods
and latest spin of the same lethal propaganda promoted by the Atomic
Energy Commission (AEC) starting in the 1950s, crystalized the decision
that morning that it was finally time to complete the creation of
hypertext representations of Gofman and Tamplin's 1970s classic,
Poisoned Power.
i had scanned the text with Optical Character Recognition (OCR)
software back in 1992 for the
Series
on the Health Costs of Nuclear Technology posted to various
newsgroups. But work was never completed correcting, proof-reading,
and formatting this book until now. i am deeply grateful to
Stefene Russell for all her good hard work doing the first-pass
text correcting/prepping of the raw OCR'd files before passing them
on to me to proof and wrap up in HTML. Stefene writes the
Stranger
Than Fiction column for
Pif Magazine, as
well as the more mundane
Politics and Government,
Religion and Spirituality,
Performing Arts, and
Around Town
columns for her day job at
City Search: Utah.
* * * * *
the really
important
questions about nuclear power are ethical
i am not a "scientist". i am deeply concerned about the unnecessary
and utterly inappropriate human activity involving tinkering with
nuclear fission to generate heat in power plant reactors. Ever since
the close of WWII the proponents of this activity have sought to
pretend that the extremely poisonous man-made radioactive matter
produced along every step of the nuclear fuel cycle, can be safely
and completely contained, thus preventing it from contaminating and
irrevocably polluting our biosphere.
The on-going damage to the collective gene pool of all life on earth
-- not only human life -- is proceeding apace in large measure from
the continued development and promotion of nuclear power. The
historical record articulated in Poisoned Power of how this
situation developed is extremely relevant to everyone who is concerned
about this incoherent state of affairs. When this book was first
published in 1971, there was nothing comparable in its breadth and
depth for lay-persons to study to teach themselves the fundamental
issues about what nuclear power involves and why it is so
extraordinarily dangerous and unnecessary.
The
Congress of the United States, acting in the
best of faith during the immediate post-war years,
made an historic error in assigning duties and aims
to the newly established U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.
Atomic energy represented a poorly-understood,
new, potent phenomenon, born during World
War II. The possibilities and the hazards appeared
staggering.
It
seemed logical, in 1946, to organize a civilian
Commission assigned to explore and exploit the
phenomena of atomic energy for the fullest benefit of
the citizens. The Atomic Energy Commission was
given this as one of its missions. But the staggering
potential hazard was also recognized and a second
mission, that of proceeding with the fullest consideration
of protection of health and safety of the public,
was also assigned to the Atomic Energy Commission.
In
this dual mission lay the historic error. No
group of people could be expected to do both things at
the same time -- promote a technology zealously and
hastily -- and at the same time proceed slowly and
cautiously for maximum protection of public health.
Go fast but go slowly! This was in essence the directive
given the AEC at its inception.
As
the Commission explored the peaceful possibilities
of the atom, one prospect seemed inordinately
attractive: utilization of the enormous energy of
uranium fission to produce heat, hence steam, and to
use the steam to drive electrical generators. The nuclear
reactor derives its energy from nuclear fission, rather
than from fossil fuel, to produce steam -- provided
everything goes exactly as planned.
Unfortunately,
at several steps along the way,
radioactive substances, produced as waste by-products
in nuclear reactors, are released into either air or water.
The nuclear reactor itself, and the possibility of harm
from an accident there, are only the beginning of the
story.
Huge
quantities of radioactivity are produced in
the course of nuclear electricity generation. Electrical
power production is measured in kilowatts (1000
watts equal 1 kilowatt) or megawatts (1000 kilowatts
equal 1 megawatt). A large power station of any kind
produces approximately 1000 megawatts.
For
a nuclear power plant operating to produce
1000 megawatts of electrical power, we can estimate
how much uranium will be needed. From this we can
calculate precisely how much of the various radioactive
fission products will be produced, including such
infamous ones as radioactive iodine-131, radioactive
strontium-90, strontium-89, radioactive cesium-137
and radioactive krypton-85. These radioactive by-products
became familiar to us all during the heated
debates over radioactive fallout hazards when bombs
were tested in the l950's.
Some
of the radioactive by-products of nuclear
uranium fission have very short half-lives, others very
long. This concept of "half-life" seems difficult. It is
not. It's mostly just a convenient way to measure the
potential for harm and how long it may last. If a
radioactive substance has a half-life of one day, we
mean that, in the course of one day, half of that
substance will decay or disappear. In the next day,
one half of what is left will disappear, in the next day
one-half of that will disappear, and so on.
So a substance with a half-life of one day will
be reduced in radioactivity 1000 times in 10 days.
Hardly enough left to do much damage, you might say,
within the very short time of 10 days.
But
if a substance has a half-life of about 30 years
(like cesium-137) its radioactivity is reduced 1000
times only after 300 years!
One
ugly feature plagues the operation of nuclear
reactors for power generation. As the uranium atoms
split, they build up radioactive by-products which
eventually "poison" the reactor itself. Only a small
amount of the potentially fissionable fuel can be utilized
before it must be removed from the reactor and transported
by rail or truck to a fuel-cleaning or fuel-reprocessing plant.
Here
the uranium or plutonium is dissolved in
acid and purified so that it can be prepared to go back
to the nuclear reactor. But astronomical amounts of
radioactive by-products remain, after this process is
complete. Usually a nuclear reactor can function for
about two years before fuel-reprocessing becomes
essential. This means that every two years all of the
radioactive material generated by uranium fission must
be removed from the nuclear power plant, transported
by rail or truck to the fuel reprocessing plant, and there
separated from uranium or plutonium which are recovered
for future use. The immense quantities of radioactive
by-products must then be transported in some
fashion to an ultimate repository.
Plans
call for allowing the uranium fuel to remain
for a period of months after removal from the reactor
so that the short-lived radioactive by-products decay
away. This cuts the radioactivity of the spent fuel rods
some, but still massive quantities of the extremely
hazardous strontium-90 and cesium-137 have decayed
hardly at all in this short cooling-off period of several
months.
These
radioactive substances, with half-lives of 27
and 33 years respectively, must be kept isolated from
the environment for periods like several hundred years
if damage to human beings and other living things is
to be avoided. It is difficult for the layman to understand
or conceive of the enormous quantities of
hazardous radioactive by-products like strontium-90
and cesium-137 that are involved. We will explain.
A
1000 megawatt reactor, operating for two years
(the fuel-changing cycle time) produces as much of
these long-persisting radioactive poisons as about
2000 atom bombs of the Hiroshima size. This sounds
incredible, but is thoroughly documented, as a known
fact of physics. Ten such reactors -- and the AEC plans
for some 500 by the turn of the century -- operating for
two years have as much radioactivity of long persistence
in them as the combined total of such fission-product
radioactivities in all the bomb tests of the
United States and the Soviet Union combined for the
entire period of atmospheric testing up through 1962.
During
the bomb tests, that amount of radioactivity
spread fallout around the globe, aroused the concern
of more than 11,000 biological scientists, and was
finally a major factor leading to the 1963 treaty to
ban atmospheric tests of such weapons. Yet the AEC
is now proposing to build reactors containing inventories
many times this total amount of radioactivity
on the edge of all our most populous metropolitan
centers! Trucks, roaming our crowded highways, will
carry radioactive cargoes to reprocessing plants, and
eventually to a final burial spot. ( Chapter 5, "Promises, Promises",
pp.107-111 )
The fact that at the end of 1998 virtually everything in
Poisoned Power
is as relevant as when it was first published in 1971 bespeaks
a living tragedy the magnitude of which is every bit as profound
and timeless as anything William Shakespeare ever wrote. In all of
this there is one key fact to keep in mind:
We cannot have energy from nuclear fission power plants without
the generation of radioactive fission products. The energy from
fission comes from splitting heavy atoms such as uranium-235,
uranium-233 or plutonium-239. Once split the result is what
are called fission fragments or fission products. These are the
radioactive poisons that decay at various rates. Many of them will
be around for thousands of years.
The single, most important fact to always remember is that
unrepairable damage to living tissue -- particularly to DNA in
the nucleus of cells -- from exposure to radioactive isotopes
has been studied and proven to occur down to the lowest
possible doses:
. . . ionizing radiation
is not like a poison out of a bottle where you can dilute
it and dilute it. The lowest dose of ionizing radiation
is one nuclear track through one cell. You can't have a
fraction of a dose of that sort. Either a track goes
through the nucleus and affects it, or it doesn't. So I
said "What evidence do we have concerning one, or two or
three or four or six or 10 tracks?" And I came up with
nine studies
of cancer being produced where we're dealing with up to maybe
eight or 10 tracks per cell. Four involved breast
cancer. With those studies, as far as I'm concerned,
it's not a question of "We don't know." The DOE has
never refuted this evidence. They just ignore it,
because it's inconvenient. We can now say, there
cannot be a safe dose of radiation. There is no safe
threshold.
-"Gofman on the health effects of radiation:
`There is no safe threshold'",
synapse, 1/94
Injury to living systems through mutation wrought by exposure
to such radioactive poisons not only can result in cancer and
leukemia. It can also damage male sperm and female ova chromosomes
while in the testis or ovary, and "can thus be carried forward into
every cell of a new human being. Worse yet, since every cell
of the new human can carry such a mutation, the sperm or ova of
this human can carry them also, so that the original injury
persists through successive generations."
The section on
Hereditary Alterations
in Chapter 3, "How
Radiation Produces Disease and Hereditary Alterations," provides
a keenly incisive analysis of "the implications of increasing the
existing mutation rate of our genes" from the safety standards
set for population exposure to "permissible" levels of man-made
sources of radiation originally defined by official regulatory
bodies such as the AEC and National Committee on Radiation
Protection (NRCP).
The
Nobel Laureate in Genetics, Professor Joshua
Lederberg,[2]
recently indicated his grave concern about
the implications of increasing the existing mutation
rate of our genes, and stated that present radiation
standards allow for a 10 percent increase in mutation
rate. And he says, "I believe that the present standards
for population exposure to radiation should and will
(at least de facto) be made more stringent, to about
one percent of the spontaneous rate, and that this is
also a reasonable standard for the maximum tolerable
mutagenic (heredity) effect of any environmental
chemical."
Dr.
Lederberg is suggesting that all forms
of influence in our environment which can provoke
genetic mutation or chromosome injury be one
percent of the spontaneous rate, yet he points out
the serious situation that we are currently legally
permitting 10 percent of the spontaneous rate from
radiation alone. Let us quote Professor Lederberg on this:
"A ten percent increase in the existing `spontaneous'
mutation rate is, in effect, the standard that has been
adopted as the `maximum acceptable' level of public
exposure to radiation by responsible regulatory
bodies."
One
wonders how it can be that responsible regulatory
bodies would allow ten times more genetic injury to the
population from radiation alone, when a highly respected
geneticist suggests one percent as a maximum for
radiation plus chemicals combined. Other geneticists concur.
A
multitude of unsatisfactory answers to this
question has been provided. One is that we cannot afford
to impede technological progress by undue restrictions.
Thus, atomic energy programs such as nuclear electricity
generation, "must" be beneficial to humans in
terms of convenience and comfort, so they must be
allowed to pollute the environment with radioactive
substances that will ultimately produce genetic changes
in man.
A
reasonable question: why must radioactivity be
released at such a high level for atomic energy programs
to proceed? This question is never asked, but the
answer is, of course, economics. It is cheaper to pollute
than to take the necessary steps to prevent pollution.
Promoters of all technology realize this intuitively and
consciously. Hence, they press for the loosest possible
standards of pollution or, better yet, no restrictions at all.
And
the pressure of such promotional interests is
staggering. Generally, all they need to do is mention
the magic word "economics," and everyone falls into
line. If it is not economical to prevent radioactive
pollution, then assuredly we must allow the pollution
to occur unimpeded. That we may pay an enormous price
in the future through deterioration of our genes and
chromosomes and, thereby, cause fantastic human
misery and suffering, hardly enters this "economic"
picture. This is not because the proponents of atomic
(or other) technologies are hardhearted, evil individuals,
bent upon injury to humans. Far from it.
The
apparent insensitivity arises from our
widespread false definition of the term "economic."
We only include short-term considerations in our
economic calculations -- those concerned with
days, weeks, months, or a few years. More
ultimate costs to be borne by future society,
or future generations, are hard to anticipate
(they almost appear "theoretical") and they are
routinely avoided in economic
considerations. ( pp.58-60 )
Beyond the "economic" justification commonly given the authors
address the critically important issue of increasing the level
of background radiation exposure already occurring from natural
sources. Continuing:
Another
common, but unsatisfactory, answer is
given for why we would legally permit enough radiation
(and radioactivity contamination) to cause a 10
percent increase in mutation rate. We are already being
irradiated, they say, from natural sources (cosmic rays,
radioactivity of substances in the earth's crust, carbon
14 produced by cosmic rays) in an amount that can
also cause about 10 percent of the spontaneous mutation
rate. As this specious argument goes, "we can't
do much harm if we do to humans only the equal of
what nature is already doing." Fallacious as it is in
every respect, this argument seems credible to many
among the public, the medical, and the scientific
communities .
They
all fail to realize that natural radiation and
the genetic and chromosomal mutations caused thereby
are doing a great deal of harm. The genetic disorders
and deaths caused by natural radiations are no different
at all from those caused by man-made radiation. We saw in
Chapter II that all
these radiations act similarly and the injuries are no different
from one source of radiation than from another. All we can say is
that, at this moment, we know of no way to turn off the
various natural sources of radiation. We, therefore,
suffer an enormous toll of disease, debility and death
as a result of natural radiation. As a minimum element
of common sense, we should refrain, except under the
most dire circumstances, from adding to this enormous
burden of suffering by adding the injury of man-made
radiation. The benefits to society should be required to
be enormous and obviously so before permitting any
amount of increase in radiation mutations due to man-made
sources.
( pp.60-61 )
Chapter 11, "Must We
Hold Out For The "Cold Corpses"?, speaks cogently to the conflict
of interest professionals in this field are affected by which
resulted in setting such harmful standards.
When
we, the authors of this book, finally awakened to
the unbelievable galaxy of errors represented
in this standard-setting, we exposed it publicly. We
were accused of making a direct, frontal attack on all
radiation standards. Indeed, we are making a direct,
frontal attack. And proudly. This account will, we
hope, convince the public how long overdue such a
massive, direct attack is!
Unfortunately,
any criticism of erroneous public
health practices is likely to be misinterpreted as an attack
upon the motives of the men involved. We intend
no such implications, nor even consider it in questioning
their standard-setting procedures. These men are,
after all, human. All of us learn through our errors,
and few indeed have escaped serious errors of judgment
in one or another aspect of their lives. But is it not
tragic and inexcusable to persist in the errors of the
past? The defensiveness of those scientists involved is
leading directly to this tragedy. It appears certain that
it will take public pressure to introduce a rational note
into the radiation-nuclear energy scene.
We
cannot refrain from addressing the issue of
conflict-of-interest. And we do this not to impugn motives.
Public officials are routinely required to divest
themselves of holdings that might represent, or be considered
to represent, a conflict with execution of their
public duties. Yet, most of the scientists who serve on
the various radiation standard-setting committees are
directly or indirectly in the employ of the nuclear industry
or the atomic energy government bureaucracy.
Some are recipients of major university research grants
from these same agencies.
The
conflict of interest may be subconscious, but it
is inescapable. Men can hardly be expected to consider
civic responsibility exclusively, when they cannot be
unaware that certain of their actions may well result
in drying up sources of support for their research or for
their salaries. This is a hopeless situation from which
to extract objective performance. It is the very reason
for our rather strict codes in such potential
conflict-of-interest situations for public servants.
Recently
one of us was lecturing in a university
classroom concerning the leukemia and cancer hazard
from ionizing radiation. A fellow professor attending
the lecture asked, "If the Atomic Energy Commission
pays to support your research, why do you criticize
radiation as a hazard?" The deep implications of this
question, undoubtedly asked in great innocence, must
not be lost upon the public. If the source of research
funds is expected to buy silence concerning hazards of
major public concern, we are assuredly in very deep
trouble as a society.
Many
scientists would not ask this question so directly.
They would simply remain silent about public-health
hazards of technology if they sensed that speaking out
might cost them their jobs or their research
funds. Nor is it particularly hard to understand why.
The heavy hand of reprisal by vested interests, governmental
or private, is very widely
appreciated. ( pp.238-240 )
Whether we are conscious of it or not, we are all deeply
indebted to Doctors Gofman and Tamplin for the fact that they
did not emulate the behavior of their peers and remain
silent about the magnitude of the public-health hazards posed
by the development of commercial nuclear power plants. Indeed,
at the start
of Chapter 11 they presented their predictions for increases in
the incidence of Cancer Plus Leukemia and Genetic Diseases based
upon the allowable exposure standard in 1971 of 0.17 rad per
year: "32,000 extra cancer plus leukemia deaths every year", and,
for the-then 200-million people living in the U.S., "100,000 to
1,000,000 extra deaths per year from various genetic diseases,
particularly heart attacks."
Using the hypothetical example of the development of a "new `wondrous'
technology with a by-product poison" called "Q" a scenario is
played out demonstrating how standards would be set based on the
interests of the promoters of this new technology. Not on
the interests of public health considerations, in the present and
the future. One of the primary responses the AEC fell back on then
(as its descendant, the DOE, does today), when challenged about the
danger caused by exposure to man-made radiation, is that "no effect
[was] observed". This situation is examined with great insight
and common sense in "No
Effect Observed" and The
Careful Studies Required to Observe Effects from
Chapter 4,
"Is Any Radiation `Safe'?"
Over
and over again the public is treated to "no effect
observed" pronouncements by AEC officials, such as
Commissioner Thompson and Commissioner Larson, when it is
quite clear that no meaningful study was ever made. No
such studies exist.
On
the other hand, Dr. Alice Stewart (Lancet,
June 6, 1970) has produced solid evidence that
250-350 millirads delivered to embryos (1 x-ray film)
during gestation produces about a 25% increase in the
subsequent occurrence of childhood cancers and
leukemias. Faced with such evidence we wonder very
seriously whether AEC Commissioners would really
continue to make the deceptive, irresponsible
statements concerning "no effect observed."
We
have pointed out the treacherous nature of the
statement "no effect observed" used by atomic energy
proponents to justify allowing population exposure to
radiation. Were this an isolated example, now past,
we could realize this and forget it. But what about
tomorrow?... ( p.93 )
We
have been discussing here a massive effect that
can only be considered a bludgeoning of the human
species. And even so, it is apparent that an inadequate
study can lead, easily, to the ridiculous assertion, "no
effect observed."
Atomic
energy development must, unfortunately,
be regarded as one of the worst examples of
irresponsibility of this sort.
The
important purpose of demonstrating the rash
unsoundness of "expert" pronouncements in the past
is to alert the public to such errors so that they will
insist on a vastly improved performance in public
matters in the future, for radioactivity and other serious
pollutants.
In
recent testimony before the Congress (Joint
Committee on Atomic Energy Hearings) Dr. Paul
Tompkins, Executive Director of the Federal Radiation
Council, described, with apparent pride, the history of
so-called "Radiation Protection Standards." (A more
apt description might be the history of "Radiation
Disaster Standards.") Dr. Tompkins related that in
1954 the National Committee on Radiation Protection,
a leading U.S. group of "experts" had issued the
following statement,
"We have a lower limit of continuous exposure to
radiation that is (unavoidably) tolerated by man.
There is, on the other hand, a much higher level of
exposure that is definitely known to be harmful.
Between these two extremes there is a level of exposure,
in the neighborhood of 0.1R per day, that experience
to date shows to be safe for the individual
concerned."[4]
Not
a shred of scientific evidence was produced to
support this statement, an astounding statement of
supposed reassurance. Now, let us consider, in the light of
our medical knowledge of radiation injury 16 short
years later, what the cost would have been for public
exposure to radiation at such supposedly "safe" levels.
The
NCRP was reassuring about 0.1 rad per day.
For estimations of cancer risk we customarily estimate
the dose for persons of about 30 years of age. At 0.1
rad per day, a person would accumulate 1095 rads by
30 years of age (since 36.5 rads would be accumulated
in one year at this rate, it would be 36.5 x 30, or 1095
rads in 30 years). Now, from extensive studies concerning
the cancer-producing and leukemia-producing
ability of ionizing radiation in humans, it appears that
approximately 50 rads of accumulated exposure will
add as many cancers plus leukemias as occur spontaneously
due to "natural" or "spontaneous" causes.
And such added cancers and leukemias will occur each
year for many years once the latency period is over.
By
simple arithmetic, 1095 divided by 50 equals
21, so we can expect twenty-one times the natural incidence
of cancer plus leukemia. TWENTY-ONE TIMES the natural,
spontaneous fatality rate from cancer plus leukemia
would have been the result of a dose pronounced
by a body of experts as being without physical
effects upon the person exposed.
No
disaster in man's health history could match this
one had people truly been exposed to this radiation
dose, stated to be safe by a standard-setting body, the
National Committee on Radiation Protection. It is
something of a stretch of public credulousness and
confidence to call for lasting faith in such
"standard-setters."
Earlier,
we spoke of the horrors of increasing
cancer plus leukemia to double the spontaneous
occurrence. The NCRP "safe" dose could have provoked a
catastrophe 21 times larger than that!
And
this is only the beginning of the incredible
fiasco of "standard-setting" for technology. Up to now,
we have considered only the cancer plus leukemia part
of the hazard. Everyone concerned about radiation
hazards to man knows that the genetic consequences
in future generations give every expectation of being
far more severe than the cancer plus leukemia risk in
the current generation of humans.
The
United Nations Scientific Committee on the
Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) has
indicated that it takes about 10 to 100 rads to double the
spontaneous rate of genetic mutations. Professor
Lederberg, the eminent geneticist, has recently estimated
approximately 50 rads to double the mutation rate. His
estimate is almost precisely in the center of the range
estimated by UNSCEAR, so we may explore the
consequences of this estimate. At the average reproductive
age of 30 years, a person receiving NCRP's "safe" 0.1
rad per day would have accumulated 1095 rads, we
saw above. So, if the genetic mutation rate is doubled
by 50 rads, it is increased 21 times by 1095 rads. So
the NCRP "safe" dose of 0.1 rads per day would have
meant a 2100 percent increase in mutation rate.
Contrast this with Professor Lederberg's recent admonition
that society would be well advised not to add one
percent to the mutation rate. Contrast 2100 percent with
one percent!!!
It
is only by a quirk of fate and timing that society
escaped acceptance of the National Committee on
Radiation Protection's recommendation, and its
results. The nuclear electric industry and other atomic
energy programs just weren't ready, technologically,
for widespread expansion in 1954.
In our society one can see how the depth of intellectual
imprisonment experienced by a populace increasingly
conditioned to defer to and feel dependent upon "expert
pronouncements", is reaching a zenith if it was only through
a "quirk of fate" that the catastrophe alluded to above
was averted. The analogy of reaching the apex of a journey
is a metaphor for our era. If such a mentality continues,
of blindly following a course set by "experts" whose interest
is to achieve specific economic goals for their industry,
sooner or later we will not be "saved" by such a similar
quirk of fate. Continuing:
In
the years shortly after 1954, scientists began to
wake up a little and realize the enormity of the error
represented by the pronouncement of the NCRP. It
was obvious that a massive reduction, in doses to be
allowed for humans, must be made immediately.
Biologists in the 1956-58 period, realizing the enormity
of their past error, had an opportunity to implement a
sound policy with respect to allowable radiation
dosage. But they did not do so.
A
sound policy of public health protection gave
way to the powerful imperative of "convenience" for
the promoters of technology. The scientists asked
themselves. instead. how low they could push the allowable
radiation dose to the public, without interfering with
the "orderly development of atomic energy." So they
issued suggested standards along the following lines:
- 5.0 rads per year for workers in atomic energy
- 0.5 rads per year for individuals in the
population-at-large
- 0.17 rads per year average for the
population-at-large.
What a come-down these numbers represent from 36
rads per year being "safe" or "without physical effect"!
Incredible
as it seems, scientists, in a few short
years, had to change a recommendation, downward,
between seven and 200 times. And what evidence did
these standard-setting scientists provide that the "new"
standards of allowable radiation would be safe? None
whatever. Absolutely none.
Obscurantism
gobbledygook has characterized all
efforts to set so-called "safe" or "allowable" standards
for industrial poisons, radioactive or other. In truth,
standard-setters know full well there is no evidence for
any safe amount of a poison such as radiation or
radioactivity.
We
are perfectly happy to consider errors of the past as
part of the learning process. But the "standard-setters"
are not satisfied to learn by errors; they defend
their errors of the past and try to justify their
unbelievable errors of the present.
For
example, the catastrophic statements of NCRP
in 1954 are explained this way: "We were not
recommending that people be exposed widely to 0.1 rad per
day." Thank heaven for this! But, of what earthly use
is a pronouncement by a standard-setting body, that
0.1 rad per day is without physical effect upon the
exposed person, other than as guidance for technologists
so they can plan their designs, including safety
features?
When
the nuclear electricity promoters are asked
about hazards due to irradiation at the "allowable"
doses of radiation, they go into speeches about the
"expert scientists" who set these "allowable" (inferring
safe) doses after careful deliberation. Indeed, the
electric-utility industry buys two-page advertisements in
national magazines to present precisely this justification
for safety of the "allowable" doses.
When
the evidence is presented to the "standard-setters"
that large numbers of cancers, leukemias, and genetic
disorders would accrue from population exposure at the
"allowable" dose, they answer, "We didn't mean for people
to ever reach those allowable doses."
Recently,
the charade has assumed even more
ridiculous proportions as the nuclear electricity salesmen
have attempted to defend their obviously indefensible
standards for human radiation exposure. An attempt at
justification, bizarre in the extreme, is now presented
for the 0.17 rads allowable for the population-at-large.
It is known that natural sources of radiation plus those
from medical uses of x-rays add up to approximately
0.17 rads per year. "Aha," say the proponents of
nuclear electricity and other nuclear energy programs,
"We shall allow the 'peaceful atom' to give an amount
additional that will just equal what people are already
getting from other sources." But why would anyone
think of doubling the harm already being produced by
the 0.17 rads from natural plus medical radiation?
From all that has already been discussed, we know that
natural and medical radiation produce cancer and
genetic harm, in direct proportion to the dose received,
down to the lowest doses.
No
amount of ionizing radiation is safe! ( pp.99-105 )
Poisoned Power provides an extremely valuable record of
the history, based upon the author's own professional experiences
and research, of precisely how the situation developed where
standards were set for "permissible" doses of radiation exposure
for humans that were in no way safe. Such understanding is critical
to enable one to pierce the mind-fog rampant today, when the past
is reduced to fairy tale concoctions masking the lethal errors in
judgement made by our fallible human brothers of yesteryear.
Given the emphasis one is exposed to with media coverage of
current events relating to nuclear technology, such a
record is especially important as it explains what is never
acknowledged in the incoherent state of affairs we are expected to
simply "swallow" and accept as "rational" and "coherent." i am
referring here to the importance of accountability for decisions
made which affected not only people at that time, but, in the
case of nuclear power, which will affect all life on earth for
untold millenia; and the decisions made today that uphold
and perpetuate this living state of
koyaanisqatsi.
Holding people accountable for their "time on watch" is
something we see occur almost not at all now. Each of us has the
means within ourselves, by exercising our remarkably versatile
and magnificently creative powers of response ability, to reverse
this impasse in "the affairs of men".
Atomic
technology was pushed hard by two governmental
agencies, AEC and the Joint Committee on
Atomic Energy. Accredited biological experts were
assembled, in one committee or another, to consider
radiation and radioactivity and decide how much people
could be exposed to. Obviously, the pressure was
on. These expert bodies must burden the atomic technology
with the fewest possible restrictions.
Did
these experts tell the technologists, "The burden
of proof of safety is upon you?" Did they say,
"We refuse to allow you to expose anyone to man-made
radiation because we don't know how much physical
damage it will cause?" They did not.
Instead,
they pulled some numbers out of a hat and
declared that the numbers represent "acceptable"
standards for human radiation tolerances. And the
atomic technology proceeded under the blanket of
respectability of these "allowable" doses.
By
now it is obvious, since these "acceptable" doses
have had to be lowered 100-fold in the past two
decades, that something certainly was wrong
with the original standards. Perhaps the experts did
know that people wouldn't drop dead immediately from
the "acceptable" doses they set at first. But for such
late effects as leukemia, cancer and genetic diseases,
the "experts" could hardly have been further off-base
than they were.
If
there had been no information available to the
"experts" about the potential danger of cancer and
genetic injury in humans, it might be argued that the
men who set the standards had no way of knowing such
radiation effects were possible. But the knowledge was
available! These scientists knew that radiation causes
cancer and genetic damage. And still, they set totally
unacceptable standards! It is impossible to believe anything
but that the agencies responded to pressure from
the atomic technology promoters for "standards we
can live with." The technologists were presented with a
set of numbers for human exposure that presumably
wouldn't make the promoters too unhappy, while those
who set them probably prayed the disaster to the human
species wouldn't be too severe.
The
essence of this prayer comes through in the
very forthright statement of ignorance made by the
International Commission on Radiological Protection:
(83)
Because of the need for guidance in this regard,
the Commission in its 1958 Recommendations
suggested a provisional limit of 5 rems per generation
for the genetic dose to the whole population, from all
sources additional to natural background radiation
and to medical exposures. The Commission believes
that this level provides reasonable latitude for the
expansion of atomic energy programs in the foreseeable
future. It should be emphasized that the limit
may not in fact represent a proper balance between
possible harm and probable benefit, because of the
uncertainty in assessing the risks and the benefits that
would justify the
exposure.[1]
It
is very important to note that the International
Commission says "this level provides reasonable latitude
for the expansion of atomic energy programs in
the foreseeable future." Is the concern for health, or
for the technology? The Commission goes on to admit
uncertainty both with respect to risks and benefits. It
is almost unbelievable that an official standard recommending
body would suggest allowing such exposure
in the face of an overt admission of its own ignorance
concerning hazards. But this is the record of such
bodies, over and over again. The public must realize
the implications.
If
the errors in the earliest days of atomic technology
are to be excused on the basis of ignorance or
on the basis of a simple lack of awareness concerning
sound public health principles, how shall we excuse the
fact that rationality has not entered the picture to this
date. ( Chapter 11,
"Must We Hold Out For The `Cold Corpses'?," pp.233-5 )
Despite the fact that in our world today the unthinkable
prospects of almost 30 years ago are playing themselves
out with increasing rapidity, it still is truly
horrifying to the extreme that twenty-seven years after
the last sentence above was written, rationality has still
not altered the course of "The
Nuclear Juggernaut" as laid out in the book's
Introduction. It is true that the course Congress, the
nuclear manufacturing industry, and the electric utility
industry were pursuing in the 1960s -- that anticipated
multiple nuclear power plants operating at the periphery of
every major metropolitan area long before the end of the
century -- were halted, in good measure from the
solid warnings of Gofman and Tamplin.
But, at the very end of this century, the intent of the
international nuclear power lobby has not changed. See
just a few of the examples of the ongoing obdurate campaign to
promote this inappropriate and unnecessary technology --
with complete irrational disregard for all the studies of
carcinogenic and genetic damage caused by exposure to the
lowest levels of man-made ionizing radiation :
The promotional ad mentioned at the beginning in the November
Atlantic was produced by the NEI. Their slogan is
missing a few words. In the interest of accuracy it should
read, "Nuclear, More Unnecessary Suffering, Disease, and Death Than
You Ever Imagined". The text portions of the advertisement
follow:
Nuclear power plants provide
electricity 24 hours a day and perform
at world-class levels.
|
With production costs second only to
coal-fired plants, nuclear power is an efficient
way to generate large amounts of electricity.
|
RELIABLE
E L E C T R I C I T Y
|
PROVEN
E C O N O M I C A L
|
It's all in a day's work for nuclear energy.
Nuclear power plants safely and economically generate
the electricity we need for our homes and industry.
Nuclear energy provides 20 percent of America's electricity,
enabling us to maintain our high standard of living.
Nuclear plants are also the largest energy source that
produces no greenhouse gas emissions, so they help
protect the environment.
|
C O N S I S T E N T L Y
SAFE
|
E N V I R O N M E N T A L L Y
CLEAN
|
No major U.S. industry
has a better safety record than the
nuclear power industry.
|
Nuclear power plants don't
burn anything to produce electricity,
so they don't pollute the air.
|
Make no mistake: as with such equivalently lucrative
and out-of-control industries like BioTech, the
financial stakes are ENORMOUS. Web
sites like CORE
and NEI provide
ample evidence of the amount of money involved in this
industry. But all such venues that present their the endless
reports and studies concerning the "facts" about "safety"
are riddled with the fundamental falsehood that "There exists
some `safe' level of exposure to radiation, below which
one does not increase one's chance of contracting cancer, or
damaging the chromosomes in one's eggs or sperm that will be
passed on to one's children." --And this, going on thirty
years after the following was already known :
It
came as a great shock to us, in the course of our
study of radiation hazards to man, that nuclear electricity
generation has been developed under the false
illusion that there exists some safe amount of radiation.
This unsupportable concept is surely one of the gravest
condemnations of nuclear electricity generation. Obviously
any engineering development proceeding under
an illusion of a wide margin of safety is fraught with
serious danger.
What
is more, the false illusion of a safe amount of
radiation has pervaded all the highest circles concerned
with the development and promotion of nuclear electric
power. The Congress, the nuclear manufacturing industry,
and the electric utility industry have all been led
to believe that some safe amount of radiation does
indeed exist. They were hoping to develop this industry
with exposures below this limit -- a limit we now know
is anything but safe. ( Chapter 4, "Is Any
Radiation Safe?", p.75 )
And of course, if one scans through the masses of experts
dished up to "speak with knowledge and authority" (see
NEI: Press Room:
Guide to Nuclear Energy Experts) one will be left reeling
with the impressive array of M.D. and Ph.D. -credentialed
specialists ready to sing the praises and value of increasing
the world-wide commerce in enriched uranium and plutonium to
heretofore unimagined heights.
Here we see all too clearly where very little has
changed in the last 27 years. However there is one arena
that can be brought into an even sharper focus than when the
following words were written in 1971 -- the culpability of
people who claim this technology is "safe" and "clean" fall
into one of two possible categories :
There
are two possible ways to describe the motives of the
promoters of nuclear power, yet either way makes them
indictable for crimes against humanity.
First,
let us assume that they really are ignorant about
existing knowledge of the effects of "low" doses of
radiation when they say, "We don't really know yet about
the effects of `low' doses of radiation." In that case,
these promoters of nuclear power are saying in effect,
"Expose people first; learn the effects later." There is
only one description for such planned mass experimentation
on humans -- moral depravity. And such experimentation with
"low" doses of radiation can produce irreversible effects
not only on this generation, but upon countless future
generations of humans who have no voice, no choice. If that
is not a crime against humanity, what is?
Alternatively,
let us assume that they truly do know the
facts about fatal injury from "low" doses of radiation, and
yet they are still willing to promote nuclear power. In
this case, the charge is not experimentation upon humans,
but rather it is planned, random murder. The crime of
murder is perhaps worse than the crime of
experimentation. ( 1979 Foreward,
pp.X-XI )
Professionals in the nuclear industry, such as engineers,
medical doctors, and biological and physical scientists, are
caught in a powerful conflict of interest vise endemic in a
society such as ours where multi-billion dollar industries
and academia meet. Historically, this is the pool from which
the "experts" have been drawn that have created the
"permissible" global standards for public exposure to
man-made sources of radiation.
It is irrational to expect such people will be able to
conduct truly disinterested, unbiased studies after
considering all the evidence, while simultaneously
placing the interests of public health above all other
considerations during such deliberations. And yet that is
exactly how this industry has "grown up" and "come of age".
Chapter 12,
"Toward An Adversary System Of Scientific Inquiry," provides
exceedingly perceptive analyses of the conflict of interest
issue inherent in large-scale technologies as well as
describing ways in which a broad segment of society can
participate in making sound decisions concerning
exposure to poisons such as radioactivity.
The
public has every reason to ask why the nuclear
electricity industry developed this far before there was
a widespread appreciation of the hazards. Why, the
public wants to know, was it not warned much earlier
that the Insurance Industry has no confidence in nuclear
electricity generation? How did it escape public
notice that nuclear electricity plants represent a gigantic
experiment being conducted at the peril of life and
property of citizens of the U.S.? How does it happen
that "standards" for radioactivity exposure (both for
routine operations and in the event of accidents) are
such as to lead to the expectation of massive injury in
the form of cancer, leukemia, and genetic diseases?
The
answers lie in the very nature of large-scale
technology. One of its major characteristics is the careful
exclusion of the public from all the considerations
and decisions. Technologies, such as nuclear electricity
generation, espouse the principle that, "In such complex
problems we must put all of our faith in the
experts." The experts, for several
obvious reasons, will surely bring society to its doom,
unless certain corrective measures are urgently introduced.
We shall consider such corrective measures in two areas:
- the need for extensive public participation,
- the need for adversary assessment of technology.
Technologies
such as nuclear electricity generation
are highly financed enterprises, usually involving hundreds
of millions, or even billions, of dollars. Biological
scientists, physical scientists, and engineers are necessarily
attracted to such technologies, because the research and
development job opportunities are excellent.
The
"experts" ultimately chosen to participate in decisions
concerning safety, or lack of it, come from these
same groups. They decide on "standards" for exposure
of the public to such by-product poisons as radioactivity.
It
is axiomatic: scientists chosen in this way are not
likely to make decisions that embarrass their technology.
And adverse decisions concerning its hazards
can compromise the technology. A "standard-setting"
decision that can make the technology itself appear
economically unattractive might wipe out a scientist's
financial support. Consciously and subconsciously, the
scientist has a strong motivation to make the technology
look good. The result, in general, is that the
public bears the burden of any hazards, actual or
potential.
Such
scientists and engineers are not evil in their
intentions. However, they are often so thoroughly
compromised in outlook that their search for hazards can
best be characterized by minimum, sincere diligence.
At every step in their deliberations, where they must
choose, the choice is that which minimizes the hazard
estimate. Precisely the opposite choice should be the
case if public health and safety were truly of paramount
concern.
One
product of such scientific deliberations is the
concept of an "allowable," or "tolerable," or "permissible"
dose of a poison such as radioactivity. Never has
anyone proved that any dose of radioactive poison is
safe. Yet bodies of scientific "experts" are duly appointed
to "standard-setting" boards or committees. Under
the auspicious title of "Radiation Protection," such
committees proceed to ordain how much radioactive
poison the public must accept in order to allow for
"the orderly development of the technology (atomic
or other)."
In
the course of their deliberations these committees
repeatedly recite the benefits of the new technology
and state that society can ill-afford to forego them.
Next they estimate the hazards, with all uncertainties
weighted for the technology, not the public health,
stating all the time that they are proceeding cautiously
and conservatively.
As
an early constructive step, the public could insist
upon the abolition of all "standard-setting" bodies.
Major decisions concerning exposure of the public to
poisons such as radioactivity or other poisonous
technological by-products belong in the public forum.
Such decisions, often dealing with effects upon the heredity
of the human species, are what we choose to call decisions
for all men for all time. A very broad representation of
society as a whole must assume active participation
in such decisions.
How
could such a broad segment of society make
sound decisions concerning exposure to a poison such
as radioactivity? There are several prerequisites:
- Abolition of "experts" or "standard-setters" as
decision makers
- Honest presentations of the hazards of by-product
poisons.
- Honest presentations of the benefits of proposed
technologies, including serious consideration of
alternative methods of achieving the benefits.
- Open-forum debate, followed by decision either
by public vote or vote of public representatives.
- Preservation of the option to reverse decisions.
New information concerning hazards and benefits
must always be anticipated Society must preserve
the option to change its choice of technologies
in the light of new evidence.
- Recognition of the principle that the appropriate
permissible dose of a man-made poison is zero.
Deviations from zero allowable pollution must be
allowed only by public decision to be polluted in
exchange for some benefit it chooses to receive.
- Recognition that the burden of proof is upon the
technology to prove safety, rather than for the
public to prove hazard.
Clearly,
the major inputs are (2) and (3), the
honest presentations of hazards and benefits. It is to be
expected that enthusiastic supporters of the technology
will be abundant, simply because dollars are associated
with the technology. These proponents will describe
the benefits glowingly; they will discover the
hazards to be minimal or zero. Further, they will find
alternatives to their technology to be non-existent or
hopelessly difficult.
This
all describes the nuclear electricity industry
perfectly. It is what we can expect for just about any
hazardous technology. And this can hardly be described
as the kind of balanced presentation required
for open-forum decision-making by the public or its
representatives.
The
obvious requirement is an assessment of benefits
and hazards by competent scientists and engineers
who do NOT derive their income and support from the
technological entrepreneurs, private or governmental.
What is needed, therefore, is an adversary system of
technology evaluation. Such adversaries must provide
the information the technological proponents might fail
to provide. The public may be surprised to realize that
this essential adversary evaluation of technology is
totally lacking in our society. ( p.249-254 )
Along with the biological considerations, Poisoned Power
examines the technical engineering side of the coin. The
complement to the biologically question, "Is Any Radiation Safe?"
( Chapter 4 )
is the engineering question, "How Safe Are Nuclear Reactors?"
( Chapter 6 ).
Despite the appearance that everyone professionally trained
for and employed by the nuclear industry is convinced of the
infallibility of the design and implementation of power plant
fail-safe systems, there are those who do not see it this way :
How
safe are nuclear reactors? Let us quote from
consulting engineer, Adolph Ackerman:
As
an independent consulting engineer I have
been active for many years in alerting the engineering
profession to its overriding responsibilities in design
and construction of safe atomic power plants. The
simple fact is that none of the atomic power plants
currently in operation or under construction have been
designed with the traditional concepts of engineering
responsibility and ethical commitment for maximum
public safety.[5]
Mr.
Ackerman spelled out his reasons for this
statement quite clearly in a recent article. Professor Robert
L. Whitelaw, of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and
formerly Project Engineer for the design and
construction of the power plant for the nuclear ship, N. S.
Savannah, commented on this paper by Ackerman in
the IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic
Systems (vol. AES-5, no. 3, May 1969):
I
wish to endorse fully the principal argument
advanced by A. J. Ackerman in his paper and,
perhaps, strengthen the impact of his paper with this
brief discussion.
His
principal argument has been confirmed by my
own experience of the past fifteen years on nuclear
projects and problems of various kinds This
experience included preparing proposals and nuclear hazards
evaluations in a variety of nuclear power plants, both
commercial and military.
It
has been my observation that, despite the enormous
amount of meticulous detail which the ACRS
regularly requires on every projected power plant to
satisfy itself that there is no "credible accident" that
can threaten the public (or even the operators) -- and
despite the volumes of paper and hours of presentations
consumed on this topic, and no doubt well-intentioned --
there is still by common consent an unwritten agreement
to treat as "incredible" the most fearful of all nuclear
accidents that can occur in any plant with a highly
pressurized primary system Such
an accident is, of course, the explosive rupture of the
primary vessel itself, which is ruled out of the list of
credible accidents for the simple reason that there is
no adequate answer short of putting the plant underground
or inside a mountain, as Ackerman has
pointed out.
Dr.
Edward Teller, often called the father of the
hydrogen bomb and one of the most outstanding supporters
of the AEC, has stated:
A
single major mishap in a nuclear reactor could
cause extreme damage, not because of the explosive
force, but because of the radioactive contamination.
. . . So far, we have been extremely lucky . . . But
with the spread of industrialization, with the greater
number of simians monkeying around with things they
do not completely understand, sooner or later a fool
will prove greater than the proof even in a foolproof
system.[6]
On
September 10, 1970, in Livermore, California,
Dr. Teller told the Livermore Chapter of the Society of
Professional Engineers that reactors were safe, but they
should be put underground. ( Chapter 6, p.143-5 )
Most people aren't aware of the most telling indicator of
all for just how "safe" nuclear power plants are. The
Price-Anderson Act, passed by Congress in 1957 and continually
renewed from then to now, absolves the electric utility industry
of all risks beyond the maximum liability for a single nuclear
plant disaster of 560 million dollars.
The
key point, over and above the lack of confidence
of the insurance industry in nuclear electricity
plants, is the utter disregard of personal rights the
Price-Anderson Act represents for the average citizen.
Since the maximum coverage is 560 million dollars per
nuclear electricity accident, and since the damage can
run to 7 billion dollars, in a serious accident, the individual
might recover only 7 cents out of every dollar
lost, assuming he is lucky enough to emerge from such
an accident with his life.
The
insurance industry will not suffer. The electric
utility industry will not suffer. Through the generous
manipulations of the U.S. Congress (prodded by the
Joint Committee), only the citizen will suffer -- in the
name of progress.
If
the Price-Anderson Act were repealed, as assuredly
it should be, it is extremely doubtful that any
future nuclear electricity generating plants would be
built above ground. Indeed, it is extremely doubtful
that any electric utility company would be so foolhardy
as to continue operation of nuclear electricity plants
already built.
Electric
utility propagandists, and atomic energy
entrepreneurs, state that the extreme skepticism of the
insurance industry shouldn't put anyone off. The insurance
industry, they tell us, refuses to underwrite the
risk simply because there is no prior "experience" upon
which to base an estimate of the risk of major nuclear
power plant accidents. Precisely.
But
there is much more to it than this simple truth.
The industry is saying, in a most persuasive manner,
that they (the insurance industry) have no confidence
whatever in the hopeful, optimistic safety calculations
of nuclear electricity propagandists, certainly not
enough confidence to risk dollars. ( p.161-2 )
This bizarre, unbelievable state of affairs is explained and
analyzed in great detail throughout
Chapter 7,
"Nuclear Electricity and The Citizen's Rights", and in the
section from
Appendix I
entitled, "Price-Anderson
Act--Insurance Against Personal and Property Damage from
Nuclear Accident".
What was -- and even after the likes of Three Mile Island and
Chernobyl continues -- being vouched-for by the nuclear
industry is nothing short of perfect containment of all
"hazardous" radioactive poisons ensuring they never escape
into the biosphere. (Of course, promoters of nuclear power
attach a very different meaning to the word "hazardous",
given that they steadfastly ignore the evidence that even
the lowest levels of ionizing radiation cause cancer,
leukemias, and genetic damage to chromosomes in the nucleus
of living cells.)
Picking up from where we left off
at the end of the first book excerpt
with the following enumeration in
Chapter 5,
"Promises, Promises" :
Those
events which must go absolutely perfectly
at every step along the complicated route just described
are these:
At the reactor itself, bearing enormous quantities
of radioactive poisons, no accidents which
can distribute such poisons to the atmosphere,
land or water can be tolerated.
Every two years, the fuel carrying this burden
of poison should be transported without mishap
by rail and truck to the fuel-cleaning plants. Any
significant accidental release in this phase of the
operation can render sizeable areas of our nation
uninhabitable for many years.
At the fuel reprocessing plant absolutely perfect
containment must be assured, year in, year out.
The waste radioactivities, dangerous for hundreds
of years, must be transported to a final
resting place. And this waste must be guarded
from any escape into the environment for periods
longer than the recorded history of any government.
At no step (reactor, transport, fuel reprocessing,
transport, waste burial) can sabotage of the
operation conceivably occur without disastrous
consequences for human beings. Yet there will be
hundreds of plants and transportation vehicles
that must be protected against such sabotage perfectly.
Senseless, indiscriminate bombings and
arson are hardly an unknown occurrence in the
United States today.
We
shall return, later, to the issue of a major
accident at the reactor itself, and we shall see that
no one has the vaguest notion of the risk of an accident
there. And we are planning for hundreds of such
reactors! Human perfection is required at all these
many steps in the entire cycle of events -- and required
constantly for hundreds of years. No government has
ever undertaken such massive responsibility in the
history of mankind.
When
one considers the fantastic requirements --
perfect safety, perfect engineering, perfect reliability,
perfect loyalty -- for every aspect of such a massive
nationwide program to avert disaster, one wonders
how the American people can be deceived into
accepting such a solution to our power-shortage problems.
Obviously, they have no way of knowing any
better. They are constantly assured by spokesmen of
the AEC and the power companies that nuclear energy
is "clean" and "safe." ( p.113-4 )
As evidenced in the NEI ad, the
"clean"-and-"safe" mantra continues to be employed to assure
people everything's "O.K." with this undertaking, started
-- and still very much championed -- by the U.S. government.
"No government has ever undertaken such massive
responsibility in the history of mankind." What is the
reason such responsibility is being assumed? All is justified
in the name of increased electric power consumption.
People are certainly much more aware about issues involving power
consumption and energy conservation than in 1971. The following
passage from Chapter 9,
"Alternatives Available to Us", lucidly directs our attention
to the actual source of the ceaseless claims that more power
is needed :
We
must start with the fundamental question:
"Why more power?" It is a question that has been
publicly discussed only very recently. The flat, unqualified
assertion that ". . . power needs are doubling every
eight years" is not sufficient. Unqualified acceptance of
this statement would be tantamount to endorsing the
notion that electrical power consumption is a desirable
end in itself.
Today,
when environmental questions are
paramount, we must question the basis for all intrusions on
the environment. We do not know that more power is
needed. The population of the United States grows by
about one percent per year. It does not necessarily
follow that a population increase of one percent per
year demands an increased power consumption of
about ten percent a year.
It
is by no means certain that power asked for is
equivalent to power needed. How is the power to be
used? The advertisements by our utility friends stress
the use of power for lighting hospital operating rooms,
running audio-visual aid equipment in our schools,
making possible stereo recordings of Brahms and
Beethoven, and a host of other culturally interesting things.
It is highly unlikely that these uses account for a
significant fraction of the present or projected power use.
Look closely, and it becomes readily apparent, for
example, that the Pacific Northwest probably wants its
added power to operate aluminum smelters in order to
meet the growing need for beer cans and TV dinner
trays.
That
these factors are recognized, at the very
highest levels of government, is evidenced by these excerpts
from the keynote address at the American Power
Conference in Chicago, given April 21, 1970, by Carl E.
Bagge, Vice Chairman of the Federal Power Commission:
Does
it seem possible that it was but six years ago,
in November 1964, that the Federal Power
Commission, in cooperation with all the segments of this
industry, published the first National Power Survey?
This comprehensive nationwide survey was
undertaken in order to define and articulate the long range
goals of the industry. Some of the finest talent in
government and industry studied the past performance
of this highly fragmented industry; and as they
observed the developing trends in generation and
transmission; and as they projected the future supply and
demand for electricity, there emerged a concept -- a
vision, if you will, which was translated into
presumably attainable objectives -- which were
characterized as "guidelines for growth." . . .
Looking
back only the few years since its
publication, one is struck by what in retrospect was an
inexplicable lack of humility on the part of the
architects of the National Power Survey. Certainty must
have existed even then in the thinking of the utility
industry and its regulators. The questioning of the
limitations of technology, its direction, and even its
values, which was then being focused on other sectors
of our society, apparently had not extended to the
electric power industry. And if it was, we must have
believed that the utility industry would remain
immune from these forces.
How
did this happen? How could we all have been
so positive -- so blindly certain -- that the only challenge
-- the only goal -- was the one which we conceived
-- that of continually reducing costs in order to usher
in the era of unlimited power -- the era of the gigawatt
-- the electric energy economy -- under what we
characterized as "guidelines for growth." I submit that it
was engendered by a monstrous sense of intellectual
and technological arrogance which ignored not only
the limitations of technology but even more
importantly, the limitation of the vision of its high priests.
The arrogance of our high priests is spread across the
pages of our technical journals and in the National
Power Survey as an irrevocable indictment of our own
myopia. Today we stand convicted by our own
testimony. ( pp.190-2 )
Such words are a deeply refreshing antidote to the incessant
barrage promoting an infinitely increasing cultural ethic of
consumption that can never say "Stop!", much less "Reverse!",
but only repeats, "more", "more", "more". . . The story of
nuclear power is a story founded upon "a monstrous sense of
intellectual and technological arrogance which ignored not
only the limitations of technology but even more importantly,
the limitation of the vision of its high priests."
The fact that there are eminently safer, cleaner, sustainable
alternative energy sources "should" be enabling our single human
family to choose life and move away from the course towards oblivion
we are stubbornly pursuing by continuing to pretend we can safely
contain the mountains of radioactive poisons continuing to be
generated by existent nuclear power plants.
What is never acknowledged by nuclear industry proponents is
the truly central role energy efficiency should be
playing in our culture. This is discussed in
Power Sources for the Future
and Energy Efficiency:
Our Largest Energy Supply
( Chapter 9 ),
Chapter 13,
"The Ultimate Issue -- Conversion or Ecocide", and
Appendix VI,
"Nuclear Power and Alternatives." As pointed out in the
1979 Foreward :
"But we need the power . . ."
Lastly,
we must deal with the economic blackmail being used
to bludgeon Americans into accepting nuclear power. "It is
either nuclear power, or starving in the dark," say the
promoters of nuclear power. They lie like carpets.
We
can say, with great assurance, that nuclear power
itself is the greatest threat to our energy supply, to
the health of our economy, and to employment for our
people. If we stopped pouring funds down the rathole of
nuclear power, the money would be available to stimulate
bigger and cheaper sources of clean energy which are benign
and which would be a real boon to our economy. We now have
the equivalent of 50 giant nukes which are operable
(sometimes) in this country. This book tells you about two
simple, proven resources of additional energy, ready to
"go" quickly, which would be equivalent to over 600 giant
nukes (See page 206.) ( p.XIV )
And as is described in Point number 16 of
Appendix VI :
Is the government investing equally in all the alternatives?
Unfortunately,
for years we've been putting about 83 percent
of the federal energy-research dollar into radioactive power
plants, and almost nothing for the other possibilities.
Last year, the government spent approximately
|
$255,000,000
|
on developing radioactive nuclear power plants.
|
|
$30,000,000
|
on developing fusion power.
|
|
$300,000
|
on developing MHD generators.
|
|
zero
|
on developing geothermal technology.
|
|
zero
|
on developing solar energy.
|
In
other words, we spent less on developing
non-radioactive sources of power than we spent on two 747
airliners.
In
fact, when we take inflation into account, the effort
in fusion will decrease again this year under the AEC's
plans. The AEC is in charge of both fusion and fission
(radioactive power plants). ( pp.335-6 )
In the past, short 50+ years, the reckless and irresponsible
development of nuclear power and weapons has created a biological
and genetic burden of an heretofore unimaginable magnitude upon
the next 500,000 years of all life exploring itself here on this
planet. This situation is anomalous to anything humans have
created up to now by the reckoning of western civilization's
recorded history.
In the face of continued promotion of this thoroughly discredited
and unnecessary technology to produce electricity via nuclear
fission, all of us who understand the supreme gravity of the
situation must continually keep the essential questions in mind
and continue raising these questions to offset the hypnotic
effects of the massive PR efforts mounted by the nuclear industry
to greenwash it's ultimately deadly legacy and lethal future (if
left to promulgate it's own agendas).
Summary: The Important Questions
There
has been much press and TV coverage devoted to the
technical aspects of the Three Mile Island accident, but
very little to its moral aspects. Yet the really important
questions about nuclear power are ethical:
- The use of lies and deception by the nuclear industry
in order to manipulate public opinion, and in order to
use people, even kill people, for the benefit of
that industry.
- The experimentation on people without their knowledge
or consent.
- The acceptance of random murder and denial of the
inalienable right to life as the cost of "progress."
- The genetic degradation of the human species, vs. our
minimum responsibility to protect our species' genes from
injury.
- The need to hold bureaucrats and industry employees
personally accountable and responsible for implementing
hazardous and even murderous policies, even if such
policies are advocated by Congress and the President.
Yes,
Poisoned Power
is a sad story about the absence
of ethics and morals in men. But it is not too late to jolt
society into realization of what is going on, and what is
in the future if humans do not improve in the very basic
and minimum principles of morality. Either we improve, or
the future is dismal indeed. We hope that Poisoned
Power upsets you enough to make you work toward such
improvement. ( 1979 Foreward,
pp.XXII-XXIII )
If we are to fulfill our obligation to the whole future of all
life on earth we must acknowledge the incoherent fantasy that
producing nuclear energy is "safe", "clean", "proven", and
"reliable". At the same time we must redirect all our
collective financial and psychic resources into completing
development and maturation of truly non-polluting energies
like photovoltaic, wind, and fusion. In concert with this we
must get on with truly facing and addressing the enormous
burden of pollution already created by the nuclear fuel cycle
industries.