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Radiation
The different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum have very different effects upon interaction with matter. Starting with low frequency radio waves, the human body is quite transparent. (You can listen to your portable radio inside your home since the waves pass freely through the walls of your house and even through the person beside you!) As you move upward through microwaves and infrared to visible light, you absorb more and more strongly. In the lower ultraviolet range, all the UV from the sun is absorbed in a thin outer layer of your skin. As you move further up into the x-ray region of the spectrum, you become transparent again, because most of the mechanisms for absorption are gone. You then absorb only a small fraction of the radiation, but that absorption involves the more violent ionization events. Each portion of the electromagnetic spectrum has quantum energies appropriate for the excitation of certain types of physical processes. The energy levels for all physical processes at the atomic and molecular levels are quantized, and if there are no available quantized energy levels with spacings which match the quantum energy of the incident radiation, then the material will be transparent to that radiation, and it will pass through.
Ionization is the ejection of one or more electrons from an atom or molecule to produce a fragment with a net positive charge (positive ion). The classification of radiation as "ionizing" is essentially a statement that it has enough quantum energy to eject an electron. This is a crucial distinction, since "ionizing radiation" can produce a number of physiological effects, such as those associated with risk of mutation or cancer, which non-ionizing radiation cannot directly produce at any intensity.
Although the precise ionization energy differs with the atom or molecule involved, a general statement is any radiation with quantum energy above a few electron volts is considered to be ionizing radiation. The threshold for ionization lies somewhere in the ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum, so all x-rays and gamma-rays are ionizing radiation. All forms of nuclear radiation are also ionizing radiation because of their extremely high energies.
The unit used to measure radiation dosage is the rem, which stands for roentgen equivalent in man. It represents the amount of radiation needed to produce a particular amount of damage to living tissue. The total dose of rems determines how much harm a person suffers. At Hiroshima and Nagasaki, people received a dose of rems at the instant of the explosions, then more from the surroundings and, in limited areas, from fallout. Fallout is composed of radioactive particles that are carried into the upper atmosphere by a nuclear explosion and that eventually fall back to the earth's surface.
The practical threshold for radiation risk is that of ionization of tissue. Since the ionization energy of a hydrogen atom is 13.6 eV (electron volts), the level around 10 eV is an approximate threshold. Since the energies associated with nuclear radiation are many orders of magnitude above this threshold, in the MeV range, then all nuclear radiation is ionizing radiation. Likewise, x-rays are ionizing radiation, as is the upper end of the ultraviolet range.
Although a dose of just 25 rems causes some detectable changes in blood, doses to near 100 rems usually have no immediate harmful effects. Doses above 100 rems cause the first signs of radiation sickness including:
*nausea
*vomiting
*headache
*some loss of white blood cells
Doses of 300 rems or more cause temporary hair loss, but also more significant internal harm, including damage to nerve cells and the cells that line the digestive tract. Severe loss of white blood cells, which are the body's main defense against infection, makes radiation victims highly vulnerable to disease. Radiation also reduces production of blood platelets, which aid blood clotting, so victims of radiation sickness are also vulnerable to hemorrhaging. Half of all people exposed to 450 rems die, and doses of 800 rems or more are always fatal. Besides the symptoms mentioned above, these people also suffer from fever and diarrhea. As of yet, there is no effective treatment—so death occurs within two to fourteen days.
In time, for survivors, diseases such as leukemia (cancer of the blood), lung cancer, thyroid cancer, breast cancer, and cancers of other organs can appear due to the radiation received. There is currently no effective medical treatment available for potentially fatal radiation doses. Medical science has no way of telling the difference between people who have received fatal doses and will die despite all efforts and others who received less radiation and can be saved. Treatment for the ones that can be saved includes blood transfusions and bone-marrow transplants. Bone-marrow transplants rejuvenate the supply of white blood cells which was affected by the radiation.
By any reasonable standard of scientific proof, the weight of the human evidence shows decisively that cancer is inducible by ionizing radiation even at the lowest possible dose and dose-rate--which means that the risk is not "theoretical." Therefore, we know that harm to human health will be immense, if the false claims about safety or benefit prevail and exposures rise.
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Medical science has hunted tirelessly for the cause of cancer, spending billions of dollars studying the role of everything from genetics to industrial pollutants, to bacteria, viruses and cosmic radiation. But one highly qualified, highly contentious researcher says the cancer industry has overlooked one obvious source: itself. according to a study by a prominent radiation expert, 75% of new cancer cases can be blamed on ionizing forms of medical radiation from ubiquitous diagnostic tools, including X-rays, computed tomography (CT) scans, mammograms and fluoroscopy.
American doctors deliver some 200 million medical radiation procedures annually, not including dental x-rays, for everything from treating acne to monitoring pregnancies. Medical x-rays and other routine radiation treatments may have helped cause over half the cases of coronary heart disease and cancer in the US, according to Dr. John Gofman, professor emeritus of molecular and cell biology at the University of California at Berkeley and chairman of the Committee for Nuclear Responsibility. If the study's findings hold up, they could prove to be of enormous consequence: cancer and coronary heart disease accounted for about half of U.S. deaths in the last decade.
The study by Gofman is the first to establish a correlation between such radiation treatments and heart disease. Perhaps most disturbingly, as Gofman points out, there are currently almost no regulations on the use of low level radiation treatments. High doses of radiation have long been known to cause cancerous mutations. Gofman, however, claims to have proved that low level radiation is also far more dangerous than commonly believed.
Dr. Gofman is certainly no solitary crank. He holds a medical degree plus a PhD in nuclear and physical chemistry. He has been a lecturer at the University Of California School Of Medicine since 1947 and has accumulated a host of other appointments and credits. In the 1970s, he co-invented the VIDA heart monitor, a pocket computer worn by heart patients to detect and signal episodes of cardiac arrhythmias. He also invented a cardiographic electrode still widely used throughout hospitals in the U.S. Early in his career, he co-discovered uranium-233 and was instrumental in isolating the first milligram of plutonium. In the matter of radiation's hazards, however, he stands outside the mainstream.
His recent study draws upon earlier research by the University Of Washington School Of Medicine, which showed that the buildup of plaque that can block the arteries taking blood from the heart may be caused in part by a single source. Gofman believes that single source to be the kind of radiation that is used in routine medical procedures. The radiation, Gofman claims, causes mutations in heart muscle cells. These mutated cells proliferate, much like a cancerous tumor, and plaque builds up around them in the artery, he contends.
Gofman is a prominent but controversial figure in the field of radiation research. He was a key figure in the Manhattan Project, which spawned America's first atomic bomb. Many of his findings, such as his early connection between cholesterol and heart disease, have largely been incorporated into mainstream medical practice. "Dr. Gofman is a highly respected scientist in this field," says Dr. Henry McGill of the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research in San Antonio. "He's been something of a maverick, but he's turned out to be right."
But some of his other findings, like his 1996 study claiming that mammograms help cause 75 per cent of breast cancers, have always been challenged. Gofman's latest study is likewise being met with skepticism. While many experts dispute Gofman's statistics, there is widespread support for the second part of his study, which calls for more regulations on the use of low-dose medical radiation. Currently, there are no nationwide guidelines on radiation dosages, and virtually no licensing requirements for radiation equipment operators.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration have no regulatory power over doses used in x-rays or any other radiation procedure. They only regulate the actual machinery. Radiation policy is left to each state. Variations in state laws make it difficult to estimate how many medical radiation procedures administered each year are unwarranted, says Charles Hardin, executive director of the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors. "Some states have done very well in minimizing exposures," says Hardin. "Others have not done quite as good a job."
Moreover, according to Dr. Fred Mettler Jr., Chairman of Radiology at University of New Mexico, aside from California, no state requires physicians to be certified to use radiation equipment. "If you have a medical degree, you can get a machine," says Mettler. As a result, Gofman maintains, thousands of patients are exposed to unnecessarily high doses of radiation, boosting their risk of cancer and heart disease.
Gofman's study outlines ways in which medical procedures could reduce exposures by ninety per cent. To better assess the risks involved with low-dose radiation, Gofman also suggests using a dosimeter on each patient. "If we don't start a national program [of minimum dose and keeping dose records], we condemn a certain number of people to cancer and heart disease," he says. While his linkage between radiation and heart disease remains contested, even Gofman's critics concede he has a point. "I agree 100% with Gofman that we've got to reduce radiation exposure," says UCLA's Withers.
Various media generally refer to "Gofman, long-time opponent of nuclear power," but they almost never label people who deny harm from low-dose radiation as "long-time advocates of nuclear-power" or mammography, etc., or as people who have a personal conflict of interest because their grants or livelihoods come from interests who irradiate people.
Computer Aided Tomography (CAT) is causing a revolution in the medical fields such as radiology, neurology, and nuclear medicine. By combining "ordinary" X-ray technology with sophisticated computer signal processing, it is possible to generate an image of the tissues of the body which is unobscured by other organs. An ordinary X-ray system takes pictures by passing X-rays through the body and recording the interference patterns onto a photograph. The different tissues in the body absorb the X-ray beams to varying degrees, and the film responds to the intensity of the X-rays received. The resulting photograph displays the accumulated absorption patterns to the tissue.
CAT is similar to an "ordinary" X-ray system, but it uses multiple X-rays oriented at different angles around the body. A computer is then used to extrapolate a three-dimensional image from the various two-dimensional images.
In medical nuclear imaging, CAT scans are used to view organs containing a type of radiation known as gamma-emitting radionuclides. Original imaging methods called scintillation cameras are analogous to conventional X-ray pictures. However, the usefulness of scintillation cameras is limited because:
* Only organs with a high radionuclide concentration can be separated from their environment
* The resolution is limited, such that improving resolution reduces the detector efficiency
* The radioisotopes widely used have low-energy gamma radiation, which is subject to much absorption in the body causing the detector efficiency to vary significantly with depth, and to be affected by the presence of bone overlying the organ of interest.
Recent developments use tomographic reconstruction to provide a high-contrast image of organs and structures containing positron-emitting radioisotopes.
Airport Backscatter x-ray machines, sometimes called "virtual strip searches" for their ability to allow security men to see beneath people's clothing, are setting the stage for a future epidemic of cancer. Thus far, news coverage has focused almost exclusively around the more emotionally charged, privacy concerns. But the looming issue is whether repeated bombardment with radiation is "planting the seeds" of disease. In light of the abundance of evidence attesting to radiation's proven dangers, it is unfathomable that any competent, unbiased doctor could take the position that x-rays do not pose a menace to all living cells through which they pass, leaving behind a painful and costly trail of destruction.
Drawing on sources like The Mayo Clinic and The Radiological Society of North America as well as interviews with prominent radiologists, molecular biologists, and medical doctors, ionizing (penetrating) radiation in any dose, no matter how tiny, causes genetic mutations, which set all living cells exposed on the path to cancer. X-rays are considered ionizing radiation. However, the manufacturer of the new Backscatter machines, currently being piloted at several airports, along with the FDA have given assurances of the device's "complete safety" for everyone. It is undisputed within scientific circles that even a single x-ray increases a three-month-old's chances of developing cancer in later life by at least 10 times, and yet they have plowed ahead approving up to 5000 backscatter images per person, per year. It's unconscionable.
Predictably the product's manufacturer spins out the usual half truths, citing "very low level of x-rays'" and boasting the opinion, packaged to appear as fact, that, "The system is completely safe for all persons..." Back peddling authorities are now trying to appease the public by saying everyone will be allowed to opt out. Maybe, for now.
Also a risk are other non-medical uses of radiation, including pre-employment, dental and chiropractic x-rays, newly developed "Silent Guardian" microwave crowd control devices and even police radar beams pointed at drivers that might contribute to cataracts.
Nuclear energy has caused many disasters and is extremely dangerous. The nations of the world now have enough nuclear bombs to kill every person on Earth several times. Disasters such as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island clearly illustrate the catastrophic potential of nuclear reactors. The disaster at Russia's Ural mountains shows the destructive potential of nuclear waste. The damage to people caused by radiation isn't treatable with current medical technology. Even if nuclear energy is an effective source of energy, now is simply not the time to implement it.
The two strongest nations--Russia and the United States--have about 50,000 nuclear weapons between them. What if there were to be a nuclear war? Or what if nuclear weapons were launched by accident? Nuclear explosions produce nuclear radiation. The nuclear radiation harms the cells of the body which can make people sick or even kill them. Illness can strike people years after their exposure to nuclear radiation. Because more and more countries are obtaining nuclear weapons, the threat of a nuclear weapon being detonated has become so great as to be unbearable.
In 1979, the cooling system failed at the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Radiation leaked, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee. The program was solved minutes before a total meltdown would have occurred. Fortunately, there were no deaths. In 1986, a much worse disaster struck Russia's Chernobyl nuclear power plant. This time, a great deal of radiation leaked. Hundreds of thousands of people were exposed to the radiation. Several dozen died within a few days. In the future, thousands more may die of cancer caused by the radiation.
Nuclear reactors also have waste disposal problems. Reactors produce nuclear waste products, which emit dangerous radiation. Because they could kill people who touch them, even in future years, nuclear waste cannot be thrown away like ordinary garbage. Currently, many nuclear wastes are stored in special pools at the nuclear reactors. The United States plans to move its nuclear waste to a remote underground dump during the late 1990s. In 1957, at a dump site in Russia's Ural Mountains, several hundred miles from Moscow, buried nuclear wastes mysteriously exploded killing dozens of people.
Many of the victims in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Chernobyl died of diseases (particularly cancers) caused by radiation. There is no known medical technique to determine the amount of radiation a person has been exposed to. In addition, there are only replacement techniques available to treat these cancers. For example, leukemia (cancer of the blood) can only be "cured" with a bone marrow transplant to replenish the body's supply of white blood cells. At a major disaster such as Chernobyl, it would be impossible to get willing donors with specific blood types to all the thousands of cancer victims. With the threat of a nuclear meltdown and no relatively effective treatment technology available, the nations of the world cannot take the risk of having nuclear power plants.
The planet's water cycle is the main way radiation gets spread about the environment. When radioactive waste mixes with water, it is ferried through this water cycle. Radionuclides in water are absorbed by surrounding vegetation and ingested by local marine and animal life. Radiation can also be in the air and can get deposited on people, plants, animals, and soil. People can inhale or ingest radionuclides in air, drinking water, or food. Depending on the half life of the radiation, it could stay in a person for much longer than a lifetime. The half-life is the amount of time it takes for a radioactive material to decay to one half of its original amount. Some materials have half-lives of more than 1,000 years!
According to a report from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, it will take 3 million years for radioactive waste stored in the United States as of 1983 to decay to background levels. So, presently, the only solution is to store the waste in a place so that the environment won't be contaminated. The problem with storing nuclear waste is both political as well as technological. In terms of politics, no one wants it stored near them. So there's much dispute as to where radioactive waste should be stored. In addition, storing so much waste is a major technological challenge. According to a report issued by the British Parliament, "In considering arrangements for dealing safely with such wastes, man is faced with time scales that transcend his experience."
Radioactive wastes come in many different forms including the following:
* protective clothing of people in contact with radioactive materials
* the remains of lab animals used in experiments with radionuclides
* cooling water, used fuel rods, and old tools and parts from nuclear power plants
* mill tailings from uranium-enrichment factories
* old medical radiation equipment from hospitals and clinics
* used smoke detectors which contain radioactive americium-241 sensors
Types of Nuclear Waste
Nuclear waste is divided into several categories. High-level waste consists mostly of spent nuclear reactor fuel from commercial power plants and military facilities, as well as reprocessed materials which can emit large amounts of radiation for hundreds of thousands of years. Commercial nuclear power plants in the U.S. alone produce 3,000 tons of high-level waste each year. The amount of spent fuel removed annually from the approximately 100 reactors in the U.S. would fill a football field to a depth of one foot. When spent fuel is removed from a reactor core, it still emits millions of rems of radiation.
In the absence of high-level waste repositories, nuclear power plants generally store their spent fuel rods in lead-lined concrete pools of water. These pools somewhat contain the spread of gamma radiation by keeping the rods relatively cool. They also help prevent fission. The average commercial power plant puts 60 used assemblies into temporary storage each year and will probably continue to do so until the year 2000, when responsibility for spent fuel will be transferred to the Department of Energy. Space is running out at many plants though.
The plants have another option of storing their spent fuel at other plants still under construction. It is theoretically possible to reduce the amount of storage space that spent fuel rods require by removing them from their assemblies, bundling them tightly, and then packing them into heavily shielded dry storage, but repacking these highly radioactive rods may present too much of a challenge.
For long-term storage of high-level waste, a waterproof, geologically stable repository and leak-proof waste container is required. Packaging has to be tailored to the volume of the waste, the actual radioactive isotopes of elements it contains, how radioactive it is, its isotopes' half-lives, and how much heat it still generates. One technique for packaging high-level wastes involves melting them with glass and pouring the molten material into impermeable containers. The containers could be buried in soil or in a rock pile and surrounded by fill material and a barrier wall. From the 1940s through the 1960s, barrels of radioactive waste were frequently dumped in oceans. This ended in 1970 when the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) determined that at least one-fourth of these barrels were leaking. A new, possibly safer proposal under consideration for long-term ocean storage includes offshore drilling and a procedure known as self-burial. In offshore drilling, holes would be drilled into the seabed and filled with barrels of waste. In self-burial, specially shaped barrels would be dumped and left to sink to the ocean floor.
Geologic disposal is currently the most popular solution for waste disposal. During the 1980s, the U.S. government invested more than $2 billion into geologic disposal. In this form of disposal, mined tunnels with deep holes for waste canisters would be built using conventional mining techniques. Monitoring and waste retrieval would be relatively easy. In 1987, a site was chosen for the first permanent high-level commercial nuclear waste storage repository in the United States--Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada. Expected to cost up to $15 billion, this repository is scheduled to go into operation by the year 2010.
Over the years, a number of other ideas for high-level waste disposal have been proposed and, at least temporarily, abandoned. One was disposal in space, in which sealed containers of radioactive material would be sent up into distant orbits. This would be an expensive and risky operation, as problems on the launch pad or in space could expose the earth and atmosphere to an enormous amount of radiation. Another suggestion was burying waste under the Antarctic ice sheets. However, this would risk irradiating that area and the surrounding sea. A much safer idea, which would render disposal unnecessary, is to bombard radioactive waste with subatomic particles to transform it into less harmful isotopes. Unfortunately, this attractive proposal awaits still unrealized technology.
Mill tailings left over when ore is refined and processed is the largest by volume of any form of radioactive waste. Only 1% of uranium ore contains uranium--the rest is left on-site as sand like residue. These tailings are generally left outdoors in huge piles, where they blow around, releasing radioactive materials into the surrounding air and water. By 1989, some 140 million tons of mill tailings had accumulated in the United States alone; with 10 to 15 million tons added each year. Although their radiation is generally less concentrated than other types of waste, some of the isotopes in these tailings are long-lived and can be hazardous for many thousands of years.
Until their radioactive risk was known, mill tailings were sometimes used as foundation and building materials, especially in western states. When their risk was discovered, these materials in the buildings had to be monitored. These monitored sites are generally safer, although some groundwater contamination still occurs at them. It has been recommended that tailings be stored underground in clay pits, far from population centers.
Low-level wastes are usually defined in terms of what they are not. They are not spent fuel, milling tailings, reprocessed materials, or transuranic materials. Low-level waste includes the remainder of radioactive wastes and materials generated in power plants, such as contaminated reactor water, plus those wastes created in medical laboratories, hospitals, and industry. Wastes in this category usually, although not always, release smaller amounts of radiation for a shorter amount of time. "Low level" does not mean "not dangerous," though. Although its radioactivity is usually less concentrated than that of high-level waste, low-level waste can be dangerous for up to tens of thousands of years.
Most low-level wastes come from reactors. These wastes can be divided up into two categories:
* Fuel wastes are fission products that leak out of fuel rods and into cooling water.
* Nonfuel wastes result when stray neutrons bombard anything in the core other than fuel--such as the reactor vessel itself--and cause them to become radioactive.
The remainder of low-level wastes comes from industry and institutional sources, including pharmaceutical plants, universities, and medical facilities. Instead of going to low-level waste dumps, these wastes are often kept on-site for the short time it takes for them to decay to safe levels. Then they are deposited into sanitary landfills. However, it is likely that liquid wastes are literally poured down the drain, whether or not they are still radioactive.
Low-level waste landfills were first built in the 1960s. In near-surface land burial, containers of waste fill a trench and are covered and surrounded by compacted earth. There are currently a few burial grounds in the U.S. to which most commercial low-level waste materials emitting detectable amounts of radiation are sent. A few other landfills are currently inactive due to severe waste-containment problems and radioactive leakage. Waste containers in near-surface landfills are prone to corrosion, particularly in moist climates. Landfills provide a false sense of comfort because they are "out of sight, out of mind." More worthwhile alternatives include above-ground landfills and to store waste at existing nuclear plant sites.
There are a number of unresolved issues regarding disposal of low-level wastes. The current institution control period (the amount of time a waste site must remain under guard after it has been filled and closed) is only 100 years. Yet the hazards presented by some low-level wastes can continue for thousands of years. What will keep future generations from uncovering and being contaminated by these substances?
There are very few people in radiation health science who are independent from interests who irradiate people. In real science, undistorted by corporate and political pressures, most controversies do get resolved, because all the participants are competing to find the truth. But not all participants in low-dose radiation health science are necessarily in a disinterested search for the truth. The reason that the low-dose radiation controversy may never be solved by normal scientific procedures is that many participants may not be in a normal or genuine scientific search for the truth. It would be naive to expect evidence and logic to persuade such people.
Several notable events have intensified the campaign to deny harm from low-dose radiation: (a) The Chernobyl accident, and the resulting "need" to deny health damage, (b) The estimate that it will cost over $250 billion to clean up nuclear pollution from our weapons facilities, and the resulting desire to spend much less, (c) The difficulty of obtaining public approval for the electric utilities to transfer their radioactive poisons to Yucca Mountain and other rad-waste dumps, and (d) The decisions to persuade women to take yearly mammograms (low-dose x-rays).
Today, a growing number of people associated with the nuclear and medical industries assert, falsely, "there is no evidence that exposure to low-dose radiation causes any cancer--the risk is only theoretical," or the risk is "utterly negligible," or "the accidental exposures were below the safe level," and even "there is reasonably good evidence that exposure to low-dose radiation is beneficial and lowers the cancer rate." No one at all denies that high doses of ionizing radiation are carcinogenic and mutagenic. Such doses are not at issue. It is public resistance to low doses which seriously threatens the future of powerful radiation interests.
While the media generally identify conflicts of interest in the tobacco "wars," the media rarely do so when they quote someone who denies harm from low-dose radiation. The National Council on Radiation Protection is treated by the media like a neutral scientific body, but its activities depend on the "generous support" of about 60 organizations, a list overwhelmingly dominated by interests who irradiate people. It is to NCRP's credit that the list is very public, and appears at the end of every NCRP report. A Partial list:
American College of Nuclear Physicians
American College of Radiology
American Dental Association
American Hospital Radiology Administrators
American Medical Association
American Nuclear Society
American Radium Society
American Society of Radiologic Technologists
Association of University Radiologists
Defense Nuclear Agency
Edison Electric Institute
Electric Power Research Institute
Health Physics Society
Institute of Nuclear Power Operations
NASA
National Cancer Institute
Radiological Society of North America
Society of Nuclear Medicine
US Dept. of Energy.
US Dept. of Labor
US EPA
US Navy
US Nuclear Regulatory Commission
In 1990, the government-sponsored BEIR Report (p.172) estimated that if the population received an extra 100 milli-rems of dose every year (approximately equivalent to doubling the natural "background" rate), the dose-increment would induce extra cancer fatality in one out of every 400 people per lifetime. According to Gofman, it is quite possible that a permanent doubling of the "background" dose of ionizing radiation, worldwide, would very gradually double mankind's burden of inherited afflictions--from mental handicaps to predispositions to emotional disorders, cardio-vascular diseases, cancers, immune-system disorders, and so forth. Such a doubling would be the greatest imaginable crime against humanity.
Today's radiation enthusiasts do admit they lack definitive evidence that low-dose radiation is harmless or directly beneficial. They admit it's a "maybe." If today's radiation enthusiasts sincerely care only about the good of humanity, then why are they not the ones actively urging reduction of radiation exposure until they can provide definitive evidence? Under circumstances of uncertainty, isn't dose-reduction what people of goodwill would want for their fellow humans? Ionizing radiation is a proven and ubiquitous mutagen to which humans everywhere are actually exposed (medically, environmentally, and occupationally). Moreover, unlike some chemical mutagens, ionizing radiation is capable of inflicting every possible kind of mutation, from a single "base-change" to deletion of entire genes. It is especially potent at inducing the kind of complex genetic injuries which cannot be repaired. None of those three statements is in dispute. At the very time when more and more dreadful afflictions (not only cancer) are discovered to be gene-based, one might expect a very loud consensus in favor of immediate reduction of exposure to ionizing radiation. Instead, we see the opposite: A growing effort to belittle the menace of this particular mutagen.
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The unique structure of clays gives them unusual filtering capabilities for absorbing toxic wastes, including radioactive contaminants. In just one gram of zeolite clay, for instance, the three dimensional structure of the channels in its crystalline structure provide up to several hundred square meters of surface area on which absorption (and channel reactions) can take place. The zeolites are particularly useful for removing heavy metals and radioactive species from water.
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While you can take an Epson salt or Clorox bath, you can also take a radiation detox bath of zeolite clay that’s formulated with special herbs for the process.
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Zeolites are natural, inert, non-toxic, environmentally friendly substances that are known to remove toxic metals from waste water, land, septic systems and the air. Zeolites can adsorb huge amounts of materials such as ions or gas molecules. Zeolite clay has an unusual crystalline structure and is tetrahedral in shape, similar to a honeycomb appearance. The channels and holes in the sponge-like structure of zeolite have a uniform shape and size. It is this unique crystalline structure that gives zeolite clay such unusual capabilities of filtering, mineralizing, and absorbing toxic wastes. In one gram of zeolite, the channels in its structure provide up to several hundred square meters of surface area on which adsorption and chemical reactions can take place. Its unique structure acts like sieves, or “shape-selective catalyst,” catching only molecules small enough to fit into the cavities, while excluding larger molecules.
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There are around 50 different kinds of natural zeolites and about 150 synthetic versions with varying physical and chemical properties. Natural zeolites were discovered as major constituents of numerous volcanic tuffs in saline-like deposits. Zeolite contains the minerals potassium, calcium, silicon, hydrogen, oxygen, aluminum and sodium. Zeolite clay has been beneficial in remineralizing and re-establishing pollution control in the soil and for use in hydroponic plant growth. The high purity of the natural deposits has aroused considerable commercial interest in the
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Zeolite clay has been a medium for air filters, water filters, and odor control. It is environmentally friendly for waste dump sites and has been used as a filter medium for the removal of radioactive wastes and for the removal of heavy chemical toxins and heavy metals such as iron, zinc, cadmium, lead, and copper, deemed hazardous by the government, from individuals as well as from mining and water waste sites. Zeolite clay has been used successfully for the extraction of radionuclides from human beings and animals.
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The natural zeolites can absorb up to 30% of their dry weight of gases, such as nitrogen or ammonia. Toxic gases, chemicals, mold, mildew, formaldehyde, and other toxins are drawn by the natural negative electrical charge into the crystal micro pores of the clay. The odors and gases are removed, not merely covered up. Research is now being done by several companies for its use as an absorbent of excess moisture, molds, and fungi. “Pouches” of zeolite clay are now available for, not only odor control, but the elimination of toxic gases and chemicals, smoke, and radioactive gases. These “pouches” are placed in a room, and act like a magnetic sponge.
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The British Nuclear Fuels (BNF) uses this specific type of zeolite to remove radioactive strontium and cesium and, therefore, reduces the radioactivity of liquid waste discharged into the
Radioactive metals - gold, silver, carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminum, nickel, and copper - are being made available for recycling. There are more than 1,577,000 metric tons of irradiated scrap metal available. The metal comes from decommissioned nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons and the oil and gas industries, for the most part, and tons of steel from buildings that contained radioactive substances is also part of the "hot metal" scrap.
In 1997, the NRC and the DOE established the National Center of Excellence for Metal Recycling. The Association of Radioactive Metal Recyclers (ARMR) was formed in 1995 and is based in
"We're looking at an exponential increase," said Diane D'Arrigo, a staff member at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. "Think about the metal you come into contact with every day. Your IUD, and your bracelets, your silverware, the zipper on your crotch, the coins in your pocket, frying pans, belt buckles, that chair you're sitting on, the batteries that are in your car and motorbike, the batteries in your computer." 5.5 million pounds of radioactive steel scrap was shipped to
Some of the radioactive metal shipped to
"There is no safe dose or dose rate below which dangers disappear. No threshold-dose," said John Gofman, former associate director of the Livermore National Laboratory. "Serious, lethal effects from minimal radiation doses are not 'hypothetical,' 'just theoretical,' or 'imaginary.' They are real."
"If you're sitting on it, or if it's part of your desk, or in the frame of your bed--where you have constant exposure and for several hours you will be in most danger," says Richard Clapp, associate professor in the department of environmental health at the Boston University Schools of Public Health.
Val Loiselle, chairman of the Association of Radioactive Metal Recyclers, said, "We were not always called Beneficial Reuse. In our first year, we were called the Radioactive Scrap Metal Conference. We can tackle the public on the notion that radioactivity is an effluent, not a waste. This industry has a right to effluence just like any other industry. And it cannot be zero. No industry has zero effluence." "DOE has 3,000 to 4,000 facilities that are in D and D [Decommission and Decontamination] state," said Loiselle. "There are 123 commercial nuclear power plants. Thirteen of these are entering the decommissioning pipeline. As these plants come down, we will be seeing lots of metals and equipment."
Michael Wright, director of health, safety, and environment for the United Steelworkers of America, says that there is a serious danger to workers from low-level radioactivity in steel. "You can't inhale a piece of steel," says Wright. "But if you melt it, there's a substantial risk of breathing it in. That's orders of magnitude more dangerous. There isn't anything that protects people."
"These exposures also can cause neurological problems," says Jackie Kittrell, a lawyer with the American Environmental Health Studies Project, an
Christina Bechak, vice president of the Steel Manufacturers Association, is concerned that radiation will accumulate on the machines used for shredding and smelting the metal. "Scrap metal is valuable, but we don't want radioactive scrap. The detectors in the factories are set very sensitive," says Bechak.
"In years past, a lot of material went out of these facilities that wouldn't meet commercial-world standards," says Michael Mobley, the director of the division of radiological health in the Tennessee Department of Energy and Conservation. "There's been some issue about this: 'Well, if we miss one or two spots it's no big deal because the standard is so strict.' If every once in a while stuff is going out that's hotter than standard, how much is going out that's hotter than standard? Their survey processes are just going to evolve into nothing."
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