nuclear

"Normally you have to wait for generations to see the effect of the environment on mutations, and most mutant animals are pretty damaged so don’t live long. In a world affected by climate change, we really need to understand nuclear energy as an option, and its potential effects on natural populations. We know that exposure to acute radiation is terrible, but actually low levels are nowhere near as bad as we think. And many of the animals around Chernobyl have actually done very well, because the humans left – and it turns out we are way worse than radiation."

"Fission is a process of deadly fascination; had nature chosen her constants just a little differently, we should have been deprived of its potential for social good and spared its power for social evil. Despite the former and despite the undeniable fact that the latter is responsible for nuclear and particle physics being decades in advance of what would otherwise have been their time, I know what my own choice for the constants would have been."

"In some sense, nuclear fission is not one of those developments in physics which arose logically and systematically in the course of progress. There was a great deal of accident and surprise in the process."

"On May 7, a few weeks after the accident at Three-Mile Island, I was in Washington. I was there to refute some of that propaganda that Ralph Nader, Jane Fonda and their kind are spewing to the news media in their attempt to frighten people away from nuclear power. I am 71 years old, and I was working 20 hours a day. The strain was too much. The next day, I suffered a heart attack. You might say that I was the only one whose health was affected by that reactor near Harrisburg. No, that would be wrong. It was not the reactor. It was Jane Fonda. Reactors are not dangerous."

"Thus, the words "nuclear energy" have many interpretations. As they bring to mind the terrifying spectre of a war of exploding A-bombs and H-bombs, they are horrible words. Yet those same words, used to describe the many uses of the atom for man's peaceful progress -- in medicine, agriculture, biology, industry and the production of electric power -- bear no relation of association to the uncontrolled fury of the atom as it might be employed in war. And finally, the words "nuclear energy" as they relate to the controlled testing of nuclear weapons so that we may be assured of the means of defending ourselves, ought not to be confused with the unrestrained use of large numbers of such weapons in actual warfare."

"Our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter."

"And Lord, we are especially thankful for nuclear power, the cleanest, safest energy source there is. Except for solar, which is just a pipe dream."

"A paper reactor [new reactor concept] has the following characteristics: it is simple; it is small; it is cheap; it is lightweight; it can be built very quickly; very little development is required and it will use off the shelf components; it is in the study phase and not being built now. By contrast a real reactor has the following characteristics: it is complicated; it is large; it is heavy; it is being built now; it is behind schedule; it requires an immense amount of development on apparently trivial items; it takes a long time to build because of its engineering development problems."

"What if Roosevelt and Churchill had accepted the proposals from Bohr, Szilard, and others to internationalize the project? Would an with Russia still have resulted? The answer is probably yes. Bohr's idealistic concept was essentially a free exchange of information internationally. All nations would pool scientific knowledge, rather than keep it secret. An international body consisting mainly of scientists would oversee its exploitation. These ideas harked back to the free flow of information about physics in the fifty years before the Second World War, a period Bohr regarded as a golden age. However, not only times but nuclear physics had changed. Nuclear physics was by then perceived as having not only massive military potential but real commercial value for power generation. But these factors conferred great diplomatic, economic, and political power. For Stalin, possession of nuclear capability had immense importance, both symbolically and practically. Generation of electricity from nuclear power had the potential to achieve his long stated aim to "catch up and overtake" the West in terms of industrialization. Nuclear weapons would give him the ability to rule over his increasing empire in Eastern Europe, while allowing him to appear as, and to act as, the equal or the best of the West elsewhere. Western lack of trust in a totalitarian regime made a race inevitable."

"First, in dealing with those nations that break rules and laws, I believe that we must develop alternatives to violence that are tough enough to actually change behavior – for if we want a lasting peace, then the words of the international community must mean something. Those regimes that break the rules must be held accountable. Sanctions must exact a real price. Intransigence must be met with increased pressure – and such pressure exists only when the world stands together as one. One urgent example is the effort to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, and to seek a world without them. In the middle of the last century, nations agreed to be bound by a treaty whose bargain is clear: All will have access to peaceful nuclear power; those without nuclear weapons will forsake them; and those with nuclear weapons will work towards disarmament. I am committed to upholding this treaty. It is a centerpiece of my foreign policy. And I’m working with President Medvedev to reduce America and Russia’s nuclear stockpiles. But it is also incumbent upon all of us to insist that nations like Iran and North Korea do not game the system. Those who claim to respect international law cannot avert their eyes when those laws are flouted. Those who care for their own security cannot ignore the danger of an arms race in the Middle East or East Asia. Those who seek peace cannot stand idly by as nations arm themselves for nuclear war. The same principle applies to those who violate international laws by brutalizing their own people. When there is genocide in Darfur, systematic rape in Congo, repression in Burma – there must be consequences. Yes, there will be engagement; yes, there will be diplomacy – but there must be consequences when those things fail. And the closer we stand together, the less likely we will be faced with the choice between armed intervention and complicity in oppression."

"Klaatu: So long as you were limited to fighting among yourselves -- with your primitive tanks and planes -- we were unconcerned. But soon you will apply atomic energy to space ships -- and then you become a threat to the peace and security of other planets. That, of course, we cannot tolerate."

"Nuclear know-how without nuclear infrastructure doesn't get you very much. A racecar driver without a car can't drive. A pilot without a plane can't fly."

"I happen to be one who believes that we will not get very far in working out a peace program, or in lowering the suspicious fingers which are now being pointed toward America by other nations of the world, until we recognize that, after all, the secret of atomic energy does not belong to America, but that, instead, it belongs to all mankind."

"Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery; None but ourselves can free our minds. Have no fear for atomic energy, cause none of them can stop the time."

"The Green New Deal will need to be subject to constant vigilance and pressure from experts who understand exactly what it will take to lower our emissions as rapidly as science demands, and from social movements that have decades of experience bearing the brunt of false climate solutions, whether nuclear power, the chimera of carbon capture and storage, or carbon offsets. But in remaining vigilant, we also have to be careful not to bury the overarching message: that this is a potential lifeline that we all have a sacred and moral responsibly to reach for."

"No man can fully grasp how far and how fast we have come, but condense, if you will, the 50 thousand years of man's recorded history in a time span of but a half-century. Stated in these terms, we know very little about the first 40 years, except at the end of them advanced man had learned to use the skins of animals to cover them. Then about 10 years ago, under this standard, man emerged from his caves to construct other kinds of shelter. Only five years ago man learned to write and use a cart with wheels. Christianity began less than two years ago. The printing press came this year, and then less than two months ago, during this whole 50-year span of human history, the steam engine provided a new source of power. Newton explored the meaning of gravity. Last month electric lights and telephones and automobiles and airplanes became available. Only last week did we develop penicillin and television and nuclear power, and now if America's new spacecraft succeeds in reaching Venus, we will have literally reached the stars before midnight tonight."

"In reality, the story of nuclear power development in the US over the last 50 years is beyond pitiful and would not pass muster under any “normal” business plan. How the nuclear industry gets away with it remains baffling."

"If reactors were safe, nuclear industries would not demand government-guaranteed, accident-liability protection, as a condition for their generating electricity."

"The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one."

"As I said, there is some merit in these views [that nuclear power is the "only way to save the planet from cooking"]. More accurately, there would be if limited and short-term reliance on nuclear energy, with all of its extreme hazards and unsolved problems — like waste disposal — was taken as an opportunity for rapid and extensive development of sustainable energy. That should be the highest priority, and very quickly, because severe threats of environmental catastrophe are not remote."

"The general question of nuclear power is not a simple one. It is hardly necessary to stress how dangerous it is after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, which has far from ended. Continued use of fossil fuels threatens global disaster, and not in the distant future. The sensible course would be to move as quickly as possible to sustainable energy sources, as Germany is now doing. The alternatives are too disastrous to contemplate."

"The analysis of mutation rates in genomic repeat elements has also been applied to study transgenerational IR effects in human populations, namely in individuals living in the vicinity of the Chernobyl reactor accident or near nuclear test sites (Semipalatinsk, [Kazakhstan]]; Dubrova et al., 1996, 2002a, b). In all of these studies, they found an increase in the mutation rate among the progeny of the exposed parents. Taken together, these data support the hypothesis that exposure to IR can induce germline genomic instability that may predispose future generations to an increase risk of genetic diseases, infertility, and even cancer."

"For the attention of the residents of Pripyat! The City Council informs you that due to the accident at Chernobyl Power Station in the city of Pripyat the radioactive conditions in the vicinity are deteriorating. The Communist Party, its officials and the armed forces are taking necessary steps to combat this. Nevertheless, with the view to keep people as safe and healthy as possible, the children being top priority, we need to temporarily evacuate the citizens in the nearest towns of Kiev region. For these reasons, starting from April 27, 1986 2 pm each apartment block will be able to have a bus at its disposal, supervised by the police and the city officials. It is highly advisable to take your documents, some vital personal belongings and a certain amount of food, just in case, with you. The senior executives of public and industrial facilities of the city has decided on the list of employees needed to stay in Pripyat to maintain these facilities in a good working order. All the houses will be guarded by the police during the evacuation period. Comrades, leaving your residences temporarily please make sure you have turned off the lights, electrical equipment and water and shut the windows. Please keep calm and orderly in the process of this short-term evacuation."

"There has been an accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. One of the nuclear reactors was damaged. The effects of the accident are being remedied. Assistance has been provided for any affected people. An investigative commission has been set up."

"Normally you have to wait for generations to see the effect of the environment on mutations, and most mutant animals are pretty damaged so don’t live long."

"The risk projections suggest that by now [2006] Chernobyl may have caused about 1000 cases of thyroid cancer and 4000 cases of other cancers in Europe, representing about 0.01% of all incident cancers since the accident. Models predict that by 2065 about 16,000 cases of thyroid cancer and 25,000 cases of other cancers may be expected due to radiation from the accident, whereas several hundred million cancer cases are expected from other causes."

"The developers of the reactor plant considered this combination of events to be impossible and therefore did not allow for the creation of emergency protection systems capable of preventing the combination of events that led to the crisis, namely the intentional disabling of emergency protection equipment plus the violation of operating procedures. Thus the primary cause of the accident was the extremely improbable combination of rule infringement plus the operational routine allowed by the power station staff."

"NARRATOR: In 1986, in what was the Soviet Republic of Ukraine, the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded, releasing 400 times more radioactive material than the Hiroshima Bomb. Thirty workers died; 50,000 people fled the nearest city, and the radioactive fallout spread over Europe. It was the world's worst nuclear accident. Thirty years later, its hastily built enclosure is crumbling. In a race against time, engineers are struggling to prevent another catastrophic release of deadly radioactive debris into the environment."

"NARRATOR: In the vicinity of the reactor, the radioactive fallout forced a third-of-a-million people to evacuate, never to return. It remains the world's worst-ever nuclear power plant disaster. It left the Soviet authorities with a monumental problem: around 200 tons of shattered uranium fuel rods and other radioactive debris remained inside the damaged reactor building. Left uncovered, it would continually release radioactive dust into the air, a poisonous cloud to threaten the surrounding area. Over the next six months, workers braved extreme radiation to seal the reactor inside a 300,000-ton shelter, made from steel and concrete. It came to be called the "sarcophagus." But it was flawed from the start. The extreme radiation prevented the workers from completing the welds needed to seal the prefabricated sections of the sarcophagus together."

"Chernobyl happened, first of all, because it was no automatic system of control. ... Why? It was a huge reactor, very heavy, ... very very heavy and big ... way bigger than reactors which we have here in the United States. So it is very more difficult to control. So, I would say, it was clear for many people that sooner or later it will be this accident."

"A nuclear disaster did, nevertheless, occur—not because of war but as the result of an explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on April 26, 1986. This event also changed Gorbachev. It revealed "the sicknesses of our system . . . the concealing or hushing up of accidents and other bad news, irresponsibility and carelessness, slipshod work, wholesale drunkenness." For decades, he admonished the Politburo, "scientists, specialists, and ministers have been telling us that everything was safe. . . . [Y]ou think that we will look on you as gods. But now we have ended up with a fiasco." Henceforth there would have to be glasnost' (publicity) and perestroika (restructuring) within the Soviet Union itself. "Chernobyl," Gorbachev acknowledged, "made me and my colleagues rethink a great many things.""

"The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power station was graphic evidence, not only of how obsolete our technology was, but also of the failure of the old system. At the same time, and such is the irony of history, it severely affected our reforms by literally knocking the country off its tracks."

"I absolutely reject the accusation that the Soviet leadership intentionally held back the truth about Chernobyl. We simply did not know the whole truth yet."

"We were just not prepared for that sort of situation."

"The Chernobyl disaster, more than anything else, opened the possibility of much greater freedom of expression, to the point that the system as we knew it could no longer continue. It made absolutely clear how important it was to continue the policy of glasnost, and I must say that I started to think about time in terms of pre-Chernobyl and post-Chernobyl."

"Our very lives might depend on this listening. In the Chernobyl nuclear accident, the wind told the story that was being suppressed by the people. It gave away the truth. It carried the story of danger to other countries. It was a poet, a prophet, a scientist. Sometimes, like the wind, poetry has its own laws speaking for the life of the planet. It is a language that wants to bring back together what the other words have torn apart."

"The Chernobyl accident in April 1986 caused the deposition of radionuclides across Europe, followed by a long-term artificial increase of the radiation background [1]. In addition to the classical subject of mutagenesis after acute radiation exposure [2], the study of the time course of biological damage associated with chronic low-dose radiation exposure of mammals and the endeavors to predict biological damage in consecutive generations have become a relevant issue. Since there is little information on this topic [3, 4], the present work addresses these important questions. Starting with 1986, we were engaged in studying bio-logical effects of chronic low dose radiation in natural populations of bank vole (Clethrionomys glareolus, Schre-ber) in a series of many animal generations. The bank vole is a widespread rodent species that is used as indicator of environmental quality. It is a convenient object for many genetic tests, which originally have been devised for the laboratory mouse [5]. Comparison of own and literature data on doubling doses of acute irradiation for chromosome injuries had shown that the sensitivity of somatic cells of the bank vole to ionizing radiation is very similar to the sensitivity of human lymphocytes and germ cells of laboratory mice."

"After the 1986 meltdown, radioactive fallout scattered across much of the northern hemisphere, while some 150,000 square kilometres in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine were contaminated, according to the IAEA. That contamination spread as far as 500 kilometers north of the site."

"Mankind has never experienced a misfortune of this magnitude, with consequences so grave and so hard to eliminate."

"The consequence of radiation exposure in fetuses is mostly based on observations rather than based on scientific research. Ethical issues prohibit researching on the fetus. Therefore, most of the data on the impact of radiation on the fetus derives from observations of patients who suffered Japan’s Hiroshima bombing and the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster. Based on the observations made from the victims of the high level of radiation exposure, the consequences of radiation exposure can categorize into four broad groups, including pregnancy loss, malformation, developmental delay or retardation, and carcinogenesis. Pregnancy loss most often happens when radiation exposure happens during early gestation (less than two weeks)."

"Next to a crumbling nuclear reactor destroyed in an explosion 30 years ago, an unprecedented project in the history of modern engineering is being built. When it’s completed, the New Safe Confinement, or NSC, will be the largest movable object built on land, according to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, or EBRD. When an explosion tore through Chernobyl’s No. 4 reactor on April 26, 1986, near Pripyat, Ukraine, more than 30 people died and countless others have died from radiation symptoms since, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the World Health Organization. The Ukraine government evacuated some 135,000 people from the area and the 19-mile exclusion zone around the plant will re-main uninhabitable for decades."

"Vince Novak, the director of nuclear safety for EBRD, called the Chernobyl disaster “the worst accident that ever happened in nuclear history.” “It’s more than just a shed,” Novak continued. “It is also a workshop. It has to provide an environment in which people will be able to carry out the waste management activities for a period of probably 100 years.”"

"Building an arch in proximity to a nuclear leak has its fair share of challenges. Before construction of the NSC began, workers helped decontaminate the area by removing the top layer of soil along with any potential radioactive material that might have been left behind. After that they poured a layer of concrete over a large area and erected a wall closest to the sarcophagus. During peak construction times, there are around 1,200 employees at the site from over 27 nations. To ensure they are safe from radiation exposure, the millisievert (mSv), or the average accumulated back-ground radiation exposure dose, is closely monitored. The average dental X-ray exposes someone to about 0.014 mSv. A worker in the New Safe Confinement arch is exposed to 0.0075 mSv’s per hour. A new, state-of-the-art changing facility with a capacity for 1,430 workers was built onsite and offers medical and radiation protection facilities. There also is an ambulance on duty, in case of emergencies. In addition, the Chernobyl Shelter Fund provides training facilities, radiation monitoring and medical equipment as well as a medical screening program for the workers, according to the EBRD. All work on site is carried out under the strictest health and safety regulations by a specially trained workforce, according to Bouygues and Vinci. So far there has not been a single case of exposure beyond permissible limits, according to the EBRD."

"Once at the centre of a 1,000-square-mile exclusion zone, Chernobyl has seen a sharp rise in visitors since an HBO mini-series about the tragedy aired earlier this year. And according to President Volodymyr Zelensky, it is now time for a different narrative surrounding the site. “We must give this territory of Ukraine a new life,” Zelensky said as he signed a decree on Wednesday. “Until now, Chernobyl was a negative part of Ukraine’s brand. It’s time to change it.” On April 26 1986, a reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded, forcing a region-wide evacuation and sending radioactive fallout billowing across Europe. While the explosion itself caused around 31 deaths, mil-lions of people were exposed to dangerous radiation levels. The final death toll as a result of long-term radiation exposure is much disputed. Although the UN predicted up to 9,000 related cancer deaths back in 2005, Greenpeace later estimated up to 200,000 fatalities, taking further health problems connected to the disaster into account. For more than two decades, authorities maintained the exclusion zone around the reactor, including the city of Pripyat, once home to 50,000 people."

"In a statement posted on his official website, Zelensky said: “Chernobyl is a unique place on the planet where nature revives after a global man-made disaster, where there is a real “ghost town”. We have to show this place to the world: scientists, ecologists, historians, tourists.” While much of the area has been open to tourists since 2011, the president’s words are likely to boost what some have described as “dark tourism” in the region. That said, Zelensky is keen to develop the region for the better and give it more of a mainstream appeal. During a visit to Chernobyl on Wednesday, the president pledged to transform the “exclusion zone” into “one of the growth points of a new Ukraine.” He added: “First of all, we will create a “green corridor” for tourists.”"

"The president said black market practices would be stamped out with the introduction of electronic ticketing. “Unfortunately, the exclusion zone is also a symbol of corruption in Ukraine,” he said. “These are bribes that security officials collect from tourists, the illegal export of scrap and the use of natural resources. “We will stop all this very soon. Let’s finally stop scaring off tourists and turn the exclusion zone into a scientific and upcoming tourist magnet. Let’s make it a land of freedom that will become one of the symbols of a new Ukraine. Without corruption. Without unnecessary prohibitions.”"

"Only about 150 elderly people still live in the 19-mile radius exclusion zone, in defiance of authorities. Officials say it will only be safe for humans to live there again in 24,000 years, according to AFP, although with the right paperwork tourists can visit for short periods. “There’s no hunting or fishing there so wildlife is booming,” Ivanchuk told CNN. “Animals that left the area years ago are starting to come back like eagles, wolves and moose. Lynx were recently spotted there for the first time in more than 50 years.” But Olena Burdo, a junior researcher at the radiobiology and radioecolo-gy department of the Kyiv Institute for Nuclear Research, did not welcome the government move. More scientific research and funds for radiobiological study was needed, she told CNN, adding: “But we don’t need so many tourists.”"

"Ten years later, the radiation remains. It's there in the soil; in the animals; in the people. Few know that better than three American scientists -- toxicologist Cham Dallas and geneticist Ron Chesser, both from the University of Georgia, and Texas Tech geneticist Robert Baker -- who are researching the accident's genetic effects in the shadow of Chernobyl's burned-out Reactor 4. It is research with ramifications beyond the contaminated 30-kilometer zone around Chernobyl. "We live in a society where Chernobyl may not simply remain here," said Dallas. "We may have a Chernobyl in America some day. Either from a nuclear reactor accident, or more likely, from use of a terrorist's nuclear weapon." It is research with relevance for people worldwide. "We are going to need this information. What are the consequences of long-term exposure to radionucleides inside the body? We're going to need to know," Dallas explained."

"The reason such information is needed is nowhere more obvious than at Chernobyl itself, where another nuclear accident could occur. Danger is increasing in what's left of Reactor 4 -- commonly called "the sarcophagus." The concrete tomb encasing the reactor hasn't held up. And some believe it's a threat to the world. Forty tons of radioactive dust have accumulated inside. And there's a pressed slab of uranium and concrete that some believe could lead to a chain reaction, causing a more powerful explosion than the original one. It's a terrifying possibility. The original explosion spewed radiation throughout Europe, and spread to parts of the rest of the world. Human error, compounded by a faulty technical design, led to the accident. Exposure to massive amounts of radiation immediately killed 32 plant workers and firefighters. Thou-sands more died later from effects of the accident. The Ukrainian government now says hundreds of thousands of people suffer from Chernobyl-related illnesses."

"Among the scientists here, there's deep concern about long-term genetic damage to future generations. In an effort to find answers, Dallas, Chesser and Baker use the fields and abandoned villages around Chernobyl to collect and study radioactive mice. "There's certainly enough radiation here to contaminate those mice and cause genetic effects that we're seeing," observed Dallas. "There's no doubt about that. We just like to know how much it takes before it's a hazard to humans." They run tests on the mice at a nearby makeshift lab, set up in what was once a kindergarten classroom."