Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environmenthas just been published by the New York Academy of Sciences. It is authored by three noted scientists: Russian biologist Dr. Alexey Yablokov, former environmental advisor to the Russian president; Dr. Alexey Nesterenko, a biologist and ecologist in Belarus; and Dr.Vassili Nesterenko, a physicist and at the time of the accident director of the Institute of Nuclear Energy of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus. Its editor is Dr. Janette Sherman, a physician and toxicologist long-involved in studying the health impacts of radioactivity.
The book is solidly based—on health data, radiological surveys and scientific reports—some 5,000 in all.
It concludes that based on records now available, some 985,000 people died of cancer caused by the Chernobyl accident. That’s between when the accident occurred in 1986 and 2004.
More deaths, it projects, will follow.
The book explodes the claim of the International Atomic Energy Agency—still on its website – that the expected death toll from the Chernobyl accident will be 4,000. The IAEA, the new book shows, is under-estimating, to the extreme, the casualties of Chernobyl. Read the rest of the essay here.
If correct, this is, needless to say, a fairly serious distortion of the magnitude of Chernobyl on Brand's part. It turns out that Brand is not counting deaths from cancer as "deaths due to Chernobyl." Brand accepts the "4000 might die a little earlier from cancer" claim, but does not count those deaths in the same way as the 56 who died in the accident itself. The damage to wildlife has been quite significant as well, contrary to Brand's claims about a Chernobyl-produced environmental refuge. Reactions?
4 comments:
I understand the seriousness of what is claimed by the IAEA, but even if they are correct, it would seem that still nuclear power would be considered quite safe given the overall history of its use. Also, the standards of safety, etc., are extremely high in the U.S., and the reactors here have redundant safety features built in. Everything is a trade off, if you want a reduction in greenhouse gases, or just true clean energy, nuclear seems to be the way to go. And like I believe Brand said, it's not a matter of storing the waste for a million years, etc., but a hundred or so, until technology catches up and we find a way to utilize as fuel what we now consider waste.
This is yet another great example on how bias and statistical skills can go terribly off course. We see here two opinions (one with a lot more facts than the other, but anyways) that are both technically right but depending on your own personal ideas you may choose one or the other to support. I, for one, do see the resulting deaths from cancer and other diseases caused by the fallout as being caused by the nuclear meltdown though Brand doesn't. You have to wonder if Brand ignores that information because he truly cares so much about the cause of nuclear power or if he knows that it is bad press for his ideas. Humm...
Part of the problem with using Chernobyl as an example is that it is an isolated incident. Part of the reason for that is in its design. Most reactors like Chernobyl are designed with a negative void coefficient, the relation of steam in the coolant to the heat output. Usually, as steam builds in the coolant, the reactions slows down, and the heat output is lowered to compensate.
Chernobyl was designed with a huge positive void coefficient, meaning that as the steam builds, the reaction is sped up, increasing the heat/power output. This makes the reactor extremely dangerous at low power levels, which is where Chernobyl was operating when the tragedy occurred.
So while it was horrific and tragic, it is hard to use this isolated incident as a counterexample to the safety of nuclear energy.
I agree this is just a matter of opinion for most people. Brand does give good statistical analysis about how the nuclear power is used for good. I am kind of torn down the middle for this particular problem. It cannot be directly related that the Chernobyl is the cause of cancer, but it can be related. I for one do not exactly know what to think about it, but I will tend to lead toward Brand because he tends to have more statistical analysis about the situation.
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