Zoltan!,
I've worked on nuclear accident analysis for almost 18 years and wrote two computer codes (MACCS and MACCS2) that succeeded the CRAC computer code that was used to calculate accident consequences for the 1975 Rasmussen Report on reactor safety PRA:
Thanks for this excellent link. I agreed with pretty much everything except the very last sentence: "By all accounts, this has rid the industry of much of the sloppiness that plagued it before TMI."
pbs.org
Why do I say this? Because things are always going wrong in commercial power plants due to external events (primarily loss of offsite power), equipment failures, or operator error, or a combination. The NRC refers to these as "accident precursors." Every year or two they publish a report that summarizes them.
I'd say offhand that about once a year we have a close call (like a near miss with an airplane) in one of our 120 odd reactors. I agree with Charles Perrow (cited in above link) that sooner or later it's inevitable one of these near-misses will be compounded with human error and we'll have an accident.
If that accident leads to a significant release, we may be unable to clean up the mess, and would have to interdict a large area. This would be at a tremendous direct cost, not to mention the possibility of public outcry leading to calls to shut down other reactors. This conclusion is based on a govt. report I prepared: SAND96-0957.
I know about PRA and how they do it to make up those estimates of how likely an accident of a certain scale is. It's still "by gosh, and by golly" with junior engineers doing "anal extractions" all the time.
We really don't have a clue about how to incorporate human stupidity into the PRA risk estimates; so that means they underestimate risks, everything else being equal.
Sound terrible huh? Well, I'm sure you heard the joke about the scientist driving everyone crazy by always saying "on the other hand" so that eventually someone yells out "give me a one-handed scientist!"
Working in this field, people always ask me isn't it horrible and doesn't it make me depressed? And how can I bear to deal with such horrors on a daily basis? And isn't there some grand conspiracy by the govt. to foist these disasters on us? And maybe hide them once they happen.
Well, what I tell them is that the risks from toxic chemicals vastly exceed the risks we face from nuclear enterprises. Not just toxic waste, but accidents during production (such as Bhopal, India), and during transportation and storage of toxics.
There is absolutely no scientific data in support of radiation at low doses (up to a few rem per year) causing cancer. In fact, it's the opposite. That is, the data shows that areas with higher background radiation levels tend to have lower cancer incidence rates.
This subject of health benefits from radiation is subsumed under the term "radiation hormesis" if anyone here wants to do a web search or (much better) search of scientific literature using UNCOVER or MEDLINE or another free search service on the web.
Finally. I agree with you that the public's fears of radiation seem irrational. But the fears are real. And, as I'm fond of saying, you don't win arguments by calling someone stupid.
David |
