A SECRET NUMBER

This excellent brochure, however, makes no comparison with toxic shipments. That can be found in "Risk comparison the transportation of spent fuel" by A.P. Hun and E.T. Lessard, Report BNL #36390 (available to AtE readers from A.P. Hull, Safety & Environm. Protect. Div., Brookhaven Natl. Lab., Upton, NY 11973). Among other statistics it gives the annual US fatalities in the shipment of gasoline (29); propane (15), chlorine (9), and spent reactor fuel (estimated at 0.0001).

But that is still not satisfactory, for chlorine and fuel rods are not alternatives. The pertinent question is this: How many lives are saved by shipping reactor fuel, fresh and spent, in comparison with shipping coal to produce the same amount of power? And count only members of the public killed by coal trains at railroad crossings; don't count miners, railroaders or utility employees, all of whom take a voluntary risk.

That number is not directly recorded, but a fairly good estimate can be made from other statistics, including the number of unit coal trains per week, their load, the average distance from mine to power plant, and other hard numbers. The result obtained by several investigators is close to 1 (railroad crossing) fatality per 1,000 MW coal-fired power per year, or for 1984, approximately 374 deaths.

Once again we meet the inherent safety of a fuel 3,500,000 times more concentrated than coal. And once again we meet a figure about which both Mr. Resnikoff and (AIF president) Mr. Walske will keep mum.