It takes 20, not 10, halflives to reduce the level of activity to one millionth [AtE Apr 90]. I suspect the large number of protests was partly due to the computer-caused wide knowledge of the powers of 2 (2^10 = 1,024 bytes is close enough to 1,000 to be called a "kilobyte.") By what kind of sloppiness do errors like this arise? In my case, by cribbing it unthinkingly from p. 86 of Murray's Understanding radioactive wastes, where it doubtlessly appeared by a typist striking the 1 instead of the 2 key, and such numerical errors are hard to catch in proof reading. But the moral is unchanged: don't take anything on authority, trust nothing but ra-tional derivation, if possible your own.
It is typical of the Science scribblers (4/6/90) to devote two full pages to physician M. Gardner's contention published in the Brit. Med. J. (2/17/90) that men exposed to low-level radiation over 6-10 years at Sellafield fathered children more likely to contract leukemia [AtE Apr 90l. The contention is demolished by J. Frem- lin, Prof. Emer. of Radiology, U. of Birmingham (England) in Nuclear Issues, March 1990 (APG, 8 Ruvigny Mansions, Embank- ment, Putney, London SW15 1LE, England). First, the contention is totally inconsistent with other observations
¾not only of the continuously examined offspring of people exposed to the bombs in Japan, but also in Kerala (India), Brazil, and even in Cornwall and Devon [see map,AtE Apr 90] where no such effects have been observed. Second, Prof. Fremlin points out that in other cases, not connected with nuclear radiation, child leukemia clusters have been observed for a very different reason: the influx of a new population (e.g. new oil towns in Scotland) which is immune to a virus, but infects the old-timers who are not. This explanation has been accepted in all other cases, so there is no need to manu- facture a new and shoddy theory. [Let me add that this phenomenon of infected invaders has made more history than often realized. For example, the large Aztec armies were not defeated by a small band of Spaniards, but by the smallpox germ to which the latter were immune. See many more examples in the fas- cinating book Plagues and Peoples by W.H. McNeill, Anchor/Doubleday 1976.]Part of Exxon's clean-up after the Valdez spill was done by spraying a fertilizer, invented by a French petroleum company, to aid the growth of hydrocarbon-eating bacteria. The $10 million ex-periment worked well enough to be continued by Exxon (Science, 3/30/90, p.1537). Watch for Rifkin protesting that the bacteria will take over the solar system.
Last time I invited readers to watch Sweden was in May 1988: their plan to phase out nuclear power by 2010 was ac-celerated after Chernobyl. But hydro is already harnessed (or can-not be for environmentalist opposition), and the country has no oil, no gas, little coal, just plenty of socialist welfare. Hopes of striking inorganic methane by Prof. Gold's theory [AtE Nov 81, Jan 84] have now also been abandoned after 3 years of drilling to a depth of almost 20,000 ft. So Swedish pols are nervously beginning to shift from what deviously brought them to power. Careful now, boys! Genetic mutations, you know, no way to get rid of the wastes . . . poisoning the planet . . . cancer epidemics . . .
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Vol. 17, No. 9
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Issues Issue/No.: Vol. 17, No. 9 Date: December 01, 2004 03:38 PM Title: Seabrook goes on line
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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