dihydrogen monoxide, bananas and a life of absurdity in the nuclear business

www.fedorukcentre.ca

Neil Alexander Executive Director

Sylvia Fedoruk Canadian Centre for Nuclear Innovation

Dihydrogen Monoxide, Bananas and the Role of Bad Science in making Policy


Dihydrogen monoxide: Toxicity

Death due to accidental inhalation of DHMO even in small quantities

Found in biopsies of pre-cancerous tumours and lesions

Prolonged exposure to solid DHMO causes severe tissue damage

Gaseous DHMO can cause severe burns


Dihydrogen Monoxide: Environmental Damage

A major component of acid rain

Causes soil erosion

Associated with killer cyclones

Thermal variations in DHMO are a suspected contributor to the El Nino weather effect


Dihydrogen monoxide

is the major component of

beer

Cheers!


Ontario Power Generation’s (OPG) Darlington nuclear station has been killing millions of fish every year, in contravention of federal environmental law. You can help stop this.


The Image The Reality


Half-life of Plutonium 24,000 years


100 tonnes @ 15% = 15 tonnes

1 bomb = 18Kg

So one steam generator would make ~ 5,500 bombs!

www.fedorukcentre.ca100 tonnes 4 grammes of radioactive materials


A banana equivalent dose (abbreviated BED) is an informal expression of ionizing radiation exposure, intended as a general educational example to indicate the potential dose due to naturally occurring radioactive isotopes by eating one average sized banana. One BED is often taken as 0.1 µSv, however, in practice this dose is not cumulative as the principal radioactive component is excreted to maintain metabolic equilibrium. The BED is only an indicative concept meant to show the existence of very low levels of natural radioactivity within a natural food, and is not a formally adopted dose quantity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionizing_radiation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_isotope

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert


1 steam generator = 17,000 bananas


64 Grams 168 Tonnes 2.6 million times as much !


15,884 died as a direct result of the tsunami

1,000 died as a result of poorly informed decisions about the

consequences of the radioactivity

No one has or will die from the radioactive releases


The premature deaths reported in 2012 were mainly related to the following: (1) somatic effects and spiritual fatigue brought on by having to reside in shelters;

(2) Transfer trauma – the mental or physical burden of the forced move from their homes for fragile individuals;

(3) delays in obtaining needed medical support because of the enormous destruction caused by the earthquake and tsunami. However, the radiation levels in most of the evacuated areas were not greater than the natural radiation levels in high background areas elsewhere in the world where no adverse health effect is evident, so maintaining the evacuation beyond a precautionary few days was evidently the main disaster in relation to human fatalities.


Accepted global limits on radioactivity levels in foods is 1000 Bq/kg (1,200 Bq/kg in the U.S.). Dominated by cesium-137 and Sr-90, these levels were set by organizations like the IAEA and UNSCEAR after decades of study. Because of public radiation fears broadcast in the press after the Fukushima accident, Japan cut the limit in half hoping it would have a calming influence. But the level of fear remained high, so Tokyo lowered the limits to one-tenth of the international standards.

This has had the unintended consequence of making people even more afraid of what they are eating, moving safe foods into the scary category and limiting food exports, causing even further economic and social damage.

Suddenly, all sorts of normally safe foods are now banned. Wild mushrooms from Aomori Prefecture are now banned because they have cesium levels of about 120 Bq/kg. This cesium has nothing to do with Fukushima, it’s the same type as is in everyone’s food around the world, and it wouldn’t have rated a second look before the accident.

Other Unintended consequences


The Used Fuel “Problem”

www.fedorukcentre.ca16 sites, 100kw….a few hundred thousand years


Nuclear Does other things as well?

Quality and Safety Inspections

Emergency Lighting Smoke detectors

Sterilizing Medical Equipment

Preserving Foods

Detecting stowaways!

Leak Detection

Fracking Tracers

DNA Sequencing

Compact Fluorescents

Nuclear Medicine & Imaging

Materials Research


Thank you

@FedorukCentre


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Overall Impression of Nuclear Power in SaskatchewanPercentage of those expressing an opinion

Entirely Negative

Mainly Negative Mainly Positive Entirely Positive


Example Research Nuclear Imaging Technologies Tools & Techniques

Nuclear Imaging Tools: Radioisotopes

Nuclear Imaging Tools: Targeted Probes

Drug Development and Targeted Drug Delivery

Testing and Optimizing Plant-derived Therapeutics

Investigations of the production of new isotopes and new production techniques for existing radioisotopes

Development of high-affinity agents to leverage the unique ability to study alpha emitters in targeted radiotherapy. These activities are critical to the development of improved diagnostic and therapeutic technologies for animals and humans

The use of new radiolabeled drugs to develop new therapeutic agents by providing ways to monitor the biological fate of drugs and delivery systems

Identification and selection of plants with enhanced nutritional composition and/or the ability to produce compounds of commercial value. Tagging medicinal or nutraceutical compounds to determine clinical safety, efficacy and pharmokinetics and maximise production in animal models and ultimately humans


Example Research

Human & Animal Nuclear Medicine: New Models of Disease and Technologies for Diagnosis and Treatment

Large Animal Models of Disease

Diagnosis, Treatment and Prevention of Neuropathologies

Reducing Morbidity in Chemotherapy and Systematic Disease

Physiologically –relevant large animal models will be used to study disease where smaller animals are proving to be inadequate. Diseases to be investigated will include infectious and non-infectious inflammatory diseases, neoplasia and dementia.

One of the three research priorities of the College of Medicine, Neuroscience, including the study of dementia and movement disorders will be studied with available imaging tracers.Effectiveness of novel treatments such as stem cell therapy for Parkinson’s disease will be evaluated as part of national clinical trials.

Development of techniques for better calculation of the effect of drug exposures including improved measurement of renal function.


Example Research Plant Productivity: Nutrient Uptake and Root-Soil Interaction

Imaging Plant Roots and Uptake of Nutrients

Tracking Reservoirs for Enteric Human Pathogens

Rare stable and Cyclotron-generated isotopes will be used to study uptake from soils in-situ. Critical components of the rhizosphere will be identified. Plants with improved tolerance to various stresses and/or superior metabolic capabilities will be identified.

Plant reservoirs of bacterial pathogens such as Pantoea (a close relative of E Coli and Salmonella) will be investigated to develop strategies for controlling infection.

dihydrogen monoxide, bananas and a life of absurdity in the nuclear business

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