2013-02-11

OMG the radioactivity will kill us all!

Via Tim Worstall at Forbes we learn that "there is no safe level of radiation":

STOP DEPT OF ENERGY PLANS to dump 14,000 tons of radioactive scrap metals into the manufacturing of consumer products. There is no safe level of radiation. Keep nuclear waste out of my home and workplace!
Maureen Headington, the contact for this petition, comes from Burr Ridge, Illinois. A quick Google indicates that she has radioactive waste under her bonnet, but other forms of energy are in her sights:
The segment features an interview with Maureen Headington who organized this campaign to call attention to the health and environmental hazards from old coal-fired power plants.
and her Stand Up/Save Lives campaign isn't keen on ozone either:
For the past 8 years I have worked as an unpaid volunteer attending city council and village board meetings, with a campaign of public education called "Stand Up/Save Lives"
One can only imagine the hundreds of sighs as she stood up: "Oh no, it's Maureen again..."

If Maureen is curious about the dangers of radiation, I'm sure she is familiar with Tokaimura and Goiâna where, respectively, 10+ Sieverts within a few minutes killed workers but 3+ Sieverts was survivable, and 4.5+ Grays was fatal but 1-4 Grays was survivable. Ms. Headington is concerned about material with a peak radioactivitity of 10 micro-Sieverts per year. That is, one hundred millionth of the radioactivity required to kill a worker at Tokaimura. By contrast, the fatal dose of cyanide is 1.5 mg/kg body weight (105mg for a 70Kg human) and apple pips contain 0.6mg of cyanide so you need fewer than 200 apple pips to kill you. Yet I don't see Ms. Headington clamouring to ban apples - yet.

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