Seil Chat

Are you really scared of two or three pieces of radioactive material the size of a pinhead or less?

You must be the sort of people scared to go outside. How can you possibly allow yourselves to drive down a road breathing in the particles from a car in front? Or eat food with additives? Or take prescription drugs? There are so many other risks to life out there, things to die from, some people are going to worry themselves to death before they ever get the merest chance to die of nuclear radiation.

I played on Sandside beach, built sand castles, and dams across the burns, regularly throughout the 70's and 80's. I would happily do so now. Except I hate places blighted by signs.

Are you really scared of two or three pieces of radioactive material the size of a pinhead or less?

again you seem to have your facts wrong - by two or three do you mean over 100???????

Published: 17 October, 2007
RADIATION surveyors have recovered the 100th Dounreay fuel particle to end up on the nearby public beach at Sandside.

The hot-spot was found buried in sand in the middle of the beach last Thursday afternoon.

Tests at the site revealed it contained 210,000 becquerels (Bq) of radioactivity – one of the highest counts since the checks at Sandside began 23 years ago.

John O'Groat Journal

During a routine survey at Sandside Beach, on the 15th December 2006, a radioactive object was discovered towards the eastern end of the beach, lying in seaweed close to the water’s edge. The object appeared to be made of a dark-coloured plastic, and was about 8 by 3 inches in area and over 1 inch thick. It appeared to have been partly melted or burnt.

That's the UKAEA's description of one of you 'pinheads'.

I do go outdoors and take my chances in the big bad world - but given the choice I'd go for renewables all the time - and no, I'm not a lettuce munching enviro-hippy.

..and careful who you jump into bed with - remember it was your friends at the UKAEA/BNFL and the NCB that were up to some pretty underhanded political shennanigins in the early 80's

210,000 becquerels (Bq) of radioactivity

It may be the highest recorded, but is that a high or low level of radioactivity?

How does it compare with the radioactivity in a luminous watch dial or in your smoke alarm?

Does a 100 pinheads add up to alot?

A piece 8 inches by 3 and an inch thick, but is it any more radioactive than a natural rock on the beach?

You're told something is radioactive, Oh my god, let's all die at once!
You see you are scared, but you don't know the answers. Fear of the unknown, that's all it is.

I'm not scared...neither am I a luddite...it's about choice.

.and the issue is not the level of radioactivity its the fact that unaccounted radioactive material turns up well outside the plant - I think Nick B's Springfield reference could be equally applied to Dounreay. It's not the super safe industry you make it out to be.

What about Three Mile Island and Chernobyl?????

I have a feeling PP that you just like an argument for arguments sake and you probably couldn't agree on the colour of sh*te.

Eric, 2 points:

1) You are arguing about the consequences of past practices which everyone agrees were less than perfect, being as they were intrinsically mixed up with hurried nuclear weapons development in an oversecretive society. Modern society is much more transparent and, wherever nuclear energy developments now happen around the world, openness and local community involvement and approval are fundamental.

2) Even despite the above, the consequences of the past nuclear energy industry are totally trivial compared to those of the fossil fuel energy industry whether thinking of mining deaths, gas explosions, oil platform disasters, local and global pollution by aerosol particles, heavy metals, enhanced natural radioactivity or global climate change. A low density of hot particles on Sandside bay isn't in the same league. Nor was the Chernobyl accident, dreadful though it was. Much of the problem you are an example of is due to lack of scientific understanding, not something I blame you personally for at all, as the blame must rest most heavily on the shoulders of those in the nuclear industry who have so completely failed to explain their mission (and with the media who love to stoke the scare story aspect of the invisible nuclear menace).

Essentially, we have available the solution to all our energy and climate change problems and we are absolutely mad to be thinking about piffling hypothetical windmills, seabed turbines etc. Nuclear energy IS natural - it's the primary energy production process in the natural universe. Let's just get on and use it!!

Hi Eric,

No, I just have a firm view on this and am not saying it just to provoke you! You put Dounreay in Search and you'll see I've demonstrated these views before. However I agree you should NOT try to argue with me on what colour sh*te is.

Chernobyl was 23 years ago, Three Mile Island 30 years ago. There were specific problems identified with these operations. Problems that have been 'built out' of newr nuclear power stations. Dounreay was built 54 years ago as an experimental research facility. It wasn't built as a power station, and as such was pushing the boundaries of nuclear development. Today's nuclear power stations are different, only built on tried and tested designs.

Be honest with yourself, when did you last hear of a nuclear incident of any significance? And there are already nuclear reactors all over the world. Even Chernobyl didn't live up to the Armageddon CND said it would.

There are too many other ways to die to get too stressed about the risk of being engulfed in a radioactive cloud. Get your lives, you scaredy pants, in proportion. It sure is short enough.

Nuclear energy IS natural - it's the primary energy production process in the natural universe.

If you are referring to nuclear fusion then you are of course correct - it is the process that makes starts burn. It combines lower atomic number elements to produce heavier elements, and is the source of all heavy elements - why we are made of star stuff ourselves. In spite of half a century of intensive reseach we are still a long way from sustainable controlled nuclear fusion here on Earth.

Nuclear fission - which is what power stations and nuclear weapons use - is not such an everyday process in the universe however. There has only ever been one naturally occurring fisson reaction on Earth, some two million years ago.

Nuclear fission produces waste products with a half life of tens or hundreds of thousands of years. For those who don't know anything about this this Wikipedia article is as good a starting point as any. All storage techniques currently in use require the long-term stability/co-operation of future governments and political systems to ensure the continuing safety of the environment - does that sound like a good bet to you? Furthermore, if the cost of nuclear-generated electricity is calculated to take into account the full costs of decomissioning reactors and storing the waste safely for a few tens of thousands of years it makes no economic sense whatsoever.

And for those of you who think this is all a very sophisticated process - it is essentially an atomic bomb with control rods inserted to absorb enough electrons to stop the pile going critical (ie exploding). It gets hot and the heat is used to boil water to make steam to drive turbines. Not quite as high-tech a process as you might imagine . . .

And of course a glowing target for terrorists, with the additional danger of misplaced radioactive material ending up in a dirty suitcase bomb.

Great, lets have one on our doorstep.

Nick, there are a lot more nuclear processes going on on this planet than you imply, not least the millions of natural radioactive events per hour in each of us and in the rocks and environment around us. Don't hurt a bit either, do they? Controlled nuclear fission is not at all like a bomb, control rods absorb neutrons not electrons and the half-lives of the pollutants from fossil fuels are infinitely long not limited as for fission products. Furthermore, it isn't the cost of nuclear energy that's the issue - it's the cost of us not using it, ecologically, climatically and financially. As I said, the media and the past nuclear establishement are to be blamed for erroneous views such as those you expressed. Hoots mon!

And of course a glowing target for terrorists, with the additional danger of misplaced radioactive material ending up in a dirty suitcase bomb

No, Nick, this will not happen: not in the UK anyhow.

the media and the past nuclear establishement are to be blamed for erroneous views such as those you expressed

Sandy, au contraire - it is the media and the current nuclear establishment - more au fait with modern PR methodology than before - that are responsible for the mistaken views you apparently hold. My views are based on science and economics.

Your bizarre reference to 'millions of radioactive events taking place in each one of us' is impressive but ultimately irrelevant and meaningless - you are not talking about the same process at all. You might as well compare a barium enema to putting a chunk of plutonium in your pants.

You are however right that I should have said neutrons, not electrons - that was an error in the heat of the moment, my apologies for that. In an uncontrolled fission reaction each neutron emitted from one fission event will cause another one, thus a chain reaction is set up. This IS essentially the same process as occurs in a nuclear reactor, which is all I said. However, in a reactor the reaction mass is too diverse for a catastrophic bomb-type chain reaction to occur even if all the control rods are withdrawn at once. This is not to say however that meltdown and decontainment of the reaction mass cannot occur, nor is it to say that a substantial conventional explosion cannot breach the reactor containment and scatter highly radioactive materials into the environment - as happened at Chernobyl.

As for PP's contention that the problems at 3 Mile Island and Chernobyl have been identified and will not occur again - I believe him, but wonder what other new problems and security risks remain to be identified at the point of unexpected manifestation.

Anyway, as you said earlier it looks like we will have to agree to differ on this Sandy. The strongest argument on your side as far as I am concerned is the dramatic conversion of James Lovelock, the "father" of the environment movement and author of the Gaia hypothesis. He he is an infinitely more 'rabid warmist' (as Longshanks would have it) than myself, and he may be right - but I repeat, "To rely on nuclear power to reduce CO2 emissions is like smoking to lose weight. It's not a good idea."

But - Wee Eck says not in my (Scottish) back yard and I say good on him.

Quote:
And of course a glowing target for terrorists, with the additional danger of misplaced radioactive material ending up in a dirty suitcase bomb

No, Nick, this will not happen: not in the UK anyhow.

Phew, that's a relief . . .

Dounreay 'loses' bomb-grade uranium

Dounreay's missing uranium

Lost uranium due to 'accounting uncertainty'

And before you say it was all in the past remember - no more boom or bust! Same sh*t, different day.

We may as well argue about our religious beliefs as about nuclear energy, Nick. Each to his own. But I know that the science of these modern systems is good and I believe that the politics have changed. The new nuclear establishment has learned its lesson and knows that it can only succeed through open involvement with the community. I agree that the past operation of nuclear facilities has been pathetic but I think that you too must move on and forget the sins of the past. One thing I do agree with you about is that terrorism has introduced a new and major problem for the nuclear industry but, in the context of a power station, the potential problem is limited. Like the irrational fear of anything nuclear, the irrational fear of terrorism is proving a scourge of our age. I think a wee reactor on Seil would be quite safe and would do us all good! James Lovelock has seen the light. Let's hope you and Wee fat Eck do too !:lol:

Come on Nick, we all know newspapers are desperate for headlines (even in the past). They often have an element of truth but more often than not 'sensationalist' headlines do not tell the whole story. Look at what happened when the wind turbine fell off the other week.....even Eric reports on this site that the turbine blade has mysteriously disappeared (has he looked at his avatar recently and seen where it might have gone?)

Nuclear facilities are well protected and even if a terrorist team fought their way in, there is realistically nothing they could do to a reactor or with fissile material before they would be cleared out. Don't think they haven't investigated dirty bombs in suitcases but the science involved just mean any thrillers with this storyline will just remain fiction.

I agree we should investigate other means of power generation, and more especially power conservation. Let the researchers do it. But invest in nuclear energy, because it will probably be nuclear researchers who will find the better solution.

As far as immediate impact on climate change is concerned, nuclear energy is the obvious solution - we can build sufficient nuclear power stations to meet all our needs more quickly and efficiently than we can build wind- or tidal turbines. Nuclear power stations are generally as safe as coal- or gas-fired ones, and they certainly are not going to explode. I am not sure whether anyone has ever conducted a complete environmental audit of nuclear power though - the enery costs of construction and decommissioning, all the concrete used to render the waste manageable etc. etc. , but it is likely to come in well ahead of coal-fired, and as has been pointed out before, thus far the safety of nuclear power has been far better than fossil fuel.

There is one fundemental problem with nuclear energy though, and that is the waste generated. Nuclear waste is uniquely hazardous in that very small quanitities in the wrong place can have catastrophic consequences. This is why radioactive materials are covered by their own raft of health and safety legislation. When we started building and operating nuclear power stations, we had no idea what to do with this waste which ended up simply being put in storage mostly at Windscale aka Sellafield. Much of it is still there and they are constructing more "temporary" storage facilities as we speak. We still do not really know what to do with it short of dumping it where there are fewer voters. Reprocessing generates much larger quantities of (admittedly lower-grade) waste, while making precious little economic sense to boot.

I cannot help feeling that investing a large chunk of our future on a process which develops very dangerous by-products with which we have no way of dealing is simply trading our current problems for future, perhaps equally devastating, problems. A bit like installing a flush toilet without any sewage treatment mechanism in place

Nuclear waste is uniquely hazardous in that very small quanitities in the wrong place can have catastrophic consequences.

eg if wrapped in a wad of conventional explosives and let off in a city . . . or if PP's 'pinhead' ends up in a human lung. Of course, the majority of black market radioactive materials are available outwith this country, but recent data losses and previous plutonium 'accounting errors' (see above) tend to suggest that we are simply incapable of keeping track of something that needs accounted for to the nearest gramme.

I wasn't suggesting, your reverence, that nuclear power stations were 'likely' to blow up, nor was I suggesting, PP, that nuclear power stations were likely terroroist targets (although a well-placed airliner could cause a few problems). However, I do not accept that they are foolproof, and the possiblility of loss of containment in even the most modern nuclear reactor is always there, no matter how small. In other fields of endeavour human error, stupidity or greed has regularly found ways round the most foolproof of safety systems.

The Vicar is quite right though - while other 'disaster' scenarios might be unlikely or purely hypothetical, the biggest argument against rushing into a new generation of nuclear power stations is that we don't want to leave our grandchildren standing around knee-deep in our radioactive sh*t still wondering what to do with it. Sadly though concern for the future beyond ones own political half-life is not a common trait among our politicians.

It is another commonly perceived myth that no-one knows what to do with nuclear waste. The technology of vitrification or encapsulation in rock-like matrices is very well established and deep disposal or storage will see it safe for the relevant timescale. The highly toxic wastes emitted by fossil stations, on the other hand, are just scattered locally and globally and have infinite half-lives. Double standards! Just like we don't bother much about questioning the technology when a community is blown up by leaking gas or when an oil-rig disaster happens. Too many people have the over-the-top phobia expressed by the Vicar and Nick. Natural radon deposits hot particles in the lung. So does smoking fags.

All that's needed for safe disposal of the relatively small amounts of radwaste is money and public acceptability. Again, new philosophies include full stakeholder involvement and financial reward for communities. The technology for nuclear exists - bring it on!!

The highly toxic wastes emitted by fossil stations, on the other hand, are just scattered locally and globally and have infinite half-lives.

Only radioactive materials have half-lives, so the above statement makes no sense. What exactly are these 'highly toxic wastes' to which you refer? The only significant waste 'scattered' by coal fired power stations comes out of the flues, and technologies for dealing with this - fluidised bed technology, scrubbers, carbon capture etc- already exist.

Vitrified nuclear waste is very stable but still highly radioactive. People have been talking about deep disposal on land or subsea for three decades now, and a lot of research has been done. However, to my knowledge no large-scale programme of deep disposal has yet been implemented anywhere in the world, and the vitrified waste currently remains in temporary/intermediate surface storage.

In 2006 the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) released draft recommendations after three years of investigation and consultation. It commented that the time taken to develop deep facilities means that robust interim storage measures are also needed. The committee went on to say:
These "temporary" storage facilities must be safe and secure, particularly against terrorist attacks; and they should be built with the prospect of being used for many decades.

So - presenting deep disposal of vitrified waste as a mature technology and a definite solution for future waste is being a little premature if not wilfully misleading.

Isn't our forum-guru being a bit abusive, Nick? "Wilfully misleading" is surely unnecessarily harsh! Deep disposal programmes in Sweden, Finland, ROK, Japan and Switzerland are well advanced. The CoRWM exercise in UK was a political sham of a process, chaired by an expert on butterflies, a committee which spent 3 years reinventing the wheel and whose processes and conclusions were ridiculed by all and sundry both nationally and internationally and by our own House of Lords Select Committee. Not a good one for you to quote really. Furthermore, surely you can see that a pollutant which does not decay or disappear at all, ie has a half-life of infinity, is more persistent and hence potentially more damaging than one with a finite half-life? At least radwaste species have the decency to disappear over time! What pollutants come from fossil fuel burning? Well, how's about carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, oxides of nitrogen, hydrocarbons, particulates, ozone, volatile organic compounds, sulphate particles, toxic heavy metals, radioactivity (polonium and radium)? Clean fossil fuel technology isn't with us yet and certainly isn't going to happen any time soon in China and the developing world whose emissions will eventually tip the climate into irreversible and disastrous change.

Sandy MacSeil wrote:China and the developing world whose emissions will eventually tip the climate into irreversible and disastrous change.

Steady Alexander old chap; you're backing your argument with statements not based on proven fact but rather on theory and are the subject of massive controversy at the moment.
Otherwise a most interesting and erudite debate going on here although I think some people are, strangely, striking up conversations with themselves!
Personally I'm a supporter of all things nuclear and to solve your little kerfuffle re. disposal of nuclear waste; it seems easy and logical to shove it into a rocket and send the rocket into the sun which will. surely, dispose of it safely.

Shankers (glows in the dark by choice)

Deep disposal programmes in Sweden, Finland, ROK, Japan and Switzerland are well advanced.

Have they actually disposed permanently of any waste yet in any of these countries? I can't find any reference to this having taken place, but would be happy to follow up any link you can provide Sandy. I think however that everyone is still using surface or shallow depth temporary/intermediate storage. The risk assessment required is of an order of magnitude above anything else humanity has attempted due to the very long timescales involved, so I for one am glad they are not rushing into this.

The China problem is another matter. In terms of global CO2 output the UK going nuclear is going to make a negligible difference. On the other hand, the thought of China rushing out a massive nuke-building programme doesn't inspire me with confidence.

I note you mentioned the ROK in your previous post. Interestingly enough that is where the first commercial installation of the Lunar Energy Rotech turbines I mentioned earlier is happening, so they are obviously not planning on putting all their eggs in the nuclear basket.