It seems like the anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011 is always the cause for freaking out about radiation. Fukushima radiation has reached North American shores.
At least these folks include some actual data. Most journalists when faced with actual numbers that aren’t the number of drinks they had on Friday, resort to meaningless measures – like “one tenth the size of a human hair.” In this case I kept seeing “1000 times lower than the dose allowed by Canada in drinking water.” Which is fine if you trust Canadian authorities to set reasonable standards.
Still, these guys at least try not generate panic.
“Even if the levels were twice as high, you could still swim in the ocean for six hours every day for a year and receive a dose more than a thousand times less than a single dental X-ray,” Buesseler said. “While that’s not zero, that’s a very low risk.”
They have to give a tip of the hat to the Linear No Threshold hypothesis of radiation exposure, but that isn’t on the journalists so much, because that is how a lot of the policies are written. Even though we know that LNT is so much bovine scatology.
And while they do give the measurements – “1.5 becquerels per cubic meter (Bq/m3) of cesium-134, the Fukushima fingerprint, and 5 Bq/m3 of cesium-137” – they neglect to give any indication of what a Becquerel is (aside from a “basic unit of radioactivity”) or what the standards are.
A Becquerel is defined as one radioactive decay per second. And so one decay per second per unit of measure, which is cubic meters in this case.
Of course not all radiation is created equal, and so this doesn’t tell the whole story, but at least they are trying. Though I suppose going into the energy in the various types of ionizing radiation and the different effects they have is beyond the scope of something like this article. Still it would have been nice to see the dose listed in Sieverts (or millisieverts more likely) since that is a better measure of deleterious effects.
We can detect stupidly small amounts of radiation. And radiation isn’t all the result of nuclear testing and nuclear power. Radiation is everywhere; it rains down on us from outer-space and it comes out of the rocks in the earth. You can’t get away from it. So don’t Freak Out.
I suppose we can in part blame this on the Sendai conference on disaster preparedness and recovery that just finished. I didn’t pay a lot of attention to this, but the UN didn’t get what they wanted – which is usually more power and money.
Some additional posts on the topic:
TFS Magnum – Archives: The Banana Equivalent Dose, or Your Food is (always has been) Radioactive.
Once Again the Radiation Scare Rears Its Stupid Head | 357 Magnum.
357 Magnum Archive 
Wait… one radioactive decay per cubic meter per second? And I’m supposed to be concerned about that? Out of, what?, 10^24 or 10^26 molecules?
Thanks again. Nobody handles this story as well as you.
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Probably not that many molecules in the ocean… there are about 1 X 10^80 elementary particles in the whole universe. (There are about 1 X 10^24 seconds in the 13.8 billion years since the Big Bang – for comparison.)
But I take your meaning. And while Cesium 134 isn’t part of the background radiation level, it also isn’t especially energetic. And it has a half-life of 2 point some years, so it will cease to be an issue in another decade or so. Cesium 137 is a bit more of an issue, but even that….
Aside from a few truly “Hot” spots near Fukushima-Daiichi people could be living in the exclusion zone. But the Linear No Threshold theory of nuclear contamination is in effect. Even though it means nothing at these levels. “Jumping off a chair is no big deal. Jumping of a cliff can be a problem.” There is no difference in jumping and falling except for the amount of falling. LNT says they are both the same.
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And also 1 decay per second out of every cubic meter in the vicinity of the testing site. Which is also isn’t clear where they are testing. (Getting real scientific info from the popular media is impossible.)
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Where I was coming from is I remember there’s Avogadro’s Number (6.023 * 10^23) atoms or molecules in a mole (depending on if it’s pure monoatomic species, or H2 or bigger molecules). And I think a mole of water weighs something like 18 grams, so I figured a cubic meter of water has to weigh a bunch more than that. 100 moles or 1000? No idea. And everything but Avogadro’s Number has long ago dribbled out with some dead brain cells.
As you say, there’s a combination of problems here. First is we can measure silly-low levels of radiation and second is that whole Linear No Threshold paradigm.
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Former Atomic Energy Commission director Dixie Lee Ray wrote a book called “Trashing the Planet”, debunking a lot of anti-nuclear propaganda. One of the more interesting figures in the book was the amount of radioactive material dispersed by burning coal vs. the maximum release of an atomic power plant.
I probably need to scrounge up another copy of the book; I’ve forgotten most of the details, but I remember it as quite entertaining.
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There is radioactivity in just about everything. Explain to potential renters that Radon gas is naturally occurring radioactive gas, and watch them freak out.
There is radioactivity in your bananas, nuts, cigarettes, cigars, etc.
Couples who sleep together get a measurably higher radiation dose every year because the person you are sleeping next to is radioactive. Not very, but measurable.
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