Living with radiation

[Sugar Hill Kevis]

Hey fine people...

I'm supposed to write an unbiased article on living with radiation as part of my science project.

I was wondering if anybody could help me out with some points to cover and maybe some general information which could come in handy.

I really have no idea where to start and any help would be much appreciated!

[Delirium]

You are going to need to specify a whole lot more than that.

[commiecrusader]

For case studies look at Chernobyl, Hiroshima and the other place in Japan, which temporarily eludes me... Nagasaki or something. You could try and find information on the Nuclear power plant explosion in North Korea that happened a while back, but I doubt you'll find much on that. The people of Chernobyl are probably the most well documented. There is also a charity for Chernobyl children, you could try asking them for some information. Search for them on the net and you should find them hopefully. Hope this helps, good luck.

[RebelOutcast]

I wrote an essay like that a few years ago, I can post it here if you want.

[Sugar Hill Kevis]

thanks commie crusader that's got me off to a really good start!

and Rebel Outcast, that would be awesome if you could!

[RebelOutcast]

It's under a Creative Commons license, so read the license, It's pretty liberal and shouldn't affect you anyway.
It might not be exactly what you were looking for but should help.

The nuclear debate

Today we generate most of our energy from the four non-renewable resources- i.e. coal, oil, gas, nuclear. The use of these is not without problems as yet unsolved, which effect our environment, health and ultimately our future. The fossil fuels release carbon dioxide causing the greenhouse effect and thus global warming. The use of coal also releases sulphur dioxide causing acid rain. However this can be reduced by taking the sulphur out before it is burned or by cleaning the emissions. Coal mining ruins the landscape especially open cast mining. Oil spillages cause serious environmental problems.
Clearly modern society will continue to demand reliable, economic and safe sources of energy. Modern living demands continuous supplies of energy to our homes, schools, hospitals and workplaces. We need energy for electricity, general transportation, industry, medicine, food preparation and for everyday comforts.
On the face of it nuclear power seemed to be the answer to our needs. Irradiation can make some foods safe for longer it can be used to improve the quality of tools, gauges and machines. It can be used to diagnose abnormalities of the metabolism and to treat cancer. It powers spacecrafts and is one of the cleanest environmentally friendly ways of producing electricity.
Nuclear power harnesses the energy released from splitting atoms, usually of uranium or plutonium. This creates steam that drives the turbines to generate power. The world’s first nuclear power station was opened in the UK in 1956 at Calder Hall in Cumbria, and there are now several hundred reactors in operation around the world. However, Sellafield (one of Britain’s best known nuclear plants) is likely to cease its reprocessing activities in the next decade.
In 2001, twenty five percent of UK electricity was generated by nuclear power. Reprocessing (the process of recycling uranium.) was developed when industry experts believed uranium would become extremely expensive. Nuclear power has not developed as widely as was expected fresh uranium never became as expensive as was expected. Plutonium and depleted uranium is particularly hard to dispose of safely.
However, the overall cost of nuclear power is high due to the cost of the power plant and final decommissioning. Public fears over safety also make the future for nuclear power uncertain, especially with regard towards major catastrophe E.g. the accidents at Windscale (1957), Three Mile Island (1980) and Chernobyl (1986).
Despite the fact that nuclear power ensures that the UK can meet its commitments on global warming- all but one of our existing nuclear power stations are due to close within the next twenty five years. By 2023 Sizewell will be UK’s only current nuclear plant. We will need new power plants, which must be quicker and cheaper to build. Possibly ten power stations each of one thousand to twelve hundred MW capacity between 2010 and 2025.
The nuclear project must address many issues including construction risks, public acceptability, nuclear waste policy and spent fuel management contracts. The nuclear program might be privately financed. Privatisation should ensure profit making and business success, which in turn should ensure reinvestment and maintenance of plants.
The future of nuclear power is in the hands of the politicians, but at the end of the day like the fossil fuels, uranium and plutonium will eventually run out. It has been suggested that the policy should target a mix of 15% coal, 40% gas, 20% renewable, and 25% nuclear by 2025.
Environmental groups like Greenpeace argue that nuclear power projects should be aborted and believe that we should make greater use of renewable energy. This is largely because of the nuclear waste produced and consequent storage problems. Nuclear fuel inside reactors needs replacing every few years. The spent nuclear fuel is highly dangerous. Even after spent fuel is removed the reactor buildings are still contaminated with radioactive particles, which makes them difficult and expensive to decommission. The nuclear industry says it will take more than one hundred years to dismantle reactors. Britain’s current nuclear cleaning bill, excluding military facilities, is in excess of £50 billion.
Without nuclear power many space missions could not have been accomplished. Generators have powered versatile and complex instruments including computers and communications equipment than make it possible to transmit 115,200 bits of data per second including photos on the voyager missions from Jupiter. The Cassini mission began in October 1997 when a Titan IV launch vehicle lifted its payload into orbit.
The mission is a joint U.S. – European venture to explore Saturn in detail, a journey that will take nearly seven years, arriving in Saturn’s orbit in July 2004. The electrical energy to power the mission equipment including communications and sensors comes from three radioisotope thermoelectric generators that will provide a total of eight hundred and fifty watts of power.
We also know that Russian scientists have announced plans to build a nuclear power station on mars. They say that all the necessary technical drawings have been completed and they are nearly ready to begin construction work the power plant should be up and running by 2030. Experts are already questioning the feasibility of the project. The problem of protecting personnel and their environment from radiation is still to be solved.
Irradiation has been used on certain foods for more than forty years. The effects of this are that disease-causing microorganisms in food are reduced or eliminated with no changes in nutritional value or appearance. The food does not become irradiated, however it is still expensive and can only be applied to some foods and permitted radiation doses will not kill all microorganisms. Consumer products e.g. teething rings are sterilised using this technology.
In industry we can analyse materials thoroughly with less expense and faster due to nuclear science. Radioisotopes are vital to industry and are in a number of consumer products such as smoke alarms, alarm clocks, soft drinks bottles and shrink wrap film. Equipment employing radioisotopes are used in law enforcement, archaeology and farming e.t.c. Nuclear medicine and radiology are used as a diagnostic procedure and as a therapeutic procedure. Nuclear medicine and radioisotopes are introduced into the body internally, where as radiology x-rays penetrate the body from outside.
Gamma radiography shows flaws in physical objects and internal inspection is possible without damage.
Neutron Activation is a method of determining the concentration of elements in a wide variety of samples accurately and precisely. A few examples of this use are the detection of drugs or explosives or ores.
In conclusion, I believe that nuclear technology is necessary for treatment of cancers, the production of accurately measured components in things such as computers and everyday necessities such as alarm clocks and smoke alarms it is also important for making sure some foods are safe to consume. The mistrust that people have towards nuclear power is misplaced and we will need nuclear power if we want to have electricity supplies to continue in the next century as fossil fuels will run out in around fifty years time and existing alternative energy sources are unfeasible. We will need nuclear power to supply us with electricity.

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[Sugar Hill Kevis]

thanks :D

That's helped a lot, I've been able to adapt a fair bit of that!

Cheers!