RADIATION

1. RADIATION

2. "Only two things are infinite: The Universe and human stupidity.And I'm not certain about the former." —Albert Einstein

3. Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect." ~ Chief Seattle, 1854

4. We've arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces. ~ Carl Sagan

5. There is a great race on between humanity's technological powers and our wisdom to use those powers well.

6. Humanity has survived what we might call natural existential risks for hundreds of thousands of years, such as asteroid impacts, super-volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, gamma-ray bursts, and so forth. The likelihood of extinction because of these kinds of risk is extremely small on a time scale of a century or so.

7. In contrast, our species is introducing entirely new kinds of existential risk – threats we have no track record of surviving. Our longevity as a species therefore offers no strong prior grounds for confident optimism.

8. There's no such thing as an acceptable radiation level. In any amount, radiation is harmful, cumulative, permanent and unforgiving.

9. Exposure to Uranium, Radium and Thorium, which occur naturally, are normally isolated geologically from the environment under shale and quartz.Man is responsible for disturbing them, digging them up and contaminating the environment.

10. These naturally occurring elements are responsible for cellular mutations and cancers. Any exposure above natural (non-ionizing) background radiation causes diseases which would have been preventable.

11. There is a difference between external and internal radiation. Internal radiation,absorbed by inhalation or ingestion,becomes embedded in your cells, tissues and organs releasing destructive energy for the lifetime of the person, plant or animal.

12. External radiationfrom X-rays, cosmic & neutron, gamma rays can harm or kill.

13. While some forms of radiation are necessary and naturally occurring in life, others are artificially generated from various sources.

14. When energy is released as a waveform, electromagnetic radiation results. When energy is released as a particle, radioactivity exists.

15. Radioactivity is generated when an atomic nucleus experiences decay and takes on the form of alpha and beta particles. However, this type of atomic decay may also cause waves of energy to be released as gamma rays.

16. Most harmful radiation results from radioactivity or electromagnetic radiation with frequencies in excess of those in visible light, such as with X rays or gamma rays. This type of harmful electromagnetic radiation is known as ionizing radiation.

17. Ionizing radiation is the more harmful; it produces charged subatomic particles from nuclear bombs, nuclear reactors,dental & medical X-rays, CT scans and also from food irradiation.

18. Ionization is the ejection of one or more electrons from an atom or moleculeto produce a fragment with a net positive charge(positive ion).

19. Ionizing radiation has the effect of disturbing and interfering with cell division.

20. Ionizing radiation has been shown to induce DNA damage, which can lead to mutagenesis and carcinogenesis, depending on the total dose, dose rate and animal species...

21. A single alpha particle from Plutonium, Uranium, Americium or Radon can deliver a huge blast of radiation inside your body. This radiation energy can destroy your genetic material at a cellular level.

22. An emission from a radionuclidethat chanced to ride on your sandwich into your stomach, an exposure so tiny that it would never be measured, has the capacity to start what might become fatal cancer.

23. Once you ingest or inhale even very low levels of radioactive particles the Petkau effect immediately starts potentially lethal tissue ionization. The Petkau effect basically means that you are ionizing or irradiating yourself continuously from the inside out. This insidious burning at your molecular level will impair your body long before there is a diagnosable disease.

24. Even before we get cancer from radiation we have a general down-spiraling of body functions because of all the oxidative stress.

25. The smaller Beta particles can travel farther and are more penetrating than Alpha particles. Beta particles pose both internal and external risks to your body. Inhalation or ingestion are the most common methods of Beta assaults.

26. Stontium 90 and tritium are released from Nuclear Power plants during normal operation. Once in your body, Strontium 90 is mistaken for calcium, which your body uses to create new blood cells. This increases your risk ofbone and blood cancerssuch as Leukemia.

27. Tritium binds with the most abundant element on earth, Hydrogen, which is a component of water. Once bonded with water, your DNA is irradiated internally.

28. The most penetrating and damaging radiation are the Gamma rayswhich mimic potassium in our bodies and collects in our muscles. Cesium 137, Iodine 141 and Iodine 129 emit Gamma rays. The thyroid gland is the first to uptake radioactive iodine.

29. “Ionizing radiation" can produce a number of physiological effects,such as those associated with risk of mutation or cancer, which non-ionizing radiation cannot directly produce at any intensity.

30. Any radiation with quantum energy above a few electron volts is considered to be ionizing radiation.

31. The threshold for ionization lies somewhere in the ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum, so all x-rays and gamma-rays are ionizing radiation. All forms of nuclear radiation are also ionizing radiation because of their extremely high energies.

32. Once they are ingested, inhaled, or enter your body through a cut, they cut through your body like knife through butter, into the cells, blood or other organs, impacting other organs and leaving behind hideous, shocking damage.

33. The practical threshold for radiation risk is that of ionization of tissue. Since the ionization energy of a hydrogen atom is 13.6 eV (electron volts), the level around 10 eV is an approximate threshold.

34. Since the energies associated with nuclear radiation are many orders of magnitude above this threshold, in the MeV range, then all nuclear radiation is ionizing radiation. Likewise, x-rays are ionizing radiation, as is theupper end of the ultraviolet range.

35. Hazardous radionuclides (like) Iodine-131, Cesium-137, and other isotopes bio-concentrate at each step of various food chains, from algae to crustaceans to small fish to bigger fish to animals to humans, as well as vegetation.

36. They then affect specific bodily organs,including the thyroid, liver, bone and brain, where they continuously irradiate small volumes of cells with high doses of alpha, beta and/or gamma radiation, and over many years, can induce uncontrolled cell replication.That's cancer!

37. In addition, nuclides stay radioactive for generations, causing increased incidences of cancer and genetic diseases.

38. Radiation causes deathnot only through cancer but also through heart disease, diabetes and other chronic situations.

39. * Cesium 137 accumulates in fatty tissues, liver, spleen and muscles • * Iodide-131 accumulates in Thyroid, breast and ovaries • * Strontium-90 concentrates in your bones and liver • * Barium-140 causes bone tumors up to 30 years later • * Tellurium-132 causes cell mutations, repeatedly via replication • * Yttrium-0 damage to liver and respiration • * Putonium-244 concentrates in your liver • * Uranium 235 accumulates in your bones and liver These diseases and mutations don't stop with us. If ionizing radiation enters our genes,not only does it causeirreversible damage to this generation, but to future generations.

40. Cesium-137 –mimics potassiumStrontium-90 –mimics calciumIodine-131 –mimics iodinePlutonium – mimics iron

41. Cesium-137 is released as a gas and has chemical properties similar to potassium.Thus it reaches highest concentrations in potassium-rich foods,like berries and mushrooms and in animal products at the top of the food chain (e.g. milk and meat). In the body it accumulates in the same organs in which potassium accumulates(heart, pancreas and other endocrine organs, intestine and kidneys).

42. Eight months after the Fukushima meltdown, the Japanese Science Ministry released a map showing that 11,580 square miles, 30,000 square kilometers, or 13% of the Japanese mainland, had been contaminated with Cesium-137.

43. Somewhere between 4500 and 7700 square miles (an area approximately the size of Connecticut) was found to have radiation levels that exceeded Japan’s previous allowable exposure limitof 1 mSv per year. Rather than evacuate this area,Japan chose to raise its acceptable radiation exposurefrom 1mSv to 20 mSv per year.

44. The Japanese government has already declared Fukushima rice totally safe provided it emits less than 100 Becquerels (Bq) per kilogram (kg). (A Becquerel is one atomic disintegration per second.)

45. Even 1 mSv (14,000 Bq) per year is NOT safe in children,as WHO and ICRP claim. The figure is based on the assumption that absorbed Cesium-137 is distributed uniformly throughout the body. Research done between 1991 and 1999, post Chernobyl, found that children exposed to whole body radiation levels above 50 Bq per kg of body weight experienced irreversible damage to their heart and other vital organs.

46. The state of the art of nuclear power generation is such that it was deeply flawed and fundamentally dangerous from the very beginning. This fact was completely understood to be the case by the industry insiders and original financiers of every nuclear power plant ever built.

47. Nuclear engineers had a very good understanding of just how vulnerable the design, engineering and architecture was at the startup of this industry. Nevertheless, they proceeded with this ill-fated enterprise.

48. Does anyone in their right mind believe that nuclear power plants can ever be designed, engineered or constructed to withstand 9.0 earthquakes followed by 15 meter high tsunamis?

49. There has been a deliberate effortby Japanese government, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the Obama administration, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) to minimize the long term health consequences of nuclear fallout, especially to children.

50. Instead of backtracking on the billions of dollars he approved to subsidize TEPCO to build more US nuclear power plants, Obama is participating in an international cover-up to conceal the serious long term dangers of this technology.