Danger of nuclear plant discharges underrated

[seemslikeadream]

Ian Sample and Owen Bowcott
Thursday October 21, 2004
The Guardian

Radioactive discharges from nuclear power plants may be more strictly controlled in the light of a government report which finds that the health risk from particles taken into the body may be 10 times greater than previously thought.
The report, commissioned by the then environment minister Michael Meacher in 2001, says the existing safety guidelines do not take into account recent scientific studies which indicate a greater degree of uncertainty in judging the risk.

Consequently the guidelines either underestimate or overestimate the danger posed by some radioactive materials by up to 10 times, the report says.

...

Last month Mr Meacher supported a minority report by two members of Cerrie, Richard Bramhall of the Low Level Radiation Campaign and Dr Chris Busby of Green Audit, who resigned and argued that the health effects of manmade radiation had been underestimated by a factor of at least 100.

This week he said he feared that "really important evidence that ought to be in the public domain ... is being suppressed."


more
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1331978,00.html

[donsu]

1. tick, tick, tick

nt

[megatherium]

2. compared to the risks of coal?

Coal produces a not insignificant amount of radioactive elements (uranium is found in coal ore). Also, coal mining rips apart the environment, both as a result of the mining of the coal (mountaintop-removal in West Virginia) and the production of C02 (it's increasingly clear that global warming is real and anthropogenic).