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Comment by scandox | Hacker News Reader

> Considering that coal is responsible for more radioactive emissions than nuclear per TWh produced including Chernobyl and Fukushima, that is a totally irresponsible and dangerous course of action.

Don't concentration and distribution matter? I mean in Serhii Plokhii's book on Chernobyl he several times repeats the claim that a significant leak into the river/sea would have rendered large parts of Europe uninhabitable. Now either that's a gross lie or your point is ignoring a hugely significant difference between coal production and nuclear. Which is it?

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Concentration absolutely matters, and based on the figures I've seen coal fly ash - which is what the claims about radiation released from coal power plants are based on - is about as radioactive, kg for kg, as granite is. Which isn't nothing, but it's also not exactly nuclear waste. (Speaking of nuclear waste, the comparisons with coal often also get their numbers by ignoring it and only counting radiation intentionally released to the environment from a properly-working plant. Which is basically just a way of saying that if we could solve the nuclear waste disposal problem and the humans are too incompetent to build and run nuclear power plants problem it'd be a really clean form of power. That's probsbly true, but not realistic. Also, the comparison is generally based on really old and polluting coal power plants that mostly don't exist anymore.)

Nuclear waste can basically be safely solved by dumping sealed containers into the sea. We're talking about extremely small amounts of waste. A swimming pool can contain a year's supply of waste, and 20 ft of water is extremely effective radiation shielding. The ocean is so large that this would be totally negligible even if the worst happened.

It's been done before.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_disposal_of_radioactive_...

It wouldn't be negligible. Dumping all our HWL waste (250,000 tons) would increase background radiation of the oceans by 10% if completely mixed, but of course oceans are not. We would simply end up with highly radioactive areas of ocean if and when the containment failed.

Just a throwaway idea, but instead of radiating the whole ocean evenly, why not dump it in the already highly radiated nuclear weapon test zone? The US blow around 100 nukes and I wonder if a few thousands of tons would actually do much worse compared to what already down there.

> I mean in Serhii Plokhii's book on Chernobyl he several times repeats the claim that a significant leak into the river/sea would have rendered large parts of Europe uninhabitable.

The grandparent's claim is about what did happen, not what might have happened in some hypothetical, but the claim you're quoting sounds utterly implausible to me; there simply isn't enough nuclear material anywhere to render a significant area uninhabitable for any significant length of time.

A lie or just wrong? I haven't read the book (but probably will now I've been reminded) but Plokhii is a historian not a scientist, right? Is this a peer reviewed projection or hypothetical scenario a la nuclear bombs igniting the atmosphere?

Fair comment, but these claims form a very major portion of his argument on the ramifications of an accident like Chernobyl and therefore what it really means. So I think if these claims are lacking in substance then he would be guilty of a significant misrepresentation.

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