The new DOE secretary issued a Secretarial Order that is quite supportive of nuclear energy.
What secretary or group of secretaries would have to issue orders to make compliance through Ucert possible? What exactly would those orders say? If you don't write them, someone else will - and they'll probably get it wrong.
From what I've seen reported, Wright's EO is pablum. It expresses support for the DOE nuclear program which is in my view a negative. It says nothing about the NRC, and with good reason. He has no control over the NRC, and Trump has only the most indirect control.
Even in this crazy world of dueling EO's, Executive orders won't cut it. Congress will have to repeal the Atomic Energy Act. The replacement is outlined in some detail in the Underwriter Certification Manual
In the comments to my facebook post sharing this article, I got “I stopped reading when I read ‘environmental buffer zone’, since I can’t un-remember Chernobyl and all the death & illness suffered by the surrounding population.” I asked for a citation for those outcomes and got this link:
“In a 2009 United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) study, the Chernobyl accident had by 2005 caused 61,200 man-Sv of radiation exposure to recovery workers and evacuees, 125,000 man-Sv to the populace of Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia, and a dose to most other European countries amounting to 115,000 man-Sv. The report estimated a further 25% more exposure would be received from residual radioisotopes after 2005.[4] The global collective dose from Chernobyl was earlier estimated by UNSCEAR in 1988 to be "600,000 man Sv, equivalent on average to 21 additional days of world exposure to natural background radiation."[5]”
That same Wikipedia reference also summarizes other studies that, while not specifically mentioning dose rate, must certainly reject cumulative dose having any quantitative effect, I know Wade Allison, referenced below, most certainly doesn't:
"* The application of the linear no threshold model to predict deaths from low levels of exposure to radiation was disputed in a BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) Horizon documentary, broadcast on 13 July 2006.[135] It offered statistical evidence to suggest that there is an exposure threshold of about 200 millisieverts, below which there is no increase in radiation-induced disease. Indeed, it went further, reporting research from Professor Ron Chesser of Texas Tech University, which suggests that low exposures to radiation can have a protective effect. The program interviewed scientists who believe that the increase in thyroid cancer in the immediate area of the explosion had been over-recorded, and predicted that the estimates for widespread deaths in the long term would be proved wrong. It noted the view of the World Health Organization scientist Dr Mike Rapacholi that, while most cancers can take decades to manifest, leukemia manifests within a decade or so: none of the previously expected peak of leukemia deaths has been found, and none is now expected. Identifying the need to balance the "fear response" in the public's reaction to radiation, the program quoted Dr Peter Boyle, director of the IARC: "Tobacco smoking will cause several thousand times more cancers in the [European] population."[136]
* An article in Der Spiegel in April 2016 also cast doubt on the use of the linear no threshold model to predict cancer rates from Chernobyl.[106] The article claimed that the threshold for radiation damage was over 100 millisieverts and reported initial results of large-scale trials in Germany by the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and three other German institutes in 2016 showing beneficial results of decreasing inflammation and strengthening bones from lower radiation doses.
* Professor Wade Allison of Oxford University (a lecturer in medical physics and particle physics) gave a talk on ionising radiation 24 November 2006 in which he gave an approximate figure of 81 cancer deaths from Chernobyl (excluding 28 cases from acute radiation exposure and the thyroid cancer deaths which he regards as "avoidable"). In a closely reasoned argument using statistics from therapeutic radiation, exposure to elevated natural radiation (the presence of radon gas in homes) and the diseases of Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors he demonstrated that the linear no-threshold model should not be applied to low-level exposure in humans, as it ignores the well-known natural repair mechanisms of the body.[137][138]"
So you might mention that:
a) Wikipedia isn't all knowing; it's a collective of people writing about what they believe and
b) the citation he offers includes information that suggests good reason to read on. ;)
The fact that you reply to Chris's lament about failure to focus on dose rate with a list of reference that don't even mention dose rate is telling. Cumulative dose certainly can have a quantitative effect depending on the dose rate.
Do not fall into the Muller threshold trap. A threshold either means absolutely no harm up to that dose rate which you can't prove and is probably false, or it means there couldbe some harm up to that dos rate, in which case you need to say so.
The wrong way to go after LNT is to attack the NT. As long as people keep doing this, LNT will survive.
The new DOE secretary issued a Secretarial Order that is quite supportive of nuclear energy.
What secretary or group of secretaries would have to issue orders to make compliance through Ucert possible? What exactly would those orders say? If you don't write them, someone else will - and they'll probably get it wrong.
V,
From what I've seen reported, Wright's EO is pablum. It expresses support for the DOE nuclear program which is in my view a negative. It says nothing about the NRC, and with good reason. He has no control over the NRC, and Trump has only the most indirect control.
Even in this crazy world of dueling EO's, Executive orders won't cut it. Congress will have to repeal the Atomic Energy Act. The replacement is outlined in some detail in the Underwriter Certification Manual
https://gordianknotbook.com/download/underwriter-certification-of-nuclear-power
which is aimed at the staffers who will have to translate it to legislative verbiage.
I'm not qualified to do that.
Staffers need support from SMEs like yourself to get the language right. If/when we get there, I hope they use your work extensively.
In the comments to my facebook post sharing this article, I got “I stopped reading when I read ‘environmental buffer zone’, since I can’t un-remember Chernobyl and all the death & illness suffered by the surrounding population.” I asked for a citation for those outcomes and got this link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_the_Chernobyl_disaster
The lede reads as follows:
“In a 2009 United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) study, the Chernobyl accident had by 2005 caused 61,200 man-Sv of radiation exposure to recovery workers and evacuees, 125,000 man-Sv to the populace of Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia, and a dose to most other European countries amounting to 115,000 man-Sv. The report estimated a further 25% more exposure would be received from residual radioisotopes after 2005.[4] The global collective dose from Chernobyl was earlier estimated by UNSCEAR in 1988 to be "600,000 man Sv, equivalent on average to 21 additional days of world exposure to natural background radiation."[5]”
Does Wikipedia simply blow off “dose rate” here?
That same Wikipedia reference also summarizes other studies that, while not specifically mentioning dose rate, must certainly reject cumulative dose having any quantitative effect, I know Wade Allison, referenced below, most certainly doesn't:
"* The application of the linear no threshold model to predict deaths from low levels of exposure to radiation was disputed in a BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) Horizon documentary, broadcast on 13 July 2006.[135] It offered statistical evidence to suggest that there is an exposure threshold of about 200 millisieverts, below which there is no increase in radiation-induced disease. Indeed, it went further, reporting research from Professor Ron Chesser of Texas Tech University, which suggests that low exposures to radiation can have a protective effect. The program interviewed scientists who believe that the increase in thyroid cancer in the immediate area of the explosion had been over-recorded, and predicted that the estimates for widespread deaths in the long term would be proved wrong. It noted the view of the World Health Organization scientist Dr Mike Rapacholi that, while most cancers can take decades to manifest, leukemia manifests within a decade or so: none of the previously expected peak of leukemia deaths has been found, and none is now expected. Identifying the need to balance the "fear response" in the public's reaction to radiation, the program quoted Dr Peter Boyle, director of the IARC: "Tobacco smoking will cause several thousand times more cancers in the [European] population."[136]
* An article in Der Spiegel in April 2016 also cast doubt on the use of the linear no threshold model to predict cancer rates from Chernobyl.[106] The article claimed that the threshold for radiation damage was over 100 millisieverts and reported initial results of large-scale trials in Germany by the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and three other German institutes in 2016 showing beneficial results of decreasing inflammation and strengthening bones from lower radiation doses.
* Professor Wade Allison of Oxford University (a lecturer in medical physics and particle physics) gave a talk on ionising radiation 24 November 2006 in which he gave an approximate figure of 81 cancer deaths from Chernobyl (excluding 28 cases from acute radiation exposure and the thyroid cancer deaths which he regards as "avoidable"). In a closely reasoned argument using statistics from therapeutic radiation, exposure to elevated natural radiation (the presence of radon gas in homes) and the diseases of Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors he demonstrated that the linear no-threshold model should not be applied to low-level exposure in humans, as it ignores the well-known natural repair mechanisms of the body.[137][138]"
So you might mention that:
a) Wikipedia isn't all knowing; it's a collective of people writing about what they believe and
b) the citation he offers includes information that suggests good reason to read on. ;)
Ike,
The fact that you reply to Chris's lament about failure to focus on dose rate with a list of reference that don't even mention dose rate is telling. Cumulative dose certainly can have a quantitative effect depending on the dose rate.
Do not fall into the Muller threshold trap. A threshold either means absolutely no harm up to that dose rate which you can't prove and is probably false, or it means there couldbe some harm up to that dos rate, in which case you need to say so.
The wrong way to go after LNT is to attack the NT. As long as people keep doing this, LNT will survive.