Let me make something clear at the outset: All over the world, the nuclear industry takes the events in Japan very seriously. With that in mind, here's some proper perspective from We Support Lee on just how much radioactive material was released from the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant this week:
According to news sources, the leak of radiation at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant in Japan was 90,000 Becquerels, which is one billionth of the legal limit for radioactivity release.So when others start to compare this incident to Chernobyl, please keep this in mind.
90,000 Bq (Becquerels) means 90,000 disintegrations per second.
[...]
How much is 90,000 Bq in the medical world? Medical patients regularly receive 240 million Becquerels during treatments for hyperthyroidism. That's 2667 times what was released into the Sea of Japan.
These patients, some of whom are probably at a clinic in your town right now, watch tv, walk around, sit, talk, read, and disintegrate 131I at 2667 times the rate that the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant's release in the Sea of Japan is decaying.
The bottom line is that the radiation released during the earthquake is insignificant.
Comments
And if by "crystal ball" you mean "access to CNN's web site", I guess We Support Lee qualifies. I know it's hard when people cite their sources, but those little links do come in handy. Personally I think the Internet is miles better than a crystal ball.
I freely confess that I am biased towards reality. Fiction is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.
http://www.truestarhealth.com/Notes/1795005.html
Relative abundance of K-40 is 1.2*10^-4, Specific Activity is 2.59*10^5 Bq/g.
(90000 Bq * 0.25L) / (436*10^-3 g * 1.2*10^-4 * 2.59*10^5 Bq/g) = 1,660 L, or 438.5 gallons.
That's close to the volume of water released from the plant. Ergo, one notes that the water was pretty much radiologically equivalent to orange juice.
Release from plant: 2 to 3 microCuries. Typical dose for one infusion of a rest/stress study for myocardial perfusion imaging: 60 milliCuries. Note that is more than 1000 times.
The interesting thing, my company is contracting on a project to design a new infusion cart, and the most serious risks are not radiation doses. They are things like electrical contact with the saline supply, which reaches all the way to the patient's heart, or air bubbles appearing in the line. In fact, due to the characteristics of the generator, it would be fairly difficult to give someone a harmful dose.
Of course similar risk disparities abound for any honest risk assessment done for pretty much anything having to do with nuclear technology.
-Aaron
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/betu07_e/images/070719e1.html
This is why I draw a different conclusion than what's presented in the world's media.
Bill V.