Article: A "Radiating" Future - No Thanks!

Our entire planet has been contaminated with radioactivity ever since nuclear bombs and nuclear power first came into use around the time of the second world war. An orgy of atom bomb tests between �59 and �63 - as well as reprocessing of nuclear fuel and the routine emissions from swedish and foreign nuclear reactors - has continually added to the meassure of "background radiation" which we and our grandchildren and many coming generations later will have to live with. (The halflife of uranium 238 still remains 4.500 miljon years - with human meassure an eternity...)

There�s a big controvercy about just how dangerous this increased radiation is - depending on whether you�re listening to independent researchers - or to someone hired by or defending the nuclear industry: like Euratom/EU, The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) or local radiation protection authorities (like the swedish SSI: "According to the monitoring carried out emissions from the Barseb�ck reactors are far below the levels which SSI permits.."

Doctor Rosalie Bertell (who received the alternative Nobel prize, "Right Livelyhood Award", in Stockholm 1986 - and who has been consulted by both the US congress and authorities in Australia as an independant expert) has written this: "Countries with nuclear power allways refer to "international safety standards" to prove that low doses of radiation are not dangerous. Strangely enough most nuclear acccidents manage to disperse releases well within these "acceptable" limits - or else they are only releasing what�s called "noble gases" without mentioning to the public that these gases decay into strontium 90 and cesium 137". Swedish releases are excused by the same arguments.

International safety standards were decided from the beginning by the same physicists which were developing the atomic bomb - their main concern was not at all protecting people from biological effects, no it was a question of bombs for peace(!) at any cost.. For instance Euratom�s primary purpose (article one) is "to create the conditions necessary for the speedy establishment and growth of nuclear industries to contribute to raising the standard of living in the Member states"! Both Sweden (who wants to get away from nuclear power) and Denmark (who was always against nuclear power) have as members of Euratom confusingly accepted this wording of the treaty. One would suppose that it had been more reasonable to set protection of the population first of all ?

Dr Chris Busby in his book "Wings of death" outlines evidence how known releases have caused increases in cancers and deaths: depending on which type of cancer-illness is in question the result in disease may delay shorter or longer - acute leukaemia may show up allready 3-5 years after you�re exposed to radiation, other types of cancer show up 20 years from the release. But if you take account of this delay - you will see that the increases in cancers, infant mortality or malformation in babies will follow the curves showing known major contaminations.

At the start of �97 a UN organisation, Unscear, published a report comparing 43 reactors in western countries - which showed that swedish nuclear power plants releases "MORE radioactivity to both air and water than other reactors"! The report actually showed that one single swedish reactor in Oskarshamn was responsible for 24 % of the combined releases of "noble gases" from all reactors in the world during 1988 - and that another swedish reactor, Ringhals1, during the years �85-�88 did release 50 times more of these gases than the average! So much for the "safe, swedish nuclear power" - the local radiation protection authority, SSI, whose pride ought to be relative to how well they fullfill their job of protecting people in Sweden from unneccessary radiation, had to confirm the claims of the UN-report In the same pages SSI also describes 3 swedish reactors as having the simplest kind of exhaust-filtering system out of all BWR-reactors in the world - and both of the reactors at Barseb�ck belong, along with the american reactor Monticello, the category second-simplest cleaning systems.

Following anxiety among the local population over unusual many cases of cancer in the neigborhood of Barseb�ck, the regional cancerregistry at the universty hospital at nearby Lund took a closer look at the statistics and at the end of 1997 their report came out. Even though it didn�t specifically point out the Barseb�ck reactors as the cause, the statistics were clear enough: They showed an increase of a whole range of cancer illnesses! Amongst which was a five fold increase of acute leukaemia above what should be expected (in Sweden as a whole leukaemia makes up about a third of all cancers in children - so around 100 children pr year are victims with tragedies as a consequense for the parents, families and friends who are involved). In several parts of this otherwise "neutral" or carefully worded report, terms are used to describe the findings - like "significantly enhanced occurrencies" (of lymphatic leukaemia) and "clearly significant over-risks" (of skin-cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphomia and cancer of the urine-bladder).

Even if radiation protection authorities have to admit that there isn�t any level of radiation which can be said to be safe - they still persist in turning safety precaution upside down - like a pyramid standing tremblingly on its point: nuclear power is good - so therefore we have to put up with the risks. A little radiation is not as dangerous as a Hiroshima bomb, so that�s a risk we�ll have to take. There�s no way to safely take care of all the radioactive waste for all future - so therefore we have to allow that low level waste be disposed of in the environment or to permit that metal from closed down reactors be recycled (for instance by the swedish company named "RadWaste" near the plant called "Studsvik") - recycled so it can be used to make new products and sold to customers who are not told and therefore have no way to protect themselves!

This latest procedure is fully in compliance with a new EU law (of course written by Euratom, who does act under controll by any parliament) - which will make it the standard, that low level radioactive materials can be used for just about anything by the industry - they will not have to ask for authorisation or to report in which ways this radioactive material is dispersed into society! If everything goes according to the EU plans - the directive has to be implemented into the law of all member states at the latest by May next year. And if one country follows these "regulations" approved by the EU - then no other country may stop the free import of such "radiant" commodities onto its own "free" marcetplace.

While speaking of toppled logic: Sweden, as well as Norway and Finland, has assigned hundreds of millions of kroners to help Russia take care of all the nuclear waste which is piling up in the northern region of Murmansk - maybe as a result of the lesson from the drastic effects after the accident at Chernobyl, which has shown us that we are not immune to releases in other countries. But the Swedish Defense Research organisation (FOA) has shown in one of its own reports that far more input of radioactivity in the oceans north of Murmansk and Scandinavia comes from the "legal" outpourings from Sellafield in England - much more than from the entire accident at Chernobyl. When participating in a workshop at the European parliament I was wawing with another report from Greenpeace - quoting from their information, that between 2-3 times more of radioactive cesium in the nordic waters originates from Sellafield, than what was spread from the Chernobyl-accident.

Three weeks later even the nordic ministers of environment were protesting to England against this - but as far as I know neither the nordic environmental ministers nor their radiation protection authorities has raised any objections to the new EU-directive - which, if England were to implement it, would permit England to raise the limits for releases of cesium to 250 times higher! So - even though England has been proven to cause a great deal of the total releases - it is a fact that English legislation has been much stricter than for instance Sweden�s or most of the rest of Europe�s: the lower limit in England has been 400 Bq pr kilo - while the rest of Europe and Sweden has chosen a limit of 100.000 Bq/kg. Now - if England�s much stricter limits have not prevented enourmous amounts of radioactive contamination, then noone can claim that Sweden�s and the rest of Europe�s standars are safe - and consequently protests from our ministers against any further weakening of limits by this new EU-directive would be logical, and the least we should demand from them!

On top of all this EU and Euratom have been so generous towards the nuclear industry, that such isotopes which are causing the industry the hardest headaches - well, for those the limits have been set extra high... Krypton and Tritium are two such examples: for Krypton 85 the new limits for exemption is going to be 1.000 times higher than the previous EU-limit and 250.000 times higher than Englands 400 Bq/kg. For Tritium the new limits are set 10.000 times higher than earlier by EU - and all of 2,5 million times higher than England�s present limit. This demonstrates clearly that the present lawmakers are more conserned about the continued operation of the nuclear industry - than about safeguarding all living beings?

THE LATEST NEWS ! Our friends in "Low Level Radiation Campaign" in England have had several long meetings, both with the EU Commision as well as with their own environmental Minister. It seems as if they have won som respect with their own government for our objections to the directive - and that England may choose to not implement the new limits, but rather will stick to their present limits of 400 Bq/kg. Also indications are that they will not let go of controls on how industry gets rid of radioactive materials - it is assumed that 400 Bq shall continue to be the maximum limit for disposal of radioactivity from exempt businesses and to Clearance from nuclear sites. The Low Level Radiation Campaign opposes clearance of contaminated material - even at the 400 Bq/kg level - because of the very large amounts of radioactive atoms that could be released into the environment by that route.

What will governments in the rest Europe do?

The british government�s position, which is far more cautious than expected by the regulators, the commission, the nuclear industry or the radiological protection organisations - is a good example for all other governments to follow: We can certainly decide to maintain tougher regulations and practices within our own countries, even though the problem with imported goods from other countries remains - if we allow EU�s concept of radioactivity as a "free trade"-commodity to be unchallenged!