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Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

irsn.fr

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Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#14

Post by bootload »

jshmrsn wrote: post #2

Can someone describe the significance/insignificance/context of this?

"Iodine-131 is a radionuclide with a short half-life (T1/2 = 8.04 day)."

Short half life, a nuclear event of some sort happened recently and nothing has been reported. I-131 is an isotope of Iodine and the source could be natural gas related, medical diagnostic OR a product of uranium and plutonium used in nuclear fission. [0]

Which countries have access to plutonium?

"only particulate iodine was reported."

What is the source of the particles?

"first found during week 2 of January 2017 in northern Norway."

What countries have access to plutonium that are active near Norway?

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine-131

Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#15

Post by tonfa »

jshmrsn wrote: post #2

Can someone describe the significance/insignificance/context of this?

French version of the news mentions that it has no health impact: http://www.irsn.fr/FR/Actualites_presse/Actualites/Pages/201...

"Ces niveaux sont sans aucune conséquence sanitaire"

I suppose the interest is in understanding the source of it.

Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#16

Post by iSnow »

bitL wrote: post #4

Poland has the highest reading - something going awry at Chernobyl or somebody testing low yield nukes? I am also really disappointed this wasn't anywhere in the news, at least people could have taken some iodine. I understand the level is low but there is still non-zero probability of somebody going ill from it.

I think we can rule out low-yield nukes, those test would still create a noticeable signal.

If I had to place a bet, then I'd put it on some low to medium accident at a nuclear power station in Russia that led to an emergency release of contaminated steam.

Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#17

Post by raverbashing »

cjensen wrote: post #7
jshmrsn wrote: post #2

Can someone describe the significance/insignificance/context of this?

The ISRN appears to be a French government agency. They are claiming to have detected non-natural levels of radioactive iodine across Europe. The implication is that someone, somewhere had a nuclear accident and did not report it.

Yes, it stands for "institute for radioprotection and nuclear safety"

Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#18

Post by [deleted] »

iSnow wrote: post #16
bitL wrote: post #4

Poland has the highest reading - something going awry at Chernobyl or somebody testing low yield nukes? I am also really disappointed this wasn't anywhere in the news, at least people could have taken some iodine. I understand the level is low but there is still non-zero probability of somebody going ill from it.

I think we can rule out low-yield nukes, those test would still create a noticeable signal. If I had to place a bet, then I'd put it on some low to medium accident at a nuclear power station in Russia that led to an emergency release of contaminated steam.

[deleted]

Re: Detection of radioactive iodine at trace levels in Europe in January 2017

#19

Post by Haldir »

en wrote: post #5

The releases of January 2017 are 10,000 times lower than those observed (in France) following the Fukushima incident[0] CRIIRAD[1] believes that the meteorological conditions (and air pollution actually in Europe) and (legal) authorizations of iodine-131 releases by the industry are the cause of this event which could have passed unnoticed[0] It is an unimportant event. [0] http://www.criirad.org/balises/CRIIRAD_1702…

Are you certain you have your scaling factor correct? Your Link and also https://www.bfs.de/DE/themen/ion/umwelt/luft-boden/spurenmes... report ~50micro Becquerel/m3. Not sure how you calculated 10000 as the scaling factor.
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