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Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#101

Post by mlyle »

maxbond wrote: post #69
godelski wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read the second paragraph, this is addressed. If you follow the links in the BBC article you'll find data on the wildlife. The only thing abnormal about population sizes in the area is that there are a larger number of wolves than compared to non-contaminated regions. But we also need to consider that due to the size of this area, that it in essence is akin to the largest nature preserve and has far fewer huma…

Your claim is that bioaccumulation is not a problem because a.) It has not reached a level dangerous to humans (through direct consumption) and b.) Life is thriving in Pripyat. a.) is orthogonal, and b.) is encouraging but doesn't establish that there _isn't_ a problem here. Mostly what I take issue to is that you're saying people need to stop being concerned about something, but the reasons you gave didn't really su…

If bioaccumulation hasn't posed a problem yet, it doesn't seem to be too much of a concern.

The dose rate near Chernobyl has fallen 2 orders of magnitude. Further, now the vast majority of the activity is Cs-137, which is excreted pretty quickly. Further, the waste is getting buried and further removed from the food chain (though Russia recently stirred up soil there, which isn't ideal).

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#102

Post by NikkiA »

gus_massa wrote: post #33
bboygravity wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One hypothesis is that the moon was basically spat out by a supercritical natural fission reactor inside earth at a time when the earth was still rotating much faster. Basically slinging a part of itself into space to form the moon. I love that hypothesis.

Sadly the current most popular hypothesis in the scientific community is the collision of a smaller version of the Earth with another planet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_the_Moon

Oddly enough, that article doesn't mention the name 'Theia' or even link to the larger page on the collision theory that searching for 'Theia' brings...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theia_(planet)

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#104

Post by formerly_proven »

Konohamaru wrote: post #85
dekhn wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That didn't sound too right for me (but my biology knowledge is dated at this point) so I read the relevant section from that page. It concludes wiht: """The delayed fungal evolution hypothesis is controversial, however, and has been challenged by other researchers, who conclude that a combination of vast depositional systems present on the continents during the formation of Pangaea and widespread humid, tropical con…

This is good news. The idea of the delayed fungal evolution hypothesis was this: "Before trees grew wood that was unable to rot and so became coal but after fungus came now wood is ruined and it's impossible to make coal again." Understanding that coal formation is a reversible process and that a new agent didn't permanently ruin the process, is a sigh of relief.

So coal is actually renewable?

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#105

Post by mbfg »

godelski wrote: post #63
beders wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, a nature reserve... Never mind the 200,000 people that had to be relocated... It doesn't matter how we perceive as nature coping with this disaster. The fact that it shouldn't have happened, the fact that there are still other reactors in operation of the same type, the fact that billions of tax payer dollars went into preventing more severe consequences should be a warning sign that this madness we call nuclear…

> Never mind the 200,000 people that had to be relocated... This is definitely a traumatic event. I'm not going to downplay this or the harm done at Fukushima. But I also don't think it is helpful to exaggerate the damage. The context of the discussion here was about nature and wildlife, so that's what I talked about. If you want to bring people into the conversation then I think that's a different matter. The cost o…

Surely the engineers didn't think the plants would be unsafe, right? I'm not sure what's so bad faith about that particular argument.

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#106

Post by godelski »

maxbond wrote: post #69
godelski wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read the second paragraph, this is addressed. If you follow the links in the BBC article you'll find data on the wildlife. The only thing abnormal about population sizes in the area is that there are a larger number of wolves than compared to non-contaminated regions. But we also need to consider that due to the size of this area, that it in essence is akin to the largest nature preserve and has far fewer huma…

Your claim is that bioaccumulation is not a problem because a.) It has not reached a level dangerous to humans (through direct consumption) and b.) Life is thriving in Pripyat. a.) is orthogonal, and b.) is encouraging but doesn't establish that there _isn't_ a problem here. Mostly what I take issue to is that you're saying people need to stop being concerned about something, but the reasons you gave didn't really su…

> Your claim is that bioaccumulation is not a problem because

We have decades of living with the results (event was 1986), decades of scientific research (not just reactors, but medicine and space), and high political motivation to demonstrate harm (as it shows the failure of the USSR and communism). That in all this time and with all this money and motivation, we have not gathered data that conclusively says that the bioaccumulation is a problem. That is the basis of my claim: almost 40 years of analysis of the exact event and 80 years of health physics (the study of radiation on humans).

Mostly what I take issue to is that you're saying science doesn't matter. At least this is how it comes off. I actually agree that point a and b are orthogonal. The second paragraph is written to address a second point. I have a complaint about a common false fear mongering claim by the article and I also add some information that is about the article's main topic. They don't become a singular argument due to proximity. Paragraph 2's only mention of humans is that they probably shouldn't live there, which is difficult to confuse with "it is safe to live in Chernobyl because bavarian boar, hunted a thousand kilometers away, is safe to eat despite their radiation levels." Forgive me, but it is difficult to not feel frustrated and interpret you as not actually reading what I wrote. Definitely not in good faith.

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#107

Post by aetherson »

formerly_proven wrote: post #104
Konohamaru wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is good news. The idea of the delayed fungal evolution hypothesis was this: "Before trees grew wood that was unable to rot and so became coal but after fungus came now wood is ruined and it's impossible to make coal again." Understanding that coal formation is a reversible process and that a new agent didn't permanently ruin the process, is a sigh of relief.

So coal is actually renewable?

On multi-hundred million year timespans.

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#108

Post by godelski »

mbfg wrote: post #105
godelski wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Never mind the 200,000 people that had to be relocated... This is definitely a traumatic event. I'm not going to downplay this or the harm done at Fukushima. But I also don't think it is helpful to exaggerate the damage. The context of the discussion here was about nature and wildlife, so that's what I talked about. If you want to bring people into the conversation then I think that's a different matter. The cost o…

Surely the engineers didn't think the plants would be unsafe, right? I'm not sure what's so bad faith about that particular argument.

Because it is a non-argument. The implication is that engineers are incompetent and will never gain competence. There's much more detailed arguments to be made, but I'll give you two things to consider that will give you context and help you track down those arguments if you are interested

1) RBMK reactors (like Chernobyl) have a positive void coefficient, which leads to an increase in radiation as steam pressure increases. At the time of the of the disaster, this was generally considered "not a good idea" due to the ability for these reactors to explode and release high amounts of radiation. This was even known by Soviet Scientists and was even a plotline in the HBO miniseries (people seemed to miss this, but maybe a priori knowledge made it more significant to me).

2) Concerning Fukushima, the region was hit with the largest tsunami ever seen in recorded history for the area and one of the largest ever recorded anywhere. Meaning the largest to hit Japan in at least 1000 year. With the reactor being built in a time where scientific knowledge did not know that this magnitude of an earthquake was possible in such a fault. The comment implies that such lack of knowledge, and thus potential for danger, will always exist. But the knowledge even advanced before the quake happened, but was still relatively new at the time (btw, this also applies to the Cascadia subduction zone off of Washington and Oregon).

These were due to two completely different causes, with 25 years of experience between them, and with the latter being caused by an extremely rare natural disaster. It is improper to characterize risk by black swan events (or gray swan events, which may be more accurate concerning Fukushima). Additionally, the results and causes are not even remotely similar. The connections are simply that both involve nuclear power. It is literally comparing apples to oranges, which both happen to be round fruit that grow on trees. The argument is setting an impossible standard and using a false narrative. It is posting with high confidence but low expertise. In the end, it only confuses and makes it more difficult for anyone reading to acquire accurate knowledge about the events and actual risks of nuclear energy.

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#109

Post by godelski »

taneq wrote: post #95
godelski wrote: post #51

> including some [wild boar] bagged as far away as Germany—continue to show abnormal and dangerous levels of radiation. This really needs to stop. I remember doing the calculation a few years back due to another HN post (and the German obsession around boar) and you'd need to eat roughly 0.55lbs (0.25kg) of the most radioactive boar you could find every day or 3lbs (1.4kg) of the median. That is to just hit EU radiat…

How many bananas is that?

548 bananas per day

Re: Forests around Chernobyl aren’t decaying properly (2014)

#110

Post by fallingfrog »

lazide wrote: post #91
fallingfrog wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn’t sound right. Iirc there have been many periods in earth’s history warmer than today, and carbon was part of the climate feedback for all of them, but this is the first time that warming is coming from direct forcing via co2.

This is definitely not the first time temperatures have risen due to direct co2 levels. Last time was only about 3 million years ago.

Are you sure? Because my understanding is, in the past what has happened is that some other force causes a bit of warming, and then the oceans heat up, which causes co2 to bubble out, which then causes more warming, which causes more co2 to bubble out, and so on. So co2 is an active part of the picture but it wasn’t the independent variable, so to speak. Whereas now we’re mining fossil carbon and squirting it directly into the atmosphere, which is new.

And climate scientists are very smart and have worked out how much the added co2 amplified the original warming, and have been able to work out how much warming you would get by doubling co2 levels, which appears to be around 3 degrees C.

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