[ RadSafe ] Fwd: CTBTO.org: Polonium is also a common, natural radioisotope.

Sun Aug 16 21:58:42 CDT 2015

Of course, the Christina MacPherson “headline” - "Nuclear bomb testing has resulted in radioactive polonium in seafoods” -  is non-sequitur.

210Po occurs naturally in the U-238 decay series and is ubiquitous in nature;  the presence of polonium simply does not indicate any man made activity at all in most cases.  In the cases where it might be introduced by human effort, the half-life is quite limiting from a geochemical perspective - as Franz points out below.  

Polonium does sound dangerous though ( and of course it is if you have enough of it in a concentrated form, just ask Alexander Litvinenko ), and I am sure that people who want to provide a scare find polonium to be an excellent villain provided it can be assigned to bombs instead of good old mother nature.  In reality, of course, polonium exists pretty much anywhere uranium exists or radon can reach and is concentrated in a few species (tobacco probably being  the most important from a human exposure point of view).  

Maybe the New Zealand seafood folks will put up a rebuttal down there in Wellington !   

Bradly Keck

> On Aug 16, 2015, at 3:46 PM, Franz Schönhofer <franz.schoenhofer at chello.at> wrote:
> 
> Roger and Chris,
> 
> The questions you raise are not really difficult to answer - especially not for me, who has some experience n such matters.
> 
> Let us leave the question of Cs137 and K-40 aside because in this context it is of no importance. The same is true for Xenon ("asphyxation" - just one of the most funny, paranoid and silly statements I ever heard!!!!!): Anybody knows the percentage of nitrogen or CO2 in air? Depletion of oxygen in air by Xenon (I suppose Xe-133) is more than absurd.
> 
> I "guess" they refer to Po-210 - what else? Po-210 is used in the neutron source of nuclear bomb ignition.
> 
> It is more than well known, that Po-210 is enriched by mussles and seafood. See for instance Australian reports on the impact of waste waters from the Northern Territory uranium mines on local aborigines food like feshwater mussles, the impact of the Sellafield releases on seafood (I had in Cumbria delicious seafood!!!!). Finally I suggest to study the report of the IAEA on the Mururoa project- easily found on Google, where one important result was, that the main contribution of radioactived dose to the population of the South Pacific was due to Po-210 in seafood a natural staple of them. I have been the head of the Terrestrial Working Group, but could not help to look over my shoulder to the maritime working group.,......
> 
> Now let us getting a little deeper into science: The number of nuclear bombs exploded in the air is very well known. Anybody who knows, how much of Po-210 is in such an nuclear ignition device? I do not believe that this is still a secret. Then one could easily calculate the maximum amount of Po-210 potentially distributed over the world and the health risk taking into account the half live of 138 days!
> 
> BTW tobacco concentrates it from air because the leaves are very hairy, such enhancing the possbility to take up the radon progeny very efficiently.
> 
> Franz
> 
> 
> -- ---Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- From: Chris Alston
> Sent: Sunday, August 16, 2015 8:10 PM
> To: The International Radiation Protection (Health Physics) Mailing List
> Subject: [ RadSafe ] Fwd: CTBTO.org
> 
> Roger
> 
> We don't know what species of Po it is.  If it is Po-210 (t1/2 = 138 d),
> the first thing I wonder is what its analogues are, and if certain seafoods
> do not concentrate it (before they become sea-"food").  For instance,
> tobacco does this, no?
> 
> Looking at the website, my first take on it is that they are
> well-intentioned, but need more expert advice.  For instance, their "Chart
> 1" (which actually is a "table") properly should include K-40 (cesium is a
> K-analogue) to give a better perspective on the issue.  Then, they seem at
> a loss to give radiation risks for xenon, so they note for it a hazard of
> asphyxiation, by reason of oxygen-displacement.  This really is grasping at
> straws; any gas that is not O presents potentially the same hazard.  And
> the last thing anyone will worry about, in the event an "A-bomb" goes off,
> will be inhaling so much xenon that their air supply has < 18% oxygen.
> 
> Cheers
> ca
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Roger Helbig <rwhelbig at gmail.com>
> Date: Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 5:10 AM
> Subject: [ RadSafe ] Has Nuclear bomb testing has resulted in radioactive
> polonium in seafoods
> To: RADSAFE <radsafe at health.phys.iit.edu>
> After reading this, I searched for Polonium and found this CTBTO website
> https://www.ctbto.org/nuclear-testing/the-effects-of-nuclear-testing/general-overview-of-theeffects-of-nuclear-testing/
> and since it cites activist organizations, I wonder how much of the
> information that they present on this page is accurate (for example,
> how accurate is the following?)
> Thanks.
> Roger Helbig
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