Re: News -[re: Fossil Power Plant Pollution]

[RadiumProj@cs.com]

In a message dated 4/23/00 6:00:46 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
ruth_weiner@email.msn.com writes:

<<I am a little mystified as to why the other
constituents of fly ash (e.g., lead, uranium, cadmium, etc.) aren't in there
along with mercury.>>

COMMENT:
These other constituents are vaporized or released as very fine particulates 
along with mercury. However, mercury because of its much higher vapor 
pressure tends to be released to a greater degree than the other elements 
noted from coal,  as well as not condensing back to particulate form in the 
stack effluents such that that Hg can be trapped in a bag filter or 
electrostatic precipitator. In addition for any unit release of Hg vs. any 
other element in coal, mercury's environmental toxicity [the level achieved 
in the environment vs. the level capable of causing harm] as it were is 
orders of magnitude greater than any other contaminant in coal.


<<  In fact, except for air  pollution episodes like the famous one in Donora 
in 1948, deaths can't be  tied to air pollution any more than to low levels 
of ionizing radiation.
 Ironically, the one air pollutant that is lethal in high enough
 concentration is CO, which is not emitted  much by even dirty power plants
 because they burn the fuel more to completion. >>

COMMENT: 
I have to  respectfully disagree with several statements above.  Donora, PA 
in the late 1940s was only one case where acute levels of air pollution from 
coal burning [mainly sulfur dioxide] led to a significant excess of short 
term excess mortality. There was another acute air pollution episode in the 
US in New York City  in the early 1960s which led to a significant  
short-term excess of deaths  among the elderly and in infants. My references 
on this are in storage, but I remember it having been well documented in my 
graduate courses in Air Pollution Control in 1970-72.    There have also been 
numerous episodes of acute excess mortality around the world in London, 
Athens, and other major cities from severely elevated short term conventional 
air pollution episodes.

The evidence of excess mortality from generalized air pollution, at more 
protracted and lower peak levels than the above incidents,  from fossil fuel 
burning is strong enough that no credible argument can be made that there are 
fewer than many thousands of excess cases of mortality per year in the US due 
to fossil fuel air pollution. Dr. Cohen in several of his papers has provided 
numerous solid references on this point, and derived an approximate number of 
excess air pollution related deaths from the average fossil fueled power 
plant.  I vaguely remember a number like 50 to 100 excess deaths per year 
minimum from each large coal fired plant as reviewed by  Dr. Cohen. These 
numbers have uncertainly but the impacts are far from zero, and sum to an 
estimate of thousands of excess deaths per year in the US from coal burning.  
I find it hard to understand why someone cognizant of the scientific 
literature would argue strongly to the contrary.

A statement is made above that the  "one air pollutant that is lethal in high 
enough
concentration is CO, which is not emitted  much by even dirty power plants".

I'm sure Dr. Weiner is aware that even airborne carbon dioxide can kill 
acutely at a high enough level by suppressing respiration. Ditto with mercury 
vapor at surprisingly low absolute levels, sulfur dioxide, and even fine 
particulates. For example,  with mercury a person can drink a beaker of 
mercury metal [specifically and not organomercurials at trace levels which is 
the problem with Hg contaminated fish now found in every lake across the 
Northern US, Canada, and the Everglades] and suffer no serious health effects 
other than some gastrointestinal distress. However, break a mercury 
containing thermometer and spill even one drop of mercury onto a hot stove in 
a closed room and the airborne mercury levels in a room will be acutely fatal 
because mercury crosses the blood-brain barrier. The mercury levels in the 
environment today, primarily from fossil fuel burning has resulted in 
numerous cases of eagles being found with severe neurological damage leading 
to death in Massachusetts, Maine, and upstate NY and in panthers in the 
Florida everglades being unable to reproduce due to mercury uptake from 
aquatic pathways [crawfish ==>racoons ==>panthers] causing genetic damage to 
their germ cells. 

In any case, I am not endorsing the US PIRG report on fossil fuel power plant 
pollution, but only noting it's existence since the report and its many 
claims highlights an area where even long-standing antinuclear advocacy 
groups seem to be painting themselves into a corner in opposing nuclear 
energy when they may soon need to reevaluate its many environmental 
incentives more objectively if they are not to lose all credibility in their 
claimed goal of environmental stewardship. These groups or perhaps some of 
the more moderate environmental groups are eventually going to have to become 
much more accepting of nuclear energy in order to meet critical environmental 
goals these groups hold sacred. It will eventually be in their interests to 
come to embrace nuclear energy. Unless the nuclear industry recognizes the 
perspective of these various groups, and the issues of mutual self-interest 
involved, the nuclear industry will once again fail in building any kind of 
support for continued and increased use of nuclear electric generation.

Lastly, Dr. Weiner writes:
<<Nukes are here to stay, and are part of the energy picture, but so are 
fossil fuel plants.>>

COMMENT:
I find this statement about nukes being here to stay rather baffling. Not one 
new nuclear electric generating plant has been ordered in the US since 1974 
as I recall, while hundreds of plants or more which were ordered or on the 
drawing board have been canceled at an integrated  cost to the US economy of 
over one trillion dollars. The major increase in nuclear activity over the 
past ten years has been in the area of nuclear D&D as more and more nuclear 
power plants, superconducting supercolliders, test facilities like LOFT, the 
HFBR at Brookhaven, and numerous academic research reactors have been shut 
down prematurely. "Nukes are here to stay"?  Hardly. The DOE is projecting a 
steady decline in installed nuclear capacity in the US in the next few 
decades. A few plant life extensions do not a nuclear industry make. 

Some years ago prior to the 1988 presidential election, I was invited to 
present a talk to a Boston ANS chapter dinner meeting following my 
publication of a tongue-in-cheek satire to numerous New England newspapers 
including the Boston Herald, the Health Physics Newsletter, and the ANS 
Nuclear News "Backscatter" humor column about the potential health hazards of 
 a dread new public health problem affecting the body politic, namely the 
health hazards of "strepdukakis antinucleosis".  You may recall that MA Gov. 
Michael Dukakis had delayed the licensing of Seabrook Station by refusing to 
cooperate in emergency planning requirements due to the plant's EPZ 
overlapping the MA border, driving up the final cost by billions of dollars.

This talk to the ANS local chapter meeting was titled: "Nuclear Power and 
Public Information: Suicide on the Installment Plan".  I'm afraid things have 
only gotten worse since 1988 and unless significant changes are made in the 
interaction of the nuclear industry with the public, legislators, and 
environmental "stakeholders" the  nuclear industry will continue in its 
steady decline from what it could have, and should have, been.


Stewart Farber, MS Public Health
Public Health Sciences
172 Old Orchard Way
Warren, VT 05674
email: radiumproj@cs.com
(802) 496-3356 



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