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RE: Body Toxic- Environmental Memoir - Hormesis at W
Radsafe:
(I don't see where this posting, sent yesterday, has shown up on Radsafe)
As sent:
While we're on the subject of recent unsubstantiated claims about potential
excess cancer rates in shoreline communities like coastal NJ [or Long Island
for that matter where the Tooth Fairy Project is making claims of excess
breast and musculoskeletal cancer with the so-called "Standing for Truth
About Radiation "-STAR group due to potential minute incremental radiation
doses from Brookhaven or from across LI Sound from the Millstone Nuclear
power plants] a thought comes to mind.
Some years ago [early 1980s?] I heard a talk at an HPS chapter meeting in
Boston from a Boston University professor who was making extensive claims
about excess cancer rates near Pilgrim Station [ another BWR].
He had performed an analysis over some window of time looking at residents
living in areas "Near Pilgrim" and "Distant from Pilgrim" [i.e.: inland].
This analysis had not estimated radiation dose delivered to those offsite
residents near or far from the plant but the maximum doses were on the order
of a mrem per year or less incremental dose "Near Pilgrim" from plant
airborne releases.
I posed a question to the speaker noting that the sandy shoreline environment
near Pilgrim [due to nature of the sandy environment there, and similarly now
in coastal LI, or NJ for that matter] had a much lower background gamma
component due to the reduced uranium and thorium content in predominantly
quartz content sand vs. higher activity average soil and bedrock inland. I
had done background high-pressure ionization chamber background surveys along
shoreline environments throughout New Enland and knew the difference was
typically on the order of about 2 micro-R/hour dose rate lower near the
shoreline. In addition, the radon levels over sandy soil along the coast was
likely lower than over inland soil additionally reducing the annual whole
body dose equivalent to shoreline residents beyond than due to direct gamma
in soil alone. Also, sandy soil would have retained less atmospheric fallout
in the upper layers of soil, reducing slightly the incremental dose due to
total depostion from atmospheric bomb testing.
My question to the speaker making the claims of harm from Pilgrim was [not
entirely tongue-in-cheek] that since the overall annual dose to residents
along the shoreline [close to Plymouth, again a BWR like Oyster Creek] was
about 20 millirem per year lower that the areas distant from Pilgrim [which
received higher dose on average] might not the excess in cancer rates along
the shore [assuming it was indeed real] be due to the residents there
receiving a deficit of total annual radiation exposure. The shoreline
residents by receiving "too little" radiation exposure rather than excess
radiation exposure vs. inland areas, might be "suffering" increased cancer
rates assuming there was any validity to the evidence for hormetic effects of
radiation.
Also should the clear deficit in total radiation exposure to those residents
near Pilgrim [summing all background sources plus any small contribution from
Pilgrim's airborne releases] be contributing after rigorous analysis to a
slightly higher cancer rate, would Pilgrim be doing a public service by being
authorized to bypass its' Advanced Off Gas [AOG] System and thereby increase
plant related incremental radiation exposure to nearby residents from less
than a millirem per year by some 20 to 30 millirem per year [if they tried
very hard] by releasing sufficient short-lived offgas activity?
The BU Professor who was receiving a lot of political attention and media
attention by making unsupported and rather unscientific claims about excess
cancer from Pilgrim minimal offsite doses did not want to answer this
question.
The question I posed is however still valid. The lower total annual radiation
dose to shoreline resident needs to be considered in making any claim of harm
from very slight radiation doses from any nuclear facility.
Stewart Farber, MS Public Health
Public Health Sciences
172 Old Orchard Way
Warren, VT 05674
[802] 496-3356
email: SAFarberMSPH@cs.com
In a message dated 6/26/01 7:03:35 AM Pacific Daylight Time, tjsav@LYCOS.COM
writes:
A Polish professor once told me the following.
"If you are ignorant I can teach you - If you are arrogant I can debate you
- If you are both ignorant and arrogant - YOU SHOULD BE SHOT!"
One more item - Ocean county is a very nice place - I have been there often.
Enjoy - Tom
---
Tom Savin
On Mon, 25 Jun 2001 12:59:18
Gerald Nicholls wrote:
>Anyone still interested in why the general public refuses to understand
the science behind environmental policy might want to look at the book
review of the Body Toxic - An Environmental Memoir by Michael Pollan in the
6/24/01 Times book review section (under the heading "Poison"). The book,
by Susanne Antonetta, is a memoir of her growing up in Ocean County, NJ
(she was born in Georgia