re: mercury

[JPreisig@AOL.COM]

Hmmmmmmm,



       This is from:      jpreisig@aol.com    .



       Howdy radsafe people.  Hope all is well in your vicinity.





       The Spallation Neutron Source (Oak Ridge, Tenn., USA) is slated to

come online in 2006 or thereabouts, as a source of neutrons.  It will work

by slamming one GeV protons into mercury, thereby producing spallation

products, and hopefully some neutrons.  The reaction is discussed a bit

in the book by Patterson & Thomas (Accelerator Health Physics).  I hope the

mercury will be contained in some sort of closed loop system.  Anyone have

an inkling of the environmental effects of such a system???  I think I'd 

rather

see a new reactor built at Oak Ridge.  Oh well.



      Dr. Ruth (Weiner) was lamenting the demise of the FFTF (Fast Fission

Test Facility?) and its impact on production of medical radionuclides.  It 

appears that the folks at Los Alamos (LANSCE, previously known as LAMPF)

are making medical radionuclides using proton irradiation, I guess.  I read 

about

this lately, but I don't recall where.  BLIP at Brookhaven does similar 

things.



     Researchers at Brookhaven (see their web-site) are claiming to have 

observed a fairly rare particle reaction:   Kaon  --->  Pion  + neutrino 

    + anti-neutrino   .   I don't give the particle charges here, but you can 

read

    about it on Brookhaven's web-site.





     All this chatter from Niagara Falls reminds me of an old Three Stooges

     comedy routine about Niagara Falls (Slowly I turn, inch by inch, step by

     step,...., Niagara Falls...).  I was just thinking about this, and sure 

enough,

     the comedy routine shows up on Television.  Sorry to digress.



          Not every radionuclide at Love Canal and elsewhere leaches out of 

the

     site at the velocity of groundwater.  Waste form and packaging can 

control

     radionuclide transport rates.  Also some radionuclides just stay where 

they

     are, without much movement at all.  I won't suggest that bad waste 

     storage siting and design should occur at all.



          RADSAFE is so excellent.....



          Regards,               Joseph R. Preisig, Ph.D.