|
|
Twenty years since Chernobyl
As the pro-nuclear lobby steps up its campaign for a ‘new
generation’ of nuclear power stations, the real lessons of the
Chernobyl disaster need to be re-stated. PETE DICKENSON and JON DALE
write.
THIS APRIL MARKS the twentieth anniversary of the
Chernobyl catastrophe, the world’s worst nuclear accident. The
explosion at the power plant, situated about 100 miles north of Kiev in
the Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, sent a cloud of radioactive
gas around the world. The cloud contained twenty times the amount of
radiation released at Hiroshima.
Estimates made at the time in the New Scientist
magazine, that 100,000 would eventually die as a direct and indirect
result of the radiation release, may have been too high. But if the wind
had been blowing in the opposite direction on the day, towards the
densely populated city of Kiev instead of over relatively sparsely
inhabited areas, the outcome would have been worse than even the New
Scientist estimate.
The reactor at Chernobyl was a boiling water,
graphite moderated type called a RBMK, many of which are still in
operation in the states of the former Soviet Union (the final reactor at
the Chernobyl power station was only shut down 15 years after the
incident). It is inherently unsafe in a nuclear reactor to have high
temperature graphite close to steam under pressure, but this is what
happens in the RBMK.
In this type of reactor, the uranium fuel rods are
surrounded by graphite, which absorbs some of the heat of the nuclear
reaction, a process essential to control its speed. Water is pumped past
the fuel rods and graphite to carry away more of the heat, and the steam
produced is used to drive turbines to produce electricity. In addition,
the graphite has to be surrounded by helium and nitrogen gas to stop it
burning in the surrounding air. If the hot graphite and the uranium rods
come into contact with the steam an explosion is possible, producing a
cloud of radio-active steam. This is exactly what happened in April
1986. The scale of the accident was made worse because there was no
containment structure around the reactor that could have prevented the
steam from escaping into the atmosphere.
The immediate reason for the explosion lay in the
effects of a sudden power surge causing a rupture in the pipes holding
the cooling water, thus bringing water into contact with the graphite.
The power surge occurred in the first place because of a reckless
experiment that was being conducted by technicians on an under-power
reactor. Their aim was to speed up the time it took to repair faults.
The technicians were scapegoated at the time, but
the reason they were conducting the experiment in the first place was
linked to the then power crisis in the Soviet Union. Nuclear stations
are usually operated to provide ‘base load’ electricity, that is
they are operated 24 hours a day because it is difficult and time
consuming to stop and start a reactor. If there are frequent faults,
which means that the reactor has to be switched off, its efficiency is
drastically reduced. As a result, the technicians were under pressure to
come up with a quick and easy answer to the problems caused by the
frequent faults in the power plant.
The real costs of nuclear power
WESTERN OBSERVERS AT the time, as they will probably
do again now, highlighted features specifically linked to the Soviet
system that contributed to the disaster, such as the reckless behaviour
of the staff, driven by an impatient, bullying bureaucracy, themselves
pressurised by the deep problems in the economy, combined with the poor
design and unreliability of the power plant. However, the underlying
cause, which was a combination of human error and mechanical failure,
was the same as occurred at the major nuclear accident in the USA at
Three Mile Island in 1979.
The nuclear plant there was based on a PWR (Pressurised
Water Reactor), the same type that is used at the Sizewell power station
in Britain. During the crisis at Three Mile Island the radio-active
material at the core of the reactor came within 700F degrees of its
melting point of 5,000F. If such a melt down had occurred there would
have been a major disaster, possibly worse than at Chernobyl, since the
melting uranium could have penetrated deep into the earth, contaminating
ground water over a wide area.
Advocates of nuclear power will point to the low
theoretical risk of an accident happening, but this must be set against
the potentially catastrophic scale of any incident when it does occur.
There are also risks of nuclear power generation not directly connected
to the safety of the operation of the plant. These are primarily linked
to the problems of safely reprocessing and storing the toxic waste that
is produced as a by-product of nuclear power. Evidence appeared decades
ago that the incidence of childhood leukaemia close to the reprocessing
facility at Sellafield in Cumbria was significantly raised. In the town
of Seascale, just over a mile from the plant, children under the age of
ten had an incidence of leukaemia ten times the national average,
although a government-sponsored report at the time said this was not
significant. In the USA, at a naval ship yard in Maine, the overall
death rate of workers involved in nuclear related tasks was twice the
national average and the occurrence of leukaemia 45% higher then
expected. These workers were exposed to very low levels of radiation,
well within ‘safety limits’, indicating that there is probably no
safe dose of radiation in these circumstances.
Potentially even more serious than the health
problems linked to low level radiation leakage associated with
reprocessing is the issue of storing toxic nuclear waste. A direct
consequence of producing electricity with nuclear reactors is the
accumulation of radioactive waste, uranium and plutonium. Apart from
electricity generation, there is a significant amount of plutonium
produced for military purposes which also has to be stored. To give an
idea of the scale of the problem, the amount of toxic nuclear waste
stored in the USA in 1991 was 4,900 cubic metres, with a radioactivity
of 24,000 MCi (a curie is a quantity of radioactivity, MCi is one
million curies). To put this in perspective, a typical radioactive
source used in a classroom for a science experiment has an activity of
one millionth of a curie. An average sized 1,000 megawatt (MW – one
million watts), nuclear power station reactor has a total radioactivity
of 70 MCi in its spent fuel one year after discharge. After 100,000
years this figure will fall naturally to 2,000 MCi, still two billion
times more radioactive than a typical source used in a classroom. (There
is far more waste to store now of course, compared to 1991, and the
amount is increasing all the time.)
The implication of this data is that a safe storage
method must be found that can be guaranteed to be secure for more than
100,000 years, a task that poses huge uncertainties and problems because
it is difficult to predict what natural conditions will be after that
time. If the waste is buried, the onset of earthquakes in previously
unaffected areas is possible, for example. If the radioactive spent fuel
is put at the bottom of the ocean the integrity of the materials used as
a storage medium must be uncertain after such a long time, possibly
leading to seepage. Also undersea volcanic activity could start,
producing the same result.
Technical difficulties, and the understandable
opposition from local communities where it has been proposed to dump the
waste, have meant that there will probably be at least another ten years’
delay before any supposedly safe site is ready in the USA, and another
20 in Europe. In the meantime, much of the West’s toxic waste is being
dumped on poor countries.
A new pro-nuclear drive
SINCE THE TWENTIETH anniversary of Chernobyl
coincides with the beginning of a new pro-nuclear drive by the
capitalist class in Britain and internationally, commemorating the
victims of the disaster in the Ukraine will be an embarrassment for Bush
and Blair, one which they will try to downplay as much as possible. This
could take the form of distorting or trying to bend the record about
Chernobyl’s true impact, a campaign that has already begun in sections
of the media.
The political need for a new pro-nuclear position,
that the Chernobyl commemoration threatens to stand in the way of, is a
direct result of the looming threat of global warming, a reality that
most capitalists accept now as a scientific fact and have belatedly
started to respond to. In Britain Blair has announced a ‘national
conversation’ about expanding nuclear power, which translated from
Blairspeak means he has already made the decision to go ahead with it
and the conversation he wants is about how best to sell the idea. Other
world (mis)leaders are moving in the same direction because they realise
that the Kyoto treaty, which is a market-based approach to tackling
climate change, has proved so far to be totally ineffective. Despite
noisy supportive rhetoric for Kyoto (except from Bush), the imminent
turn to nuclear is a recognition of its bankruptcy.
Developing nuclear power has become the preferred
option for international big business for several reasons. Firstly, by a
lucky co-incidence, it does not produce any greenhouse gases, in
contrast to energy generated from fossil fuels such as oil, and so meets
the main criteria, if of course the huge safety issues are ignored.
Second, nuclear power is relatively cheap to generate, since it utilises
a well-established technology, and long-term issues such as paying for
safely storing nuclear waste for the indefinite future, meeting the
costs of any future nuclear accident, and decommissioning radioactive
power plants, will be ignored or glossed over. Having said this, though,
nuclear will still be far more expensive than pumping oil out of the
desert, so why are the bosses who stand to lose most if global warming
is tackled, particularly in the USA which is the biggest culprit,
willing to contemplate a hit on their profits by going down this route?
One reason is that Hurricane Katrina brought home,
even to the most bone-headed of the American capitalists (except Bush of
course, who represents the big oil firms) that there are real long-term
costs linked to the effects of global warming that will have to be
factored into the equation. Also, although individual firms will never
voluntarily opt for intrinsically more expensive nuclear energy sources,
governments, even in the US, could go down this road if the extra
short-term costs were relatively small and were not perceived to hit
international competitiveness excessively. Another factor that could
sweeten the pill for the USA is that the American Westinghouse firm,
with its PWR-type nuclear power plant, is likely to dominate an expanded
world market.
The move to nuclear power could, however, be
reversed when there is a significant economic downturn that puts profits
under pressure, leading to the need to cut costs even more ruthlessly
than in the recent past. In these circumstances, putative nuclear plans
could be ditched in favour of a return to more profitable fossil-fuel
based energy generation. What is not likely to happen is that Blair,
Bush, or any of their successors, will opt for a safe, sustainable
option, based on renewable energy sources such as wind, wave or solar
power, because the cost of doing this will very significantly hit the
profits of the multi-nationals that they represent. For the moment at
least most world leaders are swinging behind nuclear power and will not
welcome any true assessment of the Chernobyl disaster.
Re-writing the record
WHEN THE Chernobyl reactor went into meltdown no
news was released by the Soviet government of the radioactive cloud
escaping into the atmosphere. Days later the world became alerted when
Swedish nuclear power workers were found to be contaminated with
radioactivity – before going into work. Ever since, governments and
the nuclear power industry have tried to play down the effects of
Chernobyl on health.
Two early estimates of the likely number of deaths
were ‘5000 to 10,000 fatal cancers over the next 70 years’
(International Commission on Radiological Protection) and ‘less than
25,000 worldwide’ (International Atomic Energy Agency – IAEA).
Twenty years later a renewed attempt is being made
to cover up Chernobyl’s effects on health. Last September a report was
issued by the Chernobyl Forum, set up by a number of agencies including
the IAEA, the World Health Organization, a number of United Nation (UN)
bodies and the governments of Belarus, the Russian Federation and the
Ukraine.
Accompanying the report was a press release,
entitled ‘Chernobyl: the true scale of the accident’, and subtitled,
‘20 years later a UN report provides definitive answers and ways to
repair lives’. This got wide publicity. "A total of up to four
thousand people could eventually die of radiation exposure from the
Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident", it said. "As of
mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths have been directly attributed to
radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly exposed rescue
workers, many of whom died within months of the accident".
Even the Forum’s estimate has been challenged as
too high. The Nuclear Industry Association has put the number of deaths
at 41, with the possibility of a few more in the future. Dr Zbigniew
Jaworowski, a former chairman of the UN Scientific Committee on the
Effects of Atomic Radiation, says the only firm number of deaths are 28
who died on site. A higher cancer rate is because increased screening is
finding cases that would otherwise have remained undetected, he argues.
(Lexington Institute) So was Chernobyl less dangerous than first
thought?
In fact the Chernobyl Forum report does not support
the misleading headlines of its press release. The ‘fewer than 50
deaths’ directly attributed to radiation relates only to those who
died from acute radiation sickness. It does not include those who are
dying from cancers, or who will develop cancers in the future, as a
result of exposure to radiation. The report itself estimates 8,930
cancer deaths expected in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus among 200,000 ‘liquidators’
(soldiers and workers who cleared the site), 135,000 evacuees and 7.1
million residents of the most contaminated areas.
And it has serious deficiencies. It excludes up to
600,000 liquidators. Most were men aged 20-40 in the armed forces,
miners, fire-fighters and other workers. They would normally have been
fitter and had a much lower death rate than the general population - the
so-called ‘healthy worker effect’. But the report compares the death
rates of liquidators with the Russian population as a whole, rather than
men of the same age who had not been exposed.
An important study published eleven months before
the report was not referred to. This compared the rate of new cancer
cases in Belarus liquidators with adults of the same age in the least
contaminated part of that country. It showed a 20% increase in the total
number of liquidators’ cancers.
This study also compared cancer rates with those of
1976-85. There was an average 40% increase in cancer incidence, with a
56% increase in the most contaminated region. Most cancers have a latent
period (between exposure and time of disease) of many years. Increased
cancer rates are still being detected in Hiroshima survivors, sixty
years after exposure. Such an increase in Belarus after only 15 years is
alarming, suggesting many more in years to come.
The report also excludes deaths in other countries.
Although exposure was low, a very large number of people were affected.
Studies have shown a 30% increase in leukaemia in the US for babies born
in 1987 and 1988, a 260% increase in Greece and 387% increase in
Scotland and Wales (twelve cases with only three expected). Using
conservative radiation risk estimates, the US Department of Energy
predicted 17,400 excess cancer deaths over a 50 year period, 63% of
these occurring outside the former USSR, mostly elsewhere in Europe.
The Forum’s report excludes non-cancer deaths. Two
per cent of all deaths of Russian liquidators between 1986-98 were
estimated to have been due to heart and circulation disease caused by
radiation. This is almost as much as cancer deaths due to radiation
(2.6%).
The President of the Australian Medical Association
for the Prevention of War, Professor Tilman Ruff, has added to the
report’s estimate of 8,930 excess cancer deaths in the three most
affected countries: 4,400-6,600 cancer deaths in the liquidators for
whom risk estimates have not yet been made; 5,077-6,769 estimated excess
heart-related deaths in all the liquidators; 10,920 excess cancer deaths
outside the three worst affected countries (based on the US Department
of Energy figures); an additional 20% of cancer deaths (4,850-5,290) in
future generations. This yields an estimate of 34,200-38,500 deaths.
It does not include deaths from suicide, alcohol and
drug abuse, genetic effects or other causes, all of which are
significantly increased in the most severely contaminated zones and
among evacuees. And it does not include the suffering of those who have
not got a fatal illness, but who live in fear that they will die
prematurely because of their exposure to radiation.
The biggest health problems so far have not been
fatal illnesses but mental health problems among evacuees and
liquidators. Chernobyl pulled communities apart, uprooted families and
left them without work or their homes. A similar disaster must never be
allowed to happen again.
Who was affected by the disaster?
Workers on site at the time or sent in to fight the
fire;
Those conscripted (mostly from the armed forces) to
clean up the site, remove radioactive waste and enclose the wrecked
reactor in cement. There were 200,000 of these so-called ‘liquidators’
during 1986-87 when radiation levels were highest, and as many as
800,000 by 1990;
Those who lived within 30km, most of whom were
subsequently evacuated (116,000 in 1986, a further 220,000 later);
Those living in severely contaminated zones (from 5m
to 6.8m people);
Those living long distances away where increases in
radiation levels were detected, including much of Europe.
ALL COMMENTATORS agree that there have been major
mental health problems in the communities who were uprooted from their
homes and who lost jobs. But not all agree that this was the
responsibility of the Stalinist Soviet government who failed to protect
them and then provide for them, followed by the governments that ruled
as the wealth (and health) of the former USSR plummeted during the
restoration of capitalism. The US-born Ukrainian, Mary Mycio, for
example, has a Thatcherite explanation of their problems.
"The exaggerated awareness of ill health and
sense of dependence has created… the ‘Chernobyl accident victim
syndrome’.
"Given more than 40 types of Chernobyl
benefits, some residents of contaminated areas in Belarus can be
eligible for quite large sums of money. For example, working single
mothers raising children under the age of three in contaminated
districts get about $30 a month – which is around one-third the
average Belarusian wage and which may help explain the rise in birth
rates in contaminated regions.
"It may also have something to do with the rise
in infant mortality in contaminated regions in the late 1990s –
contrary to the trend of lower infant mortality in the rest of the
country. More study is needed to figure out if this is due to radiation,
poor health, and poor social services in contaminated regions or to the
outward migration of educated young people. But the system of Chernobyl
benefits gives single women who may lack the education, health, skills,
or desire for parenting an incentive to have children and raise them in
contaminated lands".
Wormwood Forest: A Natural History of Chernobyl (2005) Joseph Henry
Press
|