In article ,
Doug Freyburger wrote:
Bill who putters wrote:
Strange thought entered my mind concerning the tragedy in Japan. With
the higher levers do radiation entering the ocean. With this make the
fish unsuitable for harvesting and will this enable the fish populations
to have a long respite ?
Probably not. The ocean is too big so dilution works. The isotopes
have short enough halflives that the radiation will fade very quickly.
Except for Iodine-131 (8.02 days), most of the rest have half lives of
30 years and up.
The current situation is a huge mess but the effects will remain more
local than what happened at Chernobyl. There will be more of a move
farther away from shore by Japanese fishermen but that's nothing new -
They are hunting whales in the Antarctic Ocean already now.
Approaches that work for DDT and mercury will work exactly the same
way for the small amounts of long life isotopes - Eat lower on the food
chain. Plant eating fish over predator fish, squid over fish, small
critters over large critters. Conveniently this approach also helps
fish populations.
Anyone know about the ramifications ?
Far more likely to have impact on land industry than sea industry. No
shift from fossil fuel to nuclear so increased strip mining in coal
belts. Increased CO2 release. And no change in the exponential growth
curve of installed solar cells so the good promise on that front is not
effected. Given how industrious the Japanese have been in the past they
will recover, rebuild and be back near the top sooner than most expect.
I don't share your optimism.
All countries are trying to lock up energy sources, for their own
benefit, and as a cudgel against others.
Jobs Not Guns.
--
- Billy
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, 16 April 1953
http://wn.com/black_panther_party
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_vN0--mHug