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VanArchie t1_ja6jkef wrote

I'm pretty sure defused throughout the ocean and with proper treatment it will be as powerful as ambient background radiation.

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doctoreldritch t1_ja6kt0o wrote

In both relevant senses of "powerful," yes, this is a non-story. Not only is the amount of remaining radiation fairly small to begin with, being diluted like crazy, and being immediately and harmlessly absorbed by the water it's in, but on top of that tritium decay is also far lower energy (and therefore both less penetrating and less damaging) than most other nuclear decay, to the point where it can't even penetrate human skin in the first place.

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Cr33py07dGuy t1_ja740um wrote

Sure. Science. But on the flip-side, have you ever seen Godzilla?

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Coolegespam t1_ja78drm wrote

>tritium decay is also far lower energy (and therefore both less penetrating and less damaging) than most other nuclear decay,

Tritium is heavy hydrogen and takes the place chemically of hydrogen. Once it's in your body it will fill the same role as hydrogen does which means it's getting into your cells, your proteins, even your DNA where it will do a lot of damage when it decays.

It's not harmless. Not in the slightest.

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wanwan159 t1_ja7d2tp wrote

half life of tritium is 12.33 years.

A human can survive about 3 days without water, which already says a lot with how fast it will exit the body.

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[deleted] t1_ja7xbnm wrote

And it has been about that long already so, it shouldn't be an issue now

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anti-DHMO-activist t1_ja7enx2 wrote

Tritium occurs naturally, just saying. There's always a tiny amount in your drinking water. It's such a weak beta-emitter, that there's almost no danger from it.

What's being released here, over 7 years, is a total of 2.2g. While the total emission into the seas is about 30-40 grams/year, without any issues so far.

Because of the short half life, there's also no reason to expect long-term accumulation.

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Coolegespam t1_ja8ws3q wrote

>Tritium occurs naturally, just saying.

At 10^-18 per H. That's effectively non-existent, and this is more concentrated.

>There's always a tiny amount in your drinking water. It's such a weak beta-emitter, that there's almost no danger from it.

There's no danger from it because there's effectively none there naturally. Being a 'weak' beta emitter is meaningless once it's already in your body.

>Because of the short half life, there's also no reason to expect long-term accumulation.

Holy shit, that's not how it works. Super heavy water in your body can under go chemical changes. Swapping bonds with other atoms, and taking the place of hydrogen in various metabolic reactions that take place. Some of them will form bonds and become sugars, proteins and amino acids.

When that tritium decays, you be left with an ionizing electron inside your body, an He3+ and a damaged base pair, amino acid, protein, etc.

It is NOT safe, and it's terrifying that you think it is.

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anti-DHMO-activist t1_ja90ayr wrote

You are deliberately trying to make it sound dangerous while conveniently ignoring actual radiation doses.

And, again, it's 2.2g of tritium. In france alone about 30g are released every year and there is no evidence of any damage at all.

>The latest committed effective dose coefficient of tritium incorporated into the body via the oral route in adults is 1.9 × 10^−8 mSv/Bq for the soluble form, and that of the biogenic form is 5.1 × 10^−8 mSv/Bq. Source

>wastewater will be diluted from hundreds of thousands of Bq per liter of tritium in the storage tanks to 1,500 Bq per liter in discharge water. [...] The maximum estimated dose from Fukushima's discharged water will be 3.9 microsieverts per year. This is much lower than the 2,400 microsieverts people receive from natural radiation on average each year. source

>As of April 2021, total amount of tritium stored in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant is about 860 terabecquerels (TBq). In comparison to the discharge of tritium from nuclear facilities across the world, see the table below. In 2018, La Hague reprocessing plant in France discharged 11,460 TBq of tritium, which is more than 13 times the total amount of tritium stored in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.[57] From 2010 to 2020, nuclear power plants in South Korea discharged a total of 4,362 TBq of tritium, which is more than 5 times the total amount of tritium stored in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. Source

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Coolegespam t1_ja92ezt wrote

You paper literally says exactly what I said above for how Tritium interacts with your body's metabolism, and the risk factors of that.

Thank you for proving my point.

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anti-DHMO-activist t1_ja9rkgv wrote

Dosis sola facit venenum.

Do you have any education about radiation hazards and how to interpret them? You're acting like an expert yet failing to respond to the points at all.

You're arguing dishonestly and cherrypicking a tiny part instead of responding to the actual point - the total radiation dose. Do you know that you have quite a lot of radioactive potassium in your body? Tiny amounts are completely negligible and their effect is included in the radiation dose calculations. That's why I posted them. The target release level is below the food safety maximums set by the WHO, even if you drank the released water without further dilution.

Even in the worst case the effect is miniscule. Ffs, learn a thing about radiation and the units used to determine exposition.

>The latest committed effective dose coefficient of tritium incorporated into the body via the oral route in adults is 1.9 × 10−8 mSv/Bq for the soluble form, and that of the biogenic form is 5.1 × 10−8 mSv/Bq

this is already that worst case. And it's as minor as it gets. Do you think everybody knowing anything about radiation at all is an utter moron?

I'm sick of people who don't know anything trying to act educated but failing to grasp the most basic things.

And, again - this discharge is already being done and confirmed harmless.

Respond to my individual points please and stop the cherrypicking. It's obvious and dishonest.

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Coolegespam t1_jabyi34 wrote

>Dosis sola facit venenum.

In radiation all dosage is cumulative and no, research has not shown otherwise yet.

>Do you have any education about radiation hazards and how to interpret them? You're acting like an expert yet failing to respond to the points at all.

I have a minor in Nuclear engineering and a minor in physics. So, kind of? I also have a BS in computational mathematics and poly sci, but they're less relevant.

>You're arguing dishonestly and cherrypicking a tiny part instead of responding to the actual point

Lol, you literally said this: >>Tritium occurs naturally, just saying. There's always a tiny amount in your drinking water. It's such a weak beta-emitter, that there's almost no danger from it.

and this

>> ...tritium decay is also far lower energy (and therefore both less penetrating and less damaging) than most other nuclear decay, to the point where it can't even penetrate human skin in the first place.

Really, this is the only point I've been attacking. Tritium is not a safe material, you keep saying it's harmless, and it's not. You don't know how it effects biological systems or the risk of it once ingested or inhaled. Your own paper says, exactly, what I said. Yet, somehow I'm dishonest.

>I'm sick of people who don't know anything trying to act educated but failing to grasp the most basic things.

Same.

>Respond to my individual points please and stop the cherrypicking. It's obvious and dishonest.

I did, you responded by posting a source that agreed with me, and point blank, said your understanding of the bio availability and effects of Tritium were wrong. Again, that is the only point I've been making this whole time.

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doctoreldritch t1_jad3vf3 wrote

Dang you guys are really still going at this huh? Just so we're all on the same page, you are aware that we eat bananas, right?

As before, even just compared to normal potassium ingestion alone (nevermind commercial air flight or medical x-rays), this is nothing, both in volume and in energy level. Our bodies' normal repair mechanisms can shrug off this small amount of low-energy radiation without breaking stride. This is like ducks panicking about a light rain; you literally live constantly immersed in the stuff, this is not making any kind of difference whatsoever.

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MonsterHunterOwl t1_ja6jp8r wrote

Yup, probably less than a banana or that’s emitted from the human body, volume matters

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AngryRedGummyBear t1_ja6po68 wrote

I find it funny that "banana for scale" works with radiation exposure.

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Iceblade02 t1_ja8g23e wrote

Yeah, it's actually a wonderful tool to describe to less well versed individuals just how (non-) harmful nuclear power is.

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MonsterHunterOwl t1_jaarir8 wrote

People without physics knowledge also are often surprised that almost everything is radioactive, and I’m some cases standing next to another human, is technically more dangerous radioactively.

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Vinomadd4877 t1_ja6l8gr wrote

True. This disaster is ONLY a disaster because of how localized the material is. It will have essentially 0 effect on the ocean at large.

...except for the matter of diffusion... If this is released in one place, yes, that place locally could be poisoned. Whether this is a good idea or not depends ENTIRELY on how the waste is dispensed.

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anti-DHMO-activist t1_ja742es wrote

It's tritium, which is practically rather harmless. And only ~2.2g of it. Even locally that's not going to have any serious impact.

La hague in france releases about 13 times that much, every year.

This is a complete non-issue.

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