Poison in the Well

Poison in the Well PDF Author: Jacob Darwin Hamblin
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 0813544238
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
In the early 1990s, Russian President Boris Yeltsin revealed that for the previous thirty years the Soviet Union had dumped vast amounts of dangerous radioactive waste into rivers and seas in blatant violation of international agreements. The disclosure caused outrage throughout the Western world, particularly since officials from the Soviet Union had denounced environmental pollution by the United States and Britain throughout the cold war. Poison in the Well provides a balanced look at the policy decisions, scientific conflicts, public relations strategies, and the myriad mishaps and subsequent cover-ups that were born out of the dilemma of where to house deadly nuclear materials. Why did scientists and politicians choose the sea for waste disposal? How did negotiations about the uses of the sea change the way scientists, government officials, and ultimately the lay public envisioned the oceans? Jacob Darwin Hamblin traces the development of the issue in Western countries from the end of World War II to the blossoming of the environmental movement in the early 1970s. This is an important book for students and scholars in the history of science who want to explore a striking case study of the conflicts that so often occur at the intersection of science, politics, and international diplomacy.

Poison in the Well

Poison in the Well PDF Author: Jacob Darwin Hamblin
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 0813544238
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 329

Get Book Here

Book Description
In the early 1990s, Russian President Boris Yeltsin revealed that for the previous thirty years the Soviet Union had dumped vast amounts of dangerous radioactive waste into rivers and seas in blatant violation of international agreements. The disclosure caused outrage throughout the Western world, particularly since officials from the Soviet Union had denounced environmental pollution by the United States and Britain throughout the cold war. Poison in the Well provides a balanced look at the policy decisions, scientific conflicts, public relations strategies, and the myriad mishaps and subsequent cover-ups that were born out of the dilemma of where to house deadly nuclear materials. Why did scientists and politicians choose the sea for waste disposal? How did negotiations about the uses of the sea change the way scientists, government officials, and ultimately the lay public envisioned the oceans? Jacob Darwin Hamblin traces the development of the issue in Western countries from the end of World War II to the blossoming of the environmental movement in the early 1970s. This is an important book for students and scholars in the history of science who want to explore a striking case study of the conflicts that so often occur at the intersection of science, politics, and international diplomacy.

The Oceans in the Nuclear Age

The Oceans in the Nuclear Age PDF Author: David D. Caron
Publisher: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers
ISBN: 9004279989
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 636

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Book Description
The advent of the nuclear age in 1945 fundamentally altered the course of human events. The oceans are not the focus of the nuclear age, but the affairs of the oceans are deeply woven into the history of that age. Knowledge of what the nuclear age has meant for the oceans, however, is highly fragmented and there exists a surprising gap in research on the impact of the nuclear age on the oceans and on ocean law and policy. Ranging from dumped wastes to transportation to security, this study frames the complex multidimensional set of relationships between the oceans and the nuclear age and illuminates patterns of impact and response in ocean law. This timely expanded edition includes a new chapter by Lt. Todd Hutchins, USN, on “Nuclear Risks in Coastal Areas: Legal and Regulatory Responses.” It provides a full discussion of the 2011 coastal Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant disaster, together with analysis more generally of the challenges to the environment and to the legal order globally that are posed by coastal siting of nuclear power plants.

Inventory of Radioactive Material Resulting from Historical Dumping, Accidents and Losses at Sea

Inventory of Radioactive Material Resulting from Historical Dumping, Accidents and Losses at Sea PDF Author: International Atomic Energy Agency
Publisher: IAEA Tecdoc
ISBN: 9789201090157
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In 1989 the Contracting Parties to the Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter (the London Convention 1972) requested that the IAEA undertake the preparation of a global inventory of radioactive materials entering the marine environment from all origins. The IAEA subsequently established a global inventory which included information officially reported in or obtained from open literature and confirmed by the countries involved, on (i) the dumping at sea of radioactive waste; and (ii) marine accidents and losses involving radioactive materials. The inventory is intended as a centralized information base against which the impact of specific sources of radioactive material entering the marine environment can be assessed and compared. In 2006 the IAEA received the request to update those inventories. The present publication includes additional information provided recently by some IAEA Member States and contracting parties to the London Convention 1972 and Protocol 1996 within a process of updating the inventory which concluded in 2014, together with the information contained in previous IAEA publications. A CD ROM provides tables, maps and a database with detailed information.

Disposition of High-Level Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel

Disposition of High-Level Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel PDF Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309073170
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
Focused attention by world leaders is needed to address the substantial challenges posed by disposal of spent nuclear fuel from reactors and high-level radioactive waste from processing such fuel. The biggest challenges in achieving safe and secure storage and permanent waste disposal are societal, although technical challenges remain. Disposition of radioactive wastes in a deep geological repository is a sound approach as long as it progresses through a stepwise decision-making process that takes advantage of technical advances, public participation, and international cooperation. Written for concerned citizens as well as policymakers, this book was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and waste management organizations in eight other countries.

Too Hot to Touch

Too Hot to Touch PDF Author: William M. Alley
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107030110
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
A fascinating and authoritative account of the controversies and possibilities surrounding nuclear waste disposal, providing expert discussion in down-to-earth language.

Deep Time Reckoning

Deep Time Reckoning PDF Author: Vincent Ialenti
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262539268
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 205

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Book Description
A guide to long-term thinking: how to envision the far future of Earth. We live on a planet careening toward environmental collapse that will be largely brought about by our own actions. And yet we struggle to grasp the scale of the crisis, barely able to imagine the effects of climate change just ten years from now, let alone the multi-millennial timescales of Earth's past and future life span. In this book, Vincent Ialenti offers a guide for envisioning the planet's far future—to become, as he terms it, more skilled deep time reckoners. The challenge, he says, is to learn to inhabit a longer now. Ialenti takes on two overlapping crises: the Anthropocene, our current moment of human-caused environmental transformation; and the deflation of expertise—today's popular mockery and institutional erosion of expert authority. The second crisis, he argues, is worsening the effects of the first. Hearing out scientific experts who study a wider time span than a Facebook timeline is key to tackling our planet's emergency. Astrophysicists, geologists, historians, evolutionary biologists, climatologists, archaeologists, and others can teach us the art of long-termism. For a case study in long-term thinking, Ialenti turns to Finland's nuclear waste repository “Safety Case” experts. These scientists forecast far future glaciations, climate changes, earthquakes, and more, over the coming tens of thousands—or even hundreds of thousands or millions—of years. They are not pop culture “futurists” but data-driven, disciplined technical experts, using the power of patterns to construct detailed scenarios and quantitative models of the far future. This is the kind of time literacy we need if we are to survive the Anthropocene.

Reflections on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident

Reflections on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident PDF Author: Joonhong Ahn
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319120905
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 456

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Book Description
This book focuses on nuclear engineering education in the post-Fukushima era. It was edited by the organizers of the summer school held in August 2011 in University of California, Berkeley, as part of a collaborative program between the University of Tokyo and UC Berkeley. Motivated by the particular relevance and importance of social-scientific approaches to various crucial aspects of nuclear technology, special emphasis was placed on integrating nuclear science and engineering with social science. The book consists of the lectures given in 2011 summer school and additional chapters that cover developments in the past three years since the accident. It provides an arena for discussions to find and create a renewed platform for engineering practices, and thus nuclear engineering education, which are essential in the post-Fukushima era for nurturing nuclear engineers who need to be both technically competent and trusted in society.

Global Climate Policy

Global Climate Policy PDF Author: Urs Luterbacher
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262535343
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 361

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Book Description
Analyses of the international climate change regime consider the challenges of maintaining current structures and the possibilities for creating new forms of international cooperation. The current international climate change regime has a long history, and it is likely that its evolution will continue, despite such recent setbacks as the decision by President Donald Trump to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement of 2015. Indeed, the U.S. withdrawal may spur efforts by other members of the international community to strengthen the Paris accord on their own. This volume offers an original contribution to the study of the international political context of climate change over the last three decades, with fresh analyses of the current international climate change regime that consider both the challenges of maintaining current structures and the possibilities for creating new forms of international cooperation. The contributors are leading experts with both academic and policy experience; some are advisors to governments and the Climate Secretariat itself. Their contributions combine substantive evidence with methodological rigor. They discuss such topics as the evolution of the architecture of the climate change regime; different theoretical perspectives; game-theoretical and computer simulation approaches to modeling outcomes and assessing agreements; coordination with other legal regimes; non-state actors; developing and emerging countries; implementation, compliance, and effectiveness of agreements; and the challenges of climate change mitigation after the Paris Agreement. Contributors Michaël Aklin, Guri Bang, Daniel Bodansky, Thierry Bréchet, Lars Brückner, Frank Grundig, Jon Hovi, Yasuko Kameyama, Urs Luterbacher, Axel Michaelowa, Katharina Michaelowa, Carla Norrlof, Matthew Paterson, Lavanya Rajamani, Tora Skodvin, Detlef F. Sprinz, Arild Underdal, Jorge E. Viñuales, Hugh Ward

Poisoning the Pacific

Poisoning the Pacific PDF Author: Jon Mitchell
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1538130343
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 316

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Book Description
In this devastating exposé, investigative journalist Jon Mitchell reveals the shocking toxic contamination of the Pacific Ocean and millions of victims by the US military. For decades, US military operations have been contaminating the Pacific region with toxic substances, including plutonium, dioxin, and VX nerve agent. Hundreds of thousands of service members, their families, and residents have been exposed—but the United States has hidden the damage and refused to help victims. After World War II, the United States granted immunity to Japanese military scientists in exchange for their data on biological weapons tests conducted in China; in the following years, nuclear detonations in the Pacific obliterated entire islands and exposed Americans, Marshallese, Chamorros, and Japanese fishing crews to radioactive fallout. At the same time, the United States experimented with biological weapons on Okinawa and stockpiled the island with nuclear and chemical munitions, causing numerous accidents. Meanwhile, the CIA orchestrated a campaign to introduce nuclear power to Japan—the folly of which became horrifyingly clear in the 2011 meltdowns in Fukushima Prefecture. Caught in a geopolitical grey zone, US territories have been among the worst affected by military contamination, including Guam, Saipan, and Johnston Island, the final disposal site of apocalyptic volumes of chemical weapons and Agent Orange. Accompanying this damage, US authorities have waged a campaign of cover-ups, lies, and attacks on the media, which the author has experienced firsthand in the form of military surveillance and attempts by the State Department to impede his work. Now, for the first time, this explosive book reveals the horrific extent of contamination in the Pacific and the lengths the Pentagon will go to conceal it.

Nuclear Wastes in the Arctic

Nuclear Wastes in the Arctic PDF Author: United States. Congress. Office of Technology Assessment
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
Examines enviromental and human health impacts from wastes dumped in Arctic and North Pacific regions, from nuclear contaminants discharged into these environments, and from radioactive releases from both past and future nuclear activities in region.