On 28 November 2011 01:14, <[email protected]> wrote: > Read about radioactivity and half life. Also those readings from Geiger > counters tell you less than half a story.
Indeed. Even when they operate, nuclear plants display extreme gluttony while consuming natural resources. Some points (I don't have the energy to look up numbers at the mo) for Koodankulam: - A very large area of the Bay of Bengal will lose its aquatic life due to effluents from the plant, which will be dumped in sea. - A vast area of inhabited and arable land around the plant needs to be evacuated to comply with IAEA/AERB norms. - Each of the reactors I think uses up about 1000 megalitres of water every year (ie, pumps in, is used to cool the reactor, absorbs radiation and then is dumped into the sea). I think that's more than the entire irrigation needs of TN. - A nuclear reactor has about 30-40 years of life, but needs to be babysat for close to a century. - The nuclear waste from a reactor has extremely stringent disposal norms. As a matter of fact, I haven't heard much about the waste disposal plans - it is all mysterious at the moment. Binand -- http://mm.ilug-bom.org.in/mailman/listinfo/linuxers
