Campaigners call on Science Minister to back citizen science with funding

Nuclear Free Local Authorities, 25 Jan 24

The UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities have been joined by campaigners from six local groups opposed to nuclear power in calling on the Science Minister to provide funding for citizen science projects to test levels of radioactivity near to civil nuclear power plants.

The partners have used the birthday of American ornithologist Wells Cooke (25 January), considered to be the founder of modern citizen science, to make their appeal to Michelle Donelan, who is the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology.

From 1881, Cooke engaged amateur birding enthusiasts in collecting information about bird migration. His program evolved into the government-run North American Bird Phenology Program supported by volunteers across the nation. More recently, even BBC television programmes, like Nature / Springwatch, have enrolled citizens in observing and reporting on wildlife in their gardens and communities.

Although citizen science has the virtue of engaging laypeople in research, making science more relevant and ‘immediate’ to the general population, for campaigners in West Cumbria sampling for radioactivity has not been a mere academic exercise for it highlighted radioactive ‘hotspots’ where exposure could be prejudicial to human health.

For almost ten years, volunteers at Radiation Free Lakeland have been taking soil and sand samples at various sites along the coast of West Cumbria from Whitehaven to Barrow-in-Furness, including beaches frequented by many tourists, and sending these to the United States for testing at a professional institute.

Due to a lack of available funding, the group could only afford to commission the institute to test for two isotopes – americium and caesium [1]. In 2018, undergraduate nuclear science students from the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts compiled the results into an initial report:

‘Of the 36 samples tested 10 (28%) were found to be over the safety limit for cesium-137 and 14 (39%) were found to be over the safety limit for americium-241.’

Some of these adverse findings were from coastal sites near to St Bees and Ravenglass, which attract many seasonal tourists.

Americum-241 is highly radioactive and chemically toxic if absorbed, with deposits accumulating in the liver and bones, remaining there for twenty and fifty years respectively, or in the sexual organs, where its residence is permanent. In all these organs, americium promotes the formation of cancer cells through its radioactivity.

Caesium-137 is soluble in water and if ingested is soon uniformly distributed within the body and remains there for up to 70 days. Based on the findings of animal experiments and autopsies performed on children exposed to radiation in the Chernobyl accident, absorption can lead to the development of pancreatic cancer.

Former US nuclear industry regulator Arnie Gunderson, touring West Cumbria at the invitation of Radiation Free Lakeland, said that some of the samples were as radioactive as those found at Fukushima, where a major nuclear accident occurred in 2011.

Gunderson was in no doubt that it was only the dedication, rigour and persistence of citizen scientists that brought these findings to light:……………………………………………………….. more https://www.nuclearpolicy.info/news/campaigners-call-on-science-minister-to-back-citizen-science-with-funding/