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Canada’s double standard on tritium emissions

Frank Greening, 24 Dec 25

Here is an example of how Canada allows all kinds of tritium emissions while other nations are criticized for almost trivial releases.

Thus, it was reported today that the Japanese reactor at Fugen had a leak that spilled tritiated water. The amount released? A staggering 20 ml:

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world/radioactive-leak-at-nuclear-plant-in-japan/ar-AA1STz9p?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=694b0a7c4e6f4035800f6658f238a437&ei=131

By comparison a CANDU reactor at Bruce NGS suffered a steam generator release back in 2007. Steam generator tube leaks involve the escape of primary heat transport heavy water contaminated with tritium. In the case of Bruce Unit 8, a steam generator leak was detected in June 2007 but was allowed to continue until the first week of November. The monthly heavy water losses associated with this leak were as follows:

  June 2007:      484   kg

  July 2007:      2157 kg

  Aug 2007:      2832 kg

  Sept 2007:      4339 kg

  Oct 2007:       5036 kg

  Nov 2007:      1115 kg

Thus, in total, 15,963 kg of tritiated heavy water was lost to Lake Huron over a six-month period in 2007. This leak created a giant plume of tritiated water that was carried northwards by the prevailing currents towards the townships of Saugeen Shores, Port Elgin and Southampton. By September 2007, the concentration of tritium in the water intake of the Port Elgin Water Treatment Plant, 17 km north of the Bruce site, had increased by more than a factor of three compared to the normal levels of tritium in lake water at this location.

But remarkably this increase in the tritium concentration in the drinking water supply to residents to the north of the Bruce site was not the reason that the Unit 8 steam generator leak was finally fixed. On the contrary, the leak was plugged to prevent further loss of a valuable commodity – heavy water – which at $300/kg had already cost Bruce Power almost $5 million. And besides, thanks to the CNSC’s lax tritium emission standards, Bruce B’s waterborne emission action level for tritium is a staggering 130,000 Ci per month; thus the station was well below its regulatory limit in this regard. Nevertheless, one has to wonder how such a liberal action level is permitted when it allows a station to discharge tritiated water that is 5000 times higher than the Ontario Drinking Water Objective.

December 27, 2025 Posted by | Canada, radiation | Leave a comment

Fukushima Now (29) – Part 1: What Constitutes Responsibility?

by Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center · December 21, 2025, By Yamaguchi Yukio, https://cnic.jp/english/?p=8747

n the 14 and a half years that have passed since March 2011, the cesium-137 that was released has finally made it to the halfway point of its half-life. After 90 years, its radioactive concentration will have diminished to one-eighth its initial level, and after 300 years, one-thousandth. According to the current medium-to-long-term roadmap, decommissioning measures should be completed around 2041 to 2051. Even by then, however, the radioactivity will have decreased only by a little more than half. Not even what these “decommissioning measures” are supposed to include has been decided on yet.

In places with serious radioactive contamination, nobody will be able to live there for another century. The area thus affected is said to exceed 300 square kilometers. The first sample of fuel debris taken from the Unit 2 reactor weighed 0.7 grams, and the second, 0.2 grams. The information gained from their analysis is just as miniscule. Meanwhile, the total amount of fuel debris in the Unit 1-3 reactors is estimated at 880 tons. Whether it will be necessary to retrieve all of it to begin with is a matter of great contention.

 Idogawa Katsutaka, who was mayor of Futaba Town at the time of the accident, evacuated the entire town to protect everyone there from radioactive exposure, leading many of them as far as 250 kilometers away to Kazo City, Saitama Prefecture, near Tokyo, where they took refuge in a gymnasium that had belonged to the town’s former Kisai High School. This was just one of the municipalities that evacuated from Fukushima Prefecture to escape radioactivity. The town’s population totaled 6,971 people overall, of whom 187 took refuge at the former Kisai High School (as of September 18, 2012). Details of their evacuation were relayed widely around the world by the 2012 film “Nuclear Nation” (Japanese: “Futaba kara Toku Hanarete,” directed by Funahashi Atsushi, music by Sakamoto Ryuichi).

As of 1 August 2025, the registered population of Futaba Town had dwindled to 5,157 in all, of whom 59 percent were living within Fukushima Prefecture and 41 percent were still evacuees elsewhere among 43 of Japan’s 47 prefectures. Idogawa’s hope is, “We want somehow to go home, all of us, together, to a safe hometown.” The number of returnees so far, however, is a mere 87 people (as of August 2025).

■ Idogawa filed suit in May 2015 against the government of Japan and Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), seeking 755 million yen in damages. A decision on the case was rendered on 30 July 2025 in Tokyo District Court, finding no responsibility on the part of the government, but ordering TEPCO to pay compensation of about 100 million yen for damages to real estate and compensation for the evacuations.

The reasoning behind this decision was that even if the government had required TEPCO to take measures against a possible tsunami, there was a good likelihood that a similar accident could have occurred anyway, so the government bore no responsibility for it. This followed the precedent of a Supreme Court’s ruling on 17 June 2022 denying the government’s responsibility.

Nor did they recognize Idogawa’s claim that his health had been damaged by his exposure in the course of evacuating. This angered Idogawa, who called it a terrible decision against a person who had faithfully fallen in line with Japan’s atomic energy administration.

I think what caused this tragic nuclear accident, unprecedented in scale, was Japan’s fundamentally flawed nuclear power system, adopted by the government in the name of “peaceful use of the atom.” It can only be called a huge transgression by the politicians, bureaucrats, scientists, and business leaders of that time on account of their lackadaisical inattention to safety.

The theory of plate tectonics teaches us not to expect to see broad regions of stability, free from concerns about earthquakes, tsunamis or volcanic activity in the Japanese archipelago. We are only part way toward clarifying the causes and circumstances of the Fukushima nuclear accident. Despite this, the government is ignoring the lessons of history and clearly announcing a “nuclear renaissance” in its 7th Strategic Energy Plan. Even if it intends to “put safety first” as a condition, it cannot create safety measures if it has yet to elucidate the causes of the accident. This is no way to ensure “safety first.” It’s a contradiction.

Establishing nuclear power plants in the Japanese archipelago in itself is a mistake. The first chairman of Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority publicly stated that even if the new safety standards created in 2012 were fulfilled, it would not guarantee safety. Even now, the phrase “safety first” commonly uttered by nuclear proponents is a fiction and can only be called irresponsible.

December 23, 2025 Posted by | health, Japan, Legal | Leave a comment

Exposure to protracted low-dose ionizing radiation and incident dementia in a cohort of Ontario nuclear power plant workers.

Brianna Frangione 1, Ian Colman, Franco Momoli, Estelle Davesne, Robert Talarico, Chengchun Yu, Paul J Villeneuve

Scand J Work Environ Health

Abstract

Objectives: Emerging evidence suggests that low-dose ionizing radiation increases the risk of neurodegenerative diseases. Past studies have relied on death data to identify dementia, and these are prone to under-ascertainment and complicate the estimation of health risks as individuals tend to live with dementia for many years following onset. We present findings from the first occupational cohort to investigate dementia risk from low-dose radiation using incident outcomes.

Methods: This is a retrospective cohort of 60 874 Ontario Nuclear Power Plant workers from the Canadian National Dose Registry. Personal identifiers were linked to Ontario population-based administrative health data. Incident dementias between 1996 and 2022 were identified using a validated algorithm based on physician, hospital, and prescription drug data. Individual-level annual estimates of whole-body external ionizing radiation were derived from personal workplace monitoring. The incidence of dementia among these workers was compared to a random sample of Ontario residents matched by sex, age, and residential area. Internal cohort analysis using Poisson and linear excess relative risk (ERR) models, adjusted for sex, attained age, calendar period, and neighborhood income quintile, were used to characterize the shape of the exposure-response curve between low-dose cumulative radiation (lagged 10 years) and incident dementia.

Results: There were 476 incident dementias and 867 028 person-years of follow-up. The mean whole-body lifetime accumulated exposure at the end of follow-up was 11.7 millisieverts (mSv). Workers with cumulative exposure between 50-100 mSv had an increased risk of dementia [RR 1.50, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.99-2.28] compared to those unexposed. Spline analysis suggested that the dose-response relationship was non-linear. The linear ERR per 100 mSv increase in exposure was 0.704 (95% CI 0.018-1.390).

Conclusion: Our findings suggest that low-dose exposure to ionizing radiation increases the risk of incident dementia.

December 22, 2025 Posted by | Canada, radiation | Leave a comment

Cancer risk may increase with proximity to nuclear power plants.

By Maya Brownstein, December 18, 2025, https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/cancer-risk-may-increase-with-proximity-to-nuclear-power-plants/

In Massachusetts, residential proximity to a nuclear power plant (NPP) was associated with significantly increased cancer incidence, with risk declining by distance, according to a new study led by Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The study was published Dec. 17 in Environmental Health. It was conducted by researchers in the Department of Environmental Health, including corresponding author Yazan Alwadi, PhD student, and senior author Petros Koutrakis, professor of environmental sciences.

Despite widespread—and potentially expanding—reliance on nuclear power in the U.S., epidemiologic research investigating the health impacts of NPPs remains limited. Meanwhile, the results of studies conducted internationally vary significantly. To broaden the evidence base, the researchers assessed proximity of Massachusetts zip codes to nuclear power plants and 2000-2018 cancer incidence data collected by the Massachusetts Cancer Registry. They controlled for confounders such as air pollution and sociodemographic factors.

The researchers estimated that about 20,600 cancer cases in the state—roughly 3.3% of all the cases included in the study—were attributable to living near an NPP, with risk declining sharply beyond roughly 30 kilometers from a facility. The risk of developing cancer attributable to living near an NPP generally increased with age.

According to the researchers, the findings highlight the importance of acknowledging and addressing nuclear energy’s health impacts, particularly at a time when its expansion is being promoted as a solution to climate change.

Read the study:

Residential proximity to nuclear power plants and cancer incidence in Massachusetts, USA (2000–2018)

December 21, 2025 Posted by | health | Leave a comment

Radioactive fertilizer and the nuclear industry

Gordon Edwards. 14 Dec 25

CORRECTION

 I wrote that 

“…selling raffinate as fertilizer goes on all the time from the world’s largest uranium refinery owned by Cameco, situated at Blind River on the north shore of Georgian Bay.”

This sentence is incorrect. Raffinate from Blind River is not used as fertilizer. I apologize for the error. 

Radioactive fertilizer from the Canadian uranium industry does not come from the Cameco Blind River refinery but from two other sources – the Cameco Key Lake uranium mill in Northern Saskatchewan, and the Cameo uranium dioxide conversion facility at Port Hope Ontario. 

Moreover, the material that is being used in radioactive fertilizer is not raffinate (i.e. refinery waste). It is ammonium sulphate that is recovered from the Key Lake uranium processing circuits and sold as fertilizer, together with a liquid by-product of Cameco’s Port Hope uranium dioxide conversion plant – an ammonium nitrate solution – that is sold to a local agricultural supply company for use in fertilizer production.

 The use of similar waste solutions from nuclear fuel facilities as fertilizer has been a concern in other jurisdictions as well. So at the present time, it is not raffinate but ammonium compounds that have been used in uranium processing that ends up in fertilizer. I apologize for not checking the facts much more carefully..

About radioactive fertilizer and the nuclear industry.

A lot of the  phosphate used for fertilizer comes from Florida where the phosphate ore is mined. That ore is contaminated with uranium and its decay products, especially radium. Radium disintegrates to produce radon gas Radon-222) and this builds up in an enclosed space, without adequate ventiliation, reaching an “equilibrium” in about one month. 

That’s why Florida was the first “hot spot” that alerted the US government to the major public health hazard posed by radon, which is estimated to kill about 20-30 thousand Americans every year. Every atom of radon comes from the disintegration of a radium atom, and in turn, every atom of radium started out as an atom of uranium.

Radioactive quilibrium means #becquerels of radium = #becquerels of radon.  One becquerel being one disintegration per second. In a simiar way, if pure radon gas is in an enclosed container, it will reach equilibrium with its four short-lived decay products in a couple of hours – so the radioactivity in the container is about five times greater than it was originally, as all the short-lived decay products have attained roughly the same level of radioactivity as the radon. 

When this radioactive fertilizer is used on tobacco crops, the radon from the soil and the fertilizer builds up under the thick canopy of tobacco leaves and hangs there for a time (radon being 7-8 times heavier than air). The radon atoms disintegrate to produce four airborne solid short lived decay products – polonium-218, bismuth-214, lead-214, polonium-214, all of which decay into lead-210 and polonium-210. [Note: the last two nuclides never reach equilibrium, unlike the first four.]

These radon decay products stick to the resinous (sticky) hairs on the undersides of the tobacco leaves and when the tobacco is harvested these radioactive materials are harvested along with the tobacco. By the time the tobacco is cured, rolled, and packaged, small quantities of lead-210 (22-year half-life) and its immediate successor polonium-210 are left in the tobacco/cigarettes for the unwitting smoker (or second-hand-smoke inhaler) to encounter.

When the cigarette is lit and the smoker draws on it, the temperature at the tip increases dramatically and it vaporizes the lead-210 and polonium-210 which is inhaled deep into the lungs, where polonium-210 sticks to and attacks the sensitive lung tissue with its very energetic alpha particles. 

Polonium-210 is a very damaging radionuclide which Los Alamos Labs reckons is about 250 billion time more toxic than hydrogen cyanide. (It’s what was used to murder Alexander Litvenenko in London at the “request” of Putin who was openly criticized by Litvenenko). 

Polonium-210 adds greatly to the cancer-causing characteristic of the tobacco residues lodged in the lung, making cigarettes smoke significantly more carcinogenic than it would otherwise be. (When the smoker is not inhaling, the lead-210/polonium-210 is wafted into the second-hand cigarette smoke as a respirable aerosol to endanger the health of those within sniffing distance,)

Inside the lung, some of the inhaled polonium-210 crosses the blood-air barrier end enters the bloodstream. Being solid, it attaches to pre-existing plaque build-up in the arteries of the smoker, usually near the arterial valves, where the alpha particle bombardment causes fibrosis of the arterial wall and valve, thus exacerbating the plaque build-up and increasing the restriction of blood flow, thereby contributing substantially to the incidence of heart attacks and strokes among smokers because of the alpha emitting polonium-210 in the plaque.

What you may not have heard is that voluminous sand-like radioactive waste from the uranium industry, called “raffinate” (leftovers from uranium refining), is also sold as fertilizer on the open market without any warnings about the radioactive content. The justification for this nefarious practice seems to be, that since “natural” phosphate from Florids is used to make fertilizer, and it is clearly radioactive (due to the radium-radon chain), and since raffinate from a uranium refinery is not much higher in radioactive content, then what the heck, we (the uranium industry) may as well turn this sow’s ear into a silk purse by selling the radioactive raffinate waste as fertilizer.

Extensive radioactive contamination – involving uranium raffinate – of the homes, schools, roadways, ravines, and the public beach in the town of Port Hope  (prior to 1985) – has led to a $2.6 billion radioactive environmental cleanup of the town (by the federal government) resulting in over a million cubic metres (about a million tonnes) of radioactibve waste to be stored for 500 years in a gigantic earthen mound just north of the town. The subsequent fate of the still-radioactive waste will be decided at that time. 

This practice of selling raddinate as fertilizer goes on all the time from the world’s largest uranium refinery owned by Cameco, situated at Blind River on the north shore of Georgian Bay. The Blind RIver plant turns uranium mill concentrates from Saskatchewan, Australia and South Africa, called “yellowcake” (mostly U3O8), into a product called “uranium trioxide” UO3. At that point the raffinate is the waste product, contaminated with radium. That’s what’s sold for fertilizer. 

The trioxide then goes to Port Hope Ontario, where it is chemically converted into UO2 (uranium dioxide) for domestic use, about 15% of the total, and into UF6 (uranium hexafluoride or “hex”) for export to enrichment plants outside of Canada where the concentration of U-235 is increased to the level required by the customer.

At the enrichment plant, the “hex” is turned into a gas at a fairly low temperature so that the heavier U-238 atoms can be separated from the lighter U-235 atoms, resulting in an enriched uranium product that goes out the front door while the voluminous discarded U-238 (called depleted uranium or “DU”) goes out the back door. 

For low enrichment in light water nuclear power plants, about 85% of the refined uranium is discarded as depleted uranium. The DU has important military uses, and a few civilian uses, but for the most part DU is part of the radioactive legacy of the nuclear age wth a half-life of 4.5 billion years.

Besides using DU in conventional bullets, shells, missiles, tanks, et cetera, used in the former Yugoslavia and in other conflicts, resulting in a battlefield litters with radioactive waste, the military also uses DU as “target rods” in plutonium production reactors to breed plutonium for nuclear warheads. In addition, the military uses DU metal in almost all nuclear warheads as a way of significantly multiplying the explosive power of the warhead by a sizable factor. These weapons are called “fission-fusion-fission” weapons, 

The first fission is from a small ball of plutonium (usually with a tritium “spark-plug” inside) whose sole purpose is to ignite the fusion reaction by raising it to a temperature of about 100 million degrees. When fusion occurs, extremely energetic neutrons are goven off which fission the U-238 that has been used for that exact purpose in the construction of the warhead. That third stage, the fission of U-238, provides the bulk of the explosive power and the lion’s share of the radioactive fallout.

It is a sad story from beginning to end.

And, to add to this tale of woe, Canada currently has about 220 million tonnes of radioactive waste (tailings) stored at or near the surface from uranium milling (the operation that produces yellowcake) along with about 167 million tonnes of radioactive “waste rock”. Yet the Canadian authorities and others routinely and unabashedly declare that nuclear power is a “clean” source of energy and for the most part, Canadian academic scientists and sientific bodies say not a peep to the contrary.

December 16, 2025 Posted by | Canada, radiation, Reference | Leave a comment

Nuclear Kills Kids

most significant of all there is now solid evidence of increased rates of leukaemia in children living close to nuclear power plants.

 Tony Webb | April 28, 2025, https://www.fabians.org.au/nuclear_kills_kids

One moment from my work in the USA in the early 1980s stands out in my memory.  I’d driven from Chicago to Cleveland at the invitation of the Health and Safety Officer of the US Boilermakers Union. The purpose was to speak to the members meeting held on the night ahead of the recruitment of members for work on the annual ‘clean-up’ of the local Nuclear Power plant.  The hired workers would be ‘radiation sponges’ – short-term casuals recruited for the ‘dirty jobs’ that would result in significant radiation exposures sometimes up to the permitted annual exposure limit and ‘let go’ if they reached that limit.  The practice offered some protection to the company’s full -time employees whose skills would be needed on an ongoing basis and whose exposures needed to be kept below the limit.   The meeting was well attended , rowdy, with a lot of questions and discussion which spilled over into the carpark after the meeting closed.  I noticed one man hanging back from the circle and invited him to join and share his thoughts.  As I recall them the essence was:

“I will be going in to apply for work tomorrow.  I understand what you shared about the risks . . . no safe level of exposure and chance of getting cancer perhaps 20 years from now . . .  It will put a roof over my family’s heads and food on the table . . . BUT my wife and I have had all the family we want.  If we hadn’t, what you shared about the genetic risks, the damage to our children and future generations . . . no I wouldn’t be going . . . “

It is a sad fact that workers, both men and women will choose, often from necessity, to put their health at risk from the work environment.  What is however consistent in my experience of working on radiation and other occupational health and safety issues is that they are far more concerned, cautious and likely to prioritise safety when it comes to risks to their children.

We now have solid evidence(1) that workers in nuclear power plants routinely exposed to radiation face significantly increased cancer risks, risks of cardiovascular disease including heart attacks and strokes, dementia and potentially other health effects. There is also an increased risk of genetic damage that can be passed on to their children and future generations. But perhaps most significant of all there is now solid evidence of increased rates of leukaemia in children living close to nuclear power plants.

To put it simply and in language that will resonate with workers and their families in the communities around the seven nuclear power plant sites the federal Liberal-National Coalition proposes to build if elected to government, nuclear kills kids.  It matters little whether or not these nuclear plants can be built on time, within budget, make a contribution to climate change, reduce electricity prices, or secure a long-term energy future; these nuclear power plants will likely kill kids who live close by. They cannot operate without routine releases of radioactive material into the environment and our young will be exposed and are particularly susceptible to any exposure that results.  

Now add to that if you care that women are more susceptible than men; that workers in these plants face greater exposure and health risks than adults in the community; that nuclear plants have and will continue to have both major accidents and less major ‘incidents’ resulting in radiation releases, community exposures and health damage. Add also that quite apart from the workers and others exposed when these plants need to be decommissioned, the radioactive wastes resulting from perhaps 30-50 years life will need to be safely stored and kept isolated from human contact for many thousands of years longer than our recorded human history.    And, again if you care, also add in the concerns around proliferation of nuclear weapons which historically has occurred on the back of, enabled by and sometimes concealed by countries’ developing so called peaceful nuclear power.

All these arguments add weight to the absurdity of Australia starting and the world continuing down this nuclear power path.  But if we want a single issue that strikes at the heart of human concerns it is this – and forgive me saying it again, it needs to be repeated many times until the electorate in Australia hears it loud and clear – Nuclear Kills Kids. 

SOURCES……………………………………………………………………………………………………

December 12, 2025 Posted by | health | Leave a comment

Nuclear power will never be “beneficial”.

    by beyondnuclearinternational, https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2025/12/07/nuclear-power-will-never-be-beneficial/

Abandoning radiation protection will further endanger vulnerable populations, writes Cindy Folkers

As its name suggests, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) was created to regulate the nuclear power industry in order to protect people and the environment from the inherent dangers of that technology. As much as the NRC is currently failing to fully meet this mission, recent political maneuvers to curtail its influence threaten public health and safety even further.  

A May 23 executive order from President Trump will now transform the stated mission of NRC from safety regulator to industry enabler, and in fact, NRC mission wording has been changed to say that nuclear power “benefits” society, despite the evidence to the contrary given the often serious health impacts of all nuclear power-related operations. This mission shift has sparked alarm among experts and safety advocates who argue that abandoning core principles of radiation protection will further endanger communities, sacrifice vulnerable populations, and increase the nuclear industry’s grip on energy policy.

The slate of executive orders issued by President Trump on May 23 are designed to “fast-track everything nuclear.” Beyond Nuclear has already highlighted the many concerns posed by these orders. For example, EO 14300 – titled Ordering the Reform of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission – will weaken radiation exposure standards, posing grave risks to public health from nuclear technology. 

Among the decades of hard-won protections this executive order undermines is the scientifically supported foundation that there is no safe level of radiation exposure. The changes threaten not just U.S. regulatory integrity but global public health and environmental safety. 

Section 5(b) of EO 14300 is particularly alarming. It calls on the NRC to adopt “science-based radiation limits” and demands the NRC reconsider its longstanding reliance on the Linear No Threshold (LNT) model. But in effect, this request contradicts itself.

The LNT model targeted for “reconsideration” is the scientific basis for radiation protection standards worldwide and rests on two principles:

1. Linear risk — the risk of disease rises proportionally with the radiation dose.
2. No threshold — there is no dose so low that it poses zero risk. 

The NRC distorts the first principle by claiming that lower doses are less “effective” at damaging health than higher doses, despite studies supporting a linear model.

The NRC has ignored the second principle by allowing exposures in the first place – since all nuclear power operations release radioactivity –  while also minimizing and even dismissing  the damage this has done to health, all in service of ensuring the nuclear power industry’s continued existence.

Such allowance also keeps nuclear power in the forefront of energy choices, despite being one of the most expensive forms of energy when including upfront capital costs.

Trump’s EO demands that the NRC find a radiation exposure threshold deemed “safe,” essentially ignoring science to further suit industry needs, rather than adhering to the scientific consensus that no such threshold exists.

But this request has put the NRC in an untenable position for two reasons. First, the NRC itself reaffirmed use of the LNT model in 2022. Second, contemporary health research has confirmed that LNT already underestimates cancer risk at lower doses in about half of cases. 

These findings are particularly striking because they were based on studies of nuclear workers, a part of the adult population and predominantly male that research has shown are at less risk from radiation exposure. Therefore, these studies do not adequately reflect the heightened vulnerabilities of women, children, and pregnancy to cancer or other radiation-associated diseases.

Exposures that may appear statistically small for adult male workers can translate into devastating risks for others. By discarding LNT, regulators would not only further ignore these findings but also codify a system that accepts — even demands — more sacrificial victims of radiation exposure. 

By undermining LNT, the executive order provides industry with a regulatory green light: higher allowable exposures, fewer safety restrictions, and a streamlined licensing process for new reactors, including small modular nuclear reactors. The scientific implication is clear, and by extension so are the policy implications: every exposure, however small, carries some risk of harm. And even though the NRC tacitly recognizes this by using LNT, it still allows radiation exposures because if it didn’t, the nuclear power and weapons industry couldn’t exist. 

Even more chilling is the NRC’s stated interpretation of the EO: “This EO provides the NRC with a great opportunity to rethink its radiation protection regulatory framework to…safely enable the nation’s use of nuclear power.” But the NRC’s history with regulation shows a willingness to stretch and redefine what is “safe”, and to muddle that definition with concepts such as “permissible” and “reasonable” that form the basis of the concept of ALARA or “as low as reasonably achievable.”

Industry has a much larger say than members of the public in what constitutes reasonable, achievable, or safe. In fact, historically, such distortion of the LNT model was necessary for the nuclear power industry to continue.

We already know that any radiation exposure poses a risk, and that women, children, (girls more so) and pregnancies are more at risk than the reference man used as the basis for U.S. radiation standards. To pretend that some radiation exposure is safe is already promoting a lie. In truth, there should be no allowable exposure.

The consequences of loosening radiation protections are far-reaching. Ionizing radiation is a proven cause of cancer, genetic mutations, infertility, birth defects, and developmental harm. The impacts are not confined to immediate exposures but ripple through generations with cancers occurring in the exposed and future offspring.

Furthermore, the effects of radiation are not abstract: they manifest in communities near uranium mines, uranium enrichment plants, nuclear reactors, and radioactive waste dumps. For these populations, exposure is not a distant risk but a daily reality.

A very small radiation dose to a pregnant woman doubles her risk of having a leukemic child and living near nuclear power facilities doubles the risk of leukemia in children. Abandoning the LNT model is tantamount to legitimizing their suffering as the price of nuclear expansion.

A mistake with wind or solar may cause a temporary power loss, unlike a mistake with nuclear which has led to meltdowns with cascading catastrophic and never-ending impacts that can render entire regions uninhabitable for centuries.  Scientific evidence associates exposure to radiation from catastrophic releases with increases in birth defects, spontaneous abortions, stillbirths, mental and developmental disorders, heart defects, respiratory illness, and cancers – particularly in children. This fundamental incompatibility with human fallibility means nuclear power is not aligned with who we are as human beings. A catastrophic release of radioisotopes from nuclear power leaves behind hazards that persist for millennia. 

The current trajectory of US nuclear policy represents a profound betrayal of public trust. By reorienting the NRC toward the false assumption that nuclear power is “beneficial” and that nuclear power can be enabled by further eroding the Linear No Threshold model, the Trump administration’s executive order prioritizes industry expansion, and economic and security interests over human health.

Cindy Folkers is the Radiation and Health Hazard Specialist at Beyond Nuclear.

December 9, 2025 Posted by | health | Leave a comment

All French nuclear power plants are releasing tritium, according to Criirad.

December 5, 2025 , https://reporterre.net/Toutes-les-centrales-nucleaires-francaises-ont-rejete-du-tritium-selon-la-Criirad

All French nuclear power plants are releasing tritium. This is the finding of the Independent Research and Information Commission on Radioactivity (CRIIRAD), which issued a warning on December 3rd about uncontrolled releases.

Between 2015 and 2024, 16 power plants recorded levels exceeding 10 Bq/l in groundwater, some exceeding 1,000 Bq/l such as Bugey, Gravelines and Tricastin, the association details.

The three other power plants (Golfech, Nogent-sur-Seine, Paluel) experienced similar episodes before or after this period, notably Nogent-sur-Seine on January 17, 2025.

Criirad emphasizes that no power plant has been able to guarantee the permanent protection of groundwater and that any massive discharge would quickly affect the aquatic environment.

According to the Sortir du nucléaire network , the toxicity of tritium has been underestimated, particularly when it is absorbed by the body, where it then enters the DNA of cells.

December 9, 2025 Posted by | radiation | Leave a comment

‘A New Form of Genocide’: Gazans Feel Little Relief from Israeli Strangulation Since the Ceasefire.

 December 6, 2025 By Tareq S. Hajjaj Republished from Mondoweiss, https://scheerpost.com/2025/12/06/a-new-form-of-genocide-gazans-feel-little-relief-from-israeli-strangulation-since-the-ceasefire/

It’s been nearly two months since the ceasefire was reached in Gaza. Hopes were high among the 2 million Palestinians in the besieged Strip that not only would the Israeli bombings stop, but that everything they had been deprived of for the past two years – food, clean water, adequate medicine and healthcare – would flood into Gaza to ease their struggles. The hopes of regaining a fragment of the life they knew before the war, have dissipated, as the reality of a “new genocide” sets in.  

Though some aid has come into Gaza, and people have tried to restore some semblance of normalcy, the reality in Gaza is far from peacetime. Israeli bombs are still falling, people cannot return to their home, and sufficient food aid and medicines are still in short supply.  

The strain being felt by Gaza’s institutions, particularly its hospitals, and by ordinary Gazans, remains alarmingly close to wartime conditions. The Government Media Office in Gaza says that the humanitarian situation has not changed during or after the ceasefire, contrary to Israeli claims, and that the siege on Gaza has continued, with border crossings remaining effectively closed. What little goods do enter Gaza, the government says, does not meet “even the minimal needs of the population.” 

In the first month of the ceasefire, according to the UN, Israel rejected over 100 requests for the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza. Today, the World Food Programme says that dietary diversity remains low, and roughly 25 percent of households in Gaza are still reporting eating only one meal daily. 

Ismail al-Thawabteh, Director of the Government Media Office in Gaza, says Israel is trying to present a misleading image suggesting it allows the flow of goods. In reality, the amount entering Gaza does not exceed one-third of what was agreed upon in the humanitarian protocol of the ceasefire. “Instead of 600 trucks per day—the minimum needed to meet essential requirements—Israel permits only about 200 trucks, most of which carry limited-value commercial or aid items.”

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA) has reported that agencies are still required to coordinate all entry of humanitarian aid convoys with Israeli authorities. For reference, between the 12th and 18th of November, OCHA said humanitarian organizations coordinated 51 missions with the Israeli authorities. Of those 51 missions, just over half (27) were actually facilitated into Gaza; five were cancelled, 15 were impeded and four were denied. 

Palestinians in Gaza tell Mondoweiss that they are feeling “suffocated,” as authorities remain unable to resolve crises such as malnutrition, shortages of food and medicine, or provide even minimal protection against harsh weather conditions.

“This is a new form of genocide,” says Khalil al-Deqran, spokesperson for the Ministry of Health in Gaza. “The policy of refusing to allow in what is necessary for people’s survival mirrors what happened earlier, when food was withheld, and malnutrition was deliberately created.”

The Ministry of Health only receives about 25% of its basic needs, causing the condition of hospitals in Gaza, according to the spokesperson, to be “deplorable and difficult”, especially in winter, when large numbers of patients, particularly children, seek care. He notes that some pediatric wards are operating at five times their bed capacity, as children live in torn tents or on the streets, leading to widespread disease. “With Israel preventing the entry of shelter materials and reconstruction supplies, the health environment becomes even more dangerous, increasing mortality and the spread of illnesses.”

The Ministry of Health said that essential medications for chronic diseases such as hypertension, heart conditions, and diabetes, which affect 350,000 patients in Gaza, are still barred by Israel from entering the Strip. Infant formula also continues to be restricted, allowed only through a few traders and in minimal quantities. Israel also prevents the entry of critical hospital supplies, including electrical generators, lab equipment, imaging devices, incubators, intensive care units, and operating room equipment – all the essential supplies needed by Gaza’s already devastated hospitals to continue functioning. “The situation remains terrible and exceedingly difficult,” the spokesperson says. Israel has not committed to the humanitarian protocol, and what has been allowed in does not amount to a drop in the ocean of the health sector’s needs.”

“There are multiple cases of malnutrition across Gaza due to the lack of infant formula and the blocking of protein-rich foods such as meat, fish, eggs, and dairy. What enters today consists mainly of non-essential food items, which perpetuates malnutrition” the health ministry said. 

“The majority of the trucks Israel allows in carry low-nutritional-value items such as processed foods, chocolate, soft drinks, and snacks, as an attempt to evade humanitarian obligations while keeping the population in a state of absolute food deprivation,” al-Thawabteh said. 

According to al-Thawabteh, the Gaza Strip requires a consistent flow of essential goods: grains, flour, proteins, livestock, red and white meat, table eggs, nutritional supplements, shelter materials, construction supplies, agricultural inputs, and raw materials for local industries. He stresses that Israel treats these goods as “prohibited or heavily restricted items.”

By his measure, there have been no real improvements on the ground since the ceasefire. Instead, he says Gaza is witnessing a “deliberate engineering of a starvation policy,” in which Israel showcases images of aid trucks to appear compliant, while “in reality blocking essential supplies and rationing aid in ways that worsen the humanitarian crisis.” This behavior, he explains, “confirms that Israel uses the agreement as a political cover to prolong crises, not as a humanitarian or legal commitment toward civilians. The siege continues, restrictions continue, and the humanitarian infrastructure remains under immense pressure.”

‘The war is not over’ 

Ordinary families in Gaza are feeling the squeeze every day. Niveen al-Sharfa, a mother of five living in a tent in Gaza City, says nothing has changed since the ceasefire. Even when some goods are available in the markets, her family still cannot afford to buy them. “We expected that once the war ended and the ceasefire began, we would see reconstruction, open border crossings, improvements in hospitals, and the entry of winter essentials such as clothing, shelter, and other necessities. But none of this happened. We are still living in torn tents, and still far from our homes.”

Al-Sharfa recalls that during the war she lived in constant fear under bombardment, but says that even now she remains afraid of hearing at any moment that someone has been killed. “Nothing has changed… everything is the same,” she says.

Even those who experienced slight improvements in daily life after the ceasefire find their hopes diminished when looking at the broader picture. 

Amer al-Sultan was displaced from his home in the Jabalia Camp in northern Gaza. He says that life has changed “a little” after the ceasefire in terms of the availability of some food— though prices remain high — unlike during the height of the war, when famine pushed people to eat the leaves off of trees. “I expected to return to my home, but unfortunately, I did not. My home lies inside the yellow zone, and this makes me feel every day that the war has not ended.”

“The world thinks the war is over, but as long as there is an army inside the yellow zone, the war is not over. Just last night, we woke up to the sound of bombardment, explosions, and gunfire in those areas. How can we believe the war has ended when we sleep and wake to the sound of bombs?”

Nidaa al-Dahdouh, a mother of two, sees no sign that the war has ended as long as her children are not living normal lives. She wants to see them going to school, instead of waking up in the morning to collect firewood or to stand in long lines for food aid. “When the war ends, I will see my children getting ready in the morning to go to school wearing warm clothes,” she says. “But so far, they are still suffering in tents and the cold that comes with it.”

“We hoped for safety after the war, that we would return to our homes, and feel that the endless killing had stopped. But none of that happened. We hoped that basic goods would return to their normal prices, but that did not happen either. Yes, some items are available—like fish, for example—but the price is extremely high, and I cannot afford it. So for me, it is as if it does not exist at all.”

Tareq S. Hajjaj is the Gaza Correspondent for Mondoweiss and a member of the Palestinian Writers Union. Follow him on Twitter/X at @Tareqshajjaj.

December 8, 2025 Posted by | Atrocities, Gaza, health | Leave a comment

The mysterious black fungus from Chernobyl that may eat radiation

 Mould found at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster appears to be
feeding off the radiation. Could we use it to shield space travellers from
cosmic rays? In May 1997, Nelli Zhdanova entered one of the most
radioactive places on Earth – the abandoned ruins of Chernobyl’s exploded
nuclear power plant – and saw that she wasn’t alone.

Across the ceiling,
walls and inside metal conduits that protect electrical cables, black mould
had taken up residence in a place that was once thought to be detrimental
to life. In the fields and forest outside, wolves and wild boar had
rebounded in the absence of humans. But even today there are hotspots where staggering levels of radiation can be found due to material thrown out from the reactor when it exploded.

 BB 28th Nov 2025, https://www.bbc.co.uk/future/article/20251125-the-mysterious-black-fungus-from-chernobyl-that-appears-to-eat-radiation

December 2, 2025 Posted by | radiation, Ukraine | Leave a comment

CT scans: benefits vs cancer risks

Program: CT scans: benefits vs cancer risks

 CT scans can be vital in diagnosing disease, but they do come with small
increased risks because of the radiation exposure. A recent US study found
that if current practices persist, CT-associated cancer could account for
up to five per cent of all new diagnoses. So what can be done to drive down
the risk? One radiologist thinks mandating informed consent before a scan
is done would be a good start.

 ABC 28th Nov 2025, https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/healthreport/ct-scans-cancer-radiation-risk/106076780

November 30, 2025 Posted by | radiation | Leave a comment

Prawns, sneakers and spices: What we know about Indonesia’s radioactive exports

Thu 27 Nov, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-11-27/indonesia-radiation-contamination-explained/106057730

Indonesian authorities are conducting a criminal investigation into the cause of radioactive contamination in a number of its exports.

It comes amid growing concern from the country’s trading partners, after traces of radiation were found in items such as prawns, spices and even sneakers.

So how does a radioactive element end up in such a variety of items?

Here’s what we know.

What has been affected?

Concerns about contamination first surfaced after Dutch authorities detected radiation in shipping containers from Indonesia earlier this year.

A report stated that several boxes of sneakers were found to be contaminated.

That was followed by a safety alert from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in August, urging consumers not to eat certain imported frozen prawns from a company known as PT Bahari Makmur Sejati.

The FDA later found the same radioactive compound in a sample of cloves from PT Natural Java Spice.

In all three cases, the products were recalled.

The FDA also banned products from the two Indonesian companies until they were able to demonstrate they had resolved issues that allowed the contamination to occur.

What has been detected?

Both Dutch and American authorities say they found a radioactive element known as caesium-137.

The US Federal Drug Administration says long-term, repeated low-dose exposure to caesium-137 increases health risks.

But the agency adds that the levels detected in the Indonesian products posed no acute risk to health.

The radioactive isotope, which is created via nuclear reactions, is used in a variety of industrial, medical and research applications.

What is the source of radioactive contamination?

Investigations have so far centred on a metal-processing factory at the Cikande Industrial Estate, in Banten province on the island of Java.

The smelting company, called PT Peter Metal Technology, is believed to be China-owned, according to investigators.

Around 20 factories linked to the Cikande industrial estate are affected, including facilities that process shrimp and make footwear, authorities say.

Nine employees working on the industrial estate were detected to have been exposed to caesium-137. They have been treated at a government hospital in Jakarta and all contaminated facilities in the industrial area have been decontaminated.

In August, Indonesian authorities said the government would impose a restriction on scrap metal imports, which were reportedly a source of the contamination.

What is being done about it?

Indonesia’s nuclear agency last month said the sprawling industrial estate would be decontaminated.

On Wednesday, Indonesian authorities scaled up their probe into the suspected source of the contamination.

“The police have launched the criminal investigation,” said Bara Hasibuan, a spokesperson for the investigating task force.

Indonesian authorities have had difficulty conducting investigations as the management of PT Peter Metal Technology — which produces steel rods from scrap metal — has returned to China, Setia Diarta, director general of the Metal, Machinery, Transportation Equipment, and Electronics at Indonesia’s Ministry of Industry, told a hearing with politicians earlier this month.

In addition, Indonesian authorities say they are preventing goods contaminated with caesium-137 from entering Indonesia.

At one port, authorities said they detected and stopped eight containers of zinc powder from Angola that were contaminated with caesium-137.

After being re-exported, containers of the mineral were last month reported as being stranded off the Philippine coast amid a stoush between Jakarta and Manila over what to do with them.

November 28, 2025 Posted by | Indonesia, radiation | Leave a comment

Minnesota’s aging nukes pose national threat

  In a review of published studies of 136 nuclear reactor sites in the European Journal of Cancer Care in 2007, elevated leukemia disease rates in children were documented in the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, and Canada. This is not a new story.

  by beyondnuclearinternational, https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2025/11/23/minnesotas-aging-nukes-pose-national-threat/

More than electricity, the reactors supply a steady dose of radioactive tritium in drinking water, writes Susu Jeffrey

“Sometimes before I give a speech, I ask the audience to stand up if they or someone in their family has had cancer,” says John LaForge of Nukewatch. “Eighty percent of the audience gets up.”

The Monticello nuclear power reactor is on the Mississippi River about 35-miles northwest of Minneapolis. Xcel’s twin Prairie Island reactors, plus about 50 giant dry casks storing waste reactor fuel, are all in the floodplain of the Mississippi. This waste is sited 44 to 51 miles southeast of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

There are no plans to move the waste off-island because there is no alternative destination. In fact, 34 more concrete encased steel casks are planned. There is no national hot radioactive waste repository. Think of these waste container sites as permanent radioactive waste dumps.

The greater Twin Cities’ 3.7 million people are in the nuclear “shadow” (within 50 miles) of all three nukes. The Mississippi River serves 20 million people with drinking water, way beyond the Minnesota state population of 5.7 million. Minnesota’s aging nukes are a national threat. For approximately the next six generations, radioactive tritium will be a part of the drinking water wherever those molecules wander.

The Monticello nuke was licensed in 1970 for 40 years, and went online in 1971, a year it had two radioactive cesium spills. In 2010, the license was renewed for another 20 years until 2030. Xcel Energy has even been granted an extension for another 20 years until 2050. It is a corporate financial security move not yet approved by the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission which holds the final consent. Paperwork is one thing, pipes are another.

In November 2022, a 50-year-old underground pipe leaked 829,000 gallons of tritium-contaminated wastewater that reached the Mississippi River, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Xcel failed to make public the radioactive spill for four months. After a May 15, 2024 public hearing in Monticello where citizens testified “We don’t trust you. You lie,” an NRC executive “clarified” Xcel’s “miscommunication.”

Senior Environmental Project Manager, Stephen J. Koenick admitted some tritium had been measured in the Mississippi. Tritium bonds with water and cannot be separated out. Water obeys gravity running downhill, in the case of Monticello, from the reactor to the Mississippi. The runaway tritium will persist in the environment for ten half-lives or about 123 years.

No telling where Xcel’s radioactive molecules will land. Men have a one in two chance of being diagnosed with cancer during their lifetimes; for women the chance is one in three (National Cancer Institute, 2/9/2022). There is tremendous popular, fear-driven support for the oncology industry.

The good news is that while cancer numbers are up so is the cancer survival rate. However, at nuke weapons, nuke reactors, and the virtually forever waste sites, “accidents” happen along with on-going radioactive decay. Radioactivity cannot be contained. When I was a newspaper reporter in Brevard County, Florida, where Cape Canaveral is located, I learned that nuclear waste cannot be rocketed off into space because it’s too hot, too heavy, and the rockets too faulty.

Nuclear Safety Regulations Changing

Among President Trump’s cost-cutting moves is a weakening of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s exposure standards. Staff would be cut and regulations “revised” virtually cutting off the commission’s independent status. The Monticello nuke was licensed for 40 years and was rubber stamped to work for 80. Octogenarian nukes are considered “safe enough” now by the nuclear/government consortium.

Piecemeal fix-it parts for geriatric machinery or people are a lucrative business. Locating a leaking tritium pipe underground, between buildings, removing and replacing it is a non-negotiable emergency at nuclear reactors with miles and miles of piping. Upkeep expenses figure in utility rate hikes.

Joseph Mangano and Ernest Sternglass did a study of eight downwind US communities in the two years after a nuclear reactor closure. A remarkable 17.4 percent drop in infant mortality was found. “We finally have peer-reviewed accurate data attaching nuclear power reactors to death and injury in the host communities,” New York State Assemblyman Richard Brodsky said of the 2002 report in the Archives of Environmental Health.

Monopoly capitalism or public service?

Clearly the Monticello reactor was designed to make money. In November 2024, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison wrote that Xcel has “aggressively” pursued multi-year rate hikes while earning large profits. In 2024 Xcel reported $1.94-billion net earnings, a profit margin up 14% from 2023.

According to Xcel propaganda, the nuke is “the biggest employer and largest local taxpayer” in Monticello, MN, and generates an estimated $550 million in economic activity each year in the region. And like profits, cancer rates are up notably among people under 50 and rising faster among women than men the American Cancer Society reports.

Repeatedly, the Xcel corporation wins its rate hike and re-licensing “asks.” These asks get rewritten and resubmitted until a “compromise” is reached. In 2025, residential customers will pay $5.39 more per month, down from the original ask of $9.89, according to Minnesota Public Radio, which also noted that greater increases are on the horizon for EVs and data center capital improvements.

Cancer

St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital advertises heavily with videos of big-eyed, bald children cancer patients. In a review of published studies of 136 nuclear reactor sites in the European Journal of Cancer Care in 2007, elevated leukemia disease rates in children were documented in the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, and Canada. This is not a new story.

The danger of mental retardation of fetuses exposed in the womb was reported in The New York Times (page A1 on 12/20/1989). Tritium crosses the placenta. In addition to the health costs of breathing and ingesting exhausts from nuclear power reactors, there is the problem of what to do with and how to contain its long-lived waste. The nuclear profit god is a once and future terrorist.

The Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Mississippi River is working for the immediate decommissioning of the Monticello nuclear reactor by educating the public on dangers of the nuclear power reactors and safe alternatives.  To learn more, visit our website. See our Monticello report “Serial Killers on the Loose: Cancer Death Rates Rising in Reactor Host Communities”.

November 27, 2025 Posted by | health, USA | Leave a comment

Department of Energy Seeks to Eliminate Radiation Protections Requiring Controls “As Low As Reasonably Achievable”

21 Nov 25 https://nukewatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/DOE-Seeks-to-Lower-Radiation-Protections-by-Eliminating-ALARA.pdf

Santa Fe, NM – An internal Department of Energy (DOE) memorandum eliminates worker and public radiation protection rules known “As Low As Reasonably Achievable” (ALARA). This fundamental departure from decades of accepted health physics practices is being promoted by senior DOE political appointees with little background in health or radiation control. It is marked as “URGENCY: High” under the auspices of the DOE Deputy Secretary, the Under Secretary for Science, and the Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration. The memorandum awaits the final signature of DOE Secretary Chris Wright.

The memo’s stated goal is to:

“…remove the ALARA principle from all DOE directives and regulations, including DOE Order 458.1, Radiation Protection of the Public and the Environment, NE [Office of Nuclear Energy] Order 458.1, Radiation Protection of the Public, and, upon completion of the rulemaking process, 10 CFR [Code of Federal Regulations] 835, Occupational Radiation Protection.” [1]

It follows the playbook of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which called for:

“Set[ting] clear radiation exposure and protection standards by eliminating ALARA (“as low as reasonably achievable”) as a regulatory principle and setting clear standards according to radiological risk and dose rather than arbitrary objectives.”[2]

Contrary to Project 2025’s assertion that ALARA is just “arbitrary objectives,” the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration declares it to be:

“…the cornerstone principle of radiation safety, emphasizing that radiation exposure should be minimized to the lowest possible levels while still allowing essential tasks to be performed. This principle applies everywhere radiation is present, including medical, industrial, nuclear, and research settings… ALARA is not just a recommendation—it is a legal and ethical requirement in radiation-related industries.”[3]

The elimination of ALARA protections is likely to increase radiation exposures to workers and weaken cleanup standards at contaminated sites where DOE has binding legal requirements with the impacted states (e.g., Los Alamos Lab, NM; Hanford Nuclear Reservation, WA and West Valley Demonstration Project, NY), as well as DOE Legacy Management sites where residual contamination remains after completion of claimed “cleanup” (e.g., Rocky Flats, CO and Weldon Spring, MO).

DOE’s memo purports to remove red tape constraining construction of new nuclear power plants, which inevitably experience huge cost overruns at ratepayers’ expense because of the inherent economic problems with nuclear power. However, because DOE’s primary mission is expanding nuclear weapons production, the elimination of ALARA protections will hit workers and nearby communities by allowing higher worker and public doses.

Two pertinent examples are the expanding production of plutonium “pit” bomb cores at the Los Alamos Lab and future pit production at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. At the same time, the independent Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board’s role of nuclear safety oversight is being crippled by the Trump Administration’s refusal to nominate candidates to the Board. Moreover, DOE’s termination of ALARA rules can even downgrade international radiation protection standards because the Department provides staff and training for the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency.

DOE’s high-level memorandum relies heavily upon a recent study by its Idaho National Laboratory.[4] According to the memo, the INL Report concluded:

“The balance of available scientific evidence indicates that annual dose rates of 5,000 mrem or less have not been shown to result in detectable increases in adverse health outcomes across diverse human populations and exposure scenarios. Furthermore, substantial evidence suggests that even 10,000 mrem/year may maintain a reasonable safety margin based on available epidemiological and radiobiological data.”

This is highly debatable (see comments by an independent epidemiologist below). By way of comparison, a standard chest X-ray is around 10 millirem (mrem) and an average annual radiation dose from all sources (including natural) to any one individual in the United States is around 600 mrem.[5] The INL report begins to rationalize public radioactive doses that are up to 16 times higher.

The Idaho National Laboratory is where DOE extracted weapons grade uranium from spent reactor fuel for warhead production, resulting in significant ground water contamination and “temporary” storage of liquid high-level waste now estimated to cost billions of dollars to stabilize. Nevertheless, according to INL Director John Wagner, the Idaho National Laboratory Report specifically recommends:

  • Eliminating all ALARA requirements and limits below the 5,000 mrem occupational dose limit in order to reduce “unnecessary economic burdens.”
  • Multiplying five-fold the allowed public radioactive dose limit from 100 mrem per year to 500 mrem per year.
  • Supporting ongoing research on low-dose radiation effects to “further refine scientific understanding and regulatory approaches.”

Ongoing research on low-dose radiation effects” is aimed at the Linear No-Threshold principle, which maintains that no dose of radiation is safe. Related, ALARA is considered to be the global bedrock of radiation protection for nuclear workers and the public and is widely accepted as best practices by health physics professionals. Historically, more than 10,000 DOE workers have filed compensation claims for their occupational illnesses, which argues for strengthening, not weakening, occupational protection standards.

In parallel with DOE under Trump Executive Orders, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (which oversees the nuclear energy industry) is questioning the Linear No-Threshold (LNT) principle. In recent written comment to the NRC, epidemiologist Joseph Mangano summarized decades of studies supporting LNT. His cited evidence includes:

  • Studies of low-dose pelvic X-rays to pregnant women in the mid-1950s that concluded that a single X-ray would nearly double the risk of the child dying of cancer or leukemia by age ten.
  • A 1990 study by the Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (BEIR) that concluded that cancers and genetic damage increase with low-level radiation as a linear, non-threshold function of the dose. It included over 900 references that support LNT.
  • A second BEIR study in 2005 that reiterated the risks of low-dose radiation exposures.
  • A 2020 systematic review of 26 studies involving 91,000 individuals with solid cancers and 13,000 with leukemia that documented excess risks caused by low dose radiation.
  • A 2023 study of 309,932 workers at nuclear plants in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States that found 28,089 had died of solid cancers with occupational doses well below Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors. This suggests that the Linear No-Threshold model may actually underestimate the harmful effects of prolonged low radiation doses.[6]

Jay Coghlan, Director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, concluded: “The Trump Administration is pumping taxpayers’ money into the much hyped “nuclear renaissance,” now in its third or fourth failed attempt, while cutting Medicaid for the poor and cutting taxes for the rich. But this time the corporate nuclear titans are being given a leg up by cutting nuclear safety protections for workers and the public, inevitably causing more illnesses. The good news is that fundamental market economics will eventually collapse the nuclear industry. However, one has to ask, at what safety costs to other sectors, such as the expanding production of nuclear weapons for the new arms race?”

November 24, 2025 Posted by | radiation, USA | Leave a comment

Trump’s new radiation exposure limits could be ‘catastrophic’ for women and girls.

it has since been widely documented that women and young girls are significantly more vulnerable to radiation harm than men—in some cases by as much as a ten-fold difference………… Those most impacted by weaker exposure standards will be young girls under five years old

By Lesley M. M. Blume, Chloe Shrager | November 14, 2025, https://thebulletin.org/2025/11/trumps-new-radiation-exposure-limits-could-be-catastrophic-for-women-and-girls/

In a May executive order, aimed at ushering in what he described as an “American nuclear renaissance,” President Donald Trump declared moot the science underpinning decades-old radiation exposure standards set by the federal government. Executive Order 14300 directed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to conduct a “wholesale revision” of half-a-century of guidance and regulations. In doing so, it considers throwing out the foundational model used by the government to determine exposure limits, and investigates the possibility of loosening the standard on what is considered a “safe” level of radiation exposure for the general public. In a statement to the Bulletin, NRC spokesperson Scott Burnell confirmed that the NRC is reconsidering the standards long relied upon to guide exposure limits.

Now, some radiology and policy experts are sounding alarm bells, calling the directive a dangerous departure from a respected framework that has been followed and consistently reinforced by scientific review for generations. They warn that under some circumstances, the effects of the possible new limits could range from “undeniably homicidal” to “catastrophic” for those living close to nuclear operations and beyond.

“It’s an attack on the science and the policy behind radiation protection of people and the environment that has been in place for decades,” says radiologist Kimberly Applegate, a former chair of the radiological protection in medicine committee of the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) and a current council and scientific committee member of the National Council on Radiation Protection (NCRP)—two regulatory bodies that make radiation safety recommendations to the NRC. According to Applegate, current government sources have told her and other experts that the most conservative proposed change would raise the current limit on the amount of radiation that a member of the general public can be exposed to by five times. That would be a standard “far out of the international norms,” she says, and could significantly raise cancer rates among those living nearby. The NRC spokesperson did not respond to a question from the Bulletin about specific new exposure limits being considered.

Kathryn Higley, president of the NCRP, warns that a five-fold increase in radiation dose exposure would look like “potentially causing cancers in populations that you might not expect to see within a couple of decades.”

“There are many things that Executive Order does, but one thing that’s really important is that it reduces the amount of public input that will be allowed,” says Diane D’Arrigo, the Radioactive Waste Project Director at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a nonprofit group critical of the nuclear energy industry. In a statement to the Bulletin, the NRC said that once its standards reassessment process is completed, the NRC will publish its proposed rules in the Federal Register for public comment.* The NRC spokesperson did not respond to questions about when the proposed new standards would be made public and whether or how the general public would be further alerted to the changes.

Once the proposed policy change hits the Federal Register, the final decision will likely follow in a few days without advertising a period for public input, Applegate adds.

“I’m not sure I know why the loosening is needed,” says Peter Crane, who served as the NRC’s Counsel for Special Projects for nearly 25 years, starting in 1975. “I think it’s ideologically driven.” He points out that the probable loosening of the standards is set to coincide with increased pressure to greenlight new nuclear plants and could weaken emergency preparedness in case of leaks or other accidents: “I think it’s playing with fire.” (The NRC’s Office of Public Affairs did not respond to questions about the rationale for loosening the standards and the timing of the reconsideration.)


Possible shorter timelines for building nuclear power plants, coinciding with weakened radiation exposure standards, could spell disaster, warn other experts. It would be “undeniably homicidal” of the NRC to loosen current US exposure standards even slightly, adds Mary Olson, a biologist who has researched the effects of radiation for over 40 years and published a peer-reviewed study titled “Disproportionate impact of radiation and radiation regulation” in 2019. Olson cites NRC equations that found that the current exposure standards result in 3.5 fatal cancers per 1,000 people exposed for their lifetimes by living near a nuclear facility; a five-fold rate increase in allowable radiation exposure could therefore result in a little over 17.5 cancers per 1,000 people. Expressed another way, that means “one in 57 people getting fatal cancer from year in, year out exposure to an NRC facility,” she says.

The NRC’s Office of Public Affairs did not respond to questions about whether the NRC could guarantee the current level of safety for the general public or nuclear workers if adopting looser radiation exposure standards, and about whether new protections would be put into place.

Are women and children more vulnerable? According to Olson, increased radiation exposure could be even more “catastrophic” for women and children. Exposure standards have long been determined by studies on how radiation affects the “reference man,” defined by the ICRP as a white male “between 20-30 years of age, weighing around 70 kilograms [155 pounds].”

But Applegate, Olson, and other experts say that it has since been widely documented that women and young girls are significantly more vulnerable to radiation harm than men—in some cases by as much as a ten-fold difference, according to Olson’s 2019 study. Olson and Applegate cite another 2006 review assessing and summarizing 60 years of health data on the survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings; the study showed that women are one-and-a-half to two times as likely to develop cancer from the same one-time radiation dose as men.

Young girls are seven times more at risk, they say. Those most impacted by weaker exposure standards will be young girls under five years old, Olson says. Her 2024 study of the A-bomb bomb survivor data for the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, titled “Gender and Ionizing Radiation,” found that they face twice the risk as boys of the same age, and have four to five times the risk of developing cancer later in life than a woman exposed in adulthood.

“Protections of the public from environmental poisons and dangerous materials have to be focused on those who will be most harmed, not average harmed,” Olson says. “That’s where the protection should be.”

Infants are especially vulnerable to radiation harm, says Rebecca Smith-Bindman, a radiologist and epidemiologist who is the lead author of a just-released major study in the New England Journal of Medicine documenting the relationship between medical imaging (such as X-rays and CT scans) and cancer risk for children and adolescents; more than 3.7 million children born between 1996 and 2016 participated and have been tracked. Smith-Bindman contests the idea that women are overall more vulnerable to cancer than men, saying that “in general, maybe women are a little bit more sensitive, …[but] women and men have different susceptibilities to different cancer types,” with women being more vulnerable to lung and breast cancers, among other types. But it is “absolutely true that children are more susceptible,” she adds. With children under the age of one, “the risks are markedly elevated.” While these findings are sobering, she points out that with medical imaging, “there’s a trade-off…it helps you make diagnoses; it might save your life. It’s very different from nuclear power or other sources of radiation where there’s no benefit to the patient or the population. It’s just a harm.”

“We’ve known for decades that pregnancy is [also] more impacted” by radiation exposure, says Cindy Folkers, radiation and health hazard specialist at Beyond Nuclear, a nonprofit anti-nuclear power and weapons organization. “Radiation does its damage to cells, and so when you have a pregnancy, you have very few cells that will be developing into various parts of the human body: the skeleton, the organs, the brain,” and exposing those cells to radiation during pregnancy can impact the embryo’s health, she says. Smith-Bindman and her team are also studying the impact of radiation exposure on pregnancy, and while their results are not yet in, “we do know that exposures during pregnancy are harmful,” she says, “and that they result in elevated cancer risks in the offspring of those patients.”

For children, lifetime cancer risk will be increased not only because of the “sensitivity and vulnerability of developing tissues, but also partly [because] they would be living longer under a different radiation protection framework,” adds David Richardson, a UC Irvine professor who studies occupational safety hazards.

Several experts noted the irony that these changes are being mandated by the same administration that is also overseeing a policy of “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA), an effort being spearheaded by Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “In terms of general [public] knowledge, I think there has not been very large coverage or acceptance of the idea that radiation affects different people differently on the basis of both age and biological sex,” says Olson. “But we now have enough reviews, enough literature to say that the biological sex difference is there. I don’t think MAHA mothers know this because it’s been underreported, [and] they would be concerned if they knew it.”

The NRC’s Office of Public Affairs did not respond to questions about concerns being raised by radiologists and epidemiologists about possible health consequences—especially for children—as a result of increased radiation exposure.

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November 18, 2025 Posted by | radiation, Reference, Women | Leave a comment

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