01-27-2008, 03:42 PM
Re: BS.
I dunno where that particular number came from. It's probably wrong.
Find me another source that cites hard numbers for that effect.
The best that I've found so far mentions a few percentages of background radiation attributable to various terrestrial sources (coal-burning power plants, contamination from nuclear bomb testing, nuclear power, our own bodies) but nothing else that I've found mentions the amount that radiation pollution has added to natural background radiation.
Some sources try to "explain" that even if a satellite's radioactive fuel were to be vaporized in the atmosphere, it would at most add half-again or double the amount that the average person is exposed to radiation and that such levels of radiation are safer than smoking cigarettes or flying in airplanes. That people actually try to rationalize that kind of thing is creepy.
I dunno where that particular number came from. It's probably wrong.
Find me another source that cites hard numbers for that effect.
The best that I've found so far mentions a few percentages of background radiation attributable to various terrestrial sources (coal-burning power plants, contamination from nuclear bomb testing, nuclear power, our own bodies) but nothing else that I've found mentions the amount that radiation pollution has added to natural background radiation.
Some sources try to "explain" that even if a satellite's radioactive fuel were to be vaporized in the atmosphere, it would at most add half-again or double the amount that the average person is exposed to radiation and that such levels of radiation are safer than smoking cigarettes or flying in airplanes. That people actually try to rationalize that kind of thing is creepy.