This seems like pretty strong evidence that the Linear No-Threshold Model for radiation exposure is the correct model. Not great for the many companies attempting to revive the nuclear power industry.

▲ ch4s3 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Not really. A round trip transatlantic flight hits you with ~0.06 to 0.1 mSv and a chest x-ray is on the order of up to ~0.02 to 0.1 mSv, so roughly similar. There's a reason x-ray techs stand behind a wall, you have a VERY small chance of DNA damage with each exposure and for most people that doesn't matter because you don't fly that often or get that many x-rays but if you do it all the time, your bound to have a high energy particle smash into the wrong part of a cell's DNA. This isn't an effect of cumulative small doses but rather rolling the same dice many times.

▲ leonidasrup 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

There are thermal baths with quite high concentration of radon.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20180306-a-spa-where-pati...

Most exposed are not the visitors, but the thermal bath workers.

"Workers and visitors in thermal spas are exposed to radiation from radon and short-lived daughters. Radon concentrations in the premises of a thermal bath in Budapest were investigated; high radon concentrations (up to 7.15 kBq.m-3) were found in some rooms. Bronchial dose and effective dose equivalent values were estimated for the staff and the visitors. In some cases the effective dose was about or in excess of 20 mSv annual limit for the workers. Doses for the visitors were about 4 mSv per year, but exposure of the public from radon is still outside the scope of the system of dose limitation."

https://academic.oup.com/rpd/article-abstract/56/1-4/319/310...

There are few places on Earth with high natural background radiation:

Ramsar, Iran (the maximal estimated dose-rate received by inhabitants is 80 mSv/year

Kerala (India), Orissa (India), Guarapari (Brazil), Yangjiang (China)

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12402632/

https://academic.oup.com/jrr/article/65/Supplement_1/i32/792...

▲ varjag 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You do get DNA damage all the time, just very few of them lead to cancerous growth. So it would make sense the risk goes linearly up with exposure.

	▲	colechristensen 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		You also evolved in a world with radiation and have repair mechanisms in place so it makes sense that the "realized" damage is not necessarily linear.

▲ thehappypm 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This isn’t exactly correct. Cancer is not (typically) caused by a single DNA mutation, but multiple accumulated errors.

▲ colechristensen 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

You have to be up to date on the exposure of a "chest xray" because tech improvements have considerably changed this in our lifetimes.

	▲	manarth 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		And cultural references can be dramatically and wildly off. `"Plant director Bryukhanov reports no more than 3.6 roentgen, which I'm told is the equivalent of a chest x-ray, so if you're overdue for a check-up…" – HBO Chernobyl` https://xkcd.com/radiation/

▲ stackskipton 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What? Nuclear Power workers are exposed much less than flight attendants and everyone else gets more radiation from their occasional flight.

Yes, disasters are worse but most other power options are killing people in non visible ways.

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arghwhat 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Whether the disasters are worse depends on your metric. The deaths from Fukushima was, to my knowledge, only a few elderly individuals who had stress-induced heart failures. And that's a worst-case scenario with corruption, old designs, complete negligence and dual natural disasters hitting the plant in parallel.

It seems absolutely silly, but even wind power kills more people per TWh produced than nuclear due to workplace accidents in installation/maintenance.

Also not sure why lung cancer from oil/coal air pollution would be less visible than hypothetical radiation-induced cancers.

EDIT: Source: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-p..., accidents include indirect deaths. Solar is the only energy source that beats nuclear in safety.

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gosub100 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Both arguments can be correct: if X dose of radiation increases cancer risk, and it's shown that a nuclear plant released Y dose (by, oh, say, leaking tritium into the earth [1]), it's not out of the question to ask them to pay into a compensation fund. That has no bearing on whether wind turbines kill people.

1: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/03/22/what-we-know-about-...

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arghwhat 3 days ago | parent [-]

I see the good intent but I cannot agree on several points.

First point is that even though radiation can cause cancer, radiation is part of life. If my basement has higher levels of radon, who should compensate me? What about the radiation exposure from requested x-rays, or food?

Second is responsibility. If I decide to fly a lot, my increased radiation exposure is not the fault if the airline. It's not their fault that the atmosphere is less protective up there, and everyone flying is equally exposed. Now if they could prevent the radiation they preferably should, but until then their responsibility is disclosure of this information to allow informed decisions. Can't blame the ocean for being wet.

Third is that by that logic, it very much has bearing whether "wind turbines kill people", as it implies that every fractional possible cause of harm must all be measured and pay in proportion to their possibility of damage.

There would be no way to even start. However, I do agree that when accidents or negligence/malice is involved, it makes sense that the actor spends energy cleaning up. For example, the biological harm to people in Fukushima was practically non-existent, but the short-term the economic and social harm was there and was entirely avoidable. Damages should be paid.

(Of course, windmills don't kill people, point is that wind, nuclear and solar is so harmless that the only thing we're looking at is differences in construction-related workplace accidents, which are a bit higher with windmills and lower with solar.)

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gosub100 3 days ago | parent [-]

First paragraph of your reply is the relative privation fallacy: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Relativ...

You cannot make the claim that releasing toxins is okay because some toxic elements occur naturally.

( Also, if your basement has a radon problem, you can mitigate it by better ventilation. You cannot mitigate a contamination zone without decades-long cleanup.)

Personal responsibility only assumes informed consent. This is why cigarette packs have warnings on them. I would argue that w passenger does have a case against the airline for not informing them that they are being exposed to cancer causing radiation even when everything this perfectly normal. The classic argument "but what about plane crashes? They don't inform you about that" is different, because crashes are.by definition abnormal, tragic, and rare. Whereas absolutely everyone on board is getting a dose every time they fly. As for medical exposure, I will go out on a limb and say that's covered under medical consent forms, and/or a medical research board has determined that the benefits from the dose outweigh the cancer risk.

But that only covers airline passengers, not employees that are getting orders of magnitude more dose. That only strengthens the argument that the airline shares liability. Do you think coal miners should have no case for lung diseases because maybe they got it from cigarettes? Or inherited it? Their employment put them in the position where they got exposed. Therefore the employer is liable for their illness.

	▲	arghwhat 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		That is not what relative privation fallacy is. The topic at hand is repeated exposure to low radiation does, I gave examples or negligible to high dosages. Disagreement does not make something a fallacy. Twofold response: 1. It was not directly part of my claim, but yes releasing "toxins" as a binary concept has to be okay because the world, nature and ourselves naturally releases toxins. Irresponsible, excessive or unnecessary release is what matters. 2. In the airline case, it is not the airline releasing anything. It is cosmic rays and solar flares, which you went closer to. The airline should give a heads up in case this information evaded you, but it's the sun you'd need to sue. You'll have to get in line behind all the skin cancer lawsuits it's dealing with though. A beach body guard has a massively increased risk of skin cancer compared to an office worker. You can, at most, ask for a shade for your watch tower or complimentary sunscreen. Even for coal and oil powerplants for example, the right thing to focus on is getting rid of it, not extracting ongoing damages. Wind, nuclear, sun. For flying, in either come up with a viable way and of radiation shielding passenger planes so it can be pushed for policy, or don't fly. Also don't go to very high altitude locations also carry increased risk. As for contamination zones, that's specifically something the one to blame will have to keep paying to manage and clean up. Their fault, their bill. But even with all that it still ends up being what takes the fewest lives, due to just how much work for society that one plant did vs. any alternative.

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ch4s3 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> only a few elderly individual who had stress-induced heart failures

Caused by the evacuation

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garbagewoman 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

>only a few elderly individuals

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aeternum 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Agreed, but one of the key reasons plants are so expensive is to ensure that power workers are exposed to much less radiation than flight attendants.

The fact that even a small amount of discharged radiation can cause damage makes everything more expensive for those companies, not just design and certification of the reactor itself but also liability insurance.

▲ redsocksfan45 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

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