[woodruffw]

I can't speak to the meltdown statistic, but for coal: just the burning alone is responsible for hundreds of thousands of premature deaths annually[1].

And that's before we consider the environmental and health risks of ash ponds[2], which can (and have caused) heavy metal pollution in nearby groundwater supply. The largest industrial spill in US history happened barely a decade ago, and was an ash pond[3].

Edit: I can personally recommend "The Buffalo Creek Disaster" (ISBN 9780394723433) as a writeup by a lawyer involved in a similar coal ash accident (one that directly killed over 100 people).

[1]: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2017936118

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_pond

[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly...

[acidburnNSA]

WHO has particulate air pollution from fossil and biofuel killing just about 8 million people per year (a Chernobyl of people (short + long term) every 7 hours). Add in that they also cause climate change and non-combustion sources like nuclear, wind, solar, hydro all look pretty darn awesome.

https://www.who.int/health-topics/air-pollution