[mpweiher]

> The cost is poisoning a large swath of land for centuries to come.

No it's not. For example, the vast majority of the soil "cleanup" in Fukushima is completely unnecessary, as was most of the evacuation. Another example: the fishermen of the Fukushima prefecture are suffering. But not because there's anything wrong with the fish, it's that people are afraid.

Fear of nuclear kills far more people than nuclear does.

Even the Chernobyl "red zone" has been shown to be net beneficial to the wildlife there. Hardly a sign of "poisoning".

Again, you are speaking from emotion, not fact.

> It's not just politics and emotion

Not just, but mostly.

> How can you not be a afraid when the potential damage is so large?

Because the potential damage is not actually "so large", as has been amply demonstrated by now, see in particularly Fukushima, but even Chernobyl. Never mind non-events like Three Mile Island.

And fear is never a good reaction, because it leads exactly to the distortions of perception that you are demonstrating.

[piva00]

> For example, the vast majority of the soil "cleanup" in Fukushima is completely unnecessary, as was most of the evacuation.

Can you provide sources for this claim?

> Even the Chernobyl "red zone" has been shown to be net beneficial to the wildlife there. Hardly a sign of "poisoning".

There's still no scientific consensus about the effects of radiation on fauna in the CEZ [0]. You have an opinion but we still haven't figured out how damaging the radiation there is for animals or not. I'd rather not have humans living around a potentially dangerous poisoned area until the effects are understood.

[0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0265931X1...

[mpweiher]

The basis of the cleanup and evacuation requirements is the Linear No Threshold model, which assumes that even the tiniest amount of radiation has adverse health effects. There is no empirical basis for the LNT model at very low doses, so it's essentially made up.

And in fact, the LNT model greatly overestimated the casualties from Chernobyl, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

There's tons of references for this on the web, see for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fuk...

Also from there:

"It is believed that the health effects of the radioactivity release are primarily psychological rather than physical effects. [..] However, people who have been evacuated have suffered from depression and other mental health effects."

The same was true in Chernobyl, check the WHO reports that came out every decade. Each subsequent report reduced the estimated number of casualties linked to radiation by an order of magnitude, while the psychological impact increased.

> There's still no scientific consensus about the effects of radiation on fauna in the CEZ

While there is no scientific consensus on the details, there is consensus that the red zone is not the poisonous wasteland you claimed. The wildlife has absolutely thrived.

https://allthatsinteresting.com/chernobyl-animals

https://www.wired.com/story/chernobyl-exclusion-zone-rewildi...

[piva00]

Wildlife has thrived due to a lack of humans, not because radiation isn't dangerous. There are mutations abound in animals from the CEZ.

A question I'd have for you would be: are you willing to live with your family an extended period of your lives in a place with a radioactive event like the CEZ?

[mpweiher]

> Wildlife has thrived due to a lack of humans

...and due to it not being a poisonous wasteland where life cannot thrive. As evidenced by it thriving.

> not because radiation isn't dangerous.

Somehow you slipped in the assumption that the radiation is definitely dangerous. Why? What is the evidence? The fact that wildlife is thriving?

And of course I never claimed the wildlife thrived because of the radiation.

Though of course there is evidence for the therapeutic effects of low-level radiation, for example:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14673618/

> A question I'd have for you would be: are you willing to live with your family an extended period of your lives in a place with a radioactive event like the CEZ?

Straw-man.

"This is not my preferred place to live" ≠ "This is place is uninhabitable".

For example, there are tons of places in my city where I wouldn't want to live. And yet tons of people do live there.

And I am sure there are tons of people who wouldn't want to live where I live. Even though I think it's pretty nice.

If the place is cheap, green, slightly hilly but not too much, with water nearby and excellent transportation options but no noise: sign me up! Certainly if the radiation is at levels of some of the stuff they're removing from Fukushima Prefecture (less than the background radiation in Denver and many other places).

[LorenPechtel]

Most of the exclusion zone is back down to what is considered safe levels--and that by the LNT numbers which almost certainly overstate the risk. (The basic problem is that while we have many data points that suggest LNT is wrong to derive better data requires a *very* large test that would be extremely expensive.)

Don't grow food, take care when messing with the soil. There are areas you certainly don't want to be digging as the orcs found out the hard way last year. It's like asbestos--harmless in place, dangerous if messed with.