So tired of the warmairs trying to put the absolute fear of Christ into anyone who mentions the upside of nuclear energy in the battle against AGW. Nuclear technology can never be seen to have evolved beyond Chernobyl while going into hyperbole over every advancements in renewables. Radiation can hurt you, but let's have some perspective.

On Fukushima,
http://www.radiationandreason.com/uploads//enc_ANStalkforWeb.pdf :

"So what were the consequences at Fukushima? The impact of the actual radiation and the released radioactivity for workers and public have been zero, as expected on the above criteria. In the next 50 years there is unlikely to be more than one single case of radiation-induced cancer, buried among all the other "natural" cases. There may have been superficial beta-burns, but no significant hospital cases"

To add, from http://www.radiationandreason.com/uploads//enc_NAIICcommentNEW.pdf (sorry that this also contains a several aspects of my previous citation)

"While other buildings and plant, such as a major oil refinery, were completely destroyed, seemingly without public comment, the nuclear reactors almost survived an assault far greater than that which they were designed to withstand."

Nobody thinks the reactors were brilliantly situated, but alternative energy installations don't miss out on the effects of immense catastrophes as tsunamis and typhoons. Well situated, well built nuclear installations will hold up way better over their 60-70 year lives than renewable installations, and their damage-exposure footprint is absolutely miniscule in comparison.

The world will not end with growth in nuclear energy, and renewables will not meet man's needs alone.

5 Findings about Fukushima from the environmentalists at *The Breakthrough Institute*:
1. Thyroid Cancer Rates Lower in Fukushima Children Than Other Regions
2. Fukushima Seafood Safe to Eat
3. Fukushima Evacuation Zone Is Mostly Habitable
4. Cancer Rates in USS Reagan Crewmembers Lower Than Control Group
5. Fukushima Death Toll Is Too Small to Measure
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/issues/nuclear/five-surprising-public-health-facts-about-fukushima

WHAT IS THE ACTUAL RISK TO PEOPLE AT FUKUSHIMA?
Authorities have found that the Soviet evacuation of the Chernobyl region caused depression and mental illness which has probably killed more people than Chernobyl’s radiation would have. Mark Lynas then goes on to say:

“So the scientific consensus currently is that the radioactivity released by the accident at Fukushima will very likely present a small additional lifetime risk of cancer for people whose homes are in the relatively high 10-100 mSv contamination range. Given that the contamination comes largely from caesium-137 (which has a half-life of about 30 years) this will persist for long enough to make permanent evacuation a worrying prospect. Think about it seriously: would you return to your home if doing so presented you with a one-in-a-thousand to one-in-a-hundred additional risk of cancer? This is the choice faced by the Japanese population and authorities.”
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/08/how-dangerous-is-the-fukushima-exclusion-zone/#sthash.dI0gnJQC.dpuf

Given that the choice between a certainty of far higher rates of suicide from evacuation OR the *possibility* of slightly higher rates of cancer, when modern medicine could have a *cure* for cancer in the next few decades, I would say go back and live in the Fukushima zone! By living there, and rebuilding and mowing and gardening, the radioactivity will gradually be dispersed and moved and possibly erode into waterways and the ocean where it will be much, much safer.

For those people who are touting nuclear power and claiming that there is no danger from Fukushima and Chernobyl I only have one thing to say.
I have this bridge in Sydney that looks a bit like a coat hanger.
I am willing to sell it to you for a price that you cannot refuse.
If you would just forward to me details and access codes for your bank accounts, then you can collect the bridge whenever you like.

No danger? Of course there is! But look at the death record rather than vivid imaginations. Also, look at advancements in nuclear technology rather than rooting it in the past. Radiation and reason.

Keep that bridge, you'll need it to cross into the imagined Nirvana of a world completely run by renewables.

Dreamer

Robert LePage (or is that Robert Strawman?)

You obviously don't read replies: so why should we bother answering your childish strawman attacks? Try reading this paragraph again as it evaluates the risk based on the best and *most* conservative radiation science available. (The theory that holds there is *no* safe level of radiation, the so called NLT model.)

“So the scientific consensus currently is that the radioactivity released by the accident at Fukushima will very likely present a small additional lifetime risk of cancer for people whose homes are in the relatively high 10-100 mSv contamination range. Given that the contamination comes largely from caesium-137 (which has a half-life of about 30 years) this will persist for long enough to make permanent evacuation a worrying prospect. Think about it seriously: would you return to your home if doing so presented you with a one-in-a-thousand to one-in-a-hundred additional risk of cancer? This is the choice faced by the Japanese population and authorities.”
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/08/how-dangerous-is-the-fukushima-exclusion-zone/#sthash.dI0gnJQC.dpuf

However, it may not even be *that* bad. The No-Linear-Threshold (no safe level) model is itself being debated by the scientific community. Sure, above a certain level, radiation is dangerous, and even more radiation, deadly! This is understood by modern science. But what about living in Kerala India, which is quite radioactive naturally? What about nations that are up on mountains or plateaus and get hit by more cosmic rays? Sadly, a major study into the actual medical effects of much lower thresholds of radiation was cancelled last year in America, probably by political lobbyists fearing the results. If NLT was abandoned, it would reduce fear of low levels or radiation. The Coal brothers, sorry, Koch brothers in the USA wouldn't want increased competition from nuclear, which France shows is the fastest way to shut down fossil fuel electricity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_no-threshold_model