The Role of Environmental NGOs: Russian Challenges, American Lessons Proceedings of a Workshop (2001) / Chapter Skim
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12 Experience in Coping with Effects of Radiation Accidents: Lessons for Society
12 Experience in Coping with Effects of Radiation Accidents: Lessons for Society
Pages 77-90
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From page 77... ...
So, it is necessary to emphasize the role of ecological organizations in informing and educating the society. CHARACTERISTICS OF RADIATION HAZARD AWARENESS Experience from radiation accidents, and especially the accident at the Chernobyl plant, has shown the impact of information on the population, both for individuals and for society, in comparison with the impact of radiation.
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From page 78... ...
Thus, accidents and disasters at statecontrolled factories appear to be the most serious for their social effects. Also, radiation accidents are certainly characterized with harsher social effects because it is the State which controls the use of radiation activities and especially nuclear energy activities.
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From page 79... ...
The movements of victims of radiation accidents play a certain role too. The members are inclined, on the one hand, to preserve their victim status and collect corresponding compensation and benefits and on the other hand, to mythologize about their participation in radiation accidents.
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From page 80... ...
Ecological organizations usually act for a longer time, independent of any positive results of their activity. For example, campaigns conducted to collect money to send children for rest from the moderate climate conditions of central Russia to the south in the Crimea or Cuba give doubtful results.
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From page 81... ...
SCIENTIFIC VALIDITY OF DECISION-MAKING Every large ecological problem, especially a radiation accident, is a unique event with a number of particular features. Therefore, scientific research and necessary scientific support take on special significance in the decision-making process that concerns safety measures and elimination of after-effects.
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From page 82... ...
decisions of Soviet National Committee on Radiation Protection (NCRP) , later Russian NCRP, for the main intervention levels and their need in corresponding legislation and administrative decrees 5.
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From page 83... ...
05/29/86 ED Central Committee of CPSU No 250 and Council of Ministers decree about decontamination efforts in Ukraine and Belarus territories affected by radiation pollution 13. 05/30/86 S Dose rate and radiation content Yes 200 in foodstuffs 14.
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From page 84... ...
Document analysis concerning these decisions allows us to find many other circumstances essentially distorting the purpose of the realized safety measures. Derived intervention levels were often used for making decisions on expanding the area of appropriating countermeasures.
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From page 85... ...
However, after the news that ICP members considered the measures in progress as quite adequate, the mass media changed their opinion on the project. Dozens of publications blamed the ICP members for trying to hide the radiological consequences of the accident for the sake of the international "nuclear Mafia." The resulting documents of ICP contained sharp criticism of both implemented and planned safety measures.
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From page 86... ...
Since specialists did not support this revision, they were just excluded from the decision-making process. Subsequent measures were realized according to soil pollution criteria instead of dose criteria, which are the only correct criteria for radiation safety.
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From page 87... ...
Active supporters of maximum expansion of the radioactive contaminated zones were: · Republic authorities of Ukraine and Belarus and Russian regional administrative elites interested in financial and material support from government funds. · Numerous mistaken public figures who did not anticipate negative results of their activity, though they connected their political fortunes with the consequences of the accident.
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From page 88... ...
So, consistent with the law, zones based on CSI37 soil pollution density isolines of 1, 5, 15, and 40 Ci per sq.
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From page 89... ...
The law, in fact, required searches for any evidence of public health decline. This surely was found in situations of decreasing living standards and unfavorable demographic trends.
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