Taming The Genie: How Fear of the Atom Threatens Our Future

 Nuclear Power Plants

I have been reading a science fiction magazine, presently called Analog Science Fiction and Fact, since about 1946 without ever missing an issue. This great science fiction magazine started in January1930 as Astounding Stories of Super-science - four years before I was born - and has survived in the publishing business that has seen many great magazines, of all ilk, flourish and then disappear. The Science Fact portion of the magazine - usually one fact article per issue - are truly about science and touch on many fronts that are at best only mentioned in passing in the world of publishing for Mr.and Mrs. Everyman. And they are well documented as to source of information. 

The reason for this long build-up is that their most recent issue contained a science fact article called 'TAMING THE GENIE, by C. Stuart Hardwick', which is an article on nuclear power plants and their importance to the world at the present time. I have been anti-nuclear power plant for sometime and was surprised to find my mind's horizon be so changed by this presentation of facts - in particular about power generation with associated deaths, and secondly but most importantly about radiation hazards. 

This first post is a quick look at the ratio of deaths to power generation - data from National Resource Council, Natural Academy of Sciences