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nuclear radiation

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    Meltdowns, waste, and war: Here are the real risks of nuclear

    There's something wrong with every source of energy. How do our nuclear nightmares compare?

    Nathanael Johnson Technology

  • Watch out for radioactive tissue boxes

    Radiation is an effective treatment for some serious illnesses, but it’s not generally applied to the common cold — unless you bought a metal tissue box from Bed Bath & Beyond. In January, the retailer recalled tissue boxes from 200 stores because they had been contaminated by radioactive metal.

    Jess Zimmerman Energy
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    Crazy-ass Japanese dub music video hates on nuclear power

    Okay, it’s possible that this song by Rankin Taxi and the Dub Ainu band is just a teeny bit reductive about nuclear power. It’s also possible that it is SUPER AWESOME. Somehow it is simultaneously serious, funny, angry, stylish, and catchy. As. Hell.

    Jess Zimmerman Energy

  • Radioactive monkeys will patrol Fukushima

    Scientists have a new approach to monitoring radiation levels around Fukushima: They're outfitting local monkeys with radiation-measuring collars, then releasing them back into the wild. The monkeys will spend a month frolicking around the (potentially) nuclear forest, collecting data about radiation levels on the ground. The experimental device, which will also include GPS tracking and […]

    Jess Zimmerman Energy

  • Great, we have three-eyed fish now

    Fishermen trawling a nuclear-plant-fed reservoir in Córdoba, Argentina have caught a three-eyed wolf fish. Like everyone else who's writing about this story, I'm illustrating this post with a picture of Blinky, the nuclear fish from The Simpsons, because the real fish is super ugly.  They don't know for sure yet whether the fish's mutation is […]

    Jess Zimmerman Science

  • Beautiful short film imagines a radioactive Japan

    This short film, called "Blind," imagines what would happen if the gas masks that so many Japanese bought after Fukushima had ended up being necessary in Tokyo. It shows the mundane realities of a radioactive life — the blinged-out schoolgirl respirators are a particularly nice touch — but also touches on the bigger issues of […]

    Jess Zimmerman Energy

  • Fukushima radiation was double previous estimates

    Japanese officials have admitted that the meltdown at Fukushima released almost twice as much radiation as they had initially allowed. ("Did we say 370,000 terabecquerels? Oops, that should have been 770,000.") They also said that the meltdown at the plant began five hours after the quake/tsunami double-punch. The plant's operator had said earlier the meltdown […]

    Sarah Laskow Energy

  • New Chernobyl sarcophagus will dismantle itself from the inside

    The "sarcophagus" that encases the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster was only ever supposed to be temporary, but it's been left in place for 25 years. It's no surprise that the thing could crumble if you looked at it funny (and a LOT of people look at it funny). So a new containment structure […]

    Jess Zimmerman Energy

  • Chernobyl, 25 years later

    Today is the 25th anniversary of the meltdown at the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Here's part one of a spooky-as-hell film showing scientists venturing inside the plant's cement sarcophagus, which keeps its nuclear material contained (for now). A few other things to look at today: What's the ecology of Chernobyl today? Some wildlife has returned, but […]

    Jess Zimmerman Energy