Three Mile Island and Nuclear Power

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Three Mile Island and Nuclear Power

by Ted Goldfarb & Carol Cina

‘Science for the People’ Vol. 11, No. 4, July/August 1979, p. 10–17

Even though federal inspectors knew in the early afternoon of Wednesday, March 28 that the uranium core in the reactor at Three Mile Island (3MI) was seriously damaged, two days went by before news of the danger was made public.1 By not ordering an immediate evacuation, corporation and government officials chose to gamble with the lives of a million people in four surrounding counties in order to protect the reputation of the nuclear power industry. 

Media coverage of the 3MI disaster reflected a similar attitude. Although extensive, it generally underplayed the true magnitude of the actual and potential hazards and gave feature coverage to the NRC and other government officials who showed more concern about the future of the nuclear industry than about the health and safety of the people. The nuclear industry and its government supporters are already issuing false threats of electrical blackouts and economic dislocation if the nuclear spigot is closed. Clearly, the nuclear industry will not give up without a struggle. We must be willing to engage them in that struggle. Now is the time to end this nuclear madness. 

The Harrisburg disaster has resulted in a groundswell of antinuclear sentiment and activity. A growing number of scientists, technicians, health workers, economists, and politicians — many of whom were originally pro-nuclear — have come to recognize that the continued development of nuclear energy poses clearly unacceptable threats to our health and safety without prospect of cheap electricity. It is now our job to learn the facts about nuclear power so we can help to educate our neighbors and co-workers. It is time to join coalitions and to organize a powerful political force opposed to both nuclear power and the intimately related and ominous issue of nuclear weapons. This article is designed to contribute to that process of education and to suggest an appropriate course of action.

How close the 3MI reactor came to a complete meltdown we will probably never know. Uncharacteristically, Metropolitan Edison (Met Ed) and officials of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) admitted that they were concerned over a period of several days that such a catastrophe might indeed occur. The extreme degree of concern and confusion is reflected in the transcripts of the NRC’s secret hearing held during the emergency.2

Immediately following a water coolant failure, the energy releasing fission process is supposed to be shut down by the imposition of neutron-absorbing control rods into the reactor core. The problem, however, is that reactor shutdown alone will not control the heat buildup due to the intense radiation in the reactor — the core must still be cooled by circulating water. During the operation of any reactor more than 200 different types of radioactive atoms are produced in the fuel rods and the cooling water. Although 3MI was in operation for only about three months, its core was already loaded with highly radioactive material. If the same accident had occurred several months later when much more radioactive waste had been created, the results might have been much worse.

At the time the fission reaction was shut off, water had to be quickly circulated through the core or the temperature would have risen above the 3200 ºF melting point of the fuel rods, causing their molten contents to dump onto the containment floor. This would have resulted in one of two consequences: the water present could have been rapidly vaporized causing a steam explosion that would have ruptured the four-foot thick steel and concrete dome, spewing forth its lethal contents into the air above. Alternately, the intensely hot core could have melted down through the base of the building and through the earth below until it reached the geologic water table (not far beneath 3MI or most other reactors) where it would produce a geyser of steam and debris containing huge quantities of radioactive materials. In either case, the prevailing winds would distribute the waste over thousands of square miles. Tens of thousands of people would die within days, hundreds of thousands would suffer serious short-term after effects, and increases in the cancer and mutation rates would affect incalculable numbers of people. The contaminated area would be unsuitable for human habitation and agricultural production for hundreds or thousands of years. 

In the 3MI nuke, enough of the core remained uncooled for a sufficiently long time to cause considerable damage and a partial meltdown.3 In addition, the cooling water reacted with the overheated fuel rods to produce a large gas bubble, an event not anticipated by reactor designers or safety regulators. This bubble interfered with the cooling process and presented the serious threat of a hydrogen-oxygen gas explosion. Such an explosion could easily have ruptured the cooling pipes and triggered a complete meltdown, a catastrophic result which was fortunately averted — this time. The crucial questions in the 3MI disaster — how much radiation was released, and what will be its long term effects — still remain unanswered. 

The Radiation Release 

Contaminated steam vented from the reactor containment building carried with it some of the more volatile radioactive atoms which leaked from the damaged reactor rods. 

The threat to health and life posed by a radioactive substance depends on several factors. These include the amount of material released, the length of time it takes for the substance to disintegrate (measured by half-life, the time required for half the atoms to decay away), the likelihood that the substance will enter the human body through inhalation or through the food we eat or drink, and the fate of the substance once inside the body.

 The gases released from 3MI contained radioactive krypton and xenon.4 These gases were primarily responsible for the high radiation levels recorded in a one to fifteen mile radius of the reactor. Another radioactive substance released was iodine-131. This substance, which can enter the body through milk, other dairy products, and seafood, was a contaminant in both the vented steam and the cooling water which was dumped into the Susquehanna River.5 It was detected in milk produced near Harrisburg a few days after the reactor failure.6 Iodine is concentrated by the human thyroid and poses a particularly serious threat to infants and young children. 

For how long do these radioisotopes pose a threat? Krypton and xenon are inert gases and dissipate relatively rapidly after their release. Most of the radioactive forms of these atoms and iodine-131 have short half-lives (a few hours to a few days), and this fact is often used to suggest that they are dangerous for only a short period of time. This is not necessarily so — if large quantities are initially present they can remain a danger to health even after the passage of many half-lives. 

Many other highly radioactive substances remain in the reactor core and cooling water. Some may still be released during the reactor cleanup. A total meltdown would have caused them to rain down on hundreds of thousands of people. One of these substances is strontium-90. This long-lived substance is a close chemical relative of calcium and would be deposited specifically in bones and teeth. 

One of the most irresponsible statements featured in the media coverage of 3MI was the early assurance by HEW Secretary Califano that the radiation released would result in no injuries or deaths among the exposed workers or the two million people living within 50 miles of plant7 — a statement which has already been modified twice by Califano as of this writing.8

 Met Ed president Creitz admitted that the amount of radioactive material released during the first several hours of the disaster is not known, since it wasn’t monitored.9 Since then, the NRC and other official agencies which control the information have issued sporadic reports of radiation levels in the area, making it impossible to determine the total public exposure accurately.

 In striking contrast to Califano’s assertion, some experts on the effects of radiation have calculated that approximately 60 excess cancer deaths had already been assured from the radiation level reported during the first week following the reactor failure.10 No estimates have been released as yet of the genetic damage which will show up as birth defects in the children of those exposed. Califano’s statement is an echo of the industry’s ludicrous claim that no one has been killed or injured by any commercial nuclear reactor. Those who spread these lies hope that the public will not recognize that low-level radiation is an insidious killer. No immediate damage is apparent and laboratory tests will reveal nothing. Nevertheless, the hidden injuries will show up with absolute certainty during the next 30 years.11

 Radioactive substances emit high energy x-rays (called gamma rays) and tiny particles which move at high speeds. Gamma rays can penetrate our bodies, while tiny alpha and beta particles are a threat when we swallow or breathe in the substances that produce them. These rays and particles cause chemical havoc within the cells they strike. If the chemicals that control cell division are affected the cell can divide wildly, producing cancer. If the blood-forming cells are affected, leukemia can result. The time between the damage to the cell and the onset of the disease is unpredictable- but can often be as long as 20 or 30 years, or more. If egg cells or sperm cells are affected, a wide variety of birth defects will show up in future generations. 

The pro-nuclear propagandists stress the fact that we are all exposed to radiation from cosmic rays and from small amounts of naturally-occurring radioactive material that is literally everywhere. This should provide no comfort since this unavoidable background radiation is suspected by most experts of being responsible for as much as 2% of the naturally occuring cancers and mutations! It has long been suspected by many radiation and cancer experts that any additional public exposure to radiation, no matter how small, will cause an increase in cancer and mutation rates. This expectation is now being confirmed by long-term studies on workers at military nuclear installations. The results of epidemiologists and statisticians such as Samuel Milham, Thomas Mancuso, Alice Stewart, and George Kneale indicate that low-level radiation is far more hazardous than studies of Japanese survivors of Hiroshima suggested.12 As soon as Mancuso’s painstaking studies began to uncover these consequences. his contract was terminated by the Department of Energy, which had originally commissioned the work.

 In response to these revelations many radiation experts have demanded that the radiation standards for worker exposure be lowered. The industry has strongly resisted, since lowered standards would mean hiring more workers. In fact this may not be a progressive step since the total exposure and its effects would probably remain the same. They would merely be spread out over more workers!

 Radiation is still being emitted by the heavily contaminated plant. The removal of the thousands of gallons of highly radioactive water and debris from the damaged reactor core threatens future atmospheric releases of unknown magnitude. Small amounts of radioactive iodine have already appeared in milk from the surrounding area.13 Yet the public has been officially informed that the emergency is over14 and no worker in the threatened area can be absent from her or his job without fear of reprisals. 

Most curious is that in all of the media coverage of the 3MI disaster there seems to have been absolutely no mention of plutonium. This is a strange omission because plutonium is present in all nuclear reactors. 

The Plutonium Factor 

No mention of plutonium – the ultimate poison? Could it be that the NRC and other government officials were afraid that public panic might result from calling attention to this super-lethal substance? Surely they must know that a reactor the size of 3MI which had been operating for three months would already contain over 200 pounds of plutonium.15

 Plutonium is one of the most lethal substances ever produced. It does not occur naturally on Earth, but is formed in all nuclear reactors from the uranium fuel. In a meltdown the hot plutonium would react with the oxygen in the air to form a cloud of tiny dustlike particles of plutonium oxide. Based on animal studies it can be estimated that if only one of these dust particles containing as little as 10 billionths of an ounce of plutonium is inhaled, the human victim will be almost certain to develop cancer within the following one to 30 years.16

 Put another way, if only one ten-millionth of the plutonium in the 3MI reactor core had ended up in the lungs of human beings, over 200,000 cancers would have resulted! What’s more, plutonium can also get into the human body through the digestive tract. It ends up in the bones, gonads and other glands where it can cause a wide variety of cancers. Plutonium-239, the form produced in the largest amounts in reactors, remains deadly for over 200,000 years. 

The underestimation of the magnitude of the plutonium threat has been recently confirmed in studies done by epidemiologist Dr. Carl Johnson. He reports a 140% increase in testicular cancer and significant increases in other malignancies due to small amounts of plutonium released during the manufacture of nuclear warheads at the Rocky Flats, Colorado military installation.17 Dr. Johnson’s carefully-controlled studies involved people living as far as 13 miles downwind from the plutonium source. 

It requires less than 20 pounds of plutonium to make a nuclear bomb. The plutonium being manufactured in the fuel rods in all of the 72 presently licensed U.S. nuclear reactors – as well as the many others around the world – could be diverted through theft or sabotage to any nation or group interested in entering the atomic weapons club. In 1945 there were only a few .hundred pounds of plutonium in the world. Today the U.S. alone has several hundred thousand pounds. Each reactor adds 1,000 pounds more per year to the inventory of this unimaginably hazardous material. 

The Radioactive Waste Problem

 The failure of the nuclear industry and the NRC to take the problem of radioactive waste disposal seriously is one of the clearest examples of their criminal irresponsibility. For years the public has been assured that a safe disposal system was being developed. Recent reports by various government agencies make it clear that no such solution is anywhere in sight.18 Indeed, a growing number of scientists believe that no acceptable solution will ever be found. 

Hundreds of thousands of pounds of radioactive wastes are being produced by the nuclear industry each year. Mining and milling of uranium ore produces huge piles of waste material called tailings. These tailings release lethal radon-222 gas which threatens the lives of mine workers as well as residents of towns near the huge, dusty, windblown piles into which they are heaped. Additional wastes are generated in every other phase of the uranium fuel cycle as well as in the reactors themselves. During the reactor’s operation much of the non-radioactive core materials become radioactive due either to neutron absorption or to neutron-induced splitting. Consequently reactors significantly increase the amount of radioactive material in existence. Not only is this an increase in quantity, but much of the radioactive material produced is more deadly than the U-235 with which the reactor was fueled.

 So-called low-level wastes are buried in rural sites in six different states. Leakage of radiation into nearby streams has occurred in at least two of the sites.19 At Hanford, Washington 500,000 of the 65 million gallons of high-level wastes stored there have already leaked out into the ground only five miles from the Columbia river! 

Each year one third of the fuel rods in each commercial nuclear reactor must be replaced. These rods containing their burden of plutonium and other high-level wastes are presently being stored in large pools of water at each of the reactors. The reason is that no plan exists to deal with them. But this temporary solution ‘is unsafe. They were supposed to be reprocessed at commercial plants which would remove the plutonium and remaining uranium for fabrication into new fuel elements. The only such plant that ever existed in the U.S. was operated for a few years by a Getty Oil subsidiary in West Valley, New York. It was an economic and ecological disaster,20 since it could not operate while keeping internal radiation at safe levels. A legacy of 600,000 gallons of high-level wastes remain, steadily  corroding their way through storage tanks. Estimates of the cost of cleaning up that mess — if anyone ever figures out how to do it — run to a billion dollars. There is no plan to charge Getty a penny for this outrage.  

NYC NAACP ON NUKES 

Statement by Leon Harris. President. Greenwich Village-Chelsea NAACP:

    The NAACP national board recently reaffirmed its position in favor of nuclear power. I am here today to say that I think this is a deeply mistaken position. and that I do not believe the membership of the NAACP is behind it at all. It is especially discouraging that our national board is virtually alone. except for corporate hirelings, in defending nuclear power after the Three Mile Island incident. 

     Black people in America have nothing to gain and everything to lose from nuclear power. We reject as false the idea that nuclear power creates jobs. The increase in cancer rates and the danger of calamitous accidents threaten Black people as much as — and maybe more than — the population in general.

   Our branch of the NAACP has been campaigning for some time against nuclear power. We’ve held public meetings and debates on the subject, have joined in anti-nuclear demonstrations. and have submitted a resolution against nuclear power to the NAACP national convention. to be held next month.

    We hope our national convention will discuss this issue. We believe that if it does. the national board’s pro-nuclear position — which puts us on the wrong side of one of the most important social issues of the day — will be soundly defeated.  

The “Cheap Power” Lie 

Although the 3MI disaster has seriously discredited the “safe power” assurances of the nuclear power industry, most people still seem to believe the claims of the utilities and their suppliers that nuclear power is “cheap power”. Nothing could be further from the truth. 

The costs of building a nuclear power plant have skyrocketed.21 The reactor being built by the Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) at Shoreham, New York was initially estimated to cost $262 million. Now, 10 years later, with about 80% of the work completed, the current price tag is $1.4 billion. And that estimate was made before 3MI, a disaster which is sure to lead to requirements for additional costly “safety” features. Shoreham may seem like an extreme example – but other reactors being built or planned are experiencing similar soaring cost escalations. For example, the 1150 Megawatt Green County, N.Y. nuclear power plant proposed for 1988 was just cancelled by the Power Authority of the State of N.Y. because the latest cost estimate had risen to $3.1 billion from “only” $1.8 billion in less than two years.22 At this rate nuclear power plants will soon be twice the cost per kilowatt of capacity as coal plants in the Northeast, and almost this expensive elsewhere. 

Other factors contributing to the steeply increasing price of nuclear-generated electricity include the fuel costs. Concentrated uranium ore (yellowcake) jumped from $7 to $42 per pound in only five years due to manipulation by the cartel that controls the international uranium market. Low operating efficiency is another key cost-increaser. Due to frequent shutdowns for repairs and “safety” improvements, nuclear plants have operated at less than 60% of their rated capacities.23 (For example, the NRC recently ordered five nuclear plants along the East coast to shut down because a “design error” makes them vulnerable to damage due to earthquakes which geologists consider a definite possibility in the vicinity of these plants.) Nuclear plants are constructed in such large sizes (they’re “cheaper” that way) that they actually increase the need for more power generating capacity by about 28% when compared to smaller coal, oil, or gas fired plants in order to provide equally reliable service.24 This is because when they break down and require emergency repairs, relatively more generation capacity is required for back-up, since each nuclear plant is so large in size. 

All this has led Charles Komanoff, the leading economic expert on comparative energy costs who is not connected with the energy industry, to conclude that within the next few years electrical energy generated by nuclear power will be far more costly than electricity produced by other means.(22) He estimates that generating costs for electricity produced by new large nuclear plants will be 9¢ per kilowatt hour (a unit of electrical energy) compared to 6¢ for the same amount of energy from a coal plant equipped with highly effective “scrubbers” to reduce air pollution. 

Who Benefits from Nukes 

If it isn’t safe and it isn’t economical, why is it still being pushed? Exxon, Gulf, Getty, Kerr-McGee, General Electric and Westinghouse all have large investments in mining rights or production facilities to protect. But why are the utilities also pushing it? In most states the laws which grant utilities a monopoly over production of electricity also guarantee them a “fair” rate of profit (in some cases 14% per year or more!) on all their electrical generating equipment.25 This means that the more expensive the facility they can convince their supposed regulators to let them build, the more profit they will reap. A study done by the Energy Systems Research Group has shown that New York State utilities continually resort to enormously inflated predictions of demand for electrical energy in order to justify new plant construction.26

But there is a catch. In order to reap the windfall profits, the utilities must be able to raise the capital to complete the project and put the plant into operation. The soaring costs are making an increasing number of utilities nervous about not being able to raise the capital to complete the job. In response to the problem of capital costs, the already heavily subsidized utilities and nuclear industry have been lobbying for even more federal and state subsidies. They also want changes in regulations, either to allow an individual utility to charge the public in advance for the full cost of building a new power plant or to permit several utility monopolies to pool their resources to help finance plant construction.

Are We Hooked? 

The nuclear energy pushers would like to convince us that we are already hopelessly addicted to nukes. Since 3MI the energy industry, the utilities, and their friends in government right on up to President Carter have been telling us that all sorts of dire consequences will result if we fail to build any more nuclear power plants and shut down the ones that are now operating. They talk about electrical shortages and dimouts, about the effect of oil supplies or fuel prices, and about potential loss of jobs. All three of these scare tactics are unjustified. 

Nuclear power presently supplies about 12% of our electricity and about 4% of our total energy.27 Nationwide there is an excess of 38% of electrical generating capacity.28 Thus, for the country as a whole, if all nuclear plants were shut down, about 26% over-capacity would remain. Since nuclear plants are often shut down for repairs, refueling or testing, utilities operating these plants must have alternate means of producing power. These alternate means could immediately take up a great deal of the slack if all· nukes were immediately shut down. Transmission networks allow utilities to buy power from one another, providing a second means by which nuclear-generated electricity could be immediately substituted-for. In many areas of the country an immediate shutdown of all operating nuclear facilities would be possible without creating unacceptable hardships. In the other areas a phase-out of nuclear power over a period of a few years is certainly possible. 

Since shutting down nukes would increase our demand for oil by only about 7%, this action would not have an overwhelming effect on the supply or price of petroleum products. Furthermore, improvements in automobile gas mileage and home insulation could more than make up for the oil required by utilities to replace nuclear power. Business Week reported in April 1979 that our supposed oil shortfall is “proving to be something of a mirage. Stocks of gasoline, heating oil, and crude are not seriously low by any measure.”29 The possibility of future shortages, according to this article, depends more on policies of the Department of Energy with regard to regulating the oil industry than on any intrinsic petroleum supply problems involving either imported or domestically produced oil. 

As far as jobs are concerned, capital-intensive facilities like nuclear power plants have a negative long term effect. During the building phase many jobs are created, mostly of a highly skilled nature. A large percentage of these jobs is taken by workers who move into the area rather than local laborers. Decentralized power-producing facilities using renewable energy sources and conservation measures produce many more permanent jobs.30

We aren’t hooked yet. There is still time to break the nuclear habit! 

What Are The Alternatives? 

The media would have us believe that the increased use of coal is the only immediate realistic alternative to nuclear energy. They also point out that coal use – even with the “scrubbers” now available to remove much of the sulfur dioxide and other atmospheric pollutants – has undesirable environmental consequences. Present mining conditions are unsafe, unhealthy, and produce water pollution as well as general ecological devastation in the case of strip mines. 

Much of this could be corrected by passing and enforcing new legislation. In countries like Wales, Australia, and the Soviet Union, coal mining is done much more safely and without the high incidence of crippling black lung disease which results from the dusty conditions in U.S. mines. The so-called “risk-risk” comparisons which attempt to show that coal mining is more hazardous than nuclear power production are totally invalid. They generally ignore or underestimate the considerable radiation hazards associated with every step of the uranium fuel cycle. Most significantly, they fail to recognize the unique potential for a totally unacceptable. catastrophic meltdown accident which is associated only with nukes. 

Increased reliance on coal, though it may be unavoidable as a short-term measure to unhook us from our nuclear habit, has another serious disadvantage. Like nuclear, it is a technology which is suited for use only in centralized, capital-intensive power plants. Recognizing this, the huge oil companies and other energy industry giants have bought up much of our domestic coal mining land.31 Switching from nuclear power to coal will keep us in the grip of these huge corporations and the utility company monopolies which now control our electric power. 

The utilities and energy industry are fond of talking about renewable energy sources as if they were some vague hope for the distant future. This is sheer nonsense! In fact, decentralized renewable energy sources would lessen our energy and financial dependence on these huge corporations. Many of these technologies for producing electricity are available right now.32 Aside from the direct conversion of sunlight to electricity, which admittedly requires more development before it will be cost-competitive, these include: 

(a) Wind power. A recent analysis shows that this one source alone has the theoretical potential for producing 75% of total U.S. energy consumption.33

(b) Methane digesters, which convert organic wastes into methane gas. China is one country where people in many localities build and use these for both illumination and cooking. 

(c) The burning of garbage. For example, the town of Hempstead, N.Y. has recently built a plant for recycling glass and metal which will, at the same time, produce 15% of the town’s electricity. 

(d) Biomass conversion, in which fast-growing plants are produced on marginal lands for use as fuel either directly or after conversion to methane or alcohol. 

Most renewable energy sources are uniquely suited for decentralized use. Their development is therefore directly at odds with the interests of the utility companies and the huge energy industry companies. When Exxon or a utility does talk about developing solar energy, they talk about centrally controlled and capital-intensive schemes that will earn large profits, such as huge solar satellites beaming back dangerous microwave energy to large arrays of receivers. Such schemes can only perpetuate control of our electrical energy by those who are already in control of the energy system, as well as introduce new and unacceptable health hazards. 

Federal funding for energy research is presently allocated almost entirely to the development of nuclear and coal energy technologies. Only a very small percentage of our federal energy research budget goes to solar and other renewable resources, and even these funds primarily support the inappropriate adaptation of these technologies for use in our present capital-intensive centralized delivery system34 For example, little money is being spent on developing low cost solar collectors which could be installed on individual homes, apartment buildings, and factories for direct production of electricity from sunlight. Many experts in this field claim that with proper funding this technology could be made cost-competitive with coal and nuclear in less than ten years.35

Many analysts have pointed out that our most neglected energy alternative is conservation.36 This doesn’t mean doing without present comforts, but rather changing our totally inefficient and wasteful practices, which compare very unfavorably with other countries. Both district heating (the use of waste heat from power plants to warm factories and living space – a tactic which is not compatible with nuclear power plants) and cogeneration (the use of heat produced in industrial processes to make electric power) are two methods in wide use elsewhere which are not widely used here and are frequently blocked by the legislation that gives our electrical utilities their monopoly control.

What Needs to Be Done 

First we must agree on a set of goals. The following are offered as a minimal set of demands which should be supported by the entire antinuclear movement: 

(1) Immediately cancel all plans to build new nuclear plants and stop construction of nukes now being built. 

(2) Shut down all presently operating nukes in areas where sufficient alternative electrical power exists to meet essential needs. 

(3) Phase out as quickly as possible the few remaining nukes by construction of alternative facilities. 

(4) Retrain and relocate all workers deprived of employment by these actions. 

(5) Change the many federal and state laws which both give the utilities and energy industry giants their monopoly status and which discourage the development of decentralized, renewable energy technologies. 

(6) Shift our present federal and state subsidies (tax write-offs, depletion allowances, etc.) away from support of nuclear development and replace them with incentives designed to encourage the development and use of decentralized alternative energy programs. 

(7) Redirect our federal- and state-financed energy research programs away from nuclear and fossil fuels and toward the exploitation of renewable resources. 

How To Do lt

 The above program can be accomplished. It will require the building of an effective, massive movement to counter the well-funded opposition of the energy industry and its supporters in the Department of Energy. The movement began years ago, but the 3MI disaster has given it new impetus and urgency. Join it today. Here are some suggestions for getting involved: 

(1) Educate yourself about nuclear power and its alternatives. (See accompanying resource list.) 

(2) Find out about organizations in your area that are involved in the antinuclear, pro-safe energy movement. (See resource list.) 

(3) Join these organizations and convince your friends and neighbors to do likewise. If no such organization exists in your area, start one. The Long Island Shad Alliance has available a short organizers guide written by some Long Island residents who got activated by the 3MI calamity (send self-addressed envelope with 28¢: postage.) 

(4) Set up forums, debates, living room discussions, town meetings, and fiml showings in your neighborhood. Put the safe energy issue on the agenda in any organization you belong to. 

(5) Seek media coverage for the movement. 

(6) Organize letter-writing campaigns to local, state, and federal legislative and other officials. 

(7) Be creative in efforts to organize a wide range of activities to publicize the movement.

Carol Cina and Ted Goldfarb are longstanding members of the Stony Brook chapter of Science for the People. Ted teaches chemistry and Carol is a graduate student at Stony Brook SUNY. Both are very involved in the anti-nuke movement on Long Island.

>> Back to Vol. 11, No. 4<<

REFERENCES

  1. New York Times. May 8, 1979, p. A1.
  2. New York Times, March 31, 1979, p.1; April 13, 1979, p.1; April 14, 1979, p.9.
  3. New York Times. March 30, 1979, p.A20.
  4. New York Times. April 2, 1979, p.A15.
  5. New York Times, March 30, 1979, p.1.
  6. New York Times. April 3, 1979, p.C14; April 7, 1979, p.39.
  7. New York Times, April 5, 1979, p.1.
  8. Energy Systems Research Group.
  9. Time, April 19, 1979, p.12.
  10. Village Voice, April 9, 1979, p.14; New York Times, April 8, 1979, p.28.
  11. Science, April 13, 1979, pp. 155-158 & 160-164; In These Times, March 22, 1978, pp.11-14.
  12. New York Times, April 13, 1979, p.C14; April 7, 1979, p.39.
  13. New York Times, April 13, 1979, p.C14; April 7, 1979, p.39.
  14. New York Times, April 10, 1979, p.1.
  15. “Safety of Nuclear Power Reactors (Light Water Cooled) and Related Facilities,” WASH-1250, Wash., D.C., U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, 1973.
  16. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Sept. 1976, pp.27-37.
  17. New York Times, April 10, 1979, p.A16.
  18. Time, April 9, 1979, p.8; Newsday, Feb. 10, 1979, Part II, p.2; Guardian, March 21, 1979, p.7.
  19. Critical Mass Journal, Aug., 1978, p.4; Nov. 1978. p.6; Reference 29, pp. 55-63.
  20. New York Times Sunday Magazine, April 10, 1977. p.15.
  21. Science for the People, Sept. 1978, pp.12-18.
  22. New York Times, April 6, 1979, p.1.
  23. Science for the People, Sept. 1978, pp.12-18.
  24. Edward Kahn, testimony before the New Jersey Public Service Commission, 1978, p.140.
  25. Nuclear Plants: The More They Build the More You Pay, R. Lanoue, Center for Responsive Law, Wash., D.C., 1978.
  26. Long Range Forecasting Model: Electrical Energy and Demand in New York State, Energy Systems Research Group, Inc., Boston, Mass., 1978.
  27. Wall Street Journal, April 2, 1979, p.28.
  28. Electrical World, Sept. 15, 1978, p.72.
  29. Business Week, April 2, 1979, p.25.
  30. Jobs and Energy, R. Grossman and G. Daneker, Environmentalists for Full Employment, Inc., Wash., D.C., 1977.
  31. No Nukes: Everyone’s Guide to Nuclear Power, A. Gyorgy & Friends, South End Press, Boston 1979, p.151.
  32. No Nukes: Everyone’s Guide to Nuclear Power, A. Gyorgy & Friends, South End Press, Boston 1979, p.151, section 3, chapter 4.
  33. Science, April 13,.1979, p.13.
  34. Science, July 22, 1977. p.353.
  35. Science, July 29, 1977. p. 447.
  36. No Nukes: Everyone’s Guide to Nuclear Power, A. Gyorgy & Friends, South End Press, Boston 1979, p.151, section 3, chapter 1.