For most of us who live far from any nuclear power plant, discussions of possible threats to public health and dangers to the lives of people stay in the hypothetical realm. But if an nuclear power plant was located in your backyard, it would be another matter. Currently, the Federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is examining the question whether to extend for another 20 years the operating license to the Oyster Creek nuclear energy plant in Lacy, N.J. Critics argue that this nuclear plant doesn’t represent a hypothetical but a real threat as a probable cause of various cancers in people, especially children.
The politics of the NRC since the mid-1990s have taken some strange turns. In 1995, changes were introduced to the commission’s guidelines for extending licenses, restraining individual members from examining the effects of radioactive atomic fuel byproducts on people’s health. They began to simply consider the impact on the general environmental region. Certainly, this change was based not on ill will, but rather on scientific findings that concluded that a potential increase in ambient radiation from an nuclear plant is not harmful to humans.
That perspective received further support from a study conducted in the early 1990s by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The physicians concluded that the 62 nuclear plants situated in 107 counties within the United States did not increase the rates of oncological diseases, particularly leukemia in children.
However, there is a growing number of scientists who categorically disagree with the findings of their peers and the conclusion of the NCI. These scientists belong to a group called the Radiation and Public Health Project (RPHP), whose findings fundamentally contradict the official view on the safety of atomic power.
According to RPHP coordinator Joseph Magnano, radioactive elements such as Strontium-90, a man-made atomic byproduct, represent a danger as a carcinogen in the environment. "We compared increases in Strontium-90 in children’s teeth with cancer statistics,” said Magnano. “It turned out that the number of sick children in the region of a nuclear energy plant is higher than in other parts of the state. The increase is caused by this chemical element."
Magnano and his like-minded colleagues are the target of critics who say that their conclusions are not scientifically based and contemptuously call them “junk science.” (Besides the NRC, the chorus of critics includes administrators of the nuclear plants and prominent national experts.)
Julie Timmons, head of the New Jersey Commission on Radiation Protection, has been vocal on the issue. Last December, the New Jersey legislature awarded a $25,000 grant to Magnano’s RPHP to research the possible link between the atomic plants and the increase in cancer rates. Timmons responded by personally delivering a letter to Governor James McGrevey requesting not provide any further money to the RPHP, and alleged that the studies conducted by this organization have no scientific value and are even harmful.
Responding to the critics, Magnano published 19 studies conducted by his research group in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Most of the studies focused on the relationship between Strontium-90 and cancer in children. It is difficult to dismiss a demonstrated 20 percent increase in cancer-related deaths in children under 10 in Ocean and Monmouth counties between the beginning of the 1980s and the end of the 1990s, when New Jersey as a whole witnessed a 25 percent drop in such cases and there was a 35 percent decrease nationally. Is this a coincidence?
Three years ago scientists from the American Cancer Society concluded that Strontium-90 found in ground water resulting from the presence of nuclear power plants in the area was not the cause of cancer in adults and children in the surrounding area. Meanwhile, according to a recent RPHP study, practically all counties where nuclear power plants are located throughout the country, there is a higher incidence of cancer in children (victims of Strontium-90) within the 30-mile zone that surrounds the plants than the national average.
The NRC will decide on the permit extension in the near future. Let us hope that the commission takes into consideration Resolution 17, in which the residents of Ocean county demand not to extend the operating license of Oyster Creek but to shut it down. It may be worthwhile to listen to them.
