It is now three years since the nuclear “accident" at Three Mile Island. The full effects on the health of people working or living in the area will perhaps never be known. The release of radiation was not effectively monitored and in any case most of the resulting sickness and deaths will take up to 20 years to occur. This lack of information has enabled speculation by both the supporters and opponents of nuclear energy to obscure the real lessons of the accident.
Three years on we are still learning the extent of the disaster. In July the first examination of the fuel rods in the core of the reactor was made possible using special cameras lowered through a screw hole in the container vessel. This revealed that the uranium oxide fuel had in fact melted, which means that the nuclear reactor core was far closer to a "meltdown” than had earlier been presumed. The massive heat necessary for the melting of the fuel, over 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit, was all but sufficient to have also melted the container vessel which encased the radioactive core. Had this happened the highly radioactive molten mass would have been totally exposed, with consequences so disastrous that it is extremely unlikely that they could have been dealt with.
Not surprisingly, there is now a lot of concern at the Central Electricity Generating Board's proposals to build a Pressure Water Reactor (PWR) at Sizewell in Suffolk. Three Mile Island was also a PWR and Sizewell will be the first of this type to be built in this country. The enquiry into these proposals begins in January and as many as two thousand individuals and groups have lodged objections. But the enquiry will not deal with the real problems of nuclear energy. It will look into the scientific, technological or engineering issues, and perhaps consider the architectural or even the employment effects. It will not look at the question of how a society based on class monopoly of the production of wealth can handle such potentially dangerous technology while serving the interests of a small minority of the population.
There are three areas that have to be looked at: radioactivity anti its effects; the design and construction of nuclear plant; and nuclear waste.
Radioactivity
All radiation is dangerous to human health. There is no accepted safe level, whether it be the “natural" radiation from the environment or whether it is the result of human labour. Although there are disagreements over the effects of low levels of radiation, the International Commission for Radiological Protection (ICRP) accepts that all levels of radiation are liable to cause damage to health. The guidelines laid down by the ICRP are accepted by the nuclear industry. Consequently, when governments or other institutions fix a "safe" level of radiation they are really saying that so many deaths or so much sickness is acceptable.
At present this "safe" limit is fixed for the average person at 0.5 rem per year — three times the radiation emitted from the normal background conditions. This figure is partly arbitrary, based on how many increased deaths or illnesses are acceptable for running capitalism; the "safe" level is derived more from the estimates of what is necessary for operating a profitable nuclear industry than from the estimates of what is desirable in terms of human health. Nuclear power stations, even when working under normal conditions, need to emit a certain level of radiation into the environment only because the cost of overcoming the problems would affect profits.
The main difference between the working conditions of nuclear reactors and the conditions on, say, a building site are that the effects of radiation can take many years before becoming apparent. Radiation induced cancer may cut a worker’s life by 30 years, but the death may not occur until 20 years after contamination. On the other hand, the effects of an accident on a building site or in a factory are usually immediately noticeable. But even when the effects are known, the question is what level of human sacrifice is acceptable when priority must be given to profitable production? Even when governments introduce legislation to restrict the use of potentially dangerous materials or practices, the incentive for employers to cut corners means that constant surveillance is necessary. Nuclear power stations have been under tighter inspection than most industries, and yet Three Mile Island and other, less disastrous nuclear accidents have shown that safety problems remain.
Design and construction
The Marshall Study Group Report on the Integrity of Pressurised Water Reactor Pressure Vessels was published in April by a group which openly supports the nuclear programme. (Dr. Walter Marshall was at the time of the report the Chairman of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority and is now the head of the Central Electricity Generating Board.) It shows the close association between concerns about the safety of the container vessels housing the radioactive core of a reactor and the problems of profitability.
In the PWRs there is no real means of preventing a large release of radiation if the vessel is badly fractured. As far back as 1969 an IEEE report stated that a container vessel fracture was "the most fearful of nuclear accidents that can occur in any plant with a highly pressurised primary system” and that no solution was possible “short of putting the plant underground or inside a mountain". This last proposal has in fact been recommended in the past but has been rejected as being economically unsound since the whole purpose of building PWRs is to reduce the cost of producing energy. Any concern for the safety of human beings is secondary. The CEGB statement, outlining its case for the new Sizewell B PWR, makes this clear: “economy, in that it is estimated to give lifetime operational savings that more than offset its original capital cost in a wide range of futures, and to have a superior economic return to investment in an AGR (Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor) or coal fired station”.
But that still leaves such problems as having to avoid fractures of the container vessel. The Marshall Report recognises the need for high standards of materials and welding, for detailed procedures in quality control, and wider measures for inspection during the manufacture of components. In the USA manufacturers on a number of nuclear sites were taking short cuts; standards were not being met and, because of the complexities involved in building a nuclear power station, the inspection process was to say the least inadequate.
The forces operating against safety are not just the employers’ prime incentive to make profits. There is also the question of the workers’ attitude. It is no coincidence that the Three Mile Island catastrophe arose through a succession of faults and mistakes which ended with a decision to turn off the water coolant. The prime reason for a worker seeking employment is to get the money in order to live. The workers’ product, whether it be a piece of equipment for a nuclear power station or an inspection job in the everyday running of that plant, is not the main purpose for working; it is a means to an end rather than a first concern. The alienation of the worker from the production process means that the incentive to create a quality product needs to be constantly enforced by external means.
To try to overcome this problem of the productive relations being in conflict with the desired technology, the Marshall Study Group recommended vast improvements in the inspection of equipment and procedures at all stages of manufacture and operation. But the problem remains.
Radioactive waste
Perhaps the most emotive issue in the field of nuclear energy in recent years has been the creation and disposal of radioactive waste. The secrecy that has surrounded the transporting and disposing of the waste has added to speculations about the dangers involved. Because the nuclear energy industry is closely associated with the nuclear weapons industry, the transportation of nuclear waste between power stations and reprocessing plants or to disposal sites has to be clouded with secrecy partly because of fears that terrorist groups may take advantage of the situation.
Nevertheless, the problems of nuclear waste are not merely of secrecy. There are three classifications for radioactive waste material, each presenting different problems. The first classification, low level waste, consists of a variety of materials that are mildly radioactive — old laboratory clothing, chemical sludges, but not of used fuel elements or materials from them. This is the type of waste that is packaged in large drums and dumped at sea. The International Atomic Energy Agency sets limits to the amount that can be disposed of in this way but, as all radiation is potentially dangerous, these levels are related more to the demands of a profitable nuclear energy programme than to any concern about human health. Dumping at sea is a cheap means of disposal and reflects the general aim of maximising profits rather than the technical problem of a particular industry.
Less publicised, but of greater concern as regards PWRs, is the intermediate level waste. This is radioactive material which even under the criteria laid down by the ICRP is too dangerous to be released into the environment and yet the quantity produced by the nuclear industry is too great to keep in store. The PWRs produce about five times the quantity of this type of waste as do the AGRs. This means that disposal and its costs are crucial issues with the PWRs. The latest report of the Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee (RWMAC) recommends that the go-ahead should be given to dumping the expected 70,000 cubic metres of this material in some deep cavity or old mine shaft. The Sizewell Enquiry into the proposed PWR will certainly have to deal with the issue of whether damage to the environment and human health is a necessary sacrifice in the interests of production for profit, it is unlikely that the increased production of dangerous radioactive waste by this type of reactor will be a determining factor.
The third type of radioactive waste, high level, has received some publicity mainly because of the deep rock drilling programmes carried out recently on a number of sites in different parts of the country. High level waste consists of the remains of old fuel elements after recyclable materials such as plutonium and uranium have been removed. Compared to low level and intermediate waste this forms a small quantity, but because it is highly radioactive is requires constant attention for 50 or 100 years. At present this waste is kept in acid in stainless steel tanks but it is proposed to transform this liquid into solid glass blocks.
Scientists, even from the UKAEA, have emphasised the desirability of being able to monitor this waste material and have looked to some form of storage. The Royal Commission, on the other hand, was concerned about the possibilities of war or terrorism and their effects on such a store; it objected to the idea of long term storage and advocated disposal in some form or other. This is what the rock drilling in various parts of the country has been about. Last December the government decided to abandon the rock drilling surveys for prospective disposal sites because they realised that the heat problems from high level waste are such that it cannot be dumped for at least 50 years. As a result, no effective programme for dealing with high level waste exists. So workers in the plants where the waste is now kept are being exposed (and are likely to be for some time) to greater risks from radiation. Concern over this has been expressed in the latest RWMAC report. The differing approaches by scientists and politicians has already led to one resignation from the RWMAC. that of Dr. Stanley Bowie. The latest report also warns of the possibility of radioactive waste management getting seriously out of hand in the absence of an effective decision about its future.
Human beings are exposed to constant risk as statistical compromises are made in the trail of devastation left in the drive for profits. One effect of the industrial revolution was the destruction of human life in the new factory system. Capitalism's use and abuse of nuclear energy reflects the way 20th century technology is handled by a society which serves only a minority of the population. Behind the white coats and white walls that are everywhere in the clinical nuclear establishments, the anarchy of production that drives millions into poverty, unemployment, sickness and war rolls on.
Will a socialist society have a place for nuclear energy? Such decisions will be made by the majority of people, in contrast to the minority who at present own and control the means of producing wealth. It will not be a question of which energy source is the most profitable, but of what is in the interest of the whole community. If nuclear energy is developed in a socialist society it will not be driven along by market forces but will develop under conscious social control, to ensure that it serves human beings instead of the market system. And lastly, in a socialist society all work will be voluntary. Consequently the motive for work will not be because it is necessary in order to get a pay packet, but the satisfaction that can be gained from it.
MD
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