Nuclear risks

Mitigation of Potential Environmental Risks of Space Nuclear Power Sources (NPS) Missions in International Law

Countering Security Risks to Nuclear Power Plants

Between 1972 and 2007 altogether 17 major terror attacks or acts of sabotage have been carried against nuclear power plants (NPP). None of them resulted in an uncontrolled radioactive release. In order to reduce the security risk to NPP due to terrorists in the future, preemptive measures are necessary to identify their motivation, incentives, operational and logistical capabilities to implemen...

Factors affecting recognition of cancer risks of nuclear workers.

OBJECTIVES To discover whether direct estimates of the risks of cancer for nuclear workers agree with indirect estimates based on survivors of the atomic bomb; whether relations between age at exposure and risk of cancer are the same for workers and survivors, and whether dosimetry standards are sufficiently uniform to allow pooling of data from different nuclear industrial sites. METHOD Data...

Testable hypotheses for cancer risks near nuclear facilities

Clarification of hypotheses can improve research design, measurements, data analysis, and interpretation of results. I will describe how hypotheses could be clarified during the design of an epidemiologic study of cancer risks near nuclear facilities in the United States. Based on what is known about age variation in radiation sensitivity and difficulties in evaluating other cancer risk factors...

Assessing the proliferation risks of civilian nuclear programmes

Nuclear power plants alone are not a proliferation risk. Without enrichment or reprocessing capabilities, power-reactor fuel, whether fresh or spent, cannot be used for the production of nuclear weapons. There are various ways, however, in which reactor projects and related nuclear fuel-cycle facilities could be used to further a nuclear-weapons development programme. This chapter describes the...