Nuclear Portraits: Communities, the Environment, and Public Policy

328 Pages·2017·1.853 MB·English

by  Laurel Sefton MacDowell

NUCLEAR PORTRAITS
Communities, the Environment, and Public Policy
In the twenty-first century, nuclear energy has become a hotly contested
issue. In the face of climate change, it has been promoted by nuclear
energy producers as an alternative form of energy. However, past envi-
ronmental and health damage continues to affect communities around
the world.
In Nuclear Portraits, scholars from Europe, North America, and Asia
demonstrate the complexity, controversy, contradictions, and dangers
that surround many aspects of the nuclear industry. The resulting local,
regional, national, and international concerns that arise, such as the
disasters at Chernobyl and Fukushima, call into question the optimism
espoused by the nuclear industry. We live in a world with more nuclear
nations than ever before, and energy policy is central to the mounting
global concern about climate change. The innovative essays found in
Nuclear Portraits will open your eyes to the realities of nuclear energy,
thereby allowing you to decide for yourself which side you are on.
laurel sefton macdowell is professor emerita in the Department of
History at the University of Toronto. Her prior work on environmental
history has been recognized by the Ontario Historical Society and the
Canadian Historical Association.
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Nuclear Portraits
Communities, the Environment,
and Public Policy
EDITED BY LAUREL SEFTON MACDOWELL
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buffalo London
© University of Toronto Press 2017
Toronto Buffalo London
www.utppublishing.com
Printed in Canada
ISBN 978-1-4426-4861-6 (cloth) ISBN 978-1-4426-2629-4 (paper)
♾Printed on acid-free, 100% post-consumer recycled paper
with vegetable-based inks.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Nuclear portraits : communities, the environment, and public policy / edited by Laurel
Sefton MacDowell.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4426-4861-6 (cloth). – ISBN 978-1-4426-2629-4 (paper)
1. Nuclear industry – Social aspects. 2. Nuclear industry – Environmental aspects.
3. Nuclear industry – Government policy. I. MacDowell, Laurel Sefton, 1947–, editor
HD9698.A2N82 2017 338.4’762148 C2016-907574-5
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its publishing
program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council, an agency
of the Government of Ontario.
Funded by the Financé par le
Government gouvernement
of Canada du Canada
Contents
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations xi
Introduction 3
laurel sefton macdowell
1 Keep It Secret: The Environmental Effects of Nuclear Armament
in the Soviet Union and the United States 24
tuomas räsänen
2 The Face of the Earth, the Shadow of the Bomb: Nuclear War and
the First International Environmental Conference, “Man’s Role in
Changing the Face of the Earth,” Princeton, New Jersey, 1955 63
fred waage
3 Experts at Risk: Military Secrets and Italian Radioecology around
the US Naval Nuclear Installation on La Maddalena 94
davide orsini
4 The Calvert Cliffs Campaign, 1967–1971: Protecting the Public’s
Right to Knowledge 121
andrew ramey
5 From Pripyat to Paris, from Grassroots Memories to Globalized
Knowledge Production: The Politics of Chernobyl Fallout 149
susanne bauer, karena kalmbach, and tatiana kasperski
vi Contents
6 Permanence, Justice, and Nuclear Waste at Prairie Island 190
james w. feldman
7 Nuclear Waste Management and Nuclear Power: A Tale of
Two Essential US Department of Energy Sites in Idaho and
New Mexico 217
michael greenberg, henry mayer, charles
w. powers, and david kosson
8 Port Hope Burning: The Trail of Eldorado, the Uranium
Medical Research Centre, and Community Tension over
Scientific Uncertainty 238
david elijah bell and marissa zappora bell
9 “Nuclear Gypsies” in Fukushima before and after 3/11 274
paul jobin
Contributors 312
Figures
1.1 Nuclear waste disposal at the Idaho National Laboratory 30
1.2 Karl Marx Street in Muslyumova village near Techa River 48
2.1 An informal moment at the Symposium with Marston Bates,
John Dodds, and Lewis Mumford 82
3.1 ENEA Centre for the Study of Marine Environments personnel
and Italian Navy divers collecting samples 102
3.2 CNEN and ISS radiometric surveillance system in
La Maddalena 108
6.1 Protesters against the proposed storage of radioactive waste at
the Prairie Island Nuclear Generating Plant 192
7.1 Location of key US Department of Energy (DOE) sites 218
7.2 Idaho National Laboratory (INL) site 219
7.3 Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), New Mexico 221
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Acknowledgments
The editor and authors would like to thank Len Husband and all the
staff of the University of Toronto Press for their cooperation and their
work on this book.