{"id":47555,"date":"2017-11-29T13:55:31","date_gmt":"2017-11-29T18:55:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetsave.com\/?p=47555"},"modified":"2017-11-29T14:01:41","modified_gmt":"2017-11-29T19:01:41","slug":"rising-oceans-mean-pacific-nuclear-waste-dump-could-threaten-many-nations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetsave.com\/articles\/rising-oceans-mean-pacific-nuclear-waste-dump-could-threaten-many-nations\/","title":{"rendered":"Rising Oceans Mean Pacific Nuclear Waste Dump Could Threaten Many Nations"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story about rising oceans and nuclear waste was first published by CleanTechnica<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Some things are so serious, all you can do is laugh.\u00a0ABC News<\/em><\/a>\u00a0in Australia is reporting rising sea levels are threatening a nuclear waste dump left behind by the United States on Runit Island \u2014 part of the Enewetak Atoll. The dump is now leaking radioactive material into the Pacific Ocean, threatening every man, woman, and child living on its edge. That is quite a few folks, if you stop to think about it.<\/p>\n

\"Enewetak<\/a><\/p>\n

Americans like to brag about the economic miracle the country brought to the world through the globalization of capitalism, but it is fair to say the foundation of American power began on August 6, 1945 when it dropped an atomic bomb blast that vaporized Hiroshima \u2014 killing more than 40,000 human beings instantly. Many more would perish in the days, weeks, and months to come.<\/p>\n

The ethics of using nuclear weapons on the civilian population of Japan has been the subject of vigorous debate ever since. With the perspective that history provides, many now question the wisdom of Harry Truman\u2019s decision to use nuclear weapons, but there is no question that once the awesome power of \u201cThe Bomb\u201d became apparent, every other nation on earth wanted one.<\/p>\n

Satirist Tom Lehrer made a career out of writing songs filled with biting social commentary. A mathematician by trade, he was an accomplished pianist. At the height of his career, when the protest song was popular, he once described his piano as an \u201c88 string guitar.\u201d One of his songs is called \u201cWho\u2019s Next?\u201d and gives a brief history of the nations who became nuclear powers in the ’50s and ’60s. (It may interest you to learn that \u201clehrer\u201d in German means \u201cteacher.\u201d)<\/p>\n

In the 1950s, you were considered cool if you knew how to spell Enewetak, the atoll in the Marshall Islands used to test advanced versions of nuclear bombs. Unconcerned about the effects the testing would have on the native people or the land they called home, the US decided both could be sacrificed to obtain a greater good \u2014 continued American dominance of nuclear weapons technology.<\/p>\n

Following an underground explosion on the tip of Runit Island, the US military brought all the nuclear wastes created by its Pacific testing \u2014 during which 42 bombs were exploded \u2014 to the crater left behind, dumped them in, and then capped the festering cesspit with a concrete dome two feet thick. Mission accomplished. Everyone go about your business. Nothing to see here, move along.<\/p>\n

A half century later, that Pandora\u2019s Box of nuclear horrors is being re-opened, not by humans but by rising sea levels. Global warming is unraveling the tomb once thought to be impregnable, and releasing a toxic stew into the Pacific Ocean. A 2013\u00a0study<\/a>\u00a0by the US Department of Energy found that the site was leaking its contents into the surrounding water. Another\u00a0study<\/a>\u00a0a year later found traces of the radioactive isotopes buried on Runit Island as far away as the Pearl River Estuary in China\u2019s Guangdong province, according to a report from\u00a0The Guardian<\/a><\/em>\u00a0published in July of 2015.<\/p>\n

The problem is, the floor of the crater was supposed to be lined with concrete before the toxic waste was dumped in. But the US government decided doing so would be too expensive, so the work was never done.\u00a0\u201cThe bottom of the dome is just what was left behind by the nuclear weapons explosion,\u201d says Michael Gerrard, the chair of Columbia University\u2019s Earth Institute in New York.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s permeable soil. There was no effort to line it. And therefore, the seawater is inside the dome.\u201d That toxic seawater is then finding its way back into the ocean.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat dome is the connection between the nuclear age and the climate change age,\u201d says Marshall Islands climate change activist Alson Kelen. \u201cIt\u2019ll be a very devastating event if it really leaks. We\u2019re not just talking the Marshall Islands, we\u2019re talking the whole Pacific.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jack Niedenthal has been helping the people living on Bikini Atoll \u2014 where 23 of the nuclear test explosions were conducted \u2014 fight for compensation. In talking about The Dome on Enewetak, he says,\u00a0\u201cTo me, it\u2019s like this big monument to America\u2019s giant fuck up. This could cause some really big problems for the rest of mankind if all that goes underwater, because it\u2019s plutonium and cement.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the ABC News report, some of the debris buried beneath the dome includes plutonium-239. An isotope used in nuclear warheads, it is one of the most toxic substances on earth and\u00a0has a radioactive half-life of 24,100 years.<\/p>\n

There is a lot of talk these days about making America great again but no one seems to be able to articulate exactly when that golden age occurred. Was it when the US could blithely order people to leave their homes so it could blow up the islands they live on? Was it when taking rudimentary precautions to prevent massive contamination from nuclear wastes was deemed too expensive? Some people seem to confuse arrogance with greatness.<\/p>\n

Nuclear arms are very much on the mind of Americans these days, as North Korea continues ratcheting up its\u00a0saber rattling<\/a>. \u00a0The other day, the annual Christmas catalog from Hammacher Schlemmer arrived in my mailbox. That reminded me of the ditty penned by one of America\u2019s greatest satirist, Yip Harburg, the fellow who\u00a0 wrote the lyrics for \u201cOver The Rainbow\u201d. Years ago, the department store featured a bomb shelter for its most affluent clients. Harburg couldn\u2019t resist skewering that promotion.<\/p>\n

Hammacher Schlemmer is selling a shelter,<\/em>
\nworthy of Kubla Khan\u2019s Xanadu dome;<\/em>
\nPlushy and swanky, with posh hanky panky<\/em>
\nthat affluent Yankees can really call home.<\/em><\/p>\n

Hammacher Schlemmer is selling a shelter,<\/em>
\na push-button palace, fluorescent repose;<\/em>
\nElectric devices for facing a crisis<\/em>
\nwith frozen fruit ices and cinema shows.<\/em><\/p>\n

Hammacher Schlemmer is selling a shelter<\/em>
\nall chromium kitchens and rubber-tiled dorms;<\/em>
\nWith waterproof portals to echo the chortles<\/em>
\nof weatherproof mortals in hydrogen storms.<\/em><\/p>\n

What a great come-to-glory emporium!<\/em>
\nTo enjoy a deluxe moratorium,<\/em>
\nWhere nuclear heat can beguile the elite<\/em>
\nin a creme-de-la-creme crematorium.<\/em><\/p>\n

Perhaps one day, when America is truly great again, Hammacher Schlemmer will offer a similar shelter to protect wealthy humans from an overheated planet and rising seas containing radioactive isotopes. Or maybe that\u2019s what Elon Musk\u2019s proposed\u00a0colony on Mars<\/a>\u00a0is really for.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

America’s nuclear testing program is about to unleash a deadly cocktail of radioactive waste into the Pacific Ocean, thanks to rising sea levels caused by global warming. 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