Climate change deniers argue that sea levels will not rise significantly. (The most famous example is the North Carolina Legislature writing legislation opposing sea level rise to allow development along the coast.)
There is one place in the world where sea level rise will be catastrophic: Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands (a US Free Association state, it gained independence from the United States in 1986). See the Wikipedia article for more about Eniwetok Atoll.
The atoll was one of the places that the US government conducted nuclear weapons tests, forty-three of them. [The US Government would forcibly remove people from various islands around the Marshalls chain when conducting tests and put them back after the tests were completed.] Unlike Johnston Atoll and other test sites in the Pacific, tests at Eniwetok went horribly wrong, and many of the weapons did not explode correctly (they spread radioactive materials with long half-lives around the atoll).
The solution (after many court fights) was to scrape away all the contaminated soil (111,000 cubic yards), put it in the Cactus nuclear weapon crater, and build a concrete dome over it to prevent the soil’s spread to the environment. This was only meant as a temporary solution, as the government could not dump the waste at sea (something about protests from virtually every nation on Earth) and did not wish to transport the waste back to the USA for disposal. (The government did not wish to appropriate money to properly treat the waste, estimated at $947 million.)
Due to stock market losses in the 2007 economic downturn, the fund to pay out compensation and to maintain the dome was exhausted in 2010 (it was invested by the government in the stock market). Conservatives in the government now are neither interested in replenishing the fund, nor properly treating the waste.
Rainwater already pools around the edges of the dome and has created cracks; radioactive material is already leaking slowly out of the dome according to a 2013 survey.
After the “cleanup,” two of the islands making up the atoll were declared free of radioactive materials in 1980, and those islands were reoccupied by the residents the same year.
In the Compact of Free Association between the Marshall Islands and the United States, a mechanism exists by which the Marshallese may make claims over the nuclear testing conducted over their country. The conservative-majority Supreme Court dismissed the Marshall Islands’ claim about the fund in 2010 without hearing it, and the fund went broke.
Since conservative politicians are also in denial about climate change, this is a problem. It was projected that the remaining island would be fit for human habitation sometime around 2026 (after the decay of short-term radioactive materials). However, rising sea levels will rupture the dome before then, spilling the long-term radioactive material into the Pacific Ocean and poisoning the waters of the Marshall Islands.
The government claims all its obligations about the Dome to the Marshall Islands under the Compact of Free Association have been honoured, and the Marshall Islands government is fully responsible for any further cleanup. The Marshall Islands’ government claims that a nation with a population of 53,000 people and a GDP of $190M simply does not have the capacity to clean up things such as plutonium 239 and other radioactive materials.
The above was written by Anymouse, a guest blogger.
Putting this much of additional, long-term nuclear materials into the sea will cause the ocean to have a significant rise in the radioactivity. Since many of these radioactive elements have half-lives in thousands or millions or even billions of years, this will be a continuing, long-term problem, causing larger numbers of mutations all over the planet, since all rainwater ultimately comes from the sea. Now, the upside to that is that life may evolve into something better able to withstand more radioactivity in their environment. However, other mutations will take place, causing a sped-up form of evolution. Most of these mutations will not be useful, and will be better classified as birth defects - whether in humans or animals, and even plants and microbes will have both useful and non-useful mutations. One outcome of this is that evolution will occur faster, while at the same time allowing fewer individuals to survive, or live well.
Previous Entry
Next Entry
Top
I claim no particular training or knowlege in any field, These opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Web-lectric, my nation, my state, the California Department of Furniture and Bedding, FEMA,
anyone or everyone else, or even myself.
Nothing in this site is designed to give any sort of advice. Any advice is pretty useless anyway, whether giving such advice or acting on any advice. Do so at your own risk\k\s\i\r\ certainty that
disaster will ensue from the offering or use of any advice, for no good deed ever goes unpunished.
Top
Website design and Hosting by Web-lectric
Copyright 2009-2017 by Elizabeth Harper