Diagram 1

Geiger Counter
(CPM) Diagram 2

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 Measures

Counts per minute (cpm) is the number of atoms in a given quantity of radioactive
material that are detected to have decayed in one minute.

If the measuring tool is very accurate,

* One becquerel (Bq) is equal to one disintegration per second, or 60 cpm.
* One curie (Ci) is equal to 3.7 x 10 10 Bq or cps, which is equal to 2.22 x 1012 cpm.

A Roentgen (R) measures the amount of charge produced in air from ionizing radiation.

CPM, Bq, and Ci are all related to the left side of Diagram 2. Now, a few definitions:

Absorbed dose relates to the amount of energy actually absorbed in some material, and
is used for any type of radiation and any material. (Measures: Rad, and Gray (Gy) )

Equivalent dose relates the absorbed dose in human tissue to the effective biological
damage of the radiation. (Not all radiation has the same biological effect, even for the
same amount of absorbed dose.) (Measures: Rem, Sievert (Sv) )

To go from CPM to absorbed or equivalent dose requires extra knowledge. There is not
a simple conversion. Fortunately, there are ways to measure these things directly.

Before we can get to conversions, we need to recall our measurement prefixes:

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 A Few Conversions

* Absorbed dose: 1 Rad = 10 mGy (milliGray)

* To get from absorbed dose to equivalent dose: The number of rems is equal to Q times the
number of rads, where Q is the quality factor. Q varies between 1 and 20, but is typically 1
for x-rays and gamma rays and 10 for neutrons. (For gamma rays and beta particles, you
may approximate: 1 roentgen (R) = 1 rem = 1 rad.)

* Within equivalent dose: 0.1 Rem = 1 mSv (millisievert)

* 1 mSv (millisievert) = 1,000 uSv (microsievert) = 0.001 Sv

Be alert to distinguish between mSv per hour (mSv / hr) (which varies depending on how
much radiation is in the air in a given moment) and mSv (ie, over the last six months, a
person has received 3 mSv of exposure).
Exposure Levels and Effects

The figures below, adapted from the World Nuclear Association, shows typical exposure
levels and their effects:

2 mSv - 6.2 mSv per year: typical background exposure from the environment (actual
level depends on altitude, natural radioactivity of local rocks, man-made factors, etc.)

2.4 mSv per year - average dose to US nuclear industry workers

9 mSv per year - exposure to airline crew flying regularly between New York and Tokyo

7-10 mSv (single dose) - CT scan

20 mSv per year - current limit (averaged) for nuclear industry employees and uranium
miners

100 mSv per year - lowest level at which any increase in cancer risk is clearly evident

1,000 mSv (1 sievert) cumulative - estimated to cause a fatal cancer many years later in
5 out of every 100 people exposed to it

1,000 mSv (1 sievert) single dose - temporary radiation sickness - not fatal

5,000 mSv (5 sieverts) single dose - fatal within a month to half of those who receive it

10,000 mSv (10 sieverts) single dose - fatal within weeks. Page 3
 Other Relevant Facts

* There are four kinds of isotopes that are likeliest to be emitted by the crippled Fukushima
Daiichi plant, as well as the other three that have been taken offline: iodine-131, cesium-137,
strontium-90 and plutonium-239. A complete meltdown could release uranium and other
dangerous elements.

* There is a risk from both air inhalation and absorption through the skin. This is why staying
indoors, sealing doors and windows and turning off the heater and swamp cooler helps.

* One also needs to consider the risk from ingestion: radiation lands on the ground. Cattle
eats grass, leading to bad milk. “Sprayed” crops and water are ingested.

* When reading about “levels of radiation” around the nuclear plant, you need to ask: was
this a short-term (less than one hour) spike in radiation (like when steam was released) or this
is a measurement that has held steady over many hours or days?

Why Do You Need to Know These Things?

* To understand the media reporting. An example:

"Elevated levels of radiation were detected well outside the 20-mile (30-kilometer)
emergency area around the plants. In Ibaraki prefecture, just south of Fukushima, officials
said radiation levels were about 300 times normal levels by late morning."

http://www.search.independent.co.uk/topic/prefecture-radiation, March 17, 2011

The average person in the U.S. is exposed to 6.2 mSv annually. This is equivalent to 0.00071
mSv per hour. 300 times the normal level comes out to 0.213 mSv / hour (300 times
0.00071). For comparison, a person gets a 0.1 mSv dose when getting a stomach x-ray.

Also, one needs to look up the radiation levels there over time. If one did so, one would see
that this level was a spike, and dropped off fairly quickly.

So while “300 times normal level” sounds horrible, in fact, in this case, it was the equivalent,
at worst, of getting two stomach x-rays.

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 Around the Nuclear Plant, March 17

From a March 17 article: “Radiation levels have reached 10 mSv per hour in some parts of
the plant, said John Price, a Melbourne-based consultant on industrial accidents and former
member of the safety policy unit at the National Nuclear Corporation U.K.

“ ‘That means they have an access time of 10 to 25 hours at the most,’ Price said in a
telephone interview today. ‘At that rate, you are going to go through workers very fast.’ ”

From the way the quote is worded (and Mr. Price’s credentials make him a worthy (in my
view) source), it sounds like the 10 mSv / hr is a steady reading, not a spike. After ten hours,
a worker is exposed to 100 mSv -- the level at which the risk of cancer starts increasing.

(By March 19, levels had dropped significantly.)

For Comparison: A Stat from Chernobyl

An estimated 24,000 evacuees received doses of about 450 mSv.

Acute vs Chronic (Long term)

Being exposed to radiation in a short period of time or over a long period of time is no
indication of the total radiation dose and, thus, the possible health effects that may occur.

The UN Report: Not to Worry

“A United Nations forecast projects the radioactive plume from the Fukushima facility would
reach the Aleutian Islands on Thursday and hit Southern California late on Friday, The New
York Times reported.

“The projection, calculated on Tuesday and obtained by the newspaper, gives no information
about actual radiation levels, it said. Health and nuclear experts emphasize that radiation in
the plume will be diluted as it travels and will have extremely minor health consequences in
the United States, it reported.” (My emphasis)

More about the U.S.

The following charts come from a EPA web site called RadNet, which is fed data from
sensitive measuring devices around the country.
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 Sacramento, CA

The first spike occurred last

Friday, late morning.

The new peak was roughly

a 30% increase over
previous peak values.

For comparison, if the peak

lasted for an entire year, the
average mSv per year
would go from 6.2 to 8.1.
(Airline people who fly
regularly from NY to Tokyo
average 9.0 mSv / year.)

Tucson, AZ

Early Sunday morning,

March 20, a slight rise is
detected. After that,
nothing unusual.

Previous to Sunday, no
increase had been found.

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 Radiation from Food and Water

In order to measure the danger to human health from ingestion, one needs to know the
amount (often measured in Bq) of the specific isotope in the food or water. It is very complex
to quantify the dangers from ingestion, but I offer a few random, useful facts:

* Children are more easily affected by radiation than adults (e.g. 20% of consumed
radioactive iodine accumulates in a child’s thyroid vs. only 7% in an adult’s);

* 200 Bq per liter of water was measured near Tokyo;

* An infant could receive a radiation dose of about 10 uSv (0.01 mSv) from drinking one litre
of this tap water, meaning one would have to drink a litre per day for a year to receive a
dose of between 1 and 10 mSv. The dose for an adult would be about ten times lower.

* 15,000 Bq of iodine-131 is equivalent to 0.33 mSv, or about half of a stomach x-ray.

* One of the levels detected in spinach (from a farm in Ibaraki) was 15,000 bq of iodine-131;
eating a kilogram of it, again, would be about the same level of exposure as getting a
stomach x-ray;

* A kilo of spinach with 690 bq of cesium-137 would be roughly 0.00897 mSv;

* The half-life of iodine-131 is 8 days, meaning the iodine-131 that accumulates in the body
will decrease over a relatively quickly period of time (6.25% of its original radioactivity
after 32 days).;

* Cesium-137 on the other hand has a half-life of about 30 years;

* The average concentration of cesium-137 which is assumed to yield (.04 mSv) per year is
200 pico-curies per liter.

The Breach in Unit 3

* Two workers suffered skin burns after wading into water 1,000 times more radioactive than
normal. The water had 3.9 million Bq of radionuclides per cubic centimeter. Highest level in
seawater nearby has been 3.21 Bq per c.c.. Cobolt-60 and cesium-137 were detected. Unit 3
uses MOX fuel (more toxic than normal).

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 In Closing

* “As an experiment, I wiped some dust from the TV screen onto a tissue, and placed it in
front of the radiation detector. The reading went from a background reading around 10 CPM
to around 1300 CPM, or 130 times the reading!”

http://www.blackcatsystems.com/GM/experiments/ex1.html

* NASA’s culture of positivity. Positive thoughts for the Fukushima 50.

* Given all the Western science above, I briefly wanted to mention the “alternative” world.

Norman Cousins offered a case study which showed that laughter helped cure Anklyosing
Spondylitis, a collagen illness that attacks the connective tissues of the body. There has also
been research which shows that psychotherapy (an activity which effects both the emotional
and energetic states of being) effects biochemistry. The movie, “The Secret,” reminds us of
the Law of Attraction: what we focus on is what we will bring into our lives.

So let’s keep our frequency high, stay in the moment with as much Love and Light as we can
muster, and enjoy!

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