Irrational Fear

It is rather painful to see how so many well educated Malaysians including Doctors, Medical Specialists, Professors etc. are being misled by irresponsible people with obvious ulterior motives.

Even the president of CAP thought that since Thorium-232 has a long half-life, it is extremely dangerous when THE REVERSE IS TRUE.

And even the Malaysian Medical Association has made statements in the China Press to suggest the radiation fear from Lynas Rare Earth Plant is dangerous.

Here are some facts with regards to the Radiation and the Lynas controversy:

Thoriun-232 is the only weakly radioactive element found in the Lynas waste product.

Thorium-232 decay produces only alpha particles which can be stopped by a piece of thin paper and cannot penetrate even the outer layer of the human skin, whereas potassium-40 in our normal diet produces the highly dangerous gamma and beta rays from all the 3 types of beta decay, i.e. electron emission, electron capture and positron emission.

A typical 5.5 MeV alpha particle can be expected to travel less than 0.005 cm in body fluids.

THE LONGER THE HALF-LIFE OF A SUBSTANCE THE LESS IS THE RADIOACTIVITY and as such the less dangerous it is.

As a simple analogy, if it takes 14,000,000,000 years for half of a house to be burnt, there is no chance of anybody getting hurt. But if it takes only 14 minutes for half of the house to be burnt down, a lot of people will be injured or killed.

Thorium-232 which is the only significant radioactive element found in the Lynas waste has an incredibly long half-life of 14 billion years and as such is much less radioactive than the Potassium-40 whose half-life is only 1.25 billion years.

Comparison of Radioactivity in Bq (number of atoms decaying in 1second)

Pure Thorium-232 = 4,080 Bq/gm
Pure Potassium-40 = 254,000 Bq/gm
Naturally Occurring Potassium (3 different isotopes) in our body and food = 31.825 Bq/gm
Artificially created Plutonium-238 = 634,000,000,000 Bq/gm (1/2 life=87.7 years)
Lynas Rare Earth Waste = 6 Bq/gm

It has been estimated that in the worst case scenario, the radiation risk from the Lynas plant is only 0.002 mSv/yr.

In Ramsar, Iran, the naturally occurring radiation is extremely high at 260 mSv/yr. This is 13,000,000%higher than the expected worse case scenario in Kuantan.

And the people in Ramsar, Iran has been found to be healthier and live longer than the rest of the Iranians! There is also no increase in the number of cancer cases.

In the south western area of Kerala state in India, the Thorium-232 in the soil is as high as 4,000 parts per million as compared to the Lynas waste which has only 1,650 parts per million.

And studies have shown that the population which have been living all their lives in these areas, do not have a higher incidence of cancer and their blood and tissues do not have a significant increase in the level of Thorium.

We are exposed to radiation all our lives. In fact we get 4,400 Bq of radiation from the Potassium-40 with a further 3,000 Bq from Carbon-14 which forms part of our body tissues.

There is no way we can escape completely from radiation. Even outer space is full of radiation. The only way we can escape from all radiation is to leave this universe! or jump into the Kuantan River and be eaten by the crocodiles.

Come to think about it, this would not work either as human body as well as the croc’s body have their own intrinsic radioactivity!