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What the F#ck is the Story with the Radioactive Wastewater at Fukushima?

by Bo

How safe is the release of Fukushima nuclear wastewater? The IAEA, and the governments of Japan and South Korea have declared the releases safe. People all around the Pacific Ocean are protesting the releases however. Where does the nuclear wastewater come from? What is in it?Because the melted nuclear cores (corium) of reactors 1, 2 & 3 at Fukushima Dai'ichi are somewhere underneath the three reactor buildings, having melted out, workers at TEPCO have been pouring cold water on the corium

Tags: Fukushima Nuclear Waste Japan
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Video - Out of the Ground, Into the Ground: Nuclear Heritage

by Bo

I had the joy of participating in a deep exploration of issues of nuclear heritage with the artist Grit Ruhland. The discussion was wide ranging focusing on the legacy of uranium mining and nuclear production. Grit's work explores nuclear heritage at uranium mining sites and communities in Germany, and modes of knowledge production around nuclear culture and technology. She does very powerful work in sculpture, video and sound installation. The event was the opening event of the Redraw Tragedy

Tags: Nuclear Waste Nuclear Power Nuclear Production Nuclear Culture Fukushima Chernobyl
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"Nuclear Memory Effects: Remembering Hiroshima and Forgetting Fukushima," Keynote Lecture for the Troubling Anniversaries Conference

by Bo

I was honored to be asked to present the keynote lecture at the Troubling Anniversaries Conference held in October 2021 jointly by the Institute for Historical Research of the School of Advanced Study at the University of London, and the Center for Public History at Queen's University Belfast. The conference brought together a fascinating cross-section of scholars and practitioners. All of the sessions are available online and can be seen here. My keynote lecture explored memory culture in

Tags: Fukushima Hiroshima & Nagasaki Global Hibakusha Nuclear Testing Nuclear Weapons Fallout
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Not Seeing the Contaminated Forest for the Decontaminated Trees in Fukushima

by Bo

I have a new article up at Japan Focus. The article is part of a group of articles promoting the book, Legacies of Fukushima: 3.11 in Context, published this summer by the University of Pennsylvania Press. The article is a short presentation of the content of my chapter of the book, and the other articles in the Japan Focus collection present several chapters by other contributors. My work focuses on it has been so hard historically to see the harm done to people who's exposure to radioactivity

Tags: Fukushima Nuclear Waste Fallout
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How Internal Exposures to Radiation Make People Invisible: Video

by Bo

I was honored to be invited to give a lecture in the "Night with the Experts" series of the Nuclear Education Information Services (NEIS) group based in Chicago (my hometown). The title of my talk is, "How Internal Exposures to Radiation Make People Invisible." There are several parts to the lecture:-The effects of nuclear weapons-How internal and external exposures to radiation are experienced differently and affect people differently-External exposures affect our whole bodies-Internal

Tags: Fallout Fukushima Radiation Chernobyl Nuclear Power Nuclear Testing Nuclear Weapons Nuclear Production
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Managing Nuclear Memory: The Journey from Hiroshima to Fukushima

by Bo

Webinar!I will be in dialogue with scholars Norma Field and Yuki Miyamoto for an online discussion that you can join via Zoom next weekend, in part commemorating the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but also exploring the public management of nuclear understandings since then, especially as relates to Fukushima, and the Global Hibakusha.Time:August 7 (Fri) 11 am (EDT) East Coast USAAugust 7 (Fri) 10 am (CDT) Central USAAugust 7 (Fri) 8 am (PDT) West Coast USAAugust 7 (Fri) 5 pm (CET)

Tags: Hiroshima & Nagasaki Fukushima Nuclear Testing Nuclear Weapons Nuclear Power Nuclear Waste Radiation Fallout Hanford
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Video: The Nuclear Realities of Testing, Power and Weapons (interview on Inbound Ambassador YouTube channel)

by Bo

I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Joy Walsh, the Inbound Ambassador, on her YouTube channel in June. , the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Fukushima, nuclear weapons, nuclear power and especially moves towards resuming nuclear testing. A wide ranging interview on a number of topics, conducted onsite at some legacy buildings in Hiroshima that face demolition I talked to Joy earlier, in February, about nuclear power being born violent. It was a great including discussion about

Tags: Hiroshima & Nagasaki Nuclear Weapons Nuclear Production Nuclear Testing Nuclear Power Nuclear Waste Fukushima
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Why Wildlife Returning to Chernobyl Tells Us Almost Nothing

by Bo

Several years ago, I was speaking with a prominent Anthropocene scholar in Uppsala, Sweden. We were in disagreement about the risks to the environment of nuclear power. For both of us, Chernobyl was part of making our case to each other. He told me that if the radiation around Chernobyl was so dangerous, it would not now be as full of returning wildlife as it has become. Animals are becoming more abundant there, he explained, so it shows that things are not as dangerous in the Exclusion Zone as

Tags: Chernobyl Nuclear Power Nevada Test Site Radiation Fallout Fukushima
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Pay no attention to that radiological disaster behind the curtains

by Bo

The government of Japan is clearly intending that the 2020 Olympics will function as a public relations win in which the image of Japan, and especially of Northern Japan and Fukushima are cleansed of images of radiological contamination. Even as the Fukushima Daiichi site itself, and the traces where the plumes of its explosions deposited fallout throughout the area remain un-remediated, the public perceptions will be remediated. This is typical of the behavior of governments in the developed

Tags: Fukushima Japan Radiation Nuclear Power
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