Are Prius Radiation Levels Checked By Factory?

So what is the potential source of harmful contamination in a new vehicle? Residual dust that may contain radioactive Iodine or other isotopes? I find it extremely unlikely that any typical fallout would activate anything on a new car, so I'm guessing it is the residual fallout itself that is a concern.

This would seem more of an inhalation or ingestion risk than one to exposed skin. A wipe down and/or fabric cleaning would likely remove most of it if you are really concerned? Maybe take some Iodine supplements before you do;-) Unless the air filter is HEPA grade, it isn't going to remove fine dust and filters won't remove vaporous or dissolved isotopes regardless.

Is the concern that an air filter will release previously trapped contaminants? Unless the filter was actually used to filter the air before it was installed in the new vehicle or during testing, it seems unlikely it would have even collected significant airborne contaminants and those contaminants wouldn't likely activate anything in the air passing through in any case.

Of course, fallout can get into anything being manufactured. But simply having a trace of radioactive fallout in your car is not sufficient for potential harm. If the concern is primarily alpha particle emissions from various isotopes, it would need a way to be ingested or inhaled to be dangerous. After all, we're not talking about the concentration or quantity of contamination to be emitting enough neutrons or gammas that are going to pentrate the dash and then your skin enough to give you a measurable dose. I would think that kind of Repo Man contamination would clearly show up on even a crude detector.

 

I agree a new car wouldn't need the air filter checked. Just the rest of the interior if nothing more than for peace of mind. A used car is a different story I believe.

I've been seeing stories like this one from today...

#Radioactive Used Car: 20.38 Microsieverts/Hr Car Destined for Kenya Stopped | EX-SKF

Anyone notice there switching from leather to softex non-leather interiors this year in Toyota cars. Lot of radioactive cows and beef in Japan. One cattle rancher lost his entire herd valued at 2 Billion dollars. Thats allot of radioactive cattle!

Japan Bans Radioactive Cattle From Near Nuclear Plant as Pollution Spreads - Bloomberg

Radioactive meat circulating on Japanese market - CNN

Japan: Radioactive substance again found in beef » Breaking News | Wire Update News | News Wires -

 

That old news

Seriously

In Japan everyone suffer from recent mother nature distractions.
Earthquake, Fukushima Nuclear, Typhoon
We have enough already.
We do not need media frenzy

Japanese government did not act together and now all citizen suffering so much. We have highest unemployment and due to high currency exchange some small company went to bankrupted.a

If you worried? Please come to Japan and see it self.

 

It's too bad that real news doesn't sell. The old newspaperman's adage of "If it bleeds it leads" is still in force. I miss the days of Walter Cronkite. He at least attempted to tell the real story. He wasn't perfect, but at least his intentions were good.

Now "news" is really a form of entertainment, pandering to a particular demographic. It isn't about the dissemination of real information, it's just about ratings. Everything is sensational, even when it isn't. I find it disgusting. We have a world full of smart, articulate people; why don't we give them a chance to speak. Instead we listen to fear mongering from plastic looking talking heads.

Tom

 

Do I hear an "Amen"?
:thumb:

 

I suggest reading about radiation, contamination and how nuclear reactors operate so you can decide for yourself what these "experts" are telling you on tv.

I accumulated a whopping (that is sarcasm) 270mrem during my time as an intermediate maintenance worker for 3 years and <50 during my 5 years of operating a reactor's steam plant. A couple plane rides will net you more.

 

I don't know why you've been holding back on us, but would you mind sending a few over to Earth?

 

We just purchased a new 2011 Prius this past Saturday. I also work at a nuke plant in the radiation protection dept. My wife had expressed some concern about radioactive contamination in a new Toyota.

So I drove the car to work for my scheduled Sunday night shift and went out to the parking lot with a couple survey meters to check out the car. I found no evidence of any radiation or contamination levels above the background levels.

My wife feels better now. I was never too concerned about it.

 

Breaking news regarding air filters and hot particles...

Scientist Marco Kaltofen Presents Data Confirming Hot Particles | Fairewinds Associates, Inc

[ame=http://vimeo.com/31370998]Scientist Marco Kaltofen Presents Data Confirming Hot Particles on Vimeo[/ame]

Washington, DC - October 31, 2011 – Today Scientist Marco Kaltofen of Worchester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) presented his analysis of radioactive isotopic releases from the Fukushima accidents at the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Mr. Kaltofen’s analysis confirms the detection of hot particles in the US and the extensive airborne and ground contamination in northern Japan due to the four nuclear power plant accidents at TEPCO’s Fukushima reactors. Fairewinds believes that this is a personal health issue in Japan and a public health issue in the United States and Canada.



Official Publication on American Public Health Association webpage


I'm Arnie Gundersen from Fairewinds.
It is October 31st, 2011. This is a video that contains scientific information that we have been wanting to share with you for a long time. Today, in Washington D.C. at 8:30 in the morning, scientist Marco Kaltofen gave a presentation to some doctors who are part of the American Public Health Association. The paper is now on our website, next to this video.
To summarize the paper, citizens, some doctors and scientists, some bloggers, some farmers, around the world provided samples to Mr. Kaltofen who analyzed them for Fukushima radiation. An example of what he found is a slide that contains air filters from cars in Japan and in the United States. Cars in the United States hardly have any radiation in their air filters. Cars in Tokyo had quite a lot, way too much. Cars in Fukushima Prefecture were incredibly radioactive.
Now I think it is important because the nuclear industry will say, well everything is radioactive and therefore we should not worry. Well, the Seattle data shows that not everything is radioactive. And it shows that the people in Japan received enormous exposures of particles into their lungs and into their digestive systems, during the course of the accident.
Another piece of information is that Fairewinds viewers were able to send in children's shoes from Japan. Mr. Kaltofen has data that clearly show that the concentration of cesium on the kid's shoelaces was astronomically high, around 80 disintegrations per second. What does that mean? Kids tie their shoes, their hands get radioactive and it goes into their G.I. tract. If it is on the ground, it is in the dust in the playground and it is in their lungs. I think that between the two, the air filters and the children's shoes, it shows that there is a severe personal health problem in Japan that will manifest itself in cancers over the next 10 or 20 years.
Now Mr. Kaltofen did not just look at Japan. He set up monitoring stations in the United States as well. Two of the three monitoring stations in the United States did show hot particles in the air in April. Since then, there have not been any hot particles. But in April, it is clear that, at the worst of the accident, hot particles were wafted across the Pacific and deposited in Seattle and in Boston at least. There is also data that indicates contamination on the ground in the Cascades, which are a mountain range right up against the Pacific Ocean.
So I think we have two problems here. In Japan, there is a personal health issue and what that means is that individuals have received enough radiation that there is going to be a statistically meaningful increase in cancers in Tokyo and especially in Fukushima Prefecture.
In the United States, it is a different story. It is a public health issue and not a personal health issue. What that means is that we will never know who is the individual who got cancer from Fukushima. But we can be sure that the radiation did reach here and that there will be an increase in cancers, especially on the West Coast where the Rocky Mountains stopped most of the radiation and deposited it on the ground.
So, this paper was given to the American Public Health Association. And here it is a public health issue. We cannot run and we cannot hide. But the radiation is up and down the West Coast and then also scattered about the rest of the United States.
In Japan, it is a different story. They need to aggressively go after the contamination that has been discovered. It is so obvious on these air filters and on children's shoes. It takes a concerted national effort, not a haphazard effort of chasing hot spots, in order to reduce the amount of radioactivity that is on the soil and in the air in Japan right now.
And the last thing the paper shows is that it is wrong to have a 10 mile evacuation planning zone. Clearly, the damage can extend out as far as Tokyo. We need to look at emergency planning and evacuations well beyond the 10 miles that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission uses here and the 12 miles that the Japanese used during the accident. You may recall that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said that Americans needed to evacuate 50 miles from Fukushima at the peak of the accident. Well, if it is good enough for Americans living in Japan, that same criteria should be good enough for Americans living in the United States.
The data in Mr. Kaltofen's paper came from citizens. It came from farmers. It came from scientists. It came from bloggers. It was an effort by individuals and not government. I think if we had relied on the government to get us this information, we never would have gotten it. So it is an important achievement for all of us, to recognize that together, using the internet, we can all provide information for scientists to use, to come to rational decisions on public policy.
This November we are asking for your support so we can continue our scientific analysis and these educational videos. There is a donate button on the Fairewinds site and we would appreciate it if you considered a financial contribution.
Thank you very much. We will keep you informed.

 

There is a big difference between being exposed to radiation during a flight and internalizing radiation in your body. BIG DIFFERENCE!

 

"Mr. Kaltofen has data that clearly show that the concentration of cesium on the kid's shoelaces was astronomically high, around 80 disintegrations per second."

80 disintegrations per second (dps) is definitely above background, but certainy is not "astronomically high". We use disintegrations per minute (dpm) to measure radioactive contamination in the states, so 80 dps = 4800 dpm. When levels exceed 1000 dpm/100 sq cm we will boundary off the affected area to prevent entry unless specific steps are in place to prevent the spread of the radioactive contamination to clean areas or to the skin and clothing of workers.

4800 dpm is nearly 5 times our limit but is really small potatoes and requires very little to prevent the spread to any workers in the area. In fact at this low level the chances of seeing anything measurable in the air is extremely unlikely.

"He set up monitoring stations in the United States as well. Two of the three monitoring stations in the United States did show hot particles in the air in April. Since then, there have not been any hot particles."

How does he define a "hot particle"? Based on his definition of "astronomically high" I am inclined to be a bit skeptical.

"But we can be sure that the radiation did reach here and that there will be an increase in cancers, especially on the West Coast where the Rocky Mountains stopped most of the radiation and deposited it on the ground."

There are air sample results from the Washington State Dept. of Health taken before and after the Fukushima event available on the web. The count rates from the post event samples are slightly higher than background levels from the same days during the previous year, but they are still ridiculously low.

 

It CAN make a big difference, but there are so many variables involved with quantifying internal dose. The isotope, chemical form of the contaminant, inhalation or ingestion, and the quantity ingested/inhaled immediately come to mind.

The levels of radiation we have in the US from Fukushima are so low that they are just high enough to be measured and the isotopes involved don't stay in the body very long (maybe a few months). Combined, the low levels and short retention time lead to a dose so low I just don't see the health hazard.

As a nuke worker I'm allowed to receive 5000 millirem in a year (I've never received more than 500 millirem in a year and typically its closer to 100-200 millirem). I just can't see anybody receiving anymore than a few millirem this year from exposure to Fukushima fallout.

Typical exposure to natural background sources is around 300 millirem/year.

Just to be clear, a millirem is a measurement of biological damage from exposure to ionizing radiation and therefore a millirem of dose from internal exposure is the same as a millirem of dose from external exposure.

 

This non-standard, ill-defined term also has set off my BS alert. I'm waiting for more clues to resolve this alarm -- and seeing none so far.

 

A "hot particle" comes from pizza eaten too soon after it comes out of the oven. These particles are known to stick to the roof of the human mouth, causing burns and blisters.

Tom

 

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Hot_particle

A hot particle is a small, highly radioactive object, with significant content of radionuclides. Because radioactivity can be inherent to a substance or induced, and there are many initial sources of radioactivity, hot particles can originate from a multitude of sources.

 

Maybe some Californians should try drinking a little less coffee rather than getting hysterical of possible increases in radiation levels.

Sheesh!