Nuclear Air Polution
Nuclear is as much about air polution as it is about climate change.
Every time people argue over energy sources and what is truly clean or best, I often feel air quality is overlooked as a benefit of nuclear.
One of the glimmers of hope Covid has brought us is a renewed (if not temporary) reminder of how important air quality and air flow is. I have taken to monitoring the quality of air in my house through CO2 monitoring, VOC measurement, radon, PM2.5 and more. What we breathe in plays a huge role in our health and lives. For example when air flow is reduced and CO2 is allowed to build up I feel more tired and lazy once that 1,500 ppm metric is hit, but more importantly there are aspects to what we breathe that does not in the short run make us feel in any particular way, but in the long run can kill.
Much in the same way you do not die from asbestos or radon exposure immediately, it builds and can slowly degrade your quality of life. A recent study by [MIT shows](tab: https://news.mit.edu/2023/study-shutting-down-nuclear-power-could-increase-air-pollution-0410) that by letting our stock of nuclear reactors decline and replacing with much more pollutant forms of energy, we risk an increase of excess deaths similar to the total number of people in the US who are shot and killed in gun violence every quarter.
We frequently seek to raise awareness and ideas on how to reduce gun violence, as we should, but when an equal killer sits in the shadows I feel like it behooves us to at least pay attention.
— Desmond