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Acid rain moves ‘hasty’
Marine Pollution Bulletin
should be contrasted with objective or permit conditions stated prior to operations. It should not be forgotten that industrial plants have a lifetime and will eventually cease operation. Industries, on closure, can be required to restore their sites to a productive ecosystem. Such reclamation also needs monitoring and quality controlling, both during temporary closures and the final shutdown, so that recovery is adequate and efficient. Mine sites have traditionally been required to reclaim stripped land for game or farm habitat, and this requirement for reclamation is now being placed on other industries, including those disturbing submerged habitat.
Final Cost of Amoco Cadiz The Amoco Cadiz oil spill off the Brittany coast five years ago has cost up to US $284 million, at 1978 currency values, according to research by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. This estimate of the losses incurred by Brittany and the rest of the world because of the 223 000 ton spill is contained in a recent report by the NOAA. The report breaks down the social costs into five categories, the clean-up operationsamounting to up to US $117 million-being the largest item on the bill. The French government spent up to US $114 million of that figure, about 85070 going on shore clean-up and the remainder on the removal of oil from the sea.
Income lost because of the spill's effect on marine resources, mainly oyster culturing and open-sea fishing, totalled about US $33 million. The value of lost recreation opportunities is estimated at up to US $82 million; income lost by the tourist industry could be up to US $60 million, although the report states that this would not contribute to the world-wide social costs because tourist industries in other parts would benefit from revenues not spent in Brittany. The 'other costs' category puts the value of the spilled oil and the destroyed tanker at $24 million each; and costs of studies on the spill at about $4 million.
Sea Discharges of Plutonium to Reduce British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), which operates the major reprocessing plant at Sellafield (formerly Windscale) on the north-west coast of England, has announced that it will reduce pipeline discharges of plutonium into the Irish Sea by about five times, over the next three or four years. In the mid-seventies, discharges from the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel elements involved an annual total of some 5000 curies of plutonium and americium. In recent years this has been reduced to a total of around 1000 curies, and news of a further cut in discharges follows a 438
Monitoring is not just routine data gathering in the hope that useful information may be obtained if 'things go wrong'. There is skill in designing a sufficient and efficient monitoring programme as with any other project in the natural sciences. A good monitoring programme requires design, implementation and analytical skills in biology and chemistry, if not other disciplines. We need more published case histories of these programmes so that the lessons learnt can be passed on. D. V. ELLIS
report on the discovery that at least five times as much plutonium is absorbed by the human digestive system from fish and other food than was once believed. The report from the National Radiological Protection Board criticized established models of the uptake of plutonium by the gut, revealing that no measurements had been made of absorption in humans and that estimates of the effect on man were only based on the extrapolation of the effects on other mammals. Meanwhile, the UK Government has revealed plans for two underground land dumps for the disposal of waste from the nuclear industry. This move is seen as a result of international pressure against Britain's continued dumping of radioactive waste at sea, which, ten years ago, was seen as the cheapest solution to the problem.
Acid Rain Moves 'Hasty' A leading British Government scientist has expressed criticism of"hasty measures" against acid rain. Addressing an EEC conference in West Germany, Martin Holdgate, chief scientist at the UK Department of the Environment, said that recent research had shown that normal rain was far more acidic than previously supposed. He questioned the accuracy of the pH measurements used in recent debates about the problem and said it was scientific "nonsense" to describe lakes with a pH of 4 as " d e a d " . Life could survive at such levels, he argued. Despite Britain's official 'wait and see' attitude, other European countries are pressing ahead with moves to reduce emissions of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. The Netherlands Minister for the Environment, Pieter Winsemius, has said that current emissions in Europe should be reduced by a factor of three or four and he is asking the Dutch Parliament to begin the process by cutting emissions of sulphur dioxide in the Netherlands by 5°7o to 475 000 tonnes. According to a national survey recently completed in West Germany, it is claimed that one-third or more of the country's trees have now been damaged by acid rain.
Pollution Causes Fish Cancers Scientific investigations in five freshwater locations across the United States have found a high prevalence of
should be contrasted with objective or permit conditions stated prior to operations. It should not be forgotten that industrial plants have a lifetime and will eventually cease operation. Industries, on closure, can be required to restore their sites to a productive ecosystem. Such reclamation also needs monitoring and quality controlling, both during temporary closures and the final shutdown, so that recovery is adequate and efficient. Mine sites have traditionally been required to reclaim stripped land for game or farm habitat, and this requirement for reclamation is now being placed on other industries, including those disturbing submerged habitat.
Final Cost of Amoco Cadiz The Amoco Cadiz oil spill off the Brittany coast five years ago has cost up to US $284 million, at 1978 currency values, according to research by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. This estimate of the losses incurred by Brittany and the rest of the world because of the 223 000 ton spill is contained in a recent report by the NOAA. The report breaks down the social costs into five categories, the clean-up operationsamounting to up to US $117 million-being the largest item on the bill. The French government spent up to US $114 million of that figure, about 85070 going on shore clean-up and the remainder on the removal of oil from the sea.
Income lost because of the spill's effect on marine resources, mainly oyster culturing and open-sea fishing, totalled about US $33 million. The value of lost recreation opportunities is estimated at up to US $82 million; income lost by the tourist industry could be up to US $60 million, although the report states that this would not contribute to the world-wide social costs because tourist industries in other parts would benefit from revenues not spent in Brittany. The 'other costs' category puts the value of the spilled oil and the destroyed tanker at $24 million each; and costs of studies on the spill at about $4 million.
Sea Discharges of Plutonium to Reduce British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), which operates the major reprocessing plant at Sellafield (formerly Windscale) on the north-west coast of England, has announced that it will reduce pipeline discharges of plutonium into the Irish Sea by about five times, over the next three or four years. In the mid-seventies, discharges from the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel elements involved an annual total of some 5000 curies of plutonium and americium. In recent years this has been reduced to a total of around 1000 curies, and news of a further cut in discharges follows a 438
Monitoring is not just routine data gathering in the hope that useful information may be obtained if 'things go wrong'. There is skill in designing a sufficient and efficient monitoring programme as with any other project in the natural sciences. A good monitoring programme requires design, implementation and analytical skills in biology and chemistry, if not other disciplines. We need more published case histories of these programmes so that the lessons learnt can be passed on. D. V. ELLIS
report on the discovery that at least five times as much plutonium is absorbed by the human digestive system from fish and other food than was once believed. The report from the National Radiological Protection Board criticized established models of the uptake of plutonium by the gut, revealing that no measurements had been made of absorption in humans and that estimates of the effect on man were only based on the extrapolation of the effects on other mammals. Meanwhile, the UK Government has revealed plans for two underground land dumps for the disposal of waste from the nuclear industry. This move is seen as a result of international pressure against Britain's continued dumping of radioactive waste at sea, which, ten years ago, was seen as the cheapest solution to the problem.
Acid Rain Moves 'Hasty' A leading British Government scientist has expressed criticism of"hasty measures" against acid rain. Addressing an EEC conference in West Germany, Martin Holdgate, chief scientist at the UK Department of the Environment, said that recent research had shown that normal rain was far more acidic than previously supposed. He questioned the accuracy of the pH measurements used in recent debates about the problem and said it was scientific "nonsense" to describe lakes with a pH of 4 as " d e a d " . Life could survive at such levels, he argued. Despite Britain's official 'wait and see' attitude, other European countries are pressing ahead with moves to reduce emissions of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. The Netherlands Minister for the Environment, Pieter Winsemius, has said that current emissions in Europe should be reduced by a factor of three or four and he is asking the Dutch Parliament to begin the process by cutting emissions of sulphur dioxide in the Netherlands by 5°7o to 475 000 tonnes. According to a national survey recently completed in West Germany, it is claimed that one-third or more of the country's trees have now been damaged by acid rain.
Pollution Causes Fish Cancers Scientific investigations in five freshwater locations across the United States have found a high prevalence of