South Africa has been considering a major move into nuclear power generation. The government has discussed possible contracts with a number of different reactor vendors.
Americium is a highly radioactive transuranic element that has an atomic number of 95 and is represented by the symbol "Am." Americium is produced by bombarding uranium or plutonium with neutrons in a nuclear reactor. One ton of spent nuclear fuel contains about ten grams of americium.
I have posted essays before about the health effects of ionizing radiation. There is a varying low level of natural radioactivity every where on Earth. Often, emissions from nuclear power plants are compared to the background natural level of radiation and dismissed if they are not more radioactive than the background.
Recently Peter Donaldson died in the UK. He was a newsreader for the BBC and he recorded an announcement that would have been used if nuclear war had broken out. Considering that I have been talking a lot lately about the possibility of nuclear war, I thought it would be interesting to explore how the BBC intended to speak to the British people in the eventuality of a nuclear attack on Britain.
