The Role of Radon in Comparisons of Effects of Radioactivity Releases from Nuclear Power, Coal Burning and Phosphate Mining

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Abstract
It is shown that radon emissions are the predominant source of radiation exposure from nuclear power, coal burning or phosphate mining. For very long time spans, erosion of the continents must be considered, and in this perspective bringing uranium to the earth's surface has no effect since it would eventually reach the surface anyhow, so coal burning and phosphate mining have no net effect; however nuclear power saves lives by removing the radon source, the net effect ultimately being a saving of 350 lives/GWe-yr. If only effects over 500 yr axe considered. lives saved by removal of uranium in mining exceed lives lost due to radon emissions from the nuclear industry under regulations now being instituted, and the net fatalities per GWe-yr caused by alI radioactivity releases are 0.017 for nuclear vs 0.045 for coal burning; the effects of radioactivity releases by 1 yr of present annual operations are LO times larger for phosphate mining than for coal burning.

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