Your biggest fear?

There is an element out there that is more abundant than uranium, cheaper to process and less toxic. It would require little retrofitting of nuclear power plants to use it and it is far more efficient for power creation. Instead of a highly radioactive waste byproduct, it leaves a sludge that is about as toxic as the mud in your garden after a good rain. The big disadvantage to this element is that it can't be enriched for nuclear weapons. The element I'm talking about is, Thorium. For power generation, it uses almost the identical technology that is being used in nuclear power plants now. It kind of makes one wonder why they don't use it instead (refer to my earlier statement about enrichment).

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Gravlore: I agree, it's unlikely to change. The only way would be for the general public to get informed and make a few of those lobbyists go swimming in the cooling ponds. Big money doesn't care about the threat of contamination to the public. They only care about more big money. It kind of makes one long for the days of tar and feathers, doesn't it.

I have looked at several maps outlining the course of the air currents that come from Asia. We, in Alberta, are definitely at risk. Not as much as those in California, Oregon, Washington and BC but we are still at risk. Within ten days of the incident, we saw a slight increase in airborne radioactivity. Since the radiation spewing forth in Fukushima has not been stopped, I presume we are still experiencing increased levels. Of course, those in charge tell us that these increases are not dangerous to humans. Really? REALLY? I think that even a slight increase is too much and is dangerous to humans. It is like the food industry - they say that a small amount of rat urine in the food supply is not dangerous to humans and is acceptable. My question to everyone is this. How many drops of rat urine would you accept in a gallon of water before you decide to stop drinking it? 100? 10? 5? Would you simply say NO rat urine is acceptable? I say that NO radiation is acceptable. Besides, the radiation monitoring stations in North America stopped reporting radiation levels only three weeks after the Fukushima disaster. I wonder why they STILL don't report radiation levels. I'll let you draw your own conclusions on that. I'll let you decide if you want to trust and believe what you are told by those 'in charge'.

Take a look at the periodic table of elements. Notice that sodium, magnesium, potassium and calcium are all in a tight little group on the left. They are the big 4 electrolytes in the human body. They are also very critical to the health of plants. Notice also that caesium is very close to potassium in the alkali metals group and shares many of the physical and chemical properties of potassium. One of the most disturbing properties is that it is preferentially taken up by plants compared to potassium. In other words, plants absorb caesium more readily than potassium. If caesium is in the ground, the plants will absorb it. If the plants in California, Oregon, Washinton and BC absorb it, eventually, we will be eating it. Caesium will compete with and replace potassium in the human body and will cause profound potassium deficiencies. That will cause cardiac dysrhythmias and uncontrollable muscular twitching and spasms. Once in the human body, it takes years to eliminate it. It has a very long half-life (about 30 years).

Is the radiation from Fukushima dangerous to us here in Alberta? YES, of course it is!

Well, thanks to everyone for sharing my worry. Hopefully I haven't added to anyone else's anxiety, but I suspect Fukushima Daiichi has done that for all of us. Probably start compiling a list of products that we are consuming that come from BC and California and find alternative sources or use the products as lanterns (sort of like Homer Simpsons "glow stick".

While everyone is on the subject of radiation I believe that we also need to take a closer look at technology. The amount of radiation that is given off through a wireless router is pretty large. Considering that most of you and your neighbours, schools, malls etc have wifi now we are voluntarily exposing ourself and children to large amounts of radiation as well as cell phone radiation. Add that to the power plant disaster in Japan, it doesn't look to good.

On a side note I noticed that no one has mentioned marshal law as a fear. No matter what the scenario may be I think the big wigs will enforce marshal law and there goes all our rights and freedoms. Granted there are more cvilians than military, it wouldn't take much for them to take us out, or for a civil war scenario to start when we are protecting our food supplies and loved ones.

I think here in Canada, 'Marshall Law' is called the "Emergencies Act" http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/E-4.5/index.html which replaced the War Measures Act.

As stated elsewhere, Canada has a standing military of 67000 and reserves of 43000 troops, nationwide. They would be stretched pretty thin holding down one city in marshall law, let alone the whole country. I'm more worried about the potential rioters that caused the 'need' for marshall law: i.e. a tuition increase? my hockey team LOST??? Technically the emergencies act is to protect property. It is much easier to destroy, and there are a lot more people interested in that, I think. But, yeah sure, I think marshall law would be scary. What would they do? Would it basically be lockdown & curfews, or could the legally start confiscating stuff deemed necessary for national security?. I'm not too familiar with the emergencies act's details.

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Gravlore,
I didn't mean to comment on whether the Montreal student protests were valid or not. While I think the original reason for the protest was pretty minor ($365 tuition increase? U of C in Calgary has raised over 450 per year for roughly a decade!), I do agree the measures taken to suppress the protests are pretty draconian, and wholeheartedly oppose those anti-protest measures.

Really, I just want to emphasize that social unrest, and riots can be touched off by quite minor things in the best of times. (and there are some definite actions that resemble rioting in the Montreal protests, even if they were committed by other people who were just there to make trouble. Burning cars = riot.)

Canada has seen some pretty hard rioting, as has the US (Trayvon Martin) and the rest of the world (like the UK, recently (Mark Duggan)) and the risk of a riot is much higher than the risk of martial law, in my estimation. While the reason for the original discontent may have been valid, the riots that resulted were destructive and indiscriminate in their targets.

Not many western democracies have imposed martial law lately. As far as I know, the last time in Canada was in response to the FLQ crisis in the 70's.

And as for thorium, the science is there, the test plans were drawn up, and the projects were dropped because you cannot build a nuclear bomb out of thorium. The main governments who spearheaded unraium reactors thought it was a nice perk to be able to make the Bomb, and so uranium was used and thorium was discarded. I recently read that China is getting back into thorium, which would be great, but it's a shame N. America gave up on thorium and lost it's expertise in the area.

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Keep in mind that when the cold war started a large percentage of the populations on both sides were actually in far ranging rural locations without stable power or even phones... Nukes would have been very effective at taking out the dozen or so metropolitan and industrial centers that each empire had at the time (1950's). The emp would be much more effective on us now. I'm guessing that's why each side had such a nice stockpile of gas and probably virus' built up to use if they could. I agree that it would be more effective for the winner to have land and infrastructure without the pesky 'locals' in the way 😎

I no longer endorse fear...

Excellent point and outlook. I think the moment when the SHTF may be different for each of us. Perhaps it will be a line we have personally drawn that finally gets crossed.

I would like to know just where the heck everyone will go when they bug out...make a beline for the foothills...then what? Everyones going to build a cabin on someone elses land and live happily ever after? Really, not a soul mentions where they plan to bug out to...unless they have purchased a cabin in a remote spot or already live on or own farm land...seems to me most of us will need to survive in place...if I'm wrong please share the ideas of where to take your loved ones and bug out to...then I might learn what I should do with 2 elderly mothers, a sister and brother-in-law who both have physical disabilities/brain injurys and my husband & I are in our early 50's and not in such good physical shape (though working on improving that) ...if for some reason there is no vehicle as being on foot is the only option we will not be able to do that ...if an EMP takes out the power grid then how does that change everyones bugging out plans...I can't be the only one with elderly and disabled relatives...any answers...anyone want to share their plans?