Expose or explode? Victims again of a nuclear conundrum

In a conundrum of their own making, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) wants to vent radioactive tritium gas to surrounding communities — under-resourced communities that have already suffered from past exposures and are burdened by legacy contamination, some of it remaining hidden until recently. Currently, the tritium waste is stored in long-neglected containers, subject to explosion. Searchlight New Mexico’s article on the issue, quotes from Exploring Tritium Dangers by Arjun Makhijani: “[tritium] makes water, the stuff of life, most of the mass of living beings, radioactive.” Cindy Folkers of Beyond Nuclear emphasized the danger to the human life cycle, particularly female fetuses that carry generational futures. Exposure to them can result in cumulative biological damage: “the kind that cuts across generations.”