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Towards a just & healthy democracy in the Commonwealth... and beyond!
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Fri Apr 22, 2011 at 23:24:46 PM EDT
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(great way to take our safety and awareness into our own hands. - promoted by eli_beckerman)
http://www.kickstarter.com/pro...
RDTN.org: Radiation Detection Hardware Network in Japan
RDTN.org is a website whose purpose is to provide an aggregate feed of nuclear radiation data from governmental, non-governmental and citizen-scientist sources. That data will be made available to everyone, including scientists and nuclear experts who can provide context for lay people. In the weeks following launch, it has become evident that there is a need for additional radiation reporting from the ground in Japan. This Kickstarter project will help us purchase up to 600 Geiger Counter devices that will be deployed to Japan. (The project minimum will fund 100 devices).
hat tip boingbong
They've raised $13,104 of their $33,000 goal from 128 backers and have 14 days left to fund their project. |
| gmoke :: Citizens' Radiation Monitoring Networks |
| Back in the early 1990s, I started a video project on citizens' radiation monitoring projects around the country. The first was around the now decommissioned Maine Yankee plant. There was another around Pilgrim Station in Plymouth, MA, spearheaded by David Quaid, a very interesting fellow. He was a cameraman with Merrill's Marauders in Burma, an inventive cinematographer with a number of film credits to his name, the producer of the first "Be all you can be" commercials for the US Army, and, when I knew him, was writing a handbook on the color temperatures of the different fluorescent lights then available. He got involved because he lived near Plymouth, went to a public meeting about the nuclear power plant, and was shocked at the lack of information and preparedness for an accident. That was not how he knew the US Army in Germany was preparing for nuclear incidents.
Unfortunately, I never finished that project (the video footage is available for anyone who is interested) but there at least two groups that are still monitoring radiation around nuclear power plants:
Seabrook, NH monitoring group: http://www.C-10.org/monitoring...
Three Mile Island monitoring group: http://www.tmi-cmn.org/
There is also a national monitoring map sponsored by Mineralab, LLC, a small company in Prescott, AZ
http://www.radiationnetwork.co...
My understanding is that there was no long-term, officially sanctioned and funded study of the effects of either TMI or Chernobyl, unlike the work that went on with the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It would be good if we actually knew and studied the consequences of our industrial actions and accidents. Transparent citizens' monitoring projects seem to be one open-source way to do so. |
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| About |
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Green Mass Group is an online forum for Green thought and collective action in Massachusetts. It is a community forum for justice, sustainability, democracy and health in the Commonwealth and beyond.
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| Quotes |
"Now, is this the deal I would have preferred? No. I believe that we could have made the tough choices required - on entitlement reform and tax reform - right now, rather than through a special congressional committee process. But this compromise does make a serious down payment on the deficit reduction we need and gives each party a strong incentive to get a balanced plan done before the end of the year. Most importantly, it will allow us to avoid default and end the crisis that Washington imposed on the rest of America."
--President Barack Obama on the debt ceiling "deal"
"Despite Democratic control over the White House, despite Democratic control over the Senate, despite overwhelming opposition from the American people, a small minority of the members of the Republican-controlled House have successfully pushed an extreme right-wing agenda onto the American political landscape. It is an ideology which believes that despite the fact that the rich are getting richer, the middle class is shrinking, and poverty is increasing, all - all of the burden for deficit reduction should rest on working people."
--Independent Senator Bernie Sanders on the debt ceiling "deal"
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Then and Now
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Then...
"Last year Evergreen, a Massachusetts company, agreed to establish their first-ever United States based manufacturing facility here in Massachusetts. They did so, or are doing so, at Devens. They have now agreed and chosen to triple their size at Devens. Their next phase of expansion, right here in Massachusetts, a signature company in a signature sector, and we congratulate all of the folks at Evergreen and look forward to continuing to work with you...
We made a personal commitment to Evergreen for the sake of Evergreen, but also because we wanted to show that there are ways in which state government, in working together with private industry and with the utility companies, could begin to create a different kind of environment, a different kind of business climate here, to grow that sector, and it is happening. It's happening. Evergreen is one of the most prominent examples, but there are a whole host of examples."
--Governor Deval Patrick, April 7, 2008, boasting about state investment in Evergreen.
and Now...
"Evergreen Solar Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection yesterday, completing a stunning reversal of fortune for a high-flying alternative-energy company that once seemed to herald a new era for the Massachusetts economy... At its peak, Evergreen employed roughly 900 people locally and attracted more than $50 million in state support, as its stock price soared above $100 a share.
Yesterday, Evergreen's stock closed at 18 cents. The company shuttered its manufacturing plant in Devens earlier this year and now has only 85 employees left. Massachusetts is one of its top creditors, owed $1.5 million in rent."
--Erin Ailworth, Boston Globe, August 16, 2011
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