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May 22, 2018 | ISBN 9780807092507
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Praise
“Pearce insightfully dissects the profound psychological and political impact nuclear technology has had on humankind and unflinchingly questions whether it might be time to acknowledge that its promises for both energy and defense have been largely unfulfilled.”
—Booklist
“In Fallout, Mr. Pearce, a veteran science journalist, travels the world to pin down what he calls ‘the radioactive legacies of the nuclear age.’ He moves between weaponry and energy, cataloguing mistakes, dishonesty and irrational fears. The result is a panorama of atomic grotesquerie that is at once troubling, surprising and ruthlessly entertaining.”
—The Economist
“For any reader who craves a clear-headed examination of the tangled relationship between a powerful technology and human politics, foibles, fears, and arrogance, Fallout is the definitive look at humanity’s nuclear adventure.”
—Midwest Book Review
“This tour de force by Fred Pearce takes the reader on a riveting journey through nuclear installations and radioactive landscapes around the world. A blend of firsthand reporting and historical research, Pearce’s prose reads easily while simultaneously asking the hard questions. The author’s penetrating political eye and sober scientific gaze combine to reveal the many reasons, including toxic legacies of fear and deception, that it’s time to call an end to the nuclear age. Read this book as if the future depended on it.”
—Betsy Hartmann, author of The America Syndrome: Apocalypse, War and Our Call to Greatness
Table Of Contents
A Note on Units
INTRODUCTION
Anthropocene Journey
PART ONE: THE DESTROYER OF WORLDS
CHAPTER 1
Hiroshima: An Invisible Scar
CHAPTER 2
Critical Mass: MAUD in the Nuclear Garden
CHAPTER 3
Las Vegas: Every Mushroom Cloud Has a Silver Lining
CHAPTER 4
Pacific Tests: Godzilla and the Lucky Dragon
CHAPTER 5
Semipalatinsk: Secrets of the Steppe
CHAPTER 6
Plutonium Mountain: Proliferation Paradise
PART TWO: COLD WAR AND HOT PARTICLES
CHAPTER 7
Mayak: “Pressed for Time” Behind the Urals
CHAPTER 8
Metlino: Even the Samovars Were Radioactive
CHAPTER 9
Rocky Flats: Plutonium in the Snake Pit
CHAPTER 10
Colorado Silos: Uncle Sam’s Nuclear Heartland
CHAPTER 11
Broken Arrows: Dr. Strangelove and the Radioactive Rabbits
CHAPTER 12
Windscale Fire: “A Cover Op, Plain and Simple”
PART THREE: ATOMS FOR PEACE
CHAPTER 13
Three Mile Island: How Not to Run a Power Plant
CHAPTER 14
Chernobyl: A “Beautiful” Disaster
CHAPTER 15
Chernobyl: Vodka and Fallot
CHAPTER 16
Chernobyl: Hunting in Packs
CHAPTER 17
Fukushima: A Scorpion’s Discovery
CHAPTER 18
Fukushima: Baba’s Homecoming
CHAPTER 19
Radiophobia: The Ghost at Fukushima
CHAPTER 20
Millisieverts: A Dose of Reason
PART FOUR: CLEANING UP
CHAPTER 21
Sizewell: The Nuclear Laundryman
CHAPTER 22
Sellafield: Stone Circles and Nuclear Legacies
CHAPTER 23
Hanford: Decommissioning an Industry
CHAPTER 24
Gorleben: Passport to a Non-Nuclear Future?
CHAPTER 25
Waste: Out of Harm’s Way
CONCLUSION
Making Peace in Nagasaki
Glossary
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
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