理工类学术英语翻译Text 11 核电的危险
杨震暮夜却金-关于自信的名言警句
Text 11 核电的危险
RISKS OF NUCLEAR
POWER
Bernard L. Cohen, Sc.D.
Professor
at the University of Pittsburgh
Radiation
The principal risks associated with nuclear
power arise from health effects of radiation. This
radiation
consists of subatomic particles
traveling at or near the velocity of light---
186,000 miles per second. They can
penetrate
deep inside the human body where they can damage
biological cells and thereby initiate a cancer. If
they strike sex cells, they can cause genetic
diseases in progeny.
辐射
与核电相联系的主要危险
来自辐射对健康的影响。这种辐射包括亚原子颗粒以光速或接近光速运行——
每秒186000英里。它
们可以深深穿透到身体内部，在体内它们可以损伤生物细胞，然后引发癌症。如果它
们攻击性细胞，它们
可以导致子孙后代的基因疾病。
Radiation occurs naturally in
our environment; a typical person is, and always
has been struck by 15,000
particles of
radiation every second from natural sources, and
an average medical X-ray involves being struck
by 100 billion. While this may seem to be very
dangerous, it is not, because the probability for
a particle of
radiation entering a human body
to cause a cancer or a genetic disease is only one
chance in 30 million billion
(30 quintillion).
辐射在我们环境中自然地发生；通常每个人每秒钟受到来自自然源的15000个粒子的辐射，而一次普
通的
医疗X光检查则带有1，000亿个粒子的辐射。可能这看起来会非常危险，其实不会，因为一个辐
射粒子进
入人体引发癌症或基因疾病的可能性是三十拍分之一。
Nuclear power
technology produces materials that are active in
emitting radiation and are therefore called
These materials can come into contact with
people principally through small releases during
routine plant operation, accidents in nuclear
power plants, accidents in transporting
radioactive materials,
and escape of
radioactive wastes from confinement systems. We
will discuss these separately, but all of them
taken together, with accidents treated
probabilistically, will eventually expose the
average American to about
0.2% of his exposure
from natural radiation. Since natural radiation is
estimated to cause about 1% of all
cancers,
radiation due to nuclear technology should
eventually increase our cancer risk by 0.002% (one
part in
50,000), reducing our life expectancy
by less than one hour. By comparison, our loss of
life expectancy from
competitive electricity
generation technologies, burning coal, oil, or
gas, is estimated to range from 3 to 40
days.
核电技术生产的材料可以非常活跃地释放辐射，所以被称为“放射性的”。这些材料主要通过发电厂常
规
运行时的少量释放物，核电站事故，放射性材料运输事故、以及放射性废料从隔离系统中泄漏而与人体
发生
接触的。我们将分开讨论这些问题，但是所有这些因素加在一起，从可能性的角度对待这些事故，最
终会让
普通美国人接触到来自天然辐射0.2%的辐射量。因为自然辐射预计会引发1%的癌症，核技术
产生的辐射最
终会增加0.002%的患癌几率（5万分之一），减少预期寿命不到1小时。相比之下，
因为竞争性的发电技术、
燃烧煤、油或气导致的预期寿命损失预计有3到40天。
There
has been much misunderstanding on genetic diseases
due to radiation. The risks are somewhat less
than the cancer risks; for example, among the
Japanese A-bomb survivors from Hiroshima and
Nagasaki,
there have been about 400 extra
cancer deaths among the 100,000 people in the
follow-up group, but there
have been no extra
genetic diseases among their progeny. Since there
is no possible way for the cells in our
bodies to distinguish between natural
radiation and radiation from the nuclear industry,
the latter cannot
cause new types of genetic
diseases or deformities (e.g., bionic man), or
threaten the raceOther
causes of genetic
disease include delayed parenthood (children of
older parents have higher incidence) and
men
wearing pants (this warms the gonads, increasing
the frequency of spontaneous mutations). The
genetic
risks of nuclear power are equivalent
to delaying parenthood by 2.5 days, or of men
wearing pants an extra 8
hours per year. Much
can be done to avert genetic diseases utilizing
currently available technology; if 1% of
the
taxes paid by the nuclear industry were used to
further implement this technology, 80 cases of
genetic
disease would be averted for each case
caused by the nuclear industry
因为辐射引发遗传病，对这一
点人们一直有很多误解。其风险略小于患癌症的风险；比如，在日本广岛和
长崎原子弹爆炸中幸存的人，
在随访病例中，10万人会多出400例癌症死亡病例。但是在他们的后代中，并
没有更多的遗传疾病。
既然我们人体内的细胞不能辨别自然辐射与来自核工业的辐射，后者则不会导致新型
的遗传疾病或身体畸
形（比如，生化人），或威胁“人类”。其他遗传病的原因包括父母晚育（晚育父母所生
孩子有更大风险
）和穿裤子的男士（这让性腺受热，增加了自发突变的频率）。而核电造成的基因风险等同
于推迟生育2
.5天，或者男士每年多穿8小时裤子。在利用现有技术预防遗传性疾病方面还有很多事可以做；
如果利
用核工业纳税款的1%来进一步实施这项技术，那么每一种由核工业造成的疾病中有80例遗传疾病都
将
得到防止。
Reactor accidents
The nuclear
power plant design strategy for preventing
accidents and mitigating their potential effects
is
also fail there is another back-up
system for it, etc., etc. Of course it is possible
that each system in this series
of back-ups
might fail one after the other, but the
probability for that is exceedingly small. The
Media often
publicize a failure of some
particular system in some plant, implying that it
was a close call
completely miss the point of
defense in depth which easily takes care of such
failures. Even in the Three Mile
Island
accident where at least two equipment failures
were severely compounded by human errors, two
lines
of defense were still not breached---
essentially all of the radioactivity remained
sealed in the thick steel
reactor vessel, and
that vessel was sealed inside the heavily
reinforced concrete and steel lined
building
which was never even challenged. It was clearly
not a close call on disaster to the surrounding
population. The Soviet Chernobyl reactor,
built on a much less safe design concept, did not
have such a
containment structure; if it did,
that disaster would have been averted.
反应堆事故
为了防止事故和减缓事故的潜在影响，核电厂的设计策略是“深度防卫”——如果出现故障，有一个
备
份系统以限制故障带来的损伤，如果这个备份系统也出了问题，它也有另一个备份系统。当然，有可能
在这
一系列的备份系统中每个系统都接连地坏了，但是这种可能性异乎寻常地小。媒体经常宣传某个工厂
某个特
定的系统出了问题，暗示说这是侥幸脱离了灾难。他们完全不理解深度防卫的意义，深度防卫可以
很容易地
解决这些问题。即使在三里岛核事故当中，至少两次设备故障都因人为失误而加重，但是两条防
卫线依然没
有被破坏——最根本的是所有的辐射能都被封存在厚厚的钢反应堆容器里，那个容器又被封存
在高度增强的
混凝土和钢铁围成的“遏阻”建筑物内，这栋建筑物甚至都还没有发挥它的作用。很显然这
对于周围的人来
说并不是侥幸逃脱了灾难。苏联的切尔诺贝利反应堆，它的设计观念则欠缺虑安全性，并
没有这样一个遏阻
结构；如果有的话，那次事故本来可以避免。
Risks from
reactor accidents are estimated by the rapidly
developing science of
(PRA). A PRA must be
done separately for each power plant (at a cost of
$$5 million) but we give typical results
here:
A fuel melt-down might be expected once in 20,000
years of reactor operation. In 2 out of 3 melt-
downs
there would be no deaths, in 1 out of 5
there would be over 1000 deaths, and in 1 out of
100,000 there would be
50,000 deaths.
The average for all meltdowns would be 400 deaths.
Since air pollution from coal burning is
estimated to be causing 10,000 deaths per
year, there would have to be 25 melt-downs each
year for nuclear
power to be as dangerous as
coal burning.
来自核反应堆事故的风险被迅速发展的“概率风险分析”
科学所预测。对于每一个核电站都要单独做概率
风险分析（花费5百万美元），但是我们可以在这里给出
典型的结果：预计反应堆的运转2万年中可能有一
次燃料熔毁，三次熔毁中两次不会有死亡，五次中有一
次会导致1000人死亡，十万次中有一次会导致5万
人死亡，所有熔毁事故平均死亡人数为400人。
因为烧煤导致的空气污染预计每年导致一万人死亡，核电每
年要发生25次熔毁才能和烧煤一样危险。
Of course deaths from coal burning air
pollution are not noticeable, but the same is true
for the cancer
deaths from reactor accidents.
In the worst accident considered, expected once in
100,000 melt-downs (once in
2 billion years of
reactor operation), the cancer deaths would be
among 10 million people, increasing their
cancer risk typically from 20% (the current
U.S. average) to 20.5%. This is much less than the
geographical
variation--- 22% in New England
to 17% in the Rocky Mountain states.
当然烧煤引发
的空气污染造成的死亡并不是很明显，但是核反应堆事故引发的癌症死亡病例也不明显。
假设在最糟糕的
事故中，也就是10万次熔毁事故中有一次（核反应堆运转20亿年中有一次），导致的癌症
死亡率是1
千万人中，风险通常从20%（现在美国的平均值）上升到20.5%，这远比地理差异要小得多——
新
英格兰22%，洛基山脉各州17%。
Very high radiation
doses can destroy body functions and lead to death
within 60 days, but such
; there would be over
100 in
0.2% of meltdowns, and 3500 in 1 out of
100,000 melt-downs. To date, the largest number of
noticeable deaths
from coal burning was in an
air pollution incident (London, 1952) where there
were 3500 extra deaths in one
week. Of course
the nuclear accidents are hypothetical and there
are many much worse hypothetical accidents
in
other electricity generation technologies; e.g.,
there are hydroelectric dams in California whose
sudden
failure could cause 200,000 deaths.
高剂量的辐射会摧毁身体机能并在60天内导致死亡，但这种“明显的”死亡仅仅在2%的核反应堆
熔毁事
故中能够被预料到，在0.2%的熔毁事故中会超过100天，而在1100,000的熔毁事故
中会超过3，500天。
迄今为止，因为烧煤引发的明显的死亡事件中最大数字发生在一次空气污染事故
中（伦敦，1952年），在那
次事故中，一周内多出了3500名死亡病例。当然这些核事故是假设的
，在其他的发电技术领域有严重得多
的事故，比如，在加州有水电大坝，如果突然出故障会导致20万人
死亡。
Radioactive Waste
The
radioactive waste products from the nuclear
industry must be isolated from contact with people
for very
long time periods. The bulk of the
radioactivity is contained in the spent fuel,
which is quite small in volume
and therefore
easily handled with great care. This
emplaced
in the natural habitat of rocks, deep underground.
The average lifetime of a rock in that
environment is one billion years. If the waste
behaves like other rock, it is easily shown that
the waste
generated by one nuclear power plant
will eventually, over millions of years (if there
is no cure found for
cancer), cause one death
from 50 years of operation. By comparison, the
wastes from coal burning plants that
end up in
the ground will eventually cause several thousand
deaths from generating the same amount of
electricity.
放射性废料
来自核工业的放射性废料产
品一定要和人们的接触隔离开来，而且要隔离非常长得时间，放射性
的大部分都包含在已用过的燃料中，
而这些已用过的核燃料体积很小，所以在非常小心的情况下很容易处理。
这种“高等级的废料”会被转化
成岩石一样的形式，然后会被安放在岩石的天然所在地，也就是地下很深的
地方。在那样的环境下一块岩
石的平均寿命是十亿年。如果核废料像其它岩石一样，很容易发现一个核电厂
产生的废料最终会在几百万
年后（如果这期间没有发现治愈癌症的方式），导致核电厂50年的运转中有一例
死亡病例。相比之下，
烧煤的工厂产生的废料最终会放在地下，如果与核电厂产生同样的电力，这些煤废料
会导致几千人死亡。
The much larger volume of much less
radioactive (low level) waste from nuclear plants
will be
buried at shallow depths (typically 20
feet) in soil. If we assume that this material
immediately becomes
dispersed through the soil
between the surface and ground water depth
(despite elaborate measures to
maintain waste
package integrity) and behaves like the same
materials that are present naturally in soil
(there
is extensive evidence confirming such
behavior), the death toll from this low level
waste would be 5% of that
from the high level
waste discussed in the previous paragraph.
更大体
积而放射性小得多的（低等级的）核电厂废料会被埋在土壤中更浅的地方（通常是20英尺）。
如果我们
假定这种材料很快分散在土壤中，这些土壤位于地表和地下水深度之间（尽管有复杂的措施维持废
料包的
完整）。它们的反应就像土壤中天然存在的同样材料一样（有广泛的证据确认这样的反应），由这种低
等
级废料造成的死亡人数是上段讨论的高等级废料造成的死亡人数的5%。
Other
Radiation Problems
The effects of routine
releases of radioactivity from nuclear plants
depend somewhat on how the spent fuel is
handled. A typical estimate is that they may
reduce our life expectancy by 15 minutes.
Potential problems from accidents in transport
of radioactive materials are largely neutralized
by elaborate
packaging. A great deal of such
transport has taken place over the past 50 years
and there have been
numerous accidents,
including fatal ones. However, from all of these
accidents combined, there is less than a
1%
chance that even a single death will ever result
from radiation exposure. Probabilistic risk
analyses
indicate that we can expect less than
one death per century in U.S. from this source.
Mining uranium to fuel nuclear power
plants leaves
the ore, which lead to radon
exposures to the public. However, these effects
are grossly over-compensated by
the fact that
mining uranium out of the ground reduces future
radon exposures. By comparison, coal burning
leaves ashes that increase future radon
exposures. The all-inclusive estimates of radon
effects are that one
nuclear power plant
operating for one year will eventually avert a few
hundred deaths, while an equivalent
coal
burning plant will eventually cause 30 deaths.
其他辐射问题
核电厂辐射性的常规释放作用在一定程度上取决于用过的燃料是如何处置的。通
常预计它会减低
人们的预期寿命15分钟。
辐射材料运输事故的潜在问题很大程度上被复杂的
包装抵消了。过去50年来有很多辐射材料的运
输过程，也有很多次事故，包括致命的事故。但是，综合
所有这些事故，有不到1%的机会接触辐射会导致
一例死亡。概率风险分析说明在美国每个世纪因为辐射
材料的运输导致的死亡人数不到1人。
开采铀给核电厂提供燃料留下了“工厂尾料”，这是对于矿石的
化学加工产生的残渣，会导致大众
接触到氡。但是，从地上开采铀降低了未来接触氡的风险，这从总体上
大大补偿了前面提到的问题。相比之
下，烧煤留下的灰增加了未来接触氡的机会。关于氡的影响，总体的
估计量是一个核电站运转一年最终会避
免几百人死亡，而相等的烧煤发电厂最终会导致3
0人死亡。
Subatomic: a. 亚原子的，原子内的
Confinement
system: 围阻系统
Progeny: n. 后代，子女
Radioactive: a. 放射性的，放射性引起的
Release: n.
排放，释放
Confinement: n. 限制，局限，关押，监禁
Probabilistical: a. 盖然论的，可能性的
Average: a.
平常的，普通的
Follow-up: n. 对病人的随访
Gonad: n. 性腺
Mutation: n. 变化，突变，突变体
Spontaneous: a.
自发的，非出于强制的，自动的
Implement: v. t. 履行，实施，执行，贯彻
A close call: 侥幸的脱险
Miss the point:
没理解，不明白
Compound: v. t. 加大（困难），加重，使合成
Breach: v. t. 违反，破坏
Vessel: n. 船，舰，器皿，容器
Essential: a. 必不可少的，最基本的，最本质的
Radioactivity:
n. 辐射，辐射能，放射性
Challenge: v.
考验，检验，指责，否认，要求发挥最大作用
Noticeable: a. 显而易见的，明显的
Hypothetical: a. 假设的，假定的
Spent: a. 已用过的
The bulk of sth: (某物的)大部分，多半
Emplace: v.
t. 安放，安装
Habitat: n. 生境，栖息地，住处，常在之地
Elaborate: a. 详尽的，复杂的，精细的，精美的
Disperse: v. t.
分散，驱散，传播，散发
Behave: v. (事物)作出反应，起作用
Toll: n. 伤亡人数
Extensive: a. 广泛的，全面的，彻底的
Radiation: n. 放热，辐射，辐射作用
Neutralize: v. t.
使成为无效，抵消
Uranium: n. 铀
Tailing: n. 残渣，尾料
Mill: n. 工厂，制造厂
Radon: n. 氡
Ore: n.
矿，矿石，矿砂
Process: v. t. 对…进行加工
Gross: a.
总的，毛的，恶劣的，严重的，明显的
Overcompensate: v. t. 过度补偿
All-inclusive: a. 包括一切的，无所不包的