New-Clear Semantics
Great article on semantics from the
Canadian Nuclear FAQ:
Slightly Semantic
This industry has had an image problem since they first coined the phrase "going critical" for a self-sustained fission chain reaction. Simply put, we're scientists and engineers, and not PR specialists. To this day there are still very few PR specialists in the industry, and, sadly, getting fewer all the time.
"Going critical" is what a reactor does, and frankly that's a much better phrase than "self-sustained chain reaction". Try to tell your friends that your reactor will soon be going critical, however, and watch how the conversation turns. Effuse about Qinshan going critical ahead of schedule and you'll soon learn who has been harbouring conspiracy theories about the nuclear industry all along.
Our capacity to frighten knows no bounds: We speak with confidence of the "Most Exposed Individual", a mysterious unfortunate living amongst the public. We laud a reactor's "containment", clearly a serious measure invoked when accidents equal disasters, last seen failing miserably in the likes of Jurassic Park and Ghostbusters.
We seek solutions for our nuclear "waste", apparently more dangerous than anything else on earth judging by our unprecedented approach - notwithstanding, of course, the fact that we currently store the material in "swimming pools".
The public requires "defense in depth", in lieu of protection from the need to defend. We design mighty coolant tubes that "leak", with the consolation that this happens before they "break". We have legislation that limits our "liability" to the public (rather than our indemnification) in case of an accident.
The list goes on, but the point is that we did not invent our terminology with a view to public perception.
And one example of this new-speak:
Nowhere is this more acutely evident than in Port Hope, Ontario, where for over a year the uranium giant Cameco Corporation has been nurturing public understanding of "Slightly Enriched Uranium", or SEU. The backdrop is the company's quest for a license to down-blend foreign LEU ("Low Enriched", or LWR-grade, uranium) into SEU, soon to be a fuel of choice in the CANDU market.
Now, a sillier term than "slightly enriched uranium" is hard to imagine but of course it makes perfect sense from the technical point of view. Here is a fuel somewhere between natural and traditional "low" enrichment (lower than low, if you will).
The
CANDU Reactors are one of a
new generation of Reactors that are a lot safer than the 1950's models that we all know about (
TMI,
Chernobyl and others.)
Posted by DaveH at March 21, 2005 7:33 PM