coal ash is more radioactive than spent nuclear fuel rods.
that explains why blacksmiths and foundry workers die from radiation poisoning so often.
you know what else is radioactive? ceramic pottery. ceramic tiles in your bathroom, cement, igneous rocks, bismuth, your computer monitor (even lcd's) compact flourescent light bulbs, the smoke detector in your house, etc etc etc.
the radiation from those sources is minute, sheilded, and of a different sort than the ionizing radiation that turns your bones into poison and melts the flesh from your body.
meanwhile, on your silly coal non-story, you omitted the truth and painted the story with bold primary colours. nice stalking horse.
heres the editors note from that story
*Editor's Note (posted 12/30/0: In response to some concerns raised by readers, a change has been made to this story. The sentence marked with an asterisk was changed from "In fact, fly asha by-product from burning coal for powerand other coal waste contains up to 100 times more radiation than nuclear waste" to "In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power planta by-product from burning coal for electricitycarries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy." Our source for this statistic is Dana Christensen, an associate lab director for energy and engineering at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as well as 1978 paper in Science authored by J.P. McBride and colleagues, also of ORNL.
so the story's claim that coal ash is "more radioactive than nuclear waste" actually should read:
"coal plants emit more radiation from their smokestacks during operation than nuclear plants do from their coincidentally similarly shaped cooling towers", despite the fact that cooling towers and nuclear plants dont emit SHIT, and their waste is carefully packaged, extracted and secured like it was radioactive (which it IS) while fly ash is NOT radioactive, it however can contain traces of shit that can be radioactive. just like well water, cinnamon sticks, and dental fillings.
nice try. too bad i actually read shit.