Reply #37: Can you answer me this?

[abqmufc]

I am genuinely wondering if you might know if anyone is doing large sampling of rainwater from Alaska down to Oregon and checking for any contaminants linked to the accident in Japan?

I've seen UC Berkley data from March 17-19. Those dates are too narrow for me (do they match up with trajectory modeling of radiation plumes anticipated to cross the Pacific) and it seems the samples are only from the Bay Area (farther south than the only trajectory model I've seen).

To me it would make sense to do the following:

1) Use trajectory models to figure out where high does of radiation released from the sight are headed. Use those models to figure out where rainwater samples would be likely to see spikes.
2) Collect daily rainwater samples from now until winter (cover the entire growing season) in areas as far north as Alaska (Kivalina lets say) down to Portland, OR and also include the corn belt in this sampling.
3) analyze those rainwater samples for any contamination linked to the accident in Japan
4) Test U.S. produced agriculture, 1/4 of my vegetable intake comes from my backyard garden, I wonder what risk my garden is in Albuquerque (from rainwater exposure) as well as commercial agriculture nationwide.
5) Tell the general public this is what you are doing, and that you don't expect any real findings, but you are being safe.


It seems this type of study is not that difficult to do. Maybe I should go back to graduate school and do this as my research.

I know such studies are being done for Mercury deposition nationwide, I've worked closely with the folks at the Mercury Deposition Network at the University of Illinois for years. I also know such studies of mercury deposition are way under funded on purpose. EPA doesn't fund mercury monitoring to the scale it should be at to lessen what evidence is available from sampling (meaning the issue is worse than most people realize, and the federal government limits funding and studies to keep the mercury issue under wraps).