Have people died as a result of radiation exposure from a nuclear power plant?
In the US no deaths have been attributed to radiation from commercial nuclear power plants. There are 10,000 reactor years of safe experience with power reactors in the US. Even with the accident at TMI, no deaths were reported. Similarly, in the rest of the world, there are no reported deaths attributed to radiation exposure from LWR’s of the design used in the US. Sadly, there are a two limited incidents in other parts of the world where deaths have occurred not related to LWR operation. In the Ukraine, 34 people died from the Chernobyl accident in 1986. This type of accident is unique to the Chernobyl Russian RBMK design of reactor. In 1999, 2 Japanese technicians died as a result of violating a procedure for handling enriched uranium in a laboratory and created a critical mass which resulted in a high radiation field.
