Roberts 8
Environmental Effects of Nuclear War
Thesis: If large scale nuclear war broke out, it would make large areas of the earth uninhabitable and almost completely destroy the environment.
Immediate effect to the environment
The Nuclear Blast
The Thermal Radiation
Direct nuclear Radiation
Effects That bring about nuclear winter
Surface temperature drops
Upper atmosphere heats causing ozone loss
Fallout and its effects on the environment
How people are exposed to fallout
The effects of this exposure
How long nuclear fallout last
The atomic bomb is our single greatest piece of technology and also the worst piece of destruction we have ever created. It is because of the research in to nuclear weapons that we have had some of our greatest technological breakthroughs in electrical power and medicine. On the other hand, it is this research and testing that have changed our world completely and not for the better. According to Ramesh Thakur "When Manhattan project director J Robert Oppenheim first saw a nuclear explosion he quoted the bhagavad gita"Now I am become death, the shatterer of worlds"" (28).
Because of all the superpowers dependence on nuclear weapons we are getting closer to seeing our worst nightmares of an all-out nuclear war becoming a reality. It is through the accident at the Chernobyl power plant and the dropping of the atomic weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that gave scientist insight into the short and long term effects of nuclear war on the environment. Through research it has been determined that if enough nuclear weapons were exploded in a large scale nuclear war, it would make large areas of our planet uninhabitable and almost completely destroy our environment.
First off there are several immediate effects that nuclear war can do to destroy the environment. The blast of a nuclear warhead can...