Does Cell Tower radiation pose a risk to our health?

[Tandor]

Hi All

My son (Gr7) is doing a school science project and has decided on doing a project on Cell Tower Radiation and Related health risks. Quite a contentious issue currently. Could you please help by doing a quick survey (7 questions).

http://goo.gl/Gy5Yli

I will make the stats available to all who answer these questions. PM me for any enquiries.

Many Thanks
Tony

 

[bdt]

 

[Mortymoose]

I use my cell less than 5 minutes a day and only on alternative weeks..... In all , my total usage on my cell in a month is less than thirty minutes....... Whilst my peers were running around with all the latest smartphones, I stuck with ye olde' Nokia 3310, coz it did what mobiles were meant to do..... make calls....

I also found that if I spoke longer than 5 minutes on a mobile, I would get headaches, people laugh at me, "Don't talk rubbish" , I only know of one other person in the whole of Namibia that claims the same......

I eventually upgraded to an S3, but hardly use it........only for work alarms and I have a limited phonebook of 25 names, If any number calls me that ain't on that list..... I don't answer it......

 

[Grubscrew]

that survey has only one predetermined conclusion, really a school project, what are the other kids doing?

 

[Segg]

I heard on 5fm the other day that an EU or Scandinavian commissioned inquiry that took place over the past 15 years or something found absolutely no correlation between any health problem and cellular equipment. Try Google that

As a general rule I've always said if it's non-ionizing radiation it can't do you any harm whatsoever. IIRC only EMW's with the energy of UV and higher have any possibility of "harming" us

EDIT: AFAIK cellular towers operate at a fixed power output, its your cellphone that adjusts its power output according to how much signal it has

 

[Lycanthrope]

<snip>

+1

Great pic, totally saved to my Imgur album

I also found that if I spoke longer than 5 minutes on a mobile, I would get headaches, people laugh at me, "Don't talk rubbish" , I only know of one other person in the whole of Namibia that claims the same......

:erm:

Well, I know of a nutjob who wallpapered his house with tinfoil, so I guess you have some ways to go before you're a complete lunatic.

 

[MickeyD]

EDIT: AFAIK cellular towers operate at a fixed power output, its your cellphone that adjusts its power output according to how much signal it has

This would have been a better topic for a school project.... scare the kids into less frequent cellphone usage!


A cell tower will pose a radiation risk if you strap your groin area to the transmitter.

 

[Lycanthrope]

A cell tower will pose a radiation risk if you strap your groin area to the transmitter.

Yeah... This kind:



That's some significant electromagnetic radiation right there.

 

[agentrfr]

No, cellphone radiation does not have enough power to damage people.

It's a simple application of the Plank Relation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck's_relation

Anybody saying anything else is hogwash.

 

[DTBA]

horsie pic

second this.

I see it this way. You have a better chance to get killed by a taxi in south africa then dying to brain cancer cause by a cellphone.

So I would rather call my GF and risk the cancer then getting hit by taxi tomorrow and I never said I love you over the phone

 

[genetic]

So I would rather call my GF and risk the cancer then getting hit by taxi tomorrow and I never said I love you over the phone

Just send her a message via WhatsApp.

 

[upup]

Okay democratic people of our country, fill in the questionnaire, you that do know and you that does not know.

Do some real study, from real people.

 

[MickeyD]

Okay democratic people of our country, fill in the questionnaire, you that do know and you that does not know.

Do some real study, from real people.

Survey done...

Results will be skewed... headache, yes but from hangover not cellphone use!

 

[Nick333]

Sorry. I was going to do the survey but then it occurred to me that this would be encouraging the teaching of pseudo-science in schools.

You could probably work out the potential DNA damage caused by a radio source with a pen and paper and scaling down for frequency and power from what we experience from ultraviolet rays from the sun. Which is to say the potential for DNA damage from any radio is the minutest of fractions of what we receive from the sun. The real danger of radio waves is that they can cook things at sufficient power. So, unless you use your cellphone as a heat source, you've noticed you've been saving on your heat bill since they installed the cell tower on your block, you believe that electromagnetic waves have some unknown carcinogenic properties or in a vast conspiracy in the scientific world, surveys are going to establish nothing useful on this subject.

Really, the best way to do research on the dangers of electromagnetic radiation is to stick a bunch of rats in front of a radio transmitter and see if they die of cancer more frequently than a control group. It's probably been done.

 

[Tandor]

I think that this would be a good topic for the school debate team . Thanks all for your input here.

The topic had to be Tower related so why Cell Tower was a logical point of discussion.
The fact that the energy consumption of a typical cell site could range between 1000kWh and 3000kWh per month, this is up to 3 times that of a normal household, multiply that with the number of cell providers within the same area and also include overlapping coverage. With all that energy being emitted what would the impact be on households in close proximity? ie < 500meters.
Nick333, Thanks for the tip on the rats studies,
The first report I found when searching EMR and Rat studies showed that "in some exposed animals there were decreased locomotor activity, increased grooming and a tendency of increased basal corticosterone levels. These findings suggested that EMR exposure may lead to abnormal brain functioning" http://goo.gl/fPc0ie
Also other studies have shown some impact, such as stated on http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2853785/
Also a youtube video on the topic http://youtu.be/tbpLD0xH0og
I have plenty of other references on good and bad but this is not whats up to debate here. The school science project requires own data collection and not just references to current published information as this would just be labelled as a report and not as a study. Fortunately Gr7 science does not require torching rats in a lab with a RF transmitter

 

[Paul Hjul]

This would have been a better topic for a school project.... scare the kids into less frequent cellphone usage!

A cell tower will pose a radiation risk if you strap your groin area to the transmitter.

being strapped to a transmitter could be a serious problem to your health because of temperature long before anything else.

Cell towers are dangerous pieces of work they can fall on houses

 

[Paul Hjul]

if the school kids have time on their side for the project it might actually be quite cool to do an experiment involving growing pot plants at the site of cell towers and because the MNOs are confident in their installations they shouldn't have to much of a problem if no costs are incurred by them (so fit in with schedules and stuff) to have orderly school children drop off pot plants at a site (just make sure they have hard hats in case the tower falls down)

 

[Nick333]

I think that this would be a good topic for the school debate team . Thanks all for your input here.

The topic had to be Tower related so why Cell Tower was a logical point of discussion.
The fact that the energy consumption of a typical cell site could range between 1000kWh and 3000kWh per month, this is up to 3 times that of a normal household, multiply that with the number of cell providers within the same area and also include overlapping coverage. With all that energy being emitted what would the impact be on households in close proximity? ie < 500meters.
Nick333, Thanks for the tip on the rats studies,
The first report I found when searching EMR and Rat studies showed that "in some exposed animals there were decreased locomotor activity, increased grooming and a tendency of increased basal corticosterone levels. These findings suggested that EMR exposure may lead to abnormal brain functioning" http://goo.gl/fPc0ie
Also other studies have shown some impact, such as stated on http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2853785/
Also a youtube video on the topic http://youtu.be/tbpLD0xH0og
I have plenty of other references on good and bad but this is not whats up to debate here. The school science project requires own data collection and not just references to current published information as this would just be labelled as a report and not as a study. Fortunately Gr7 science does not require torching rats in a lab with a RF transmitter

Perhaps pseudo science was a bit harsh. I do have a bit of a problem with this scare-mongery sort topic being pushed into a school especially a science class.

Anyway, the power consumption of a cell site isn't all being pumped back out in radio waves. There is also all sorts of switching equipment and computery stuff, I would imagine, running 24/7. Also, those towers are omni-directional. Very little of their over all power is going in a given direction and of course the power dissipates exponentially the further one is from the tower.

Whatever effect cell frequencies have in rats in lab conditions can be scaled down drastically for humans who never come within 30 metres of the working end of a cell tower.

Edit: Unless the tower falls down, which I believe they can do.

 

[Nick333]

It just occurred to me that my 1000 watt heater that's keeping me warm at the moment would happily consume the better part of a 1000kWh a month if I let it. I wonder how much effect it would have on my neighbours if I strapped, say, 3 of those on my roof.

 

[noxibox]

It just occurred to me that my 1000 watt heater that's keeping me warm at the moment would happily consume the better part of a 1000kWh a month if I let it. I wonder how much effect it would have on my neighbours if I strapped, say, 3 of those on my roof.

That would probably depend on whether or not you made them look like a cell tower.