> I'm not saying living near a chip fab doesn't present the risks you outlined. What I'm saying is it's very likely there are comparable risks living basically anywhere that isn't very sparsely populated
Doesn't this directly contradict the incidence of cancer vs. distance to industrial pollution maps? Like you're literally many times more likely to get cancer if you live near a source of industrial pollution compared to other people who live in your same city but don't live right next to a source of industrial pollution.
Think about it like this: the volume of a sphere increases proportional to the radius cubed. That means the further you get from a source of pollution, the density of that pollution falls off by a cubic of the distance. That's quite a sharp drop off. So small sources of pollution may pose some risk, but due to the small amount of particulate combined with how fast the pollution drops off means it's not so dangerous. Very large sources of pollution, however, may be dangerous for some distance.
My operating assumptions here go something like this:
- Living in a sparsely populated area that is near a chip fab presents X health risks due to its specific kind of industrial pollution.
- Living in a densely populated city without a chip fab presents Y health risks associated with higher traffic, other kinds of businesses that produce air pollution, etc.
I would want to see X quantified against Y in order to make an apples to apples comparison here. If such a comparison is made, it seems likely to me that the health risks are similar. Hence, the only way to minimize your health risks is to live in a sparsely populated area that has no jobs. Anyplace with significant economic activity is likely to be hazardous to your health in some way.
And even if X is significantly more hazardous than Y, okay, then what? "Don't move there" is a lot less helpful than proposing regulations that minimize people's exposure to pollution while still letting us have chip fabs. The damn things need to be built somewhere for us to have nice things, so let's figure out how to do it right instead of just scaring people with (potentially) misleading stats.
Doesn't this directly contradict the incidence of cancer vs. distance to industrial pollution maps? Like you're literally many times more likely to get cancer if you live near a source of industrial pollution compared to other people who live in your same city but don't live right next to a source of industrial pollution.
Think about it like this: the volume of a sphere increases proportional to the radius cubed. That means the further you get from a source of pollution, the density of that pollution falls off by a cubic of the distance. That's quite a sharp drop off. So small sources of pollution may pose some risk, but due to the small amount of particulate combined with how fast the pollution drops off means it's not so dangerous. Very large sources of pollution, however, may be dangerous for some distance.