While these are risks, they don't cause millions of years in devastation, cull off entire populations, and they don't make entire areas uninhabitable. Oil pollution is a problem, but a fixable problem. Radiation, however, is not fixable at this moment in time. Using materials that we understand and can control are safer than what we can't fix.
And if you ever see cases of acute radiation poisoning, I doubt you would wish that even on your worst enemy.
Chernobyl is no longer livable, Fukushima has contaminated the pacific so much so that Japan is living in 10 times the normal radiation levels. The west coast is dealing with 5-8 times the normal levels. Also, Fukushima has caused a rise in cesium 137 to spread across the entire northern hemisphere via the atmoshphere. This radioactive waste is also still leaking into the ocean because no one can get close enough to the reactor to stop the leaks.
3-mile island to this day has water contaminated with strontium. Strontium is known for replacing calcium in bones causing leukemia and other bone degeneration.
Most radioactive materials have extremely long half lives. And not to mention many nuclear reactors in the US alone are in critical condition with nothing much being done to repair them.
Cesium 137 has a 30 year half life, but will remain in the environment for decades after.
Strontium has a 28.79 years and will also continue impacting the environment as it continues to break down.
Uranium 238 has a half life of 4.5 billion years, uranium 235 has a half life of 700 million years.
Then you have iodine 135 decaying in 6 hours into toxic xenon 135 which take 9 hours to decay into cesium 135. All of these radioactive materials are exposed to the air when a reactor goes critical and is unable to be shut down in time.
Radioactive waste disposal zones are also at risk for collapses, there was one incident in Washington state that was never fully handled. Russia is a good example of poor nuclear waste disposal. India dumps their waste in Nepal.
And let's take a good hard look at our atmosphere. We are probably starting to feel the real aftershock of so many nuclear experiments ranging from cancers, birth defects, mental decline, and who knows what else. Then if you really want to indulge in the nuclear psychosis, take a look at the many cases where soldiers were used as human experiments for nuclear blasts in the pacific.
