Radiation is a carcinogen and causes numerous effects on living organisms and systems . The environmental impacts of nuclear power plant disasters such as the Chernobyl disaster , the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster and the Three Mile Island accident , among others , persist indefinitely , though several other factors contributed to these events including improper management of fail safe systems and natural disasters putting uncommon stress on the generators . The radioactive decay rate of particles varies greatly , dependent upon the nuclear properties of a particular isotope . Radioactive Plutonium-244 has a half-life of 80.8 million years , which indicates the time duration required for half of a given sample to decay , though very little plutonium-244 is produced in the nuclear fuel cycle and lower half-life materials have lower activity thus giving off less dangerous radiation
Three Mile Island accident
Three Mile Island accident
Human impact on the environment