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Originally Posted by Legbreaker
I believe Gold acts very much like Lead in relation to radiation. Not being a physicist, I'm in no position to say more than that with anything even approaching authority.
And yes, my understanding is the gold is never actually moved anywhere - it's held in storage to back the dollar and generally give credit something solid to work with. The gold being radioactive wouldn't mean a thing since it's not actually intended to physically change hands at any time. Even large transactions don't require transfer of anything physical - just a few numbers in a computer system.
Now given the destruction of the world economic system, that will change significantly, BUT that still doesn't mean anyone would identify a need for the gold to be shifted before it (or the global economic system it forms a part of) was nuked.
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From Wiki (I know usual caveats apply)
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Gold (Au) has one stable isotope, 197Au, and 36 radioisotopes with 195Au being the most stable with a half-life of 186 days.
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Gold has been proposed as a material for creating a salted nuclear weapon (cobalt is another, better-known salting material). A jacket of natural 197Au, irradiated by the intense high-energy neutron flux from an exploding thermonuclear weapon, would transmute into the radioactive isotope 198Au with a half-life of 2.697 days and produce approximately .411 MeV of gamma radiation, significantly increasing the radioactivity of the weapon's fallout for several days. Such a weapon is not known to have ever been built, tested, or used.
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According to the entry on salted weapons, the reason Au has never been used for this purpose is that the half life is too short, and a targeted population might survive at an undesireable rate. IE it makes a bad weapon.
Worst case scenario, the gold is prime hot for just under 27 weeks.
Ah carp, hello this is IT, have tried turning it off and turning back on again?...