Praying for meltdown: The media and the nukes Sensationalism has always been part of the popular media - but Fukushima is a telling and troubling sign of how much the media has changed in fifty years: from an era of scientific optimism to one where it inhabits a world of fantasy - creating a real-time Hollywood disaster movie with a moralising, chivvying message. Not so …
Lewis Page has been discredited; and If another Journalist wishes to display his disdain for his entire profession on an anti Nuclear slant on this story, he should go to reactor 2 in Fukushima and do some live reporting.
I am sure he will get a warm, tingly welcome with effects which will last for the rest his shortened life.
From all of the information I have read, these reactors (1-3) are scrap and will more than likely never run actively again. The reactor buildings - including reactor 4 - have suffered a lot of damage. So, it's entirely possible that 1-3 and perhaps even 4 will be scrapped, but 5 and 6 which are newer, relatively unscathed by the events and physically further away from 1-4 will probably re-enter service at some point in the future.
Even with the contaminated water in the basements, there is no need to bury this problem and leave it for future generations of engineer to deal with. Where do these so-called experts get this nonsense? The site needs to be cleaned up and decontaminated. units 1-3 will have to be decommissioned and removed from the site - with care. Since 4 was not even fueled at the time, it remains to be seen what will have to be done with it because it's not clear how the extensive damage to the reactor building will come into play.
Too many people in political positions are abusing this crisis for their own political gain. The lies they tell are just as bad as the crap the media are shoveling, but no one challenges them. It was interesting on the news last night. The tone regarding nuclear power changed utterly as safety inspections and reviews at some US reactor sites shows some major failures such as emergency systems not working, untrained crews withdrawing control rods from fueled reactors and all manner of other maintenance and operational failures. yet the report sought ot reassure us that America's Nuclear energy was the safest and not dangerous at all. Mid way through the report I turned to my wife and said "What how they'll totally change their tune on nuclear now it's American nuclear energy under the microscope..." Sure enough, no doom laden predictions of terror - even when talking of an untrained maintenance crew incorrectly withdrawing control rods in a reactor. In fact, it was portrayed as everything being A-OK, and nothing to worry about because they're safe as houses and can survive earthquakes just fine (so long as they;re no bigger than about 6.5 on the Richter scale... I guess it's only the over engineered Japanese nuclear reactors that survive cataclysmic damage with relative grace that are a threat to humanity. Love that double standard.
::rolls eyes::
Re media bang wagon, etc., etc. The old saying goes "if you can't beat them join them". Democracy is a funny thing especially when it becomes the enemy of truth and reality. But anyway, i say more power to your elbow and may the earth never be flat.
Now, about those other, you know, "conspiracy theories". Eg., Japanese human nuclear-lab-rats first to get ground breaking stem-cell treatment; And, Tokyo University knew about scale 9 quake 48 hours beforehand. All these things are true, but exactly where DO you draw the line in reporting it all?
I find these comment forums curious. Just what are people prepared to believe, and why? Maybe we should all go an examine ourselves a bit here. Is it really all about the moral high ground of truth vs fear? The right of free speech vs. obsession? What's the deal here?
How far can you go? I mean if i just mention "HAARP" for a moment. I mean there is plenty of evidence to suggest ELF waves produce earthquakes. Astonishingly, i can't find any evidence to say that they can't. So what's to do? Where do you draw the line? At what point does anyone decide they can't deal with being branded a conspiracy-loon and stop bothering to look for hard evidence? Or is it a case of "HAARP is for loons" just work backwards from that. Is that any different to "Nuclear is evil" just work back from that? So just what are we doing?
Conspiracy sites seem to have all the fun. You know, being right out there on the edge of reason, unafraid of even their own ignorance, let alone "The Feds" or whoever, whatever. Another thing which marks out these sites is the constant repetition of everything. Never letting go of the beloved axe to grind. I find this recent train of counter-intuitive pro-nuclear (apparently to some) stuff coming out of The Register quite curious also.
Just sayin.
Check out 2.5Hz ELF starting 0530 March 8th continuing through to the 11th.
http://maestro.haarp.alaska.edu/cgi-bin/scmag/disp-scmag.cgi?date=20110308&Bx=on&By=on&Bz=on
http://maestro.haarp.alaska.edu/cgi-bin/scmag/disp-scmag.cgi?date=20110310&Bx=on&By=on&Bz=on
http://maestro.haarp.alaska.edu/cgi-bin/scmag/disp-scmag.cgi?date=20110311&Bx=on&By=on&Bz=on
Well in advance of the big one says a credible Magnetometer source, courtesy of Tokyo University...
Any takers? Check the dates for other major earthquakes and you get a similar pattern. Some of these quakes can be predicted days in advance. AND there is correlation with the frequencies 1.8, 2.5, 2.8Hz, and roughly the region the quakes occur in. Quite frankly i'm bored with people telling me you can't predict earthquakes. And i'm getting just a little worn down by media-scientist types who refuse to look at any evidence outside of their comfort boundaries.
Despite the failure of Parkfield experiment governments still seem hell bent on statistical analyzing of actual seismic events. This is not a poker game or lottery where you can predict the numbers from the results. Scientific advance happens when scientists think out of the box. I'm no expert, but i reckon some of these guys need a holiday from day job.
@Steve X
I take it you didn't check then. What are you, astroturfing for the feds now? Sorry.
It's not like i'm trying to get you to believe in Super Man or Tooth Fairy. Just look at the data! Check Jap 2.5Hz, Christchurch 1.8Hz (September coz March was aftershock), Chili 2.8Hz , its all there the on the mark in the days/hours BEFORE. Don't check the noise and assume there is nothing to see, honestly, i may be no expert, but i'm not bl**dy stupid!
>*weren't* earthquakes
If ur talking broadly seismic activity thats pretty much like never. But i'm not comparing to just the noise on the graph.
Honestly i could spell it all out you in detail. But what would be the point, it would be just my word against the fearful majority. Thats why i'm saying go check the data properly yourself.
@Vladimir Plouzhnikov
Short answer: I don't know.
All i do know, is this stuff correlates and it's there for all to see.
It's weird i know, because its Tokyo Universities magnetometer kit putting plots up on apparently a research site run by BAE (as far as i can tell) on behalf of the US military. Doesn't come weirder than that.
You figure it out. Definitely gotta hook some conspiracy theories this one. On the other hand predicting earthquakes is one hell of a card trick - if thats what it's doing. But i keep thinking, could this data be used to at least save tens of thousands of lives?
I mean even if there was a slightest chance here, why do people scoff just cos it's HAARP? I guess people only ever believe what they want to believe and work backwards from there. The point this article makes, it's how the whole media works.
As far as i'm concerned the evidence here is compelling enough to make any reasonable person, or journalist, want to go check the evidence themselves.
It's credible.
There is real science going on for earthquake prediction using ULF waves. Yes HAARP did confirm the hypothesis. There is strong evidence that 20,000 people died needlessly given at least 48 hours notice. So please do not scoff at this. Really wish that some journos around here would begin to take this stuff seriously. Genocide is not some big laugh for packing ad revenue. Seriously throwing down the gauntlet here guys.
http://www-ee.stanford.edu/~acfs/fraser-smith-research.html
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/research/parkfield/discontinued.php Remember last time?
"An attempt to measure ultra low frequency (ULF) magnetic signals prior to further earthquakes was made in Parkfield, California. Independent ULF measurement systems have been installed at the Varian and Haliburton ranches near Parkfield and at Piñon Flat and Table Mountain in Southern California."
"Astonishingly, i can't find any evidence to say that they can't."
What are you trying to say? Your "intuition-based" causal reasoning processes seem ass-backwards.
Also, Tesla could rip the Earth in half from his New York basement lab and the US army has secret UFO tech etc..
Where is the facepalm icon when you need it.
> Astonishingly, i can't find any evidence to say that they can't.
If this astonishes you then you clearly have no scientific background or knowledge whatsover. That is known as the 'argument from ignorance", which says "I can't prove it's false, so it must be true". It's been known for at least 400 years, since John Locke at least. It's a favourite tool of propagandists who can't marshall real arguments.
So far no-one has ever been able to produce proof that earthquakes can be created by man, and certainly not by HAARP. There are hundreds of quakes every week, and no correlations with other events that could count as proof.
"he's never worked in the industry itself."
He's been subcontracted by UKAEA, back in the day.
Does that count?
Obviously it's unlikely that anyone directly employed in the nuclear industry will say anything against the organisations that pay their wages (and/or pensions).
And whatever Orlowski may think, Walt Patterson knows a thing or too as well.
So where does that leave us? It leaves us, I suspect, with the pro-nuclear lobby unable to refute these folks' messages and therefore attacking the messengers.
"Obviously it's unlikely that anyone directly employed in the nuclear industry will say anything against the organisations that pay their wages (and/or pensions)."
And similarly, you'd no expect anyone who makes their income from commissions from green groups to cast nuclear technologies in anything but the worst light.
I'd suggest it leaves us best served by listening to the independent academics, people like Richard Wakeford, David King, and John Beddington.
Firstly, the reactor - like reactors in the US and Europe - was built to withstand "historical events."
Unfortunately they didn't think to ask earth scientists about what a "historical event" actually meant, because if they had done, they'd have found there was a similar event in the 9th century.
Basically the design was done to cut costs and apply a bit of CYA engineering.
FAIL is the result.
Secondly, the rabid hippy haters on here might want to consider the fact that fanatically biased news sources like NHK and TEPCO's own reports are telling us that the reactor + turbine system is so fucked it's going to be buried, Chernobyl-style.
Since it's not usual to bury reactors unless they're fucked, I think we can assume that means that something may perhaps have gone a little bit wrong here.
What's disturbing - and I mean *seriously* disturbing - is how many Reg readers and Reg journalists seem to want to disbelieve that the situation at Fukushima is anything other than rosy and sweet for purely ideological reasons.
When did this turn into the Soviet Union, exactly? You're either reality-based or you're not. Shouting about it, ranting about it, or attacking dirty fucking hippies won't change the facts on the ground - and in the ground, and around the ground.
And the facts on the ground are that Fukushima is leaking radioactivity like a colander, the area around the plant is already poisoned and is going to need decontamination before it becomes liveable - if it's ever inhabitable again - and some workers have already been hospitalised.
So for Orlowski to pretend that this is business as usual, no one has been hurt, and we should all clap louder because only long-haired dope-smoking sheep breeders could possibly have an issue with what's happening, is dayglo Lindsay Lohan bonkers.
You know - facts is facts. If you don't like the facts - tough. Facts aren't a democracy, and they don't go away just because you don't like them and can't be arsed to research them properly and you'd rather replace them with rhetoric or magical thinking.
As for comparing hydro to nukes - a giant dam failure is a tragedy, but permanently losing 10-20% of a country's inhabitable area isn't such a great thing to happen either.
That hasn't happened yet, but we've already gone from "no risk to public health" to "exclusion zone" to "sarcophagus."
The omens are - let's say - not looking good on this one.
We are forced to read:
"That hasn't happened yet, but we've already gone from "no risk to public health" to "exclusion zone" to "sarcophagus.""
It depends on whom you listen to. Who exactly is talking about "exclusion zone" and "sarcophagus"? Zerohedge doesn't count.
From The Guardian: "The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say"
Yeah, the vessels held firm certainly. I looked back at your article from earlier this month about how this could never happen, and then yesterday you're still saying it.
Still, there'll be a neat elephant's foot to look at soon, eh?
http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/energy/nuclear/nuclear-engineer-says-theres-evidence-fuel-melted-through-reactor-pressure-vessel
In an article in The Guardian on Tuesday, Richard T. Lahey, former chair of nuclear engineering at Rensellaer Polytechnic Institute, in Troy, N.Y., was quoted as saying that the evidence he had seen indicated that fuel melted through the pressure vessel of reactor No. 2 at some point after the crisis began. He told The Guardian:
"The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell."
This morning, Lahey elaborated on his analysis for IEEE Spectrum, which he said had been accurately reported by The Guardian, but misinterpreted by some. (A careless read of the article suggests a new meltdown at the plant, rather an analysis of what probably occurred early on in the crisis.)
Lahey says his analysis was based on the data sources seen by him and colleagues around the world, but that the information has been inconsistent and changes hourly. “It’s really hard to read the tea leaves,” Lahey says. “They keep blowing around… I may be wrong. I hope I’m wrong.”
However, his best take is that “all cores have melted, and it appears as though Unit 2 has melted through.”
Excuse me? David King? Independent? The David King who was until recently the Government Chief Scientific Adviser? As heard on Radio4's Today programme on Monday or Tuesday talking some sense and some utter bollocks, with so many logic fails (never mind science fails) that even the presenter saw some of them? Yes I know that's attacking the messenger not the message, so Listen Again to the interview and form your own impression.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_King_%28scientist%29
John Large is an independent consultant. Yes the Greens like him, his facts suit their nuclear agenda much of the time. You should check them out and then **address the facts** not the messenger.
The Russians thought Large was the right man for the job when it came to sorting out their downed nuclear submarine. What Green agenda does that align with, or does it tell us he's a free agent with no ties, and knows what he's talking about?
Richard Wakeford? Independent academic?
"Richard Wakeford is Principal Research Scientist at the BNFL Head Office in Risley, Warrington. After carrying out postgraduate research on sub-nuclear physics he was awarded a PhD from the University of Liverpool in 1978 and after a short period of postdoctoral research joined BNFL, initially at Capenhurst before moving to Risley in 1981. He has been involved in a number of statistically related projects within BNFL, but since the mid-1980s has concentrated upon radiation risks, particularly at low doses."
http://www.cerrie.org/people/wakeford.php
John Beddington is of course the current Government Chief Scientific Adviser (not that I'd seen enough of his output to notice, I had to go check).
If I want "independent", these two names aren't top of the list.
@JeeBee and TheOtherHobbes
One of the things I have consistently said here is that the nuclear industry has an issue with the truth. Because people are so scared of radiation (due to 'the bomb'), they always try to keep everything quite because everything gets blown out of all proportion by the press, green groups etc. Most people genuinely believe they get no natural radiation at all and therefore panic when the word is mentioned. You then get the papers (almost all, not just the normal culprits) blow everything out of proportion citing people with vested interests or using people with not a clue what they're talking about. The result of all this is mistrust and bad decisions being made by people.
Let's take a for instance. The operators held the hydrogen in the containment building for some time to allow the small amount of radiation present (radioactive Nitrogen) to decay and then could release it without having to admit to a radiation leak. Unfortunately, the hydrogen detonated rather spectacularly releasing the gas and also giving the media a field day. They then said the building didn't really matter etc. to play down the incident. All this is a massive fail. The desire to not say a small radiation leak of short lived isotopes caused the destruction of the containment building which is very bad. If the core in reactor 2 has melted through it's containment vessel, this would be unfortunate, but not a major issue IF the containment building was still in place. Because, that would contain it!!
So, if this is an issue (and I haven't seen it anywhere myself yet) and the core is outside its containment vessel leaking radiation, this is the fault of the operators and also those panicing stupidly about any radiation leak. The papers and people in general are also to blame for making the operators and staff feel they had to hold the gas inside.
Both those extremely pro nuclear and also those extremely anti are as bad as each other and stop any sensible discussion and actions being had. They actually cause the problem sometimes. The widespread fear of the word radiation needs to be countered. Yes, radiation is bad in the same sense that fire or water or viruses can be bad. But, it needs to be looked at from a fact based and sensible angle.
To date, I have yet to see much in the way of facts coming out of this event. This is because of the extreme fear reaction from people and the media and the natural reluctance then of the operators and government etc. to put them out. Unfortunately, this doesn't really work as the media then simply make them up, thinking of things that 'could' happen; which are normally all 'disasters'. We need to get balance and nobody on either side is allowing that at the moment.
We also need to get a dose of reality. None of the current renewable technologies is capable of providing the power we as a planet need and this won't change for some considerable period of time, if ever. So, we either have to accept using more carbon based generation (whether coal or gas or whatever) or we have to use nuclear. Simple choice. Wishing for all renewables is the worst form of delusion. So, what are people most scared of..........climate change or radiation?
So in the absence of anything in the manual they turn immediately to the press and decide what to do based on how much journalists seem to be encouraging people to panic?
If they haven't run disaster drill they should have. If they come to the last page of the manual and have no idea what to do they should have.
And I rather suspect they do - the idea that they let media hype pressure them into making unsafe decisions is absurd. If they have then they are idiots.
I don't disagree in theory, but in practice it's somewhat different and not so clear cut. Should they have held the gas inside? Absolutely not, regardless of the issues. However, they probably didn't realise at that point exactly how bad a position they were in and they knew if a radiation release (albeit an insignificant one) occured, the media would crucify them. People would go into headless chicken mode etc.etc. Therefore, they tried to manage the publicity in a way they thought they could control and got it badly wrong. There's no excuse for that.
However, at the same time, the general populous and media must also take responsbility for their part in all this. If they go off the deep end all the time and this impacts future planning and company profitability, it is hardly surprising companies do this. People are generally pretty irrational and stupid. As my last paragraph says, there are people out there in large numbers who believe a completely carbon neutral, non-nuclear option for total electricity production exists!! Windmills and solar PV etc. will provide everything. They need to stop burying their head in the sand and realise this is rubbish. It's carbon based production or nuclear and will be for some considerable time.
Unless they want to seriously compromise their living standards, there is no alternative and crucifying any technology that occasionally goes wrong is just plain stupid. People are so ill educated (even in places like Japan), a huge number still believe a nuclear power station can explode like an atomic bomb. This is absoltuely impossible as the fissile material isn't at the required concentration level!! People who know nothing about the technology need to stop commenting and simply trust the system. Only those who have the faintest idea what they're talking about should comment and hopefully this will lead to a more balanced debate with less scaremongering and whitewashing. If you want to join the debate, instead of just chpping in, get educated first and then get involved.
If people do that, companies will be less fearful of making decisions like releasing the gas immediately because the people involved will be more knowledgeable and will understand. There's nothing more unpredictable and more damaging than an ill educated person.
First off, you need to get your facts straight before you detract others.
A melt through in this case is physically impossible, the maximum temperature this fuel mix can generate is 3,000C (Ideal Circumstances) the melting point of the reactor vessel 5,000C.
Ideal Conditions would be no water, full air circulation, and no control rods or boron anywhere in the system.
The "China Syndrome" only exists in the minds of those that wrote the script, and those silly enough to believe it as fact.
The Plutonium they have found "buried 3 inches in the soil", is per IAEA and other sources is not in the least bit hazardous, they are currently analyzing it to attempt to find out where it came from, it could well have come from the Hiroshima and Nagasaki events or from the 1,000s of French, UK and US nuke tests done in the Pacific or Chinese and Russian nuke tests done before the Test Ban Treaty.
The fact that they have found some I-131 in Scotland? There's not a snow balls chance in hell it came from Japan! I-131 has a half life of 8hrs, so unless someone had the money to resurrect a Concord, or use a supersonic military jet and fly the stuff nonstop from Fukushima to Scotland it came from somewhere else. Given the present wind patterns I would suggest it came from one of the plants they are shutting down in Germany or maybe one of your own plants or nuke subs in the UK burped some out, or from a drilling operation in the North Sea (Yes they use I-131 as a tracer, primarily because it has a very short half life, and unless you inject it by hypodermic or eat it it's harmless).
And Yes the metal buildings being demolished is not a big deal, they are there primarily to protect the rest of the containment from the elements. The biggest problem from the explosions is accessing the reactor building because of debris. The explosions could not have damaged the primary or secondary containment, it would be like shooting a BB gun at a brick wall.
I would be more concerned that the debris has interfered with the fuel cell racks in the spent fuel pools. In any case, the reactors and ancillary equipment where they have used seawater as emergency coolant are toast, they will not be brought back on line, ever. They are now junk iron.
Mostly I am sick and tired of the outright sensationalist bullshite spewed by the media, both broadcast and print. Real journalism is officially dead.
"Busby's chief notoriety is his modelling work on natural background radiation, which is highly controversial. It's often self-published, and the Journal of Radiological Protection put out a paper (PDF/45KB) debunking his work".
Hmm, this is a completely non-peer reviewed diatribe consisting of ad hominem attacks and gross, unsubstantiated allegations, written by an admitted paid consultant to the nuclear industry. It's not scientific in the last - not one sentence of it.
If that's the best you have to "debunk" Busby's research, his credibility has just ballooned.
BTW, being that you are so "scientific" and "objective", I was shocked, yes, shocked! not to read about Busby's responses to the allegations you have made against him in your "sensationalist" diatribe. For your readers, you can find a brief explanation at http://www.llrc.org/health/subtopic/compendium_refs.htm .
"Hmm, this is a completely non-peer reviewed diatribe consisting of ad hominem attacks and gross, unsubstantiated allegations"
This is personal opinion piece and there aren't "ad hominem" attacks in there. I have never heard of personal opinion pieces being peer reviewed, except in Marxist journals.
"Busby, it must be remembered, is also a scientific advisor to the Green Party"
"Chris Busby is essentially an aspiring politician who happens to have scientific qualifications"
"But Busby's chief notoriety is his modelling work on natural background radiation, which is highly controversial"
"Meanwhile Channel 4 found a Professor Walt Patterson, from think-tank Chatham House, who also talked up the disaster. An advocate of global governance and a critic of nuclear power (and more recently fossil fuels) for 40 years, his reaction was predictable"
"Another anti-nuclear activist, John Large, also passed himself off as an unbiased pundit on the news channels. He's Greenpeace's favourite "hired gun"."
Whether fallacious or not is another matter, but you can't seriously deny their existance.
So the author should take M. Busby as a pure, virgin, disinterested, above-it-all and socially disconnected person laboring off pure, unadulterated data?
Pull the other one.
Contrary to the people who hold up the "ad hominem" defense as a get out of jail free card, where a person stands on an issue is often highly relevant. Especially if we are talking about a problem that is only partially subject to positivist enquiry, as here.
Apart from that, you should read the Busby. The above are nothing compared to what HE says. Actual swearwords.
Over recent weeks I've been complaining to anyone who'd listen about the lamentable state of the GCSE physics syllabus after seeing some of the past papers my son had been doing. However, in retrospect I see that the seeming total concentration in units 1,2 and 3 on nuclear power, earthquakes and the way press reports of science are a remarkably prescient preparation for the current situation. As it appears there's been no reference to the solar system bit then I can only assume that we're due a meteorite stike any time soon.
Some "fun" research.
1. Find out how many multi-megatonne meteorite events occur per century.
2. Extrapolate the events' energy spectrum and the fatal blast radii.
3. Work out the probability of your point on the Earth's surface being within the devastated area (which last century was always somewhere remote and almost uninhabited ... as is most of the Earth's surface). Do you feel lucky?
4. Work out the probability of your life being ended by meteorite.
It's higher than most would guess, even if you exclude the extinction-level events that happen every 100 Myears or so.
(The extinction-level bit: ~10^10 deaths every ~10^8 years, = 100 deaths/year and a completely pointless calculation. The calculation for city-busters is less so).
"Now, it's easy *now* to smugly sit there and say, well, those silly buggers should have built 15m walls, had water tight generators, additional backups to the backup for the backups, put generators on the roof of some building somewhere and been prepared for a 9.0 quake. But before all of this, most people would have scoffed at the chances of a 9.0 earthquake and 10+ meter Tsunami since they go way beyond the 100 year event magnitudes."
Recently, some people may have noticed the world financial system blowing up because of inappropriate application of Gaussian models.
I suggest saying "model shows a six sigma probability of event in 100 years" is the wrong thinking, given the high cost consequences. More severe events are well documented in Japan. Whether it's likely in the 100 year span of your model seems academic the day after it's happened.
http://www.cognitive-edge.com/blogs/dave/2011/03/the_mantra_of_resilience.php
Paris, because she's got an eye for the main chance.
"Recently, some people may have noticed the world financial system blowing up because of inappropriate application of Gaussian models."
Well, no. That would mean "Gaussian models" have some amazing power. They don't.
Please start in this general area: http://mises.org/daily/3252
You know you have problems when you downvote a comment based on science and reality and upvote a comment based on stupid, groundless optimism.
Many people are unfit to make public comments because they just display their utter and breathtaking stupidity when they do.
The situation at the Japanese Nuclear plant is extremely serious and has been downplayed in the media.
Anyone who tells you "it's not as bad as you think" is a liar and an ignorant fool.
"You know you have problems when you downvote a comment based on science and reality and upvote a comment based on stupid, groundless optimism.(...)"
Not only those based on science, but those based on sheer common sense.
Known facts are that the tsunami was to be expected, (plant tsunami protection was not up even to past japanese earthquakes), and that the plant was not ready for it, but it could have been. Merely stating this gets you a deluge of down votes....and it is ridiculous, if not puerile.
So it is a FAIL and the articles provided by Mr. Page are diverting attention from the important questions:
"How are we going to keep people from saving money where they shouldn't, specially when building & maintaining nuclear power plants?" (Closing down nuclear plants is not a viable option for now)
"Why has the situation come to talks about encasing the reactors?" Certainly things are not as Mr. Page indicates.
"What are the economic consequences of not properly preparing the plant?"
"Are we for once going to measure statistically measure up the impact of the radioactive leak?"
This is seldom done, and would require to accept unexplained death rates increases over the next 10 years on areas close to the nuclear plant, or affected by fallout (however minimal/short lived it may seem to be).
Of course, these analysis should be also done on chemical spills, and I bet there lots of them after the tsunami.
... i would try to avoid having anyone point out the obvious flaws in my arguments by disabling the comments feature.
Oh, I see after the mauling he's got, he's figured it out for himself on his latest effort:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/03/31/fukushima_panic_breaks_completely_free_of_facts/
Great work reg.... so much for open debate etc. That should keep all them nuclear scaremongers at bay eh?
Speaks volumes about the strength of your position when you decide to disable comments....
Nuclear energy is a waste of time, it uses a limited resource and therefore will be short lived, even less so than oil. Even if oil reserves last another 100 years the total time humanity used it massively would be just 200 years, that may seam much to shortsighted idiots, but is nothing but a drop in the ocean.
Is strongly subsidized with means it cant carry its own weight.
It produces waste material we don't yet know how to get rid of.
Have Japan plants been termo or hydro they would already caused all the damage they could, but this nuclear bad boys still have the potential to screw us royally.
The media is an attention whore, disaster calls attention, so their stupid reaction is to be expected, that the same reason greeny idiots are talking global warming all the time.
A dam forming a water reservoir failed during the recent earthquake up in the hills behind Fukushima. The resulting flood killed at least four people and at last reports another few folks were missing from the washed-out houses devastated by the wall of water, but since it wasn't radioactivity from damaged reactors that killed these people, just benign and safe H2O from a renewable resource this particular lethal disaster hasn't been big news on the world stage. Then again death and destruction from dam failures is so common it's rarely worth commenting on unless the number of people killed gets into the thousands.
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