Biggest moments of 2011 #4 A Japanese catastrophe

Erick says:

04:43am | 20/12/11

The earthquake and tsunami killed over 15,000 people. The nuclear meltdown killed nobody, as far as I know.

But people are panicking more about the nuclear stuff. If anything, this incident shows that even outdated, badly designed nuclear plants are safer than other sources of energy.

And newer fail-safe technologies such as pebble bed reactors, thorium power, and 4th-generation nuclear plants are safer still. It would be insane to drop a proven, carbon-neutral source of baseline power over this incident.

acotrel says:

04:44am | 20/12/11

‘What we learned
Nuclear power is dangerous. If you’re going to have massive thermonuclear plants fuelled by radioactive material in backyards, they need to be tightly regulated, supervised and operated. ‘

That doesn’t sound very democratic to me - what happened to ‘self-regulation’ ?
ERICK - your comment ?

Mahhrat says:

05:55am | 20/12/11

It’s the same as all things.  Risk manage appropriately, build appropriately, have the right people in the right jobs.

We have the ability to do this, we just don’t want to spend the money necessary.  It’s just silly.

Australia should be dominating the world in nuclear power.  Absolutely rocking it.  That we’re not is just stupid.  What are we going to do when the coal runs out?

onlooker says:

06:10am | 20/12/11

Personally I would prefer for sake of future generations, that we avoid nuclear power. Nobody knows what the future holds, and what disasters may or may not happen here, if we have nuclear power.

Stephan says:

06:53am | 20/12/11

Watching the wave engulf the Japanese countryside was horrifying.  Imagining the fear, wonder and abject terror of the people caught in its path was damn near overwhelming.  Then realising the impacts from damage to the country’s infrastructure were still to be properly felt was thought provoking.

All the talk, text and gyrations regards the impacts of the blown nuclear plant demonstrates is that we STILL don’t understand what we’re dealing with.  The bogey called radiation is everywhere around us.  Sound is a form of radiation, so is light and heat.  Nuclear radiation, you say?  Our daylight comes from a hydrogen fusing Sun - now THAT’s radiation.  There’d be no life without it.

People keep harping on about saftey.  Craig, in his post, makes a simple telling point. Humanity tends to screw up in monumentous ways (generally through simple greed or sloth).  Radioactive materials are safe only if they’re well contained or far away (9 billion miles and we still get dangerous levels from our Sun). 

Until we start thinking in terms of generations and epochs, then the use of any form of toxic radiotice materials to generate energy will never be safe.  Our smartest move would be to space with one of two “beanstalks” cabling power back to earth from solar mirrors there. A project like that, though, would require a united earth.  That’s about as unliky as truly safe Nuclear power.

NESLIHAN KUROSAWA says:

07:17am | 20/12/11

Hi Daniel,

I am sure that nuclear power is very convenient & meant to make our lives easier!  As well as providing clean & affordable energy for everyone on our planet!  But at what cost, I wonder?  Just like Erick mentioned apparently “the Nuclear Meltdown in FUKUSHIMA ” did not kill anyone directly, right?  What about in the years to come? Why did so many Japanese leave their homes?

Lets all refresh our memories about the Chernobyl disaster in the old Soviet Union back in1987!  What about the actual damage done to the environment & the over all health of the people living in the neighboring countries? Certain types of cancer such as thyroid & leukemia are serious & deadly, indeed.  They are on the rise in certain parts of the world, for me personally that should be enough of a very serious warning by itself!!

We can not deny the fact about the slightest exposure to radiation changes to human DNA,  a very good example is over exposure to a simple X Rays!  It even affects the unborn babies in the uterus. That has been proven time & time again.  Somehow, I feel that it is very ignorant to assume that it is harmless.  I just want to add that we should all make very informed & educated decisions about the very future of our planet.  If we care about the generations to come & for our children’s sake!!  Best regards to your editors.

Vivian says:

08:34am | 20/12/11

“What we learned
Nuclear power is dangerous. If you’re going to have massive thermonuclear plants fuelled by radioactive material in backyards, they need to be tightly regulated, supervised and operated. “

The mind boggles. This is without doubt the most ridiculous statement of the year. The plant got hit with a tidal wave it wasn’t designed to resist. Because of the excellence of engineering it survived largely intact. Although damaged no “catastrophe” occurred.

The evidence is straight in front of you. The plant is perfectly safe. There has been not one death reported from anything connected to the plant bar one suicide when a farmer was told his perfectly safe stock would have to be destroyed. This is after we had the multitudes of prophets of doom telling us of the “brave pilots whose skin would slough off” after they overflew the plant on R&M missions. Regardless of the paid hacks that predict doom and gloom and the imbeciles in the media like that Charlie Pickering fool who believe thousands died at Chernobyl when the toll is about 60 odd the plant is a standing testament to the safety of the design, regulations and supervision of the technology.

Let me out it this way. I would rather have a nuclear plant in my backyyard than pink bats put in my roof under a government scheme.
’ Pink bats have killed more this year than nuclear incidents.

Report correctly. Give opinion backed up by evidence. Don’t run an ideological or puppy dog like must please the masters in the office piece. At least think half critically. Anyone with a set of eyes and half a brain can see the plant and the technology are much safer than even the detractors care to admit. I bet it pisses them off no end that no one has died. Sort of ruins a good fear and doubt campaign that.

Vivian says:

01:10pm | 20/12/11

You really need to check wat you link Dan. You have just disproved yourself.

So the robot piece. It opens with this link. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204553904577101641846568640.html?mod=WSJASIA_hps_MIDDLEFourthNews

The plant has reached cold shutdown. It is “safe” in your terms. It has stopped being “nuclear”. The story you linked shows how they are using robots to go into some parts of the plant that contain high levels of radiation. It has been known in nuclear “disasters” that radiation leaks - so what? This is not proof it is unsafe. This is a 40 year old reactor that withstood more than it was designed to withstand. You can actually still access the parts that were most affected albeit by robot. Perfect design. Marvelous engineering. And look. The situation is contained. Big tick

Second one from the WSJ contains this quote

“The Journal compared the Fukushima Daiichi accident-management protocol against the IAEA’s general principles, and it appears the plant document generally hews to them.”

The WSJ admits themselves they were basically fine. Yes it also shows that some areas were under-prepared but here is the thing. Would you rather spend money and time worrying about the one in a thousand year tsunami or other more practical scenarios. How is the Punch’s emergency measures for tidal waves? Do you practice often? The story says this was out of the ordinary. It tries to build a compelling case for bad management but can only scrape together a quote from an unnamed ex employee, that’s real hard hitting stuff eh Dan. There is more I could go on with but why bother. The story is as flimsy as hell, says they were following proper procedure and were hit by an unexpected event that took out redundant systems but as we know the plant is now in cold shutdown and it resisted the iunexpected beyond all expectations.

Oh and you story was from March Dan. Come on. Keep up to date at least. A scare story from March?

And now we move to the wonderful New York Times and its “Green” section. You may as well have quoted The Age or The Guardian. Giving me scare stories from the NYT about Nuclear bogey men is a self fulfilling prophecy. Anyway lets look at it. Story from September by a guy that still worries about Chernobyl. Two minutes on Google led me to this

http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=7545&tid=282&cid=123049&ct=162

This is the press release that follows up the research you are using for an example to show me how unsafe Fukushima and by association nuclear power is. And I quote

“The study, conducted by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution chemist Ken Buesseler and two Japanese colleagues, Michio Aoyama of the Meteorological Research Institute and Masao Fukasawa of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, reports that discharges from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plants peaked one month after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that precipitated the nuclear accident, and continue through at least July. Their study finds the levels of radioactivity, while quite elevated, are not a direct exposure threat to humans or marine life, but cautions that the impact of accumulated radionuclides in marine sediments is poorly known.”

Not dangerous to humans.

They try and still make it sound so but they have no proof. Like you Dan. Read the rest of it. Makes for compelling reasons not to fear nuclear plants if this, the” second worst nuclear disaster in history”, is all that happens.

Do better research. Read and understand what you link. Note the dates. Put them in context. Look at the sources.

In other words IT WAS ridiculous to say. And you have shown us why it was so.

Now to poor B4Bear. The batt analogy was to show you how stupid it is and was to worry over an accident caused by a freak nature event and why ot proves nothing. Here is another inanity

Ladders kill more people per year in Japan than this nuclear tragedy, indded any nuclear tragedy to date, will

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/mor_fal_on_and_fro_lad-mortality-fall-ladder

Thise were 2004 figures.164 in that year. Now I don’t recall any serious ladder manufacturing issues in the early 2000’s so I assume that is a normal year. This century alone then around 2,000 people IN JAPAN have died from ladder related imcidents. Imagine the outcry if that figure was from the nuclear industry.

The opposition and fear and ridiculous of people like Dan are driven by ideology not fact. It is a classic FUD campaign and Dan was wrong. You however with what appears to be a Bolt complex are just poor at reading.

Vivian says:

09:04am | 23/12/11

“It doesn’t say anywhere in that press release that it’s been disproven that dangerous levels of radiation had been found in food. “

Except for the whole “Their study finds the levels of radioactivity, while quite elevated, are not a direct exposure threat to humans or marine life” part I guess. Are you seriously suggesting that this alarmist scientist that you quoted as proof of food issues did not look hard enough?

You were very very sloppy Dan, You were caught out. The interesting thing is that you think it is somehow significant that radiation levels in food are elevated near a area where radiation leaked. Yes? So what? Is it contained and being monitored. By your own quote it is. So what is your real issue then? What is the problem? It is “safe”. Precautions are taken. You really are grasping, trying to justify and protect your ridiculous statement with nonsense and little homilies like “I’m sorry, but that’s a little worrying.”. Worrying? So what? I worry about crossing the street. It is why i look both ways. You built up a demon and it was shown to be a kitten. You are an alarmist, a nuclear extremist and we know what think of extremists don’t we, those that exaggerate beyond the know facts.

The best you seem to come p with is that safety protocols or procedures are not where you want them to be. You offer no proof of the claim that there “... are plenty of worries had about the regulation of nuclear reactors in the United States.” I am sure you can find some Greenpeace or WWF literature on the subject somewhere but really, who cares. As with all things in life, and business, there are lengths we go to that take out all foreseeable and satiffactory risk. Then there are the ridiculous. That is what you seem to want. Remove all risk. It ain’t going to happen.

“I don’t think you’d say the situation was “safe” at all if you lived in Fukushima Prefecture and had to leave your home because of radiation levels were above those safe for human health. “

Why did you write this? Read what you wrote. It makes no sense. It is NOT safe to stay so they were asked to leave. The people are now safe. What is the issue? If your house is on fire you leave. Are you then safe? Yes you are, from the fire. That is the essence of precaution and safety rules. They were applied. Do you really think it is my contention that people should be able to sit on an open reactor core for the technology to be “safe” Please.

And then we have your favourite publication the WSJ quoted again. Please read more widely for a start. Secondly you quoted the first line only. Do you actually read the links you use? The second sentence says this

“But the survey of 1,589 residents from three towns close to the disaster-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant showed that no residents were exposed to radiation above levels tolerated during nuclear emergencies.”

Seems to me the 40 year old plant after being hit by a natural event it was not designed for was remarkably “safe”.

Tell you what Dan. Lets leave this. You are linking nonsense to attempt to justify the ridiculous statement you made. I feel you are not even reading or comprehending what you link. You appear to be googling “tell me something bad about Fukushima+WSJ” and linking the first thing that comes up.

After being told I am “harassing” you yesterday by Tory I have no idea if this will be printed but we can only hope you sit back and critically look at your bias and actually read what is being linked by yourself. It is nonsensical to continue as you are.

All the best for Christmas.