A little less than a year ago, the world witnessed the largest nuclear disaster in twenty-six years. The earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan had a devastating effect on the communities and families that were involved. However, I was completely unaware of the effect this had on Fukushima Daiichi, and the series of equipment failures and release of radioactive materials that followed. There are six General Electric boiling water reactors in the plant. The quake de-fueled one of the reactors, and one by one the reactors began to fail. The plant was running on generators for a while until the tsunami struck.
This has been raised to a seven on the International Nuclear Event Scale, which is the maximum value. What I find to be the most devastating is how cancer rates will go up in years to come due to radiation exposure. Proper evacuations were exercised, however the Japanese government and TEPCO have their work cut out for them to find the best way to continue moving forward. It is absolutely vital that they continue to monitor radiation. Gamma habe reportedly been monitoring ranges within thirty km, and radiation levels have decreased sinced the incident. It is also important to monitor food restrictions. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has been sampling thousands of food products from surrounding areas. Lastly, TEPCO has been monitoring sea levels for active radiation. The levels dropped initially, but rose back to 5kBq/L.
References: Wikipedia, iaea.com, cryptome.com
I think it’s really interesting how you suggest that cancer levels will go up due to the radiation from this event. Do you think there are things Japan (and other countries) could do to help prevent against future risks like this? Or do you think there’s absolutely no way to prepare a nuclear plant against such extreme natural disasters? Do you think it will also contribute to global warming?