NUCLEAR POWER GUINEA PIG
Headline: Shiga studies impact on Lake Biwa from possible Fukui nuke accident
I've written about this fact before, but it's seldom floated in the standard mediastream and so gets forgotten even by the Japanese: Japan, for its narrowness, size and seismicity, is truly the world's Nuclear Power guinea pig. As you look at the map, simply center that big green circle on Tokyo, and the cities of Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya (urban area population exceeding 60 million persons) and Kyoto (a few million more), not to mention priceless Lake Biwa (centrally just below the Takahama-Mihama cluster!) are within a short breeze of over 30 nuclear reactors!
Given the world-witnessed occurrence of the statistically impossible event at Fukushima, the potential result of this situation is truly beyond rationale. Yet these millions carry on, living in the shadow of another series of statistically impossible events that would pretty much bring an end to Japan: for most, if not all, of those who survived would have to be evacuated. To... where?
As much as I love and worry for Lake Biwa (where I live), things would be so much worse (especially if they ever start the Monju reactor) than what the authorities' experts are intently studying...
2 comments:
I believe Monju's budget has been cut by 15%, although it's hard to believe Japan will not proceed with some sort of nuclear processing plan. It's expensive to store waste overseas, and the entire point of Monju was to demonstrate that it's possible to create a "plutonium economy."
Anyway, Japan has all of this nuclear waste just piling up in storage ponds located directly on-site. The Rokkai-mura facility, still unbuilt, is fully subscribed. I can't see how the central government will be able to coax any local authorities into accepting a nuclear waste facility.
Monju is a Faustian bargain. Time will reveal the national price for keeping that monster alive.
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