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Japanese Court Rules Against Restarting Ohi Reactors
AmiMoJo writes: "A Japanese court has ordered the operator of the Ohi nuclear plant in Fukui Prefecture, central Japan, not to restart two of its reactors, citing inadequate safety measures. The plant's No. 3 and 4 reactors were halted for regular inspections last September. Local residents filed a lawsuit asking that the reactors be kept offline. They said an estimate of possible tremors is too small, and that the reactors lack backup cooling systems. The operator, Kansai Electric Power Company, has insisted that no safety problems exist."
In this corner, we have the experts who have stake to lie to you.
In this corner, we have a bunch of local idiots being baited by some agenda-driven journalist who is likely to twist facts and probably doesn't understand nuclear safety anyway, so probably thinks non-issues are terrifying while making serious issues out of other things he knows are non-issues.
Who will prevail?!
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Clearly people never read:
"The Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission found the nuclear disaster was "manmade" and that its direct causes were all foreseeable. The report also found that the plant was incapable of withstanding the earthquake and tsunami. TEPCO, regulators Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) and NSC and the government body promoting the nuclear power industry (METI), all failed to meet the most basic safety requirements, such as assessing the probability of damage, preparing for containing collateral damage from such a disaster, and developing evacuation plans.[21][22] A separate study by Stanford researchers found that Japanese plants operated by the largest utility companies were particularly unprotected against potential tsunamis.[7]" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F...
How many people has the nuclear power industry killed exactly? For extra credit, compare against coal which has had to pick up the missing supply in Japan.
Perscriptio in manibus tabellariorum est.
Once-a-century disasters are something to plan for. There was a host of badly designed pump systems - and business processes. It's not unreasonable to fix them given the cost of their expected failure.
The major thing leading up to the meltdowns was human error, both in the emergency generator rooms / power conduits not being waterproofed, and the decisions regarding what to do with the reactors during an emergency situation. There were other plants that had gotten swamped, but did not suffer meltdowns, all due to waterproofing the emergency generator rooms; If I remember correctly one plant that was swamped and survived had quite literally finished the waterproofing only a few weeks prior.
Not only that, but the reactors most likely could have been saved even after the tsunami hit. The problem was the operators ( rightly, or wrongly ) were too afraid to depressurize the reactor vessels so passive low pressure emergency cooling measures could operate, these would have lasted long enough to get pumps and / or generators on site. This decision not to depressurize was due to public fear of "wah, small amounts of short lived Iodine and and noble radio gasses would escape with the steam" mentality and lead directly ( unknown at the time. the operator actions were quite reasonable and understandable - it is only hindsight that tells us what the best action should have been ) to the larger scale and broader spectrum radio-isotope release.
To err is human; effective mayhem requires the root password!
I'd prefer not to include Chernobyl since it was literally a catastrophe waiting to happen. A reactor with no containment building, really? Nothing like that ever got built outside the Soviet bloc. Even if included, deaths per gigawatt hour from nuclear barely amount to a rounding error when compared to fossil fuel.
I'd say as things are, coal is just as long term a solution in Japan as the nuclear plants. There just aren't that many workable alternatives. Natgas plants perhaps, but recent investigation suggests that methane leaks in production and distribution are probably enough to render greenhouse gas emissions similar in magnitude to coal. Nuclear power has risks of course. Unfortunately the world has magnified those risks a great deal by collective failure to deploy newer and safer reactor technologies. Case in point: Fukushima Daiichi. Generation I plants with known serious failure modes. There's no earthly reason Gen I plants should still be in operation. For comparison, how many businesses are depending on 1960 era computer systems, and how many people drive 1960 cars as primary transportation?
Apportioning the blame for this, in my opinion divides roughly in thirds between corporate sloth/greed, government fecklessness and societal ignorance/paranoia.
Perscriptio in manibus tabellariorum est.