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Fukushima's Radiation Is Contained By a Mile-Long Wall of Ice (cnet.com)
CNET reports on the massive ice wall created by an "intricate network of small metal pipes, capped off by six-foot-high metal scaffolding."
It turns out, coolant is running through the pipes, freezing the soil below and creating an impermeable ice wall that's nearly 100 feet deep and a mile long, encircling the reactors. It's like a smaller-scale subterranean version of the Wall in Game of Thrones, but instead of keeping out White Walkers and wights, this line of defense keeps in a far more realistic danger: radioactive contaminants from melted-down reactors that threaten to spill into the water by Fukushima Daiichi....
The structure, which cost roughly $300 million, paid for by public funds, serves as critical protection, defending the Fukushima area from one of the most radioactive hotspots in the world. While Tokyo Electric Power Co., also known as Tepco, struggles to find a way to remove radioactive material from the facility -- a process the government estimates could take more than four decades -- the more immediate concern is what to do with the contaminated water leaking out from the facility. One of the solutions has been to put up (down?) this underground ice wall, which prevents much of the surrounding groundwater from getting in.
The structure, which cost roughly $300 million, paid for by public funds, serves as critical protection, defending the Fukushima area from one of the most radioactive hotspots in the world. While Tokyo Electric Power Co., also known as Tepco, struggles to find a way to remove radioactive material from the facility -- a process the government estimates could take more than four decades -- the more immediate concern is what to do with the contaminated water leaking out from the facility. One of the solutions has been to put up (down?) this underground ice wall, which prevents much of the surrounding groundwater from getting in.
What's with the socialism remarks all over, do you even know what that word means? Obviously it's just some boogieman word for you, but morons, learn the meaning and use it right.
Nope. The wall does exactly nothing. It's basically a part of Kabuki theater that is the whole Fukushima cleanup operation. The reactor is still leaking, but the amount of released radiation is now below the dangerous levels - the hottest isotopes have decayed by now.
so much of the info about Fukushima is clearly tainted by the preferences of those writing.
I've now read, within 2 days, articles about the current cleanup efforts that
a) claim they mostly don't work, the area is still dangerous and it will take decades to complete everything.
b) claim they are a demonstration of 1st world technology keeping things under control, people returning to the area, much of the radiation being cleaned up and the Japanese making impressive progress with robots in the reactor cores as well as completing a total overhaul of all their nuclear reactors to incorporate the lessons learnt from Fukushima.
So what is true? Probably some of both. But which?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
It's been eight years since this disaster occurred.
The official report of The Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission contains a wealth of information for anyone interested in the facts regarding this disaster.
The report is scathing and contains lines such as a multitude of errors and willful negligence that left the Fukushima plant unprepared for the events of March 11 and describes the mindset that supported the negligence behind this disaster.
It is very difficult to believe that the company that got the world into this situation is the one that will get us out of it. Chernobyl's New Safe Confinement took the combined resources of the European Union to fund and was designed by the British.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
It's not meant to contain radioactive material, it's meant to keep groundwater out while they clean up to lessen the amount of contaminated water they have to deal with. When the cleanup is mostly finished they will turn it off.
The short answer: the "ice wall" is helping to reduce water flow, but isn't perfect, and if you want to spin that in a positive way, you can say "look, it's working!", and if you want to go the other way you can say "it's not working!"-- because anything short of perfection is obviously useless.
A better question would be "how well is it working?" but even better would be "how well does it need to work?".
I'm inclined to agree with our anti-nuclear friends that this is all a bunch of theater to reassure people (much like that that other "wall" we've been hearing so much about). It would be nice if they were just reassured by declining levels of leakage, and little evidence of health impacts, but that kind of message gets lost in the weeds of statistical chatter and "activist" shouting.
Fukushimas Ice Wall Not Working:
Martin Fackler at the NYT commented:
From the World Health Organization faq:
"Bio-concentration" is essentially not happening: Insignificant Environmental and Public Health Risk from Fukushima in North America 8 Years On
It comes from the big takeover of the Republican party starting with Gingrich, who started labeling all Democrats as McGovern democrats, then soon all Democrats were labeled as liberals, and pretty much created the modern day negative campaign style of win-by-any-means.
Hitler was a fascist, which is neither left nor right in outlook, but is a strict authoritarian movement with state control of both the economy and social life, usually a dictatorship and oppression of the opposition. Generally it's considered far right, however I think it doesn't really fit into the traditional left-right model because fascists didn't really express a coherent political ideology beyond an us-versus-them style of thinking. The modern guys on the right are only labeling it socialist as a distraction and part of the "please repeat these talking points endlessly" style of political debate.