Dear Climate Scientists, Please Note the Global Terror at Fukushima Four

[xchrom]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/11/03-7




Four climate scientists have made a public statement claiming nuclear power is an answer to global warming.

Before they proceed, they should visit Fukushima, where the Tokyo Electric Power Company has moved definitively toward bringing down the some 1300 hot fuel rods from a pool at Unit Four.

Which makes this a time of global terror.

Since March 11, 2011, fuel assemblies weighing some 400 tons, containing more than 1500 extremely radioactive fuel rods, have been suspended 100 feet in the air above Fukushima Daiichi’s Unit Four. “If you calculate the amount of cesium 137 in the pool, the amount is equivalent to 14,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs," says Hiroaki Koide, assistant professor at Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute. Former US Department of Energy official Robert Alvarez, an expert on fuel pool fires, calculates potential fallout from Unit Four at ten times greater than what came from Chernobyl.

Tokyo Electric Power says it may start moving these fuel rods as early as November 8. Using computerized controls, such an operation might take take about 100 days. But because of the damage done to the assemblies, the fuel pool and the supporting building, the job must be coordinated manually. Tepco says it could take a year, but that requires an optimism the company’s track record doesn’t warrant.

[pansypoo53219]

1. it was always the waste for me. if they want nukes. they have to be MINI.

we should investing in SOLAR! but it can't be raped for profits. except storage.

[Vashta Nerada]

2. I agree.

Every rooftop should be covered in solar panels. Every parking lot should have solar panels over them.

[hunter]

5. I don't think there should be any cars or parking lots.

That's a lot of land people could be growing food or living on.

[Vashta Nerada]

8. True, but...

we can't change that right now.

[hunter]

11. Why not?

[Vashta Nerada]

12. Um, parking lots are needed.

[AAO]

4. The chicken may have come home to roost.

In fact they already have but the media won't tell you that. You might stop buying frivolous shit.

[hunter]

3. Sadly, this is not the worst thing in the world. Fossil fuels are.

[PamW]

6. Overblown and OverHYPED

The Fukushima accident has been so overblown and over-hyped that what it actually is compares as a mere shadow of what it has been over-hyped out to be.

Read the assessment by a REAL SCIENTIST, Professor of Physics at University of California - Berkeley, Dr. Richard Muller; who teaches an award-winning course in science for non-scientists, and is the author of the books, "Physics for Future Presidents" and "The Instant Physicist".

Professor Muller writes the following:

The Panic Over Fukushima

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10000872396390444772404577589270444059332

The 4 signatories of the letter are scientists that realize Fukushima for what it truly is, like Professor Muller; and NOT as the OVERBLOWN caricature of what it has become. Because they have an ACCURATE perception of Fukushima; the 4 signatories come to a proper conclusion.

The good thing about science is that it is true, whether or not you believe in it.
--Neil deGrasse Tyson

PamW

[freedom fighter jh]

7. They are speaking out of fear and ignorance.

Fear -- justified fear -- of climate change, as well as justified fear that most people are ignorant of the dangers of climate change. And ignorance of the dangers of nuclear power because as brilliant as some of these people are in their own field, they may not be particularly well informed about nuclear issues.

They have every right to warn us about climate change, but unless they show expertise in nuclear matters, they have no more business than anyone else telling us to go that way.

To keep this planet a good habitat for human beings, we need to find a way to do without either fossil fuel or nuclear power. People are afraid to say that because it sounds impossible. But we're going to have to find a way.

[kristopher]

9. Kick and Rec

[Rebellious Republican]

10. Fuk i shima how about here in the good ole US of Assholes......

Duke Energy announces closing of Crystal River nuclear power plant
http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/energy/duke-energy-announces-closing-of-crystal-river-nuclear-power-plant/1273794

[kristopher]

13. Imagine we've invested in 700 new nuclear plants

...and we have a meltdown with a Chernobyl scale release of radioactivity that blankets some high density population/economic center like New York, London, Chicago, Hong Kong, Seoul, Beijing, or Moscow; forcing it's evacuation and abandonment.

What happens to that massive and already overpriced investment in low carbon energy?

Along with the concrete problems of cost, safety, proliferation and wasted associated with nuclear energy, the risk of a major public backlash in response to the next, inevitable "impossible" accident is virtually 100%.

An open letter to James Hansen on the real truth about stabilizing at 350 ppm
BY JOE ROMM ON NOVEMBER 23, 2008 AT 8:24 PM
To James Hansen (and his fellow 350 ppm-ers):

NUCLEAR: The single nuclear wedge requires building 35 nukes a year — roughly 10 times the current production rate, more than 50% higher than the greatest rate the world ever sustained for even a single decade, and far in excess of what current production bottlenecks would allow. Nuclear plant prices in this country have already tripled since 2000 to nearly price themselves out of the market (see “The Self-Limiting Future of Nuclear Power, Part 1“).

Is it now clear why your extended nuclear power discussion is off the mark? You point out that

The common presumption that 4th generation nuclear power will not be ready until 2030 is based on assumption of ‘business-as-usual”. Given high priority, this technology could be ready for deployment in the 2015-2020 time frame.

Sorry, too late. The incomprehensibly fast scale up of low carbon generation we need for 350 ppm leaves no time for such hypotheticals, no time for hoping things get commercialized within 10 years. After all, somebody has to build the massive manufacturing capacity right now, and somebody has to train all of the people needed to build these reactors right now (not to mention training people to run them), and somebody has to contract for all of the relevant raw materials pretty damn soon.

Maybe fourth-generation nukes could be useful in the next set of post-2030 wedges, which is why a major ramp up of R&D remains incredibly valuable. But for getting off of coal in two decades, we gotta go with what we have.

Again, I’m not advocating building 700 nuclear plants

[madokie]

14. This is going to be a long ass year is all I can say

1500 hundred possible fuckups. Geeze Louise lets build more of these.
NOT