Report: Nuclear industry's safety measures are 'inadequate'

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2. Report finds US nuclear plants are unprepared to deal with natural disasters

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/07/24/report-finds-us-nuclear-plants-are-unprepared-to-deal-with-natural-disasters/

Report finds US nuclear plants are unprepared to deal with natural disasters
By Agence France-Presse
Thursday, July 24, 2014 15:35 EDT

US nuclear plants must better prepare for the risk of natural disasters like earthquakes, tsunamis and floods, said a report Thursday on lessons learned from Japan’s Fukushima crisis in 2011.

Current approaches to regulating nuclear safety “are clearly inadequate for preventing core-melt accidents and mitigating their consequences,” the report said.

As of now, US safety regulations are based on making sure nuclear plants can withstand equipment failures, loss of power and other malfunctions related to the design of the plant, otherwise known as design-basis events.

But history has shown that the biggest nuclear accidents in recent history — including at Fukushima Daiichi, Three Mile Island and Chernobyl — “were all initiated by beyond-design-basis events,” said the report.

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