Peaking at 14 meters (approximately 46 feet) high, the waves swept over the plant’s 5.7-meter (approximately 18.7-foot) seawall, flooding the lower parts of the reactor buildings. Unfortunately, the succeeding tsunami further complicated the situation. This power source allowed pumps to continue to circulate coolant through the reactors’ cores, which, if left unaddressed, can overheat and cause a massive steam explosion. As a result, backup diesel generators automatically started. The shaking also cut the plant off from the Japanese electricity grid. Upon detecting the tremor, active reactors at the plant automatically shut down their normal power-generating fission reactions. The incident was later classified as Level 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES), joining Chernobyl as the only two disasters to ever receive the designation. Japan’s biggest nuclear disaster occurred at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima Prefecture, on March 11, 2011, shortly after the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. More from NextShark: Indonesia’s parliament passes landmark bill aimed at tackling sexual violence Now, as the Japanese government prepares to pump more than a million tons of treated water into the ocean, the rest of the world wonders: How did Japan arrive at such a contentious decision? Does its plan actually meet global safety standards? And what do neighboring countries have to say? However, Tokyo recently earned the blessing of the United Nations. More from NextShark: Good Samaritans hailed as heroes after saving girl from kidnapper in Hawaii restaurant Today, Japan is preparing to release "treated" radioactive water from Fukushima into the Pacific, sparking concerns among critics who fear adverse consequences to both people and the environment. The event, known as the Fukushima nuclear disaster, became the world’s most severe nuclear accident since Ukraine's Chernobyl in 1986. About 100 kilometers (around 62 miles) south of the impact, killer waves spawned another disaster, and one that would take decades to resolve: a nuclear accident. The earthquake, which lasted for six minutes, was followed by a powerful tsunami that contributed to the loss of about 20,000 lives. An undersea megathrust earthquake - with a magnitude of 9.1 - rocked the Pacific Ocean 72 kilometers (approximately 45 miles) east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region. If Japan restarts nuclear, the country's utilities could resell spare liquefied natural gas to Europe, he said.Read more of this story at Slashdot.On an ordinary spring day in Japan in 2011, one of the most devastating natural disasters in modern history occurred. "There is a strong tailwind for nuclear power at this moment," Nobuo Tanaka, a former executive director of the International Energy Agency, said in an interview Monday. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has pushed up energy prices globally, however, and a recent tremor in Japan took several gas- and coal-fired plants offline, leading to the first-ever electricity supply alert for Tokyo. Japanese public opinion moved decisively against atomic power after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami resulted in the meltdown of three reactors at Fukushima, with most of the country's operable nuclear reactors remaining shut. The newspaper has been conducting semiregular polls on the issue for more than a decade. That's up from 44% support for the restarts in a similar survey in September. Some 53% of people said nuclear reactors should restart if safety can be ensured, while 38% said they should remain shut, according to the poll conducted by the Nikkei. It comes amid surging power prices and warnings of electricity shortages in Tokyo. From a report: The survey result marks the first time since the Fukushima disaster in 2011 that an increasing role for nuclear energy has been favored. For the first time in more than a decade, a narrow majority in Japan now supports restarting idled nuclear reactors, according to a poll in the country's top business newspaper.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |