re: #665 lawhawk

I think some of the delay initially in the response to the coolant problem was to salvage the reactors, and when those failed, they were left with an option that will effectively mean the end of these reactors as a power generating source.

Reactor 1 was actually scheduled to shut down in February but had its operating license extended 10 years, but the other 2 reactors at Fukushima that are in a nuclear emergency were going to continue operating well into the future. The Fukushima complex generated 4.7 gigawatts of power - and that can’t be easily made up.

Another thing that is lost on people is that had this been a LNG or a coal powered plant, the possibility of a catastrophic explosion from the quake could have been significant - causing a tremendous loss of life at the outset of the tsunami, rather than a prolonged crisis. There are dangers will power sources that are commonly used to generate much of the world’s power - and it took a 9.0 quake and a massive tsunami to reveal major flaws in the backup systems for the reactors (the reactors themselves survived both intact).

I gather that this event has highlighted the need to view an EQ event in conjunction with a tsunami when designing these plants. They survived the actual quake OK, but the tsunami-related flooding has made it impossible to re-establish normal cooling, and that is the real problem.