There is an excellent article on GlobalPost that features a lengthy interview with Arnie Gundersen. In the article, interviewer David Case raises a lot of the nagging questions to which we have only been getting vague answers through conventional media: How do the radioactive releases at the Fukushima reactors compare to those from Chernobyl? What is the potential for the situation there to grow even worse? What will be the long-term impacts on the health of the Japanese people? What will be the long-term implications for human health around the world?
The answers, brutally honest and fully explained, are not encouraging. Of the greatest immediate concern is the prossibility that a self-starting chain reaction is unfolding now in Reactor #4 where structural damage has allowed fuel rods to come in contact with each other. That reactor is so severely compromised at this point that it would take little seismic activity to bring down the whole building. With no functioning “brakes” to the chain reaction, it could lead to a fuel pool fire, ejecting some very toxic materials directly into the atmosphere for wide distribution.
As Arnie points out, the accident at Chernobyl involved a single reactor, with a single catastrophic release. At Fukushima, the ongoing crisis involves essentially four reactors and, counting the spent fuel pools, the equivalent of eight reactor cores! He says that even without the massive explosion that jettisoned tons of radioactive material into the atmosphere at Chernobyl, the collective release of radioactivity from all the separate failures at Fukushima may already have more than equalled the release at Chernobyl.
Comparing the current industrial catastrophe to that at Bhopal, India in 1984, Arnie remarks
I absolutely disagree with the scientists who say that Fukushima’s not going to hurt anyone. The numbers I’ve seen, from reputable scientists, are that Fukushima is going to kill 200,000 from increased cancers over the next 50 years.
And, for those of us who didn’t buy the official argument that the ocean will “dilute” radioactive waste in the effluent from cooling, Arnie explains what its implications may be in the world-wide food chain.
Take the time to read it all, including Arnie’s excellent perspective on how we should view our future energy needs. It’s well worth the read.
A nerve was struck when I first saw this story. “On the beach” reference, a hard-hitting poignant message.
As a very young child, I watched the movie rerun & its haunting imagery on TV. It left an indelible mark though buried in my mind from the distant past.
Though I have not thought about it nor seen any references to it since then, the significance, at least to me is clear.
The source used in this story, as well as the many related links w/in the story using Gundersen’s analysis is much more in depth than we recieve from his brief appearances & updates & certainly much more than we are likely to find anywhere else.
Though lengthy, an easy read. I recommend anyone following the unfolding events who is interested in where this is all leading to take the time to read & save the referenced information.
As these events seem to fly by, it is easy to not take the time to try to understand the deeper issues as they occur. I’m on my second read!