Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Next step in Japan's radiation story

There's an article in the Wall Street Journal today about Japan's attempt to deal with the huge volume of irradiated water that has accumulated as a result of hosing down the reactors for such a long time. They mention the size of the problem:
". . . there is altogether an estimated 67,500 tons of water from the three most heavily damaged reactor units that needs to be either processed or stored."
That's a lot of water. I read the story and it seems they believe they'll be able to filter the radioactivity from the water at processing plants, which they're now building. Their current aim is to move the water via a hose strung from the nuclear plant to a huge cistern in the ground. Then they'll move the water again, this time from the cistern to the processing plants, once they're operational.

Sounds pretty shaky to me. The article also mentioned an idea to switch from hosing the rods with water, to cooling them down with refrigerated air. They don't mention how this will be accomplished. It sounds like there's a long way to go before this situation is truly defused.

My heart goes out to all the people in Japan who have to live through this terrible time. From out the blue comes doom. Sometimes that's the way things happen, and it must seem very unfair to those who suffer the consequences.