Experts: US Still 'Needlessly Vulnerable' to Fukushima-Style Disaster | Common Dreams

Fukushima "could have been a hundred times worse had there been a loss of the water covering the spent fuel in pools associated with each reactor," said co-author Frank von Hippel, a senior research physicist at Princeton. (Photo: Getty)

Nuclear industry pressured regulatory commission into low-balling consequences of meltdown, especially in case of reactor fire, new article says

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) did not adequately account for safety hazards when approving certain upgrades to nuclear sites around the U.S., meaning the risk of a Fukushima-like disaster caused by a reactor fire is still high, according to an article published in the journal Science on Friday.

Researchers from Princeton University and the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) argued that the NRC "relied on faulty analysis to justify its refusal to adopt a critical measure for protecting Americans from the occurrence of a catastrophic nuclear-waste fire at any one of dozens of reactor sites around the country."

The risk is especially high in the sites' cooling pools—basins that are used to store and reduce the temperatures of used radioactive fuel rods. Spent-fuel pools came into the international spotlight after the 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi site in Japan, in which an earthquake-triggered tsunami disabled the electrical systems needed for the cooling process, leading to meltdowns at three of six reactors.

NRC commissioners "did not adequately account for impacts of large-scale land contamination events," the scientists wrote. "Among rejected options was a measure to end dense packing of 90 spent fuel pools, which we consider critical for avoiding a potential catastrophe much greater than Fukushima."

Fukushima "could have been a hundred times worse had there been a loss of the water covering the spent fuel in pools associated with each reactor," said co-author Frank von Hippel, a senior research physicist at Princeton's Program on Science and Global Security (SGS), in a statement…

more: Experts: US Still 'Needlessly Vulnerable' to Fukushima-Style Disaster | Common Dreams