There is not much one can do when mother nature decides to throw at us BUT the fukushima issue possibly could have been avoided, avoided? Yes two years ago Japan was told their power plants would not with stand a powerful earthquake. Now of course the government vowed to upgrade their safety to all their nuclear power plants.
So now because the government nor the TEPCO did not follow through, the people of Japan are facing a nuclear meltdown, I just don’t think it is right to put the cost of upgrading or fixing a nuclear power plant over the expenditure of the people.
We see this all the time, a company puts safety of its workers ahead of everything else until that safety cost’s money. However one would think that because it was a nuclear plant with life threatening consequences that the Japanese Government would have been on upgrading their sites ASAP.
OECD/NEA did state that the NEA will certainly help in this matter and propose a set of actions in its areas of competence. Here is where I get confused, OECD/NEA’s own site “NEA is to assist its member countries in maintaining and further developing, through international co-operation, the scientific, technological and legal bases required for the safe, environmentally friendly and economical use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes” so you would think that if the fukushima plant was needing to be updated that NES would have been on top of said upgrades.
Now let’s not forget The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) who on their own website state that the IAEA’s mission is: “Safety and Security; Science and Technology; and Safeguards and Verification.” In my mind I don’t think they held up to their mission statement, Japan was notified 2 years ago that the safety of their plants could be compromised by a strong earthquake and their current safeguards could fail, I ask why was nothing really done in regards to the concerns of 2 years ago? I believe that because nothing was done that the current nuclear situation of Japan is solely on NEA & IAEA.
These two agencies are supposed to be the BIG BOYS of the nuclear sector but where are they? You don’t hear about any efforts to assist, although the OECD/NEA did they will offer help in this matter within its areas of competence. Unfortunately it may be too late for either agency to step up to the plate and have a positive/any influence on the outcome.