Madam, – It has been less than a week since an earthquake shook the foundations of one of the world’s largest economies, rendering half-a-million people homeless.
A nuclear power station is on the verge of a meltdown, as I write. Soon it will be impossible for workers to stay on-site at Fukushima. As Gregory Jackzo of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission explained, radiation levels are extremely high and all the water has gone from the fuel pools of reactor number four. This means there is nothing to stop the fuel rods from overheating.
A meltdown of the reactors will leave the Japanese government with no choice but to evacuate a huge number of people from what will be the effected area. What will happen to all these people, including those 500,000 already made homeless? This is a catastrophic situation for Japan.
Closer to home, I am reminded of a statistic which was in the headlines last year, when it was reported that there are at least 300,000 empty houses in Ireland.
Our collapsed housing bubble has given us an opportunity. If and when the evacuation of the Japanese population takes place, it will be up to the rest of the world to show their support. Let Ireland take the lead and offer them a place here, and encourage others to follow our example. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Your article “Japan declines Irish offer of aid” (Breaking News, March 14th) may inadvertently create a misleading impression.
With 500,000 displaced people, including 100,000 children, Japan desperately needs aid and donations, for example through the Irish Red Cross. The people of Japan are very grateful to the Irish State. The situation continues to evolve and we will avail of your kind offer when the time is right. Difficulty in accepting foreign aid workers is due to language differences and lack of suitable translators and other essential backup personnel. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I see from your report (Breaking News, March 14th) that the estimated economic cost of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami is about $180 billion. Noting also the report in your Business section (March 16th) that the cost to the Irish State of the banks bailout will be between €60 and €100 billion (at today’s exchange rate about $120 billion), I would like to make a proposal: instead of giving the money to the banks, give it to the people of Japan.
Let the banks fail and go away. The EU will probably throw us out. We could then form a new economic pact with Japan, whereby we would supply it with all the milk and beef it wants, it could use Ireland as its European manufacturing hub for for all its electronics corporations and we could allow tax-free access to each other’s markets. What would we call this pact? NAHA, the Nippon and Hibernia Alliance.
With sincere compassion for the people of Japan at this terrible time. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – As a young engineer in the UK in the late 1980s, I was a participant in a project called “Long Term Safety Review of Magnox Reactors” (referring to the first generation of civil nuclear reactors in the UK which were designed in the late 1950s and the early 1960s).
Our analysis revealed that total loss of electrical power was the most significant event which had not been adequately considered in the original design. The specific active causes of total loss of electrical power were: a major seismic event, catastrophic failure of a steam manifold on the boiler feed system, an electrical fire in the turbine hall; and a plane crash, or a missile strike.
The key adverse outcome associated with this event was an inability to cool a scrambled reactor because of the loss of the primary and secondary cooling systems.
Our solution was to develop an independent, highly redundant and seismically qualified tertiary cooling system consisting of standard (truck) diesel-engine powered pumps, a reservoir of water, a series of fire hoses, and sufficiently equipped and trained staff. We demonstrated that the system could be successfully deployed within minutes of an initiating incident.
The recent events at the Fukushima nuclear complex bear an uncanny resemblance to the scenario described above. It is disappointing that the Japanese operators failed to successfully control the removal of heat from their reactors subsequent to the earthquake earlier this week; it is possible that their defences lacked the depth of those implemented in the UK almost a generation ago. Whatever the reason, we can be sure that the reactors at Fukushima will never again generate useful power. We can also be sure that the fall-out in terms of the impact on human health will be unacceptably high.
Apart from the human and economic costs, the next most significant outcome will be the damage to the reputation of the nuclear industry and the fact that the case for nuclear power will be set back at least a generation. – Yours, etc,