Science & Technology Office Tokyo
The graphic below is from a report created by the Swiss Embassy in relation to the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster. It is taken from the paper located at Radioactive Contaminated Water Leaks (Update) December 2013 and is well worth reading in it's entirety. As a point of explanation the red blob near the bottom of the graphic is the corium; the melted fuel and reactor parts blob that has melted through the bottom of the reactor. This has happened in three reactors and as can be seen by the graphic water is flowing across this highly radioactive material and directly into the ocean. Fukushima was built on a previous riverbed and therefore water easily flows through ancient underground channels. The technology does not yet exist; and likely will not be easy to create if possible; to remove this corium from the earth. Given that test wells drilled into the ground show extremely high radiation at about 75 feet one is left to conjecture that the corium has reached that level. All of the plans to "fix" this problem revolve around stopping the water flow across the corium. At the same time if all of the water flow is stopped the corium will heat to dangerous levels and would begin spewing higher levels of radiation into the underground environment. There is an attempt to minimize the ongoing ecological ramifications of this by speaking of rates, flows and dilutions but the simple fact remains mankind has created a huge problem that will be around for many generations to come. Much has been said recently about media soft pedaling all of this; and there may be some fear mongering out there from some alternative media; but this graphic shows that this is not a problem that can truly be fixed in a few decades. This damage, in human lifespan terms, is nearly forever. Certainly it will be having an effect on this planet for thousands of years. There must be a better way and we will not find it as long as "profit" is our motive.
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