The 9.1 earthquake in Japan has created an absolutely staggering tragedy given the resulting tsunami and nuclear meltdown problem. The country deserves a bit of good news, but doesn't seem primed to get it. No, now Japan is about to enter cyclone season.
It is really difficult to understate the earthquake damage in Japan. 9.1 is a huge number, but consider the aftershocks the country has had. Since "the big one", it has had 40 quakes of magnitude in excess of 6.0. To give you a sense of how this compares to other tremors, the Northridge earthquake in greater Los Angeles was a 6.7. It caused 8.7 billion in damages, killed 33 people and left 8,700 injured. That is just one quake!
As the seasons roll over, Japan now comes to a rough one. The first cyclones can start rolling in as soon as May. This presents a rather massive problem. The reactors at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi power station are still sitting damaged structures. Well, damaged is a minor understatement. Reactor 3 looks like a pile of rubble. This lends itself to the rather obvious question of what happens if a typhoon with 100 plus mile an hour winds rolls through the area?
Is there any good news? Yes. Most of the typhoons that hit Japan tend to stay to the southern end of the country. The Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant is, of course, in the north. Having said this, the area where the plant is located was hit directly or skirted with no less than 8 different typhoons in 2004. If this were to happen again in 2011, the results are hard to imagine but would certainly be horrific given the state of the reactors as they sit today.
Then there is the question of the impact on sea currents. As we all know, the radiation from the power plant is currently primarily coming in the form of radiated water. This water is being dumped in one form or another into the ocean. Authorities claim it isn't a problem, but it is no secret that the majority of the Japanese diet comes in the form of seafood. The current threat is bad enough, but what happens when typhoons start stirring up the seas along Japan?
The most troubling aspect of all of this is the fact the problems with the reactor seem to have fallen off the table with news outlets. Many people are now under the impression the reactors are no longer leaking radiation. They are. The news outlets simply do not report about it any longer. Now that is a tragedy.
Patrick Sampson writes about energy issues like peak oil - for ThePeakOilQuestion.com.
