Despite meltdown fears nuclear power is safer than riding a horse

THE fact that I was in Japan the week before last Friday’s tsunami has given the tragedy an extra poignancy for me. How many of those people I was milling around with in Tokyo have lost relatives or their livelihoods, I can’t help but wonder?

In the midst of such human devastation, however, it is worth reminding ourselves that the 2004 Asian tsunami and the earthquake in Haiti last year were smaller in magnitude than last Friday’s events but came at a much higher human cost than in Japan. The depressing truth is that poverty and, with it, poor building standards are a much better indicator of final death tolls when the Earth ruptures than points on the Richter scale. It is a tribute to the Japanese people that, contrary to the image popularised by Hollywood in such situations, there has been little panic, no chaos. Instead of the scenes of anarchy, we have been witnessing orderly queues and cooperation with the emergency services.

Attention has swiftly shifted from the immediate loss of life to the fate of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station. While Japanese experts seek to reassure a shattered nation — and the rest of the world — that the explosions there have released only tiny amounts of radioactivity, their comments are muted by the startling images of the plants blowing apart.

The situation remains uncertain. There is continuing anxiety at the possibility of a core meltdown. People around the world are watching the unfolding crisis with a mixture of compassion for the Japanese people and unease about the resilience of an electricity source on which many depend.

What were the Japanese thinking of building nuclear power plants in the first place, you might ask? After all, not only is this the only country to have had nuclear bombs dropped on it, but Japan lies in a global region with considerable seismic activity. Why risk it? Why build nuclear power plants knowing that they pose real dangers? To understand that, you have to delve into history.

After the Second World War, Japan was a poor country with a huge and growing population. But they invested in manufacturing — cheap manufacturing. “Made in Japan” meant cheap. But the Japanese persisted. Living standards – and the quality of Japanese goods — rose remarkably in tandem. As the Japanese themselves became consumers, they were not satisfied with inferior goods.

And then, good fortune played a part. The American economy stumbled and in 1971 the dollar was devalued. The yen shot up but Japanese manufacturing thrived despite the rising cost of its goods because they were now world-class.

But only a couple of years later, disaster struck. The Japanese miracle was built on cheap oil. The world economy went into recession following the Middle Eastern embargo. Japan suffered more than most. It was immediately brought home to the Japanese that their fate did not lie in their own hands: they were at the mercy of the Arab potentates. Fears multiplied that their economy could go into reverse, that a return to poverty beckoned.

The Japanese government responded with an all-out drive to reduce Japan’s dependency on Middle Eastern oil. Fuel efficiency was one component; nuclear power was another. Within a decade, Japan was one of the wealthiest nations in the world as well as one of the most energy-efficient. But they knew the risks.

On the nuclear industry’s own disaster scale of 1 to 7, where Chernobyl was a 7 and Three Mile Island a 5, the initial Fukushima blast ranked a mere 4. That should reassure us. But no one can deny that the weekend’s blasts are a major setback for the future of nuclear power.

The partial reactor-core meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979 practically killed the industry in the United States. In people’s minds, the news from Japan is nothing less than the next generation’s Chernobyl. It might not be as bad as what happened that day in Ukraine, but Fukushima has clearly reignited public suspicion that nuclear is a dangerous business.

The situation in Japan is evolving and less than clear but, at this stage, it is worth reminding ourselves what actually did happen at Chernobyl. A series of delays, human errors and mechanical failures before, during and immediately after a safety test caused one of the reactors to overheat and explode. Enormous quantities of radiation leaked out and were cast far and wide across what was then the Soviet Union and northern Europe, including Ireland.

Chernobyl was by far the world’s worst nuclear accident but some perspective is called for. According to a 2005 report by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), “4,000 people could eventually die of radiation exposure from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant… As of mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths had been directly attributed to radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly-exposed rescue workers, many who died within months of the accident.”

The Green lobby doesn’t like to hear that but apart from the brave men who fought suicidally to deal with the immediate leak, the actual radiation dose received by the population in the countries around the plant was quite small. The radiation was cleaned up and contained quite quickly and the plant continued operating for more than a decade.

No one would want to dismiss Chernobyl as anything other than a very serious incident but nuclear power’s safety record is still very good. The leak at Three Mile Island resulted in no deaths at the time and produced an average exposure to radiation for the local population equivalent to a single chest X-ray while Chernobyl was a uniquely Soviet disaster: poor design, a lax approach to safety and no accountability. In the 25 years since, until last Friday, nuclear plants have been operating successfully with barely a single major incident reported.

Let us see how Fukushima develops. The spectre of meltdown and fears of lethal radiation pouring forth into the atmosphere chills us all. But, to date, despite headlines about thousands dying after the blasts at Fukushima, no one has actually died from radiation. Thousands are dead and there was an explosion, but nobody has died as a consequence of the explosion. So far, what has happened represents an accident at a nuclear plant, not a nuclear disaster.

If Fukushima releases lethal radiation affecting thousands of people, it will become much harder politically for any government to push through a new nuclear programme. But that is not the situation currently. The injuries sustained have not been life-threatening and the radiation fallout has been relatively small. Accidents in the oil, coal and gas industries which supply Ireland with 90% of its power have killed and continue to kill far more people than nuclear power ever has.

Of course, nuclear power presents some serious problems, especially relating to decommissioning and disposal of waste. But if the Fukushima accident really does get recorded as the third-worst civil nuclear accident, it will be yet further testament to the safety of nuclear power. Even after an earthquake measuring 9.0 on the Richter scale, a resulting tsunami, and numerous powerful aftershocks on a 40-year-old plant, nuclear power remains safer than horse riding.