Too much information coming in all at once. What a frantic scramble it must be for those in Japan trying to cope with this DISASTER (alert to Joe Offer, please strike "looming" in thread title).

"In addition, the quake disabled all external power lines at a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in Aomori Prefecture. The cooling systems here are still running on emergency diesel power." Ugh!!!

Believe it or not nuclear fuel reprocessing plants are even more dangerous to the environment than nuclear plants; that's the main reason why after our first one in West Valley (1966-1972), New York, failed to function properly the nuclear industry refused to invest in another one. These plants collect used nuclear fuel, have a huge inventory, and then re-concentrate the spent fuel into viable fuel rods again, in the process creating huge volumes of lower level radioactive waste. One of the byproducts of reprocessing is Plutonium, which is why in 1977 President Carter banned private companies from developing such plants. President Reagan lifted the ban in 1981 but no private US company has considered this a viable investment without substantial government subsidies.

There are some 15 nuclear fuel reprocessing plants still operating around the world.

Miskin-

Thanks for sharing your fears about nuclear power accidents, along with your conviction that we need to continue to rely on it while learning lessons from the mistakes.

Charley Noble