Fukushima goes Chernobyl.

[MadHound]

Despite the assurances of the nuclear lobby, TEPCO, the Japanese government and swarms of pro-nuclear lobbyists, Fukushima has indeed matched Chernobyl in severity, and could quite possibly grow worse.

"Japan's nuclear regulators raised the severity level of the crisis at a stricken nuclear plant Tuesday to rank it on par with the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

An official with the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan, speaking on national television, said the rating was being raised from 5 to 7 — the highest level on the international scale."
<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_japan_earthquake>

As radioactive material is spewed across the Japanese landscape, Japanese officials are now talking about having to cordon off hundreds of square miles surrounding the plant, essentially turning it into another dead zone. Meanwhile, across the world, levels of various radioactive isotopes are turning up in the water, soil, milk and plant matter, raising concerns that the fallout from Fukushima could have a devastating effect not just in Japan, but world wide.

Meanwhile, TEPCO, the ones responsible for this disaster, are still trying to hang on to the remaining plants and assets at the Fukushima site, and rather than opting to end this crisis by using the Chernobyl solution(concrete mixed with boric acid), they are continuing their futile fight by pumping in water, trying to cool the fuel and spent rods, sacrificing personnel and endangering Japan and the rest of the world. This is the insanity you get when you put a corporation in charge of disaster cleanup, an effort that is directed at saving corporate assets first, with saving lives and solving the problem coming in a distant second.

Immediately, what needs to be done is that the IAEA needs to step in and take control of this madness. The Japanese on the site have proven that they are either unable or unwilling to solve this disaster, so an outside agency needs to step in.

In the long run, nuclear power plants across the world need to be decommissioned and shut down. There is no longer a need to use nuclear power, and to continue to do so will only continue to endanger every single person on this planet. Nuclear power is not only dangerous and polluting, but it is more expensive than using green renewables such as solar and wind.

It is time to bring the nuclear era to an end, give it up as a bad experiment and move on. If that doesn't happen, then we can expect another such disaster approximately every generation until we finally wake up to the madness that mankind has spawned.