They really seem to be floundering from plan to plan, but at least they’ve recognized that pouring radioactive water into the sea isn’t making things any better:
TOKYO — An adviser to Prime Minister Naoto Kan indicated Sunday that a plan to flood and cool the No. 1 reactor’s containment vessel at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant with water will be abandoned as holes have been created by melted nuclear fuel at the bottom of the pressure vessel.
Goshi Hosono, tasked with handling the nuclear crisis, told TV programs, however, that the government will keep intact the ‘‘road map’’ devised by plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co to bring the Nos. 1 to 3 reactors under control within six to nine months.
On the original plan to completely submerge the 4-meter-tall fuel rods by filling the vessel with water, Hosono said, ‘‘We should not cause the (radioactive) water to flow into the sea by taking such a measure.’‘
Hosono said that the government will instead consider ways to decontaminate water used to cool fuel in the reactor so that the water can be reused.
In the meantime, it looks like the quake took out the reactor before the tsunami got there.
And in other news, TEPCO is maneuvering to have Japan’s taxpayers pick up the cleanup bill. How… American!
