Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear Disaster Hardcover – February 11, 2014

This is eminently readable, so don't be put off by reviewers who claim it is technical. The first third of the book attempts an account of the events leading up to the disaster. The rest of the book describes the political/regulatory scene in Japan afterwards, and relates it to the same in the U.S.What it does of that, it does reasonably well. The event summary suffers, a little, from not following key players and getting direct interviews with management and workers, before and after. I really didn't pick up anything new that I hadn't already gleaned from internet reports.There's also nothing new in the focus of the last half of the book, the contention that design planning for nuclear reactors is geared not toward real world events, but real world events that are economically feasible for the industries to plan against. That's been true for fifty years. For example, when it was discovered it wasn't economically feasible to design a containment that could handle a telephone pole slammed against a containment building by 150 MPH winds of a tornado, criteria were relaxed from the telephone pole to a 4" X 12" plank. The authors have made clear that even post Fukushima, while there was talk of better design, contingency plans, things soon settled back into business as usual. The contingencies plans nearly always, and still, assume a singular failure, rather than multiple failures, ignoring that when things go wrong, they go wrong in spades.The fact is, nuclear power isn't safe. The proof that its own industry recognizes that , is that they seek protection from liability in the form of the Price-Anderson Nuclear indemnities act. The industry is only willing to cover a small fraction of the damage from any accident, and after that, the home/business owner and the taxpayer is on the hook for their disasters. If nuclear disasters were as far fetched as the industry likes to claim, then you and I could get our homes fully insured for damage/radiation caused by a plant accident. Or the industry would band together and collectively offer their own insurance for a disaster in their ranks. As it is, no insurance company will touch it, the industries won't gamble on it, and congress had to bail the industry out with a legal indemnification or it would not be able to operate.That's also where this book falls short. It details little of the citizenry displaced by this uninsured disaster, caused by poor planning, poor regulations and incompetent power company management. The people who suffer, what their stories were, and their future prospects are ciphers.Ditto for the cleanup efforts for the reactors and the fuel storage tanks. It moves from the immediate disaster to regulatory concerns. Very little of the aftermath is covered.While it mentions a tiny bit about fallout on the U.S., it doesn't really cover much - not how reporting stations in the U.S. stopped publishing reports of fallout, how standards for minimum dangerous fallout were silently raised post disaster. Government monitoring stations in Ca stopped publishing figures on the internet. The incidence of measurable radiation from Fukushima in rainwater - even in Pennsylvania - went under reported. This was perhaps outside the scope of the book, But I still found it interesting that even coverage of the disaster by the major U.S. news networks wasn't mentioned. I followed the news closely. I remember clearly how the news was dominated by plant operator experts claiming there was no danger of a meltdown, even after the containment buildings blew from hydrogen explosions, even when radiation reports indicated otherwise.. And then, when the fallout began to be measured without any misinterpretation, the 'experts' disappeared from the news and then all coverage suddenly shifted to the war in Libya and Fukushima fell from the screen except in cryptic reports. Given a large portion of this book dealt with collusion between government and the industry, it would have been appropriate, I felt, to have included the press seeming willingness to mislead and then, when the meltdown was obvious in the radiation readings, to stop posting accounts of the disaster except in the most perfunctory way.This was markedly different during the Chernobyl disaster. Being that was a Soviet plant, a cold war enemy at the time, and of a design not promoted by American industries and used in the U.S., the press felt free, or were allowed, to post very critical and detailed accounts. But now, because Fukushima was a reactor similar to many operating in the U.S., with the same potential issues (I have Mark I reactors nearby me), once the meltdowns began, the major news networks virtually shut down the story. There's a story, if any investigative reporters with enough conscience to tell it or news sources with enough independence would take it on. Sadly most U.S. media is held by only a few big companies.So there are short-comings in this account, and short-comings pertinent to Fukushima. It was disappointing that so much of the book doesn't deal with Fukushima and the disaster directly. Much of the content in this book could be placed in a book detailing the shortcomings of the nuclear industry in general, detailing issues with plants in the U.S. and Japan. It would be fine if that content was in addition to a thorough study of Fukushima. But as others have noted, the book ends its focus on Fukushima before the half way mark, and never returns to clean up, population displacement, detailed radiation fallout findings and other issues related to the disaster. I was hoping for much of that, because this is a unique opportunity to gather and present those in a readable fashion for the general public. There the book fell short.I do think it is worth reading regardless that it seems to have been an attempt to relate the story of regulatory collusion between industry and government, more than the account of this specific incident. But perhaps the authors couldn't bear to pass up the opportunity to present their story on that, with the Fukushima lead- in. Still, I await a more definitive account of the disaster that perhaps will cover those elements I found lacking.

I liked the reportorial style of writing. I am not a person usually interested in science or energy, but am greatly interested in nature and man’s lack of respect for things he can’t predict. This book outlines the Japanese governments mismanagement of the Fukushima reactors in the aftermath of a mega earthquake and tsunami. It could happen again, anywhere.

Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear DisasterExcept for a few instances, Fuku is an even-handed book. however, careful reading reveals an anti-nuclear bias."Fukushima" gave me pause in its brief introduction, where I read that “many in the US, Japan and elsewhere are pushing hard to defend the status quo and hold fast to the assertion that severe accidents are so unlikely that they require scant advance planning.” Really? How “many” is “many?” And who are these people who oppose advance planning re. accidents?Chapter 1 describes the events of March 11, the day of the tsunami – and it does it well – but on page 27, a two page insert begins that discusses radiation and its effects on the body. While that’s timely, no mention is made of LNT theory or its flaws, though the subject appears briefly (and inadequately) later in the book.Chapter 2 is notable for its apparently accurate description of the relationship of Tepco and the Japanese government agencies, which it termed “incestuous.” Moving on, it reviewed events at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, but for some reason neglected to note that Chernobyl lacked a robust containment structure that is required elsewhere in the world - structure that could have greatly reduced the disaster if it had been in place.Then, on page 48, I learned something new – that “Tepco had been falsifying safety records for years.”The writers are competent, and their research impressive, but I’d complain that the subject of LNT, which finally showed up on page 216, received little comprehensive attention, and nothing like the information in Robert Hargrave’s Radiation: the Facts, was included. That information is available free from [email protected], the authors avoided a golden opportunity to point out that if the Fukushima reactors had been Molten Salt Reactors, there would have been no crisis. Neither did they mention that Tepco’s Onagawa plant on the same coast, which had a much higher seawall, easily survived the event.Fukushima, though tarred as a nuclear failure, was caused by a long chain of corporate indifference, rule-breaking, penny pinching and lying combined with a government “oversight” panel that failed to do its job.Grade C book, well written, but flawed by what it should have included, but didn’t. George Erickson - [...], member- Union of Concerned Scientists, past V P American humanist Assoc.

An interesting book that unfortunately often reads like a polemic. When I bought it I hadn't realised that it was a collaborative effort with the Union of Concerned Scientists. A group with a well known bias, this is reflected throughout the book when every human error is given sinister connotations. Sadly this detracts from the central message. If this book had been more factual and less bombastic, it would enjoy far greater credibility.

A chilling and detailed account of a disaster that is still unfolding. One that came close to being catastrophic. This book exposes the frail optimistic outlook of scientist and engineers that continues to blind them to a holistic view of the risks of such undertakings. Essential reading.

very interesting.

This book is necessary reading for all politicians supporting nuclear power

I bought this, hoping for an even-handed summary of the facts of Fukushima from the Union of Concerned Scientists. I am disappointed. The book clearly proceeds from an agenda against the NRC, and its equivalent in Japan. The authors are nominally concerned with the health effects of radiation and radioactive material, yet the treatment of radiation dosimetry is superficial and biased, and consideration of actual doses rates (by means of which one could assess the consequences) slighted in favor of hyperbole. Classically, "radiation" and "radioactivity" are routinely conflated.For example, biological effects of ionizing radiation is summarized on pp 27-28: rem is "radiation equivalent in man" not "radiation exposure man". The accepted stochastic risk is than acute exposure to 100 rem raises lifetime risk of cancer by 0.8%: the text says 10 rem raises it 1%, a serious misrepresentation of more than ten-fold. Radiation "hormesis" is raised as a bogeyman, pseudo-science that is pushed by advocates of nuclear energy, when it is not.