Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Japan Nuclear Crisis Still a Serious Concern - Henry Palermo

http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre72a0ss-us-japan-quake/

The article essentially summarizes the impact that the recent earthquake and tsunami is having on Nuclear reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. One of the main concerns is that the plant is 150 miles north of Tokyo. The plant had been beaten by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake which has led to the need of workers to try and contain the reactors before they release excess radiation and perhaps explode. The earthquake has had a serious effect on Japan’s economy, as many countries have refused Japan’s exports. In order to hinder the potential disaster workers are using helicopters and spraying water on the reactors to prevent them from overheating. The risks that Tokyo is facing go as far as Japanese families being urged to prevent their infants from drinking tap water. Some Tokyo authorities said that water at a purification plant is more than twice the safety level for infants.
The effects that this will have on us seem pretty minimal at first. Japan is on the opposite end of the earth as us, yet the economic effects and the effects on the imports that we have from Japan are probably our greatest concern from this tragedy, aside from trying to aid the people who have been devastated in Japan. Another effect that comes indirectly from this disaster is the effect it will have on the nuclear power industry as an alternative to oil and natural gas. This is especially important to people in our area because the Indian Point power plant uses nuclear power.
Overall I thought that this article was very well done, and extremely timely. My only conniption would be that outside of mentioning the effects on people in Tokyo, the writer doesn’t delve deeper into the damage that has already been done by both the earthquake and the tsunami. Yet I still believe that this was a very informative and interesting article.

2 comments:

Jack Deasy said...

I thought that overall Henry did a very good job at presenting us with the information from his article. I liked how he related the article back to us. He brought up a very god point about Indian Point power plant. Also, I liked how he told us about how the earthquake was affecting the Japanese economy. The reason being is that people don’t want to buy things from there. Finally, I liked how he told us about how the tap water in Japan is being affected by high amounts of radiation.
Even though Henry did a good job at relating this article back to us he could have done a better job. I fell like he could have gone into more detail about Indian Point and how they are trying to become more prepared incase an earthquake ever hits near to there. Also, he could have given us a little more information about the actual power plant in Japan.
I was very impressed by the overall information that this article gave us and how it gave me a much better understanding of what is happening in Japan.

Austin Engros said...

1. I liked how he mentioned how the earthquake is affecting the Japanese economy.
2. I like how he explains how they are trying to resolve the issue of the reactors overheating. He explains the steps they are taking to avoid the spread of radiation.
3. He explains well how this terrible event in Japan is going to significantly affect our lives in America as well.

1. It could have been longer and given more details about how it is going to affect the economies of the world.
2. He could have explained more about the nuclear reactors and how they are in creating possibly huge problems.

1. I did not know that the water purification was so bad in Japan at the moment. I did not know that it was recorded as twice the safety level for infants.