Fukushima was a freak event in an old power station with inadequate sea defences. Simply building another 2m on top of the wall would have been enough until the station lost its licence due to age.
I'd like to think the right managers and authorities will do the right thing in such situations. But empirically, they didn't.
Perhaps it's a specific failing of the Japanese governance regime, and knowing their own affairs more than we do, they don't have sufficient confidence they can fix that failing before another 'freak' event occurs.
Had it been a gas plant or whatever, it wouldn't have mattered. But it was a nuclear plant, and in a nuclear plant any improbable event like that is a major f* up. That's the core issue.
The numbers I heard a while was something like after first use uranium is 95-97% power, can be reused down to 15-25%. I haven't heard anyone getting this far with it, or even predictions of how radioactive it would be then.
I'd like to think the right managers and authorities will do the right thing in such situations. But empirically, they didn't.
Perhaps it's a specific failing of the Japanese governance regime, and knowing their own affairs more than we do, they don't have sufficient confidence they can fix that failing before another 'freak' event occurs.