(Newswire.net — May 29, 2017) — The US has been underestimating the safety risk from its nuclear facilities that could lead to a worse accident than the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, the Science Daily reports.
According to a new study, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NCR) is ignoring the facts indicating that a single incident can lead to a major disaster.
In a study published on May 26 in the Science magazine, researchers from Princeton University and the Union of Concerned Scientists warned that nuclear spent fuel fire at one site can lead to “trillion-dollar consequences” and terrific scenarios worse than those caused by the explosion and the leakage of radioactive water from reactors at Fukushima, which was the biggest nuclear disaster of this century so far.
Hypothetically, fire would contaminate an area larger than New Jersey and force mass relocations, according to the study.
The researchers simulated a scenario according to which spilled fuel catches fire at Peach Bottom nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, causing a domino effect and the relocation of some eight million people, while also inducing $2 trillion in damages.
The potential disaster would further impact a small part of Pennsylvania and Philadelphia and also reach New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut. Spreading further, the wave could contaminate almost the entire East Coast from South Carolina to Maine, within just three months, the simulation showed.
The researchers say that this frightening scenario can be avoided if spent fuel is not housed in the pools which are used at almost all US nuclear plants to store and cool used radioactive material.
The researchers proposed that spent fule be transfered to dry storage casks after it is cooled in pools for around five years, but the NRC, which has previously considered such measures, decided the move would be too costly.
One of the study authors, Frank von Hippel, directly blames the NRC for downgrading the potential risk of fire spreading through nuclear facilities.
“The NRC has been pressured by the nuclear industry, directly and through Congress, to low-ball the potential consequences of a fire because of concerns that increased costs could result in shutting down more nuclear power plants,” Von Hippel said as cited by Science Daily.
“Unfortunately, if there is no public outcry about this dangerous situation, the NRC will continue to bend to the industry’s wishes,” Von Hippel noted.
At least three major nuclear incidents were registered in the US last year, but the media withheld the information from the public, acording to anonhq.com, the website of an independent and investigative news organization.