"Japan insists its nuclear crisis was caused by an unforeseeable combination of tsunami and earthquake. But new evidence suggests its reactors were doomed to fail."

David McNeill and Jake Adelstein report for the Independent August 17, 2011. [2]

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[3]

The planned evacuation for Arizona's Palo Verde nuclear power plant is only 10 miles, while the Nuclear Regulatory Commission called for evacuation of Americans within 50 miles of Japan's stricken Fukushima plant. Are safety plans enough?

"About two dozen environmental groups launched a volley of legal challenges at nuclear regulators on Thursday in an attempt to stall action to extend the operation of aging reactors and to delay construction of more advanced nuclear designs."

"SCRIBA, N.Y. — Officials at Constellation Energy are investigating a leakage in a containment structure that caused the shutdown of the Nine Mile Point Unit 2 reactor on Lake Ontario over the weekend.

In the days after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown began, Japanese officials let evacuees go into areas of high radiation, downplaying and withholding information about the danger."

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing an effort to determine the extent of contamination at a former uranium mining site on the Navajo Nation that marked a high priority for assessment."

"Japan will sack three top energy officials over their handling of the Fukushima atomic disaster and scandals that have fuelled public mistrust in the country's nuclear policy, the government said Thursday."

"Partisan bickering erupted in the Senate [Tuesday] over how quickly the federal government should implement a dozen safety recommendations to ensure 104 nuclear plants in the United States are operating safely."

The former Rocky Flats federal nuclear plant was supposedly cleaned up before it was repurposed as a National Wildlife Refuge. But lack of money and invasive plants may keep plutonium worries alive.

"The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is approaching completion of an ambitious study that concludes that a meltdown at a typical American reactor would lead to far fewer deaths than previously assumed."