Thursday 14 June 2012

Michigan nuclear reactor shut after leak

With thanks to CollapseNet


Michigan: Early Guinea Pig And Now Poster Boy (video)



UPDATE 2-Entergy Michigan reactor shut after leak
They have to be downplaying this to avoid a panic (especially the sensitivity towards nuclear power post-Fukushima).


You should now be getting alarmed for humans living around this and other 40+ year old (unintentionally long-lived) nuclear reactors around the world.   These reactors were built for long use, but not longer than 40 years.  Their builders could not guarantee a plant to function properly past 40 years for safety concerns.  I am sure they were prudent; their children would be raised nearby.   And they had been told (sold) the idea that these nuclear plants would be replaced after the guarantee date...  this never happened.   The Entergy Nuclear Corp was given an extension to operate this facility until the year 2031... a 60 year lifespan.  


Weren't we running short of engineers?

Now read this article:

Michigan set to step in as Detroit nears financial collapse

Michigan and other Rust Belt residents were once the heart of the now dying global industrial civilization.  They were among the first to receive the many privileges awarded during the booming post WWII industrial years:
  • High rate of home ownership
  • Access to essentially free and quality higher education
  • Access to cheap and quality medicine/nutrition
  • Cheap energy and fuel (natural gas, coal, NUCLEAR, petroleum products, etc...)
  • Modern appliances
  • Disposal income
  • Secure union protected employment with secure retirement.
(Essentially it was economic socialism backed by free energy.  Now that energy is running out: peak oil)

The children of the top became greedy and didn't want to share anymore and began cutting back on the privileges.   The children of of the bottom and middle class are now are struggling to stay afloat.  Will the infrastructure built by their parents survive for their own children to use safely in the future? 

Probably not, unless major social-economic, and therefore, cultural changes happen quickly.  And globally.

If the change to a sustainable and environmentally conscious living happens soon enough, people can save their diseased homelands from living in a nuclear wasteland.


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