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Lessons for the future from past nuclear accidents

Why Iran should follow the South Korean model of nuclear development, reaping enormous economic benefits by eschewing the uranium enrichment that worries the world

Inside DARPA’s competition to build a better humanitarian-assistance and disaster-relief robot.

The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station needs a new plan for dealing with millions of gallons of radioactive water on its grounds. The plan should include better public outreach, improved cleanup processes and capacities, and, when radiation standards are met, a controlled release of water into the sea.

The early decommissioning of San Onofre shows the need for closer scrutiny of decisions to repair or build nuclear power plants. 

From 2005 to 2011, China rapidly developed its nuclear power capacity. In 2010 alone, it began operations at two new reactors and broke ground on 10 more, accounting for more than 60 percent of new reactor construction worldwide and making the Chinese nuclear industry by far the fastest-growing in the world. By the end of 2010, China had 14 nuclear reactors in operation with a total capacity of about 11 gigawatts electric, or GWe.

China, like all nuclear weapon states, bears a responsibility to provide leadership in nuclear security issues. But China's strategy for securing its nuclear weapons -- and the complex of facilities where fissile material for weapons is fabricated and stored -- has so far remained largely opaque.

In 1954, Lewis Strauss, then chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, gave a speech in which he famously predicted that "our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter." Whether he was talking about fission reactors or a secret fusion project is unclear, but he was wrong in either case. What did turn out to be too cheap to meter, however, was water.

Before the Fukushima nuclear disaster, China had a relatively small fleet of 14 nuclear reactor units with a relatively small capacity -- less than 12 gigawatts of electricity -- but the country had big nuclear plans. It led the world in new reactor construction, with 27 units under way, five units approved and awaiting construction, and another 16 units scheduled. If all current construction went forward as planned, the country would be ensured of reaching its original target of 40 gigawatts of nuclear-generated electric capacity by 2020.