Fukushima Radiation Leak ,Japan Earthquake Blast-Confirmed!(Video)

“There hasn’t been any significant release of radiation. So obviously they must be doing something right at this point,” said Singer. While acknowledging that the crisis is still in early stages, Singer argued in our interview, and earlier to the Wall Street Journal, that Americans should be reassured because the industry will learn from the accidents in Japan, where fail-safe systems have themselves failed.

As of midday Sunday, the New York Times reported that partial meltdowns had likely occurred at two reactors after backup cooling systems failed. Concern focused in particular on the Fukushima Daiichi plant in northeast Japan, where an outer containment wall was destroyed in an explosion Saturday. Roughly 150 people have reportedly been exposed to radiation near or inside the plant, though the severity of the exposure is unclear.

The New York Times’ front page led with a banner headline, “Japanese Scramble to Avert Nuclear Meltdowns,” while the Washington Post featured stories variously labeled “Radiation Danger,” “Reactor Emergency,” and “Nuclear Crisis.” Many press reports conclude that the current crisis is the worst since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in what is now Ukraine, where an explosion spread a cloud of nuclear fallout over large sections of the Soviet Union and eastern Europe…..

In the United States, the political backdrop for the Japanese crisis is a recent bipartisan embrace of nuclear power. President Obama last year announced $8 billion in loan guarantees for a pair of new reactors in Georgia. After more than 30 years of no new reactor construction in America, Singer said that four new reactors — in Georgia, Tennessee, and South Carolina — are expected to be online by 2020. Part of the reason for the three-decade lull was public fear generated by the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania in 1979.

“The Japanese plants have been run very safely and reliably for a very long time. They have operated quite safely,” he said, adding: “Actually, they withstood the earthquake quite well. It’s the tsunami that caused the problems with the backup generators.”

A state of emergency has been declared for three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility, the same place where an explosion late Saturday injured four people. A meltdown is a catastrophic failure of the reactor core, with a potential for widespread radiation release. Toshihiro Bannai, an official with Japan’s nuclear and industrial safety agency, expressed confidence that efforts to contain the crisis would be successful.

Meanwhile, a second reactor at the same facility failed shortly after 5 a.m. Sunday, the Tokyo Electric Power Company said, according to TV Asahi. The power company said that it was having difficulty cooling the reactor and may need to release radioactive steam in order to relieve pressure.