Siting: Nuclear Power Plants in the Agricultural Hinterland

The 2011 earthquake and tsunami that hit Fukishima Diachii Nuclear Power Plant disabled and ultimately crippled the nuclear power reactors. With reactor vessels and containment structures breached, massive amounts of radioactive material, such as Cesium 137, were released into the atmosphere spreading as far as the western coast of the United States. Displacing nearly 300000 people and rendering 30 sq km of land uninhabitable, this incident brought to the forefront the volatility of nuclear power reactor accidents and arose questions about how to plan and design for such massive breaches of radioactive containment. [1]