On Tuesday, Japanese officials deployed a long, skinny robot. It will go to the bottom of a nuclear reactor. Its mission will last two weeks. But it’s just part of a much longer effort.
The robot entered the ruins of the Fukushima nuclear power plant. There, it will grab a tiny bit of melted fuel. Scientists will study the sample. It could help them learn how clean up the disaster site.
What caused the mess? In March 2011, a tsunami hit Japan. The giant wave rose 13 stories tall. Many people died. The wave also struck the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
Nuclear power plants use radioactive material to make electricity. (Learn more about that in The Shocking Story of Electricity.) Cooling systems keep the material from melting. But when the tsunami hit, Fukushima lost power. The safety systems failed. Lava-like material spewed into the air and water. That material can sicken and kill. Even today, the site remains dangerous.
Japan is still cleaning up the area. The process could last a century. Can one little robot help?
Workers used pipes to push the robot into a reactor. Now that it is inside, they can control it remotely. The robot has tongs, a light, and a camera. It will grab a tenth of an ounce of melted fuel. (That’s a tiny amount. For comparison, a can of soda is 12 ounces.) Then it will come home. The bot moves slowly to avoid getting stuck.
Lake Barrett spent years working for the U.S. Department of Energy. He has experience helping clean up nuclear disasters. “It’s a long, long road ahead,” he says. He says the goal is to collect all the melted fuel. Officials will put the debris in specially designed canisters. Then they will store it safely.
Fukushima faces the poison of nuclear contamination. The Bible tells us about another sort of contamination. When humans sinned, creation fell under a curse. Death and disaster entered the world. But through Jesus, God brings healing. As Christians, we can take part in God’s big clean-up project!
For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. — Romans 8:20-21
