Cringely (who was a gov’t investigator on Three Mile Island) explains why Sec. of State Hillary Clinton saying the US military had delivered “coolant” to the reactors implies the reactors are probably permanently dead and will never generate power again. But the threat is still very real.
I’m guessing the US Navy delivered a load of sodium polyborate from some nuclear aircraft carrier reactor supply room in the Pacific Fleet. Its use indicates that the nuclear threat is even worse than presently being portrayed in the news.
An earthquake with such loss of life is bad enough, but Japan has also just lost 20 percent of its electric generating capacity. And I’ll go out on a limb here and predict that none of those 11 reactors will re-enter service again, they’ve been so compromised.
That means all their other power plants are working overtime to meet demand (which is currently less than normal, considering that some areas are off-line or no longer exist.)
The authorities are being much too perky about how the reactors just need to be burped or something and then everything will be fine, just fine.