A litany of nuclear accidents contradicts Obama's claims
November 5, 2009 President Obama was clearly woefully misinformed when he stated recently that Japan has employed “nuclear energy in a safe and effective way.” Japan has a history of tragic and fatal accidents at its nuclear power facilities. In 1995, the Monju fast breeder reactor suffered a serious fire and sodium leak and was closed. In 1997, a waste-storage reprocessing plant at the Tokai facility burned and exploded. In 1999, there was a criticality accident at the Tokaimura uranium enrichment facility that killed two workers and exposed many hundreds of local residents to radioactivity. In 2007, an earthquake resulted in the release of radioactivity into the ocean from the Kashiwazaki Kariwa nuclear power plant, the world’s largest with seven reactors. Five of the seven reactors are still closed.