International Law

SkyControl

By Karl-Friedrich Lenz

I am not sure if it will be possible to get some Zeppelin NT airships flying around Japan to monitor airborne radiation anytime soon. After my previous post I got a reply from a representative of the operating company. It seems I was the first one to contact them in the matter.

But I think it is very important now to beef up security for nuclear plants in Japan. If that does not happen, the irrational fear crowd might get away with sinking nuclear power here. That would of course lead to much increased CO2 emissions. In contrast to the limited and quickly declining damages from radiation, CO2 has the potential for global hell (a much more effective term than “global warming”).

One way to do this would be to have a Zeppelin NT airship float near to every nuclear plant. Have all kinds of radiation and temperature measurement equipment on board, as well as satellite communication. Have measuring stations on the ground all over the plant and make them accessible remotely from the airship.

The point of course is that with the airship permanently floating, there is no way it can be reached by either earthquake or tsunami. You would be assured that even in a worst case scenario no one thought of when building the plant you would at the very least have some communication and monitoring assets completely intact.

For example with the Fukushima accident, it would have been quite useful to look at the spent fuel pools from any angle so you know if there is water in there. That is easily done with an airship.

Of course, if we had that right now, the airships from the plants not damaged would all be at the Fukushima site in a matter of a couple of hours, boosting not only the shutdown and radiation monitoring capabilities, but also morals for the operators at the accident site.

Having a backup control center in the sky might be an excellent idea to enhance nuclear security. And “Skycontrol” has a nice ring to it for this particular idea.

Full post as published by Lenz Blog on March 26, 2011 (boomark / email).