The nuclear power plant meltdowns in Fukushima is probably one of the worst meltdowns in modern times, following the Chernobyl disaster back in 1986. Now Japan is a country that loves to recycle (if you’ve been there and were intimidated by its recycling bins, don’t worry we’ve been there), so much so that they are looking to not waste anything, even if it means irradiated timber from Fukushima.According to a report from Bloomberg, it seems that the Japanese government has turned to a German company called Entrade Energiesysteme AG who will be using the irradiated timber to generate power. The company has setup 400 container-sized biomass-to-power machines in the Fukushima Prefecture and by next year it will be able to generate 20 megawatts of power.
The idea is to help reduce the mass of lightly irradiated wood waste by as much as 99.5%. Speaking to Bloomberg, the company’s Chief Executive Officer Julien Uhlig said, “Burning won’t destroy radiation but we can shrink detritus to ash and create a lot of clean power at the same time. There’s a lot of excitement about this project but I also detected a high degree of reluctance in Fukushima to talk about radiation.”
It also seems that this won’t be just some kind of temporary measure. The prefecture plans to ultimately generate 100% of its power from renewable energy sources by 2040, which is admittedly a stark contrast to the nuclear power plants that used to operate in the area.
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