If the Japanese can't build a completely safe nuclear reactor, who can?

Increasingly, nuclear power is also promoted because it is safe. Which it is—except, of course, when it is not. The chances of a major disaster are tiny, 1-in-100 million. But in the event of a statistically improbable major disaster, the damage could include, say, the destruction of a city or the poisoning of a country. The cost of such a potential catastrophe is partly reflected in the price of plant construction and partly explains the cost overruns in Finland: Nobody can risk the tiniest flaw in the concrete or the most minimal reduction in the quality of the steel.

But as we are about to learn in Japan, the true costs of nuclear power are never reflected even in the very large price of plant construction. Inevitably, the enormous costs of nuclear waste disposal fall to taxpayers, not the nuclear industry. The costs of cleanup, even in the wake of a relatively small accident, are eventually borne by the government. The costs of health care will also be paid by society at large, one way or another. If there is true nuclear catastrophe in Japan, the entire world will pay the price.