Nuclear power plants are surrounded by two "emergency planning zones" developed out of accident analyses conducted in the 1960s and 1970s: a roughly 10-mile radius around the plant that must anticipate being exposed to a radioactive plume and a roughly 50-mile radius around the plant that must prepare for possibly being exposed to radioactive particles that drop out of a plume. be evacuated-or take some form of protective action-in time in similar circumstances? In the wake of the meltdowns in Japan and subsequent evacuations, could all these people in the U.S. That number swells when the radius extends outward to 50 miles to affect more than 180 million Americans, and includes major metropolitan areas such as New York City, Philadelphia, San Diego and even West Palm Beach, Fla. In fact, in the U.S., more than four million Americans live within 10 miles of the 63 sites of nuclear power plants with at least one operating reactor, according to data compiled by the NRC based on the 2000 census. "That would be our evacuation recommendation." "If this happened in the U.S., we would go out to 50 miles," said Bill Borchardt, NRC executive director for operations on March 17, according to transcripts of the days following the catastrophe. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) was already considering urging Americans within 50 miles of the stricken nuclear reactors to evacuate, given an explosion in Unit 1 that destroyed the reactor building and exposed spent nuclear fuel and other radioactive materials to the air. On March 11, 2011, Japan suffered a massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami that destroyed roads, bridges, and buildings killed nearly 16,000 people and critically disabled three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
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