Geir Aule Jenssen is a Norwegian electronic musician and composer who records as Biosphere. A resident of Tromsø within the Arctic Circle, Jenssen is well known for ambient and ambient house pieces, often inspired by Arctic or mountain settings, and his use of loops and peculiar samples from science fiction and natural sources. His 1997 album Substrata was voted by the users of the Hyperreal.org website in 2001 as the best all-time classic ambient album. He has also composed several film scores.
Monju (もんじゅ) was a Japanese sodium-cooled fast reactor, located near the Tsuruga Nuclear Power Plant, Fukui Prefecture. Its name is a reference to Manjusri. Construction started in 1986 and the reactor achieved criticality for the first time in April 1994. The reactor has been inoperative for most of the time since it was originally built. It was last operated in 2010 and is now closed.
Prior to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, Japan had generated 30% of its electrical power from nuclear reactors and planned to increase that share to 40%. Nuclear power energy was a national strategic priority in Japan. As of March 2020, of the 54 nuclear reactors in Japan, there were 42 operable reactors but only 9 reactors in 5 power plants were actually operating. A total of 24 reactors are scheduled for decommissioning or are in the process of being decommissioned. Others are in the process of being reactivated, or are undergoing modifications aimed to improve resiliency against natural disasters; Japan's 2030 energy goals posit that at least 33 will be reactivated by a later date.
Substrata is the third studio album by Norwegian electronic musician Geir Jenssen under the stage name Biosphere, released in 1997 by All Saints Records.
Patashnik is the second album by ambient house musician Biosphere. It was originally released in 1994 by Origo Sound in Norway and by Apollo in the rest of the world. Its track "Novelty Waves" was used for a 1995 Levi's ad campaign.
Dropsonde is an ambient album by musician Biosphere. Unlike his previous output, the album has a notable jazz influence.
The Mihama Nuclear Power Plant is operated by The Kansai Electric Power Company, Inc. and is in the town of Mihama, Fukui Prefecture, about 320 km west of Tokyo. It is on a site that is 520,000 m2 of which 60% is green space. Mihama - 1 was commissioned in 1970.
The Hamaoka Nuclear Power Plant is a nuclear power plant in the city of Omaezaki in Shizuoka Prefecture, on Japan's east coast, 200 km south-west of Tokyo. It is managed by the Chubu Electric Power Company. There are five units contained at a single site with a net area of 1.6 km2. The two oldest units were permanently shut down in 2009 and are currently being decommissioned. Three units Hamaoka-3, 4 and 5 are in long-term shutdown since the aftermath of the Fukushima accident in 2011. From 2011 to 2017 these units underwent significant safety upgrades to enhance their resistance against extreme environmental impacts such as earthquakes and tsunamis. In 2014, Chubu Electric submitted an application to resume power generation, but the review by the Nuclear Regulation Authority has been progressing slowly, and is still ongoing as of 2024. A sixth unit was proposed in 2008 but its construction has been deferred indefinitely.
The Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant genshiryoku hatsudensho, Onagawa NPP) is a nuclear power plant located on a 1,730,000 m2 site in Onagawa in the Oshika District and Ishinomaki city, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. It is managed by the Tohoku Electric Power Company. It was the most quickly constructed nuclear power plant in the world.
The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant is a disabled nuclear power plant located on a 3.5-square-kilometre (860-acre) site in the towns of Ōkuma and Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. The plant suffered major damage from the magnitude 9.1 earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan on March 11, 2011. The chain of events caused radiation leaks and permanently damaged several of its reactors, making them impossible to restart. The working reactors were not restarted after the events.
The Fukushima Daini Nuclear Power Plant Genshiryoku Hatsudensho, Fukushima II NPP, 2F) is a nuclear power plant located on a 150 ha (370-acre) site in the town of Naraha and Tomioka in the Futaba District of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) runs the plant.
The Tōkai Nuclear Power Plant was Japan's first commercial nuclear power plant. The first unit was built in the early 1960s to the British Magnox design, and generated power from 1966 until it was decommissioned in 1998. A second unit, built at the site in the 1970s, was the first in Japan to produce over 1000 MW of electricity. The site is located in Tokai in the Naka District in Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan and is operated by the Japan Atomic Power Company. The total site area amounts to 0.76 km2 with 0.33 km2, or 43% of it, being green area that the company is working to preserve.
The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant is a large, modern nuclear power plant on a 4.2-square-kilometer (1,000-acre) site. The campus spans the towns of Kashiwazaki and Kariwa in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, on the coast of the Sea of Japan, where it gets cooling water. The plant is owned and operated by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), and it is the largest nuclear generating station in the world by net electrical power rating.
The Tsuruga Nuclear Power Plant is located in the city of Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture, Japan. It is operated by the Japan Atomic Power Company (JAPC). The total site area is 5.12 square kilometres (1.98 sq mi) with 94% of it being green area that the company is working to preserve. The Tsuruga site is a dual site with the decommissioned prototype Fugen Nuclear Power Plant.
The Ōi Nuclear Power Plant, also known as Oi or Ohi, is a nuclear power plant located in the town of Ōi, Fukui Prefecture, managed by the Kansai Electric Power Company. The site is 1.88 square kilometers. Ōi Units 3 and 4 were taken offline in September 2013. In December 2017 Kansai Electric Power announced that it will decommission reactors no. 1 and 2 because of their age and the difficulty of making safety upgrades within their small containment vessels. Unit 3 was restarted on 14 March 2018, and unit 4 was restarted on 9 May 2018.
The Rokkasho Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing Facility is a nuclear reprocessing plant with an annual capacity of 800 tons of uranium or 8 tons of plutonium. It is owned by Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited (JNFL) and is part of the Rokkasho complex located in the village of Rokkasho in northeast Aomori Prefecture, on the Pacific coast of the northernmost part of Japan's main island of Honshu.
On 11 March 2011, at 14:46 JST, a 9.0–9.1 undersea megathrust earthquake occurred in the Pacific Ocean, 72 km (45 mi) east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region. It lasted approximately six minutes and caused a tsunami. It is sometimes known in Japan as the "Great East Japan Earthquake", among other names. The disaster is often referred to by its numerical date, 3.11.
The aftermath of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami included both a humanitarian crisis and massive economic impacts. The tsunami created over 300,000 refugees in the Tōhoku region of Japan, and resulted in shortages of food, water, shelter, medicine and fuel for survivors. 15,900 deaths have been confirmed. In response to the crisis, the Japanese government mobilized the Self-Defence Forces, while many countries sent search and rescue teams to help search for survivors. Aid organizations both in Japan and worldwide also responded, with the Japanese Red Cross reporting $1 billion in donations. The economic impact included both immediate problems, with industrial production suspended in many factories, and the longer term issue of the cost of rebuilding which has been estimated at ¥10 trillion.
Wireless: Live at the Arnolfini, Bristol is an ambient live album by Biosphere. It was recorded on 27 October 2007 at Bristol, United Kingdom. Biosphere performed tracks from some of his previous albums and also three new pieces.
Long one of the world's most committed promoters of civilian nuclear power, Japan's nuclear industry was not hit as hard by the effects of the 1979 Three Mile Island accident (USA) or the 1986 Chernobyl disaster (USSR) as some other countries. Construction of new plants continued to be strong through the 1980s and into the 1990s. However, starting in the mid-1990s there were several nuclear related accidents and cover-ups in Japan that eroded public perception of the industry, resulting in protests and resistance to new plants. These accidents included the Tokaimura nuclear accident, the Mihama steam explosion, cover-ups after accidents at the Monju reactor, and the 21 month shut down of the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant following an earthquake in 2007. Because of these events, Japan's nuclear industry has been scrutinized by the general public of the country.
