Satellite photos captured by NASA’s Landsat 8 present how Fukushima, Japan has reworked since a tsunami devastated the area in 2011, setting off a nuclear catastrophe that’s nonetheless being cleaned up. Today, huge areas of photo voltaic panels could be seen overlaying the land round Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

A slider image released by NASA’s Earth Observatory exhibits the stark distinction within the area from 2014 to 2021. The picture under, captured on April 13, 2014, exhibits the world simply three years after the earthquake and subsequent tsunami, which killed greater than 15,000 people. The more moderen picture, proven above, was taken March 31, 2021 and exhibits latest photo voltaic panel installations. According to Japan’s Nikkei newspaper, the federal government there’s investing billions to show the world right into a hub for photo voltaic and wind energy.

Following the nuclear catastrophe, Fukushima’s regional authorities set a purpose of totally counting on renewable power by the yr 2040 so as to resolve the huge hole left behind by the destruction of the ability plant. Nuclear energy as soon as offered about a quarter of Japan’s electricity. But for the reason that nuclear meltdown, Japan has elevated its dependence on different kinds of power sources. (Nuclear power is just not technically renewable, however it doesn’t produce greenhouse gasoline emissions.) Renewable power accounted for 43% of Fukushima’s power consumption in 2020, a significant improve from 24% in 2011, according to The Japan Times. On the opposite hand, the nation has additionally more and more relied on coal and pure gasoline as an alternative choice to nuclear power, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Cleanup on the nuclear plant has been gradual going and immensely difficult. Earlier this yr, a robotic probe managed to seize pictures of what seem like melted globs of nuclear gasoline. Controversially, officers have determined to dump radioactive water into the ocean, angering the native fishing business.