It will take until March 2015 to build, cost $320 million and use enough power each day to run 3300 Japanese households. Yet the country's government this week decided a wall of ice is the best solution to stem the flow of radioactive water leaking from Fukushima Daiichi's four stricken nuclear reactors.
The wall is the centrepiece of a $470 million drive to stop 400 tonnes of groundwater being contaminated every day. It is currently being stored in an ever-increasing number of huge tanks.
Kajima Corporation will build the 1.4-kilometre wall by sinking pipes carrying freezing fluids into the ground, gradually freezing it to form a barrier of permafrost 30 metres deep, down to the bedrock. This will force the water to drain into the sea instead.
Similar ice walls have been used in the US for years, in projects to secure mine shafts and contain contamination, for example. The cost of the project includes $150 million to reduce contamination of the stored water so it can be dumped at sea, a strategy backed by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
This article will appear in print under the headline "Icing Fukushima"
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