Japan - 9.0 Earthquake-Tsunami -Reactor Status, 2011 #6

[Quiche]

Our NRC is still selling this load of BS, mo. :tsktsk:


U.S. Reactor Review Finds No Need for Quick Action, NRC Says

Quote: The situation in Japan “has definitely improved,” although the plant isn’t yet “quite stable,” Borchardt said. “The Japanese are making progress.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-...risis-definitely-improved-nrc-reports-1-.html

 

[Daisyjane]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-27/tokyo-water-radiation-falls-to-zero-for-first-time-since-crisis.html

Radiation readings at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi station rose to the highest since an earthquake and tsunami knocked out cooling systems, impeding efforts to contain the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.

Two robots sent into the reactor No. 1 building at the plant yesterday took readings as high as 1,120 millisierverts of radiation per hour, Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at Tokyo Electric Power Co., said today. That’s more than four times the annual dose permitted to nuclear workers at the stricken plant.

Radiation from the station, where four of six reactors have been damaged by explosions, has forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of people and contaminated farmland and drinking water. A plan to flood the containment vessel of reactor No. 1 with more water to speed up emergency cooling efforts announced yesterday by the utility known as Tepco may not be possible now.

“Tepco must figure out the source of high radiation,” said Hironobu Unesaki, a nuclear engineering professor at Kyoto University. “If it’s from contaminated water leaking from inside the reactor, Tepco’s so-called water tomb may be jeopardized because flooding the containment vessel will result in more radiation in the building.”

 

[Quiche]

Greenpeace says Japan restricting its radiation tests

TOKYO - GREENPEACE said on Thursday Japan had blocked it from testing seawater and marine life for radiation from a stricken nuclear plant in territorial waters that extend 20km offshore.

http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Asia/Story/STIStory_662323.html

 

[Quiche]

Tepco Slows Water Injection at Fukushima Reactor to Curb Risk of Explosion

Quote: Electric Power Co. slowed the pace of water injection into one of the six reactors at its crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear station after a drop in pressure and temperature increased the risk of an explosion.

and

“When the pressure inside the reactor containment vessel falls below that of the atmosphere, air could enter through gaps and mix with hydrogen and cause an explosion,” Kazuhiko Kudo, a research professor of nuclear engineering at Kyushu University, said by telephone today.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-...ion-at-reactor-to-curb-risk-of-explosion.html

 

[Quiche]

Volunteers rush to tsunami-hit areas during holidays

Quote: Nearly 8,000 volunteers might work along the northern Pacific coast on each day during the holiday week, more than three times the level until now, the Yomiuri Shimbun estimated.

Sudden rushes of volunteers have already overwhelmed local officials, who have on occasion been unable to immediately find work for out-of-town guests who showed up unexpectedly, local media said.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/af...ocId=CNG.de91b56f8456056a3aee9514e682a9d5.661

 

[Quiche]

Japanese Nuclear Adviser Quits

Quote: A special advisor to the Japanese government on radiation safety resigned Friday, saying that he was dissatisfied with the handling of the ongoing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703567404576293201211871250.html

I don't have a subscription, but this blurb is information enough for me! This is a frightening sign that the blundering status is going to continue, imo.

eta: Here is another article about this resignation-- it is in protest to the standards for radiation allowed at elementary schools.

Government Adviser Quits Post to Protest Japan's Policy on Radiation Exposure for Fukushima Schools

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/04/government-adviser-quits-post-to.html?ref=hp

 

[Quiche]

http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/

Baseball, soccer, ballet Afghanistan,... nothing about their crisis. Incredible.

 

[Quiche]

Groups FOIA U.S. data on Fukushima radiation

Quote: “The radiation monitoring information being collected by the U.S. Government in Japan is of urgent interest to the public in the U.S. and internationally and we expect an expedited response to the FOIA request,” Tom Clements, Southeastern nuclear campaign coordinator for Friends of the Earth said in a statement. “If the full data set is not immediately released, the government can rightly be accused of attempting to cover up the radiation threat posed by the disaster. This would severely undermine regulators’ credibility.”

<removed broken link.>

 

[essies]

TEPCO Data Shows Ongoing Criticalities Inside Leaking Fukushima Daiichi Unit 2,
snip-
Data released on April 28, 2011 by TEPCO is now unequivocal in showing ongoing criticalities at Unit 2, with a peak on April 13. TEPCO graphs of radioactivity-versus-time in water under each of the six reactors show an ongoing nuclear chain reaction creating high levels of “fresh” I-131 in Unit 2 [...]

When a nuclear reactor goes “critical” it means that the fissioning of U-235 or Pu-239 becomes a self-sustaining process, called a chain reaction [...]

http://enenews.com/report-new-tepco...it-2-only-possible-source-pockets-molten-core
Nuclear adviser to Japanese gov’t quits, holding back tears — They “have ignored the laws”
April 29th, 2011 at 05:34 PM
snip-

Toshiso Kosako, a professor at the prestigious University of Tokyo, said at a news conference that the prime minister’s office and agencies within the government “have ignored the laws and have only dealt with the problem at the moment.” Holding back tears, he said this approach would only prolong the crisis. [...]

Mr. Kosako was appointed on March 16. In announcing the appointment, chief government spokesman Yukio Edano described him as someone who “possesses outstanding insight and expertise in the field of radiation safety.”
http://enenews.com/nuclear-adviser-...holding-back-tears-they-have-ignored-the-laws

 

[Quiche]

Radioactivity detected in breast milk in Japan

Quote: The amount was below the provisional limit for milk and dairy products under the Food Sanitation Law and poses no health risks to babies, Kyodo News agency reported, citing Japan's Health Ministry.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/n...adioactivity-detected-in-breast-milk-in-Japan

Oh yeah, babies love cesium. :tsktsk:

 

[Quiche]

Unsafe at Any Dose

Quote: Still, physicists talk convincingly about &#8220;permissible doses&#8221; of radiation. They consistently ignore internal emitters &#8212; radioactive elements from nuclear power plants or weapons tests that are ingested or inhaled into the body, giving very high doses to small volumes of cells. They focus instead on generally less harmful external radiation from sources outside the body, whether from isotopes emitted from nuclear power plants, medical X-rays, cosmic radiation or background radiation that is naturally present in our environment.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/01/opinion/01caldicott.html

 

[CarmelEyesD]

30 years ago I was breastfeeding my daughter (around a month old). I had to have a lung scan, as they thought I had an embolism. They shot a needle of radoactive dye in me, did the scan, and told me I could not breastfeed my daughter for a week! I was considered radioactive enough that they wanted me to handle her as little as possible, and have help caring for and holing her. A full week from ONE test.

 

[Quiche]

Japan unions in May Day call to end nuclear power

Quote: The rally was attended by some 21,000 people, according to the confederation which claims a membership of 1.2 million workers.

http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Asia/Story/STIStory_663483.html

Wow, for a country that didn't really know how to protest when this disaster struck, they've sure gotten the hang of it! Good for them.

 

[Quiche]

Japan lifts restrictions on milk supplies from areas near quake-hit nuke plant

Quote: The Japanese government has therefore lifted restrictions on milk supplies from all the areas in the country's north-east, except the area around the damaged nuclear power plant, the agency said.

http://en.rian.ru/world/20110501/163807603.html

Probably not a good thing, you think?

 

[sirensong]

We should be protesting here in US. This has sure taken away my ignorance of what a risk nuclear power is to the earth, and that there are more accidents that we haven't even known about. U am ashamed to say I am 55 and didn't pay much attention before this!

 

[coastal]

We should be protesting here in US. This has sure taken away my ignorance of what a risk nuclear power is to the earth, and that there are more accidents that we haven't even known about. U am ashamed to say I am 55 and didn't pay much attention before this!

My neighbors to the north are on it:

Hundreds Voice Nuke Plant Concerns; NRC, Edison Try to Reassure Public
More than 300 turned out to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission meeting to voice their concerns about the safety of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
April 28, 2011

http://lagunaniguel.patch.com/artic...ma-nuclear-regulatory-commission-san-clemente

>>>snip

...“San Onofre is the leader still in safety concerns reported to the NRC,” Warnick said. “So far we have not closed the human performance issues.”

But, he said, the plant has made progress even since January...


(article continues)

<<<snip

 

[Quiche]

Fukushima parents dish the dirt in protest over radiation levels

Quote: Children can now be exposed to 20 times more radiation than was previously permissible. The new regulations have prompted outcry. A senior adviser resigned and the prime minister, Naoto Kan, was criticised by politicians from his own party.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/02/parents-revolt-radiation-levels

 

[essies]

[video=youtube;oc0sV0OyZAw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc0sV0OyZAw[/video]
Belated release of radiation forecast data

snip-
The Japanese government is about to begin releasing data projecting the spread of radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant that it initially withheld for fear of causing panic.

The data in question is in a computer system called SPEEDI that predicts the spread of radioactive substances based on actual radiation measurements at various locations and weather conditions.

A joint task force of the government and Tokyo Electric Power Company says about 5,000 undisclosed bits of data will be released from Tuesday.

The information will be carried on the websites of the science ministry, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, and the Nuclear Safety Commission.
The secretary-general of the joint task force and prime the minister's advisor, Goshi Hosono, apologized for the delay in releasing the data.

Hosono said the task force withheld the information because some data were based on overly rigorous assumptions and feared it may trigger panic.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/02_32.html

 

[coastal]

More from the experts:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/science/03radiation.html

Drumbeat of Nuclear Fallout Fear Doesn’t Resound With Experts
May 2, 2011

>>>snip

The nuclear disaster in Japan has sent waves of radiation and dread around the globe, prompting so many people to buy radiation detectors and potassium iodide to fend off thyroid cancer that supplies quickly sold out.

The fear is unwarranted, experts say. People in Japan near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant may have reason to worry about the consequences of radiation leaks, scientists say, and some reactor workers, in particular, may suffer illness. But outside of Japan, the increase is tiny, compared with numerous other sources of radiation, past and present.

Experts say that humans are bombarded by so much radiation from so many other sources, including many natural ones, that the uptick from Japan disappears as a cause of concern {when} the big picture is considered...

>>>...<<<

...In the world’s oceans, thousands of decomposing drums of radioactive waste pose bigger dangers than the relatively small amounts of radioactive water released from the Fukushima Daiichi plant...

>>>...<<<

...During the cold war, for example, more than 500 {nuclear} detonations pumped the global atmosphere full of deadly radioactive materials, some of which are still emitting radiation....

...Figures from the United Nations put the total bomb radiation from decades of atmospheric testing at almost 70 billion curies. By contrast, the 1986 accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant released about 100 million curies of the most dangerous materials.

As for Fukushima Daiichi, Japanese officials said on April 12 that the reactor complex had released about 10 million curies. In 1979, the reactor accident at Three Mile Island released about 50 curies into the environment...

>>>...<<<

...Additionally, many experts say, the threat to the Japanese people is probably low because — unlike the radioactive fallout from the cold war and the Chernobyl accident — most of the radiation is believed to have blown out to sea on the prevailing winds...

...But people, rather than sea creatures, are by far the biggest recipients of artificial radiation, and most of the exposure is intentional. According to the United Nations reports, from1988 to 2008, the number of examinations worldwide in diagnostic radiology more than doubled, to 3.1 billion from 1.4 billion.

(article continues)

<<<snip

Sorry about the butcher job on this article, but I just had so many WTF!?- moments reading it, I couldn't stop snipping. Do read the whole thing if you can.

Taking myself off to a nice corner soon, but first:

Hey, experts?

 

[Dr.Fessel]

Live Cam showing the Tepco Reactors. Don't have any idea how they are doing this on youtube.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ck_KEILBLlU&feature=youtu.be