tagged w/ cesium
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Mounting troubles at Japan’s hobbled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant now pose a real threat to human survival. If the area in which Unit 4 is struck by another 7.0 magnitude earthquake, there’s a 70 percent chance that “the entire fuel pool structure will collapse” and massive doses of lethal nuclear radiation will be released into the atmosphere. The disaster would release approximately “134 million curies is Cesium-137 — roughly 85 times the amount of Cs-137 released at Chernobyl as estimated by the U.S. National Council on Radiation Protection (NCRP).” Experts believe that the amounts are sufficient to “destroy the world environment and our civilization”, which makes containment “an issue of human survival.” (“The Greatest Single Threat to Humanity: Fuel Pool Number 4“, Washington’s blog)
The structural integrity of Unit 4′s cooling pool was greatly compromised by the earthquake and following tsunami which struck the facility over a year ago. At present, the pools are not adequately protected or reinforced, which means that a sizable tremor could “cause a disaster worse than the three reactor meltdowns.” If such a disaster were to occur, “people should get out of Japan, and residents of the West Coast of America and Canada should shut all of their windows and stay inside,” says nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen.
While the danger to life and the environment pose the greatest single national security threat the United States has faced since WW2, the Obama administration has provided little aid to the emergency effort. Japan is largely “going it alone” trying to cobble together a plan to safely store the spent fuel and minimize the risks to public safety.
On March 8, 2012, Dr. Hiroaki Koide, Research Associate at the Research Reactor Institute of Kyoto University, gave his bleak assessment of the situation on the Japanese a news program called, “Morning Bird”. Koide explained how 1,500 rods are presently located in a “fuel pool” that has been severely damaged. The rods have to be cooled constantly or a “huge amount of radiation contained in the spent fuel will be released outside”. If an earthquake hits and undermines the pool, the coolant will exit the pool, the rods will melt and radioactive plumes will rise into the atmosphere. Koide explained that the rods could not be safely removed from the existing pool because “if you hoist them up in the air, huge amount of radiation will come out from the spent fuel and people nearby will die.”
One of the journalists on “Morning Bird” asked Koide what would happen if the Unit was struck by another earthquake?
Koide answered, “That will be the end.”
“The end,” the journalist asked, visibly shaken?
“The end,” Koide repeated emphatically.
(“Fukushima Dai-Ichi No. 4: An earthquake before spent fuel rods are moved to safe storage would be “the end”, Lambert Strether, Naked Capitalism)
Now, check this out:
“Japan’s former Ambassador to Switzerland, Mr. Mitsuhei Murata… strongly stated that if the crippled building of reactor unit 4—with 1,535 fuel rods in the spent fuel pool 100 feet (30 meters) above the ground—collapses, not only will it cause a shutdown of all six reactors but it will also affect the common spent fuel pool containing 6,375 fuel rods, located some 50 meters from reactor 4. In both cases the radioactive rods are not protected by a containment vessel; dangerously, they are open to the air. This would certainly cause a global catastrophe like we have never before experienced. … Such a catastrophe would affect us all for centuries.”
(“Fukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 is 85 times greater than at Chernobyl Accident”, akiomatsumura.com)
Murata’s concerns have been brought to the attention of the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, to high-ranking officials in the Obama administration and EU, and to leaders around the world. The reaction has basically been the same everywhere, which is, “It’s Japan’s problem. Let them deal with it.”
There is no way to overstate the media’s complicity in concealing critical information about the tragedy that is presently unfolding at Fukushima. If there is another earthquake, the media will certainly be every bit as responsible as the government officials who saw the danger, but chose to do nothing.
Now you may be asking yourself, why is RTV covering this and not Fox, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, or any other bullshit corporate owned propaganda machine?
A SHORT HISTORY OF US GOVERNMENT RESPECT FOR HUMAN LIFE
PUBLIC LAW 95-79 [P.L. 95-79]
TITLE 50, CHAPTER 32, SECTION 1520
“CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL WARFARE PROGRAM”
“The use of human subjects will be allowed for the testing of chemical and biological agents by the U.S. Department of Defense, accounting to Congressional committees with respect to the experiments and studies.”
“The Secretary of Defense [may] conduct tests and experiments involving the use of chemical and biological [warfare] agents on civilian populations [within the United States].”
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Public Law 95-79, Title VIII, Sec. 808, July 30, 1977, 91 Stat. 334. In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 91, page 334, you will find Public Law 95-79. Public Law 97-375, title II, Sec. 203(a)(1), Dec. 21, 1982, 96 Stat. 1882. In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 96, page 1882, you will find Public Law 97-375.
DOES OUR GOVERNMENT RESPECT HUMAN LIFE?
The following list comes from declassified documents, news reports, videos, the National Archives, and from the final report of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments.
Continue reading!
http://rezn8d.net/2012/04/20/fukushima-is-about-to-blow-and-nobody-gives-a-damn-about-you/
Video references in commentsMounting troubles at Japan’s hobbled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant now... more
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R3zn8D
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This is a public service announcement. Your government has lied to you. The safety regulators have lied to you. The media has lied to you. You and your children are currently breathing Strontium, Cesium, Xenon, and radioactive Iodine, which is still spewing from the “active” Fukushima-Daiichi reactor complex. The irrefutable evidence I present needs to be front page news everywhere. Inform everyone.
http://rezn8d.net/2012/04/12/fukushima-radiation-incoming-taste-the-rainbow/This is a public service announcement. Your government has lied to you. The safety... more
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NBC | LOS ANGELES...
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Scientists Find Post-Tsunami Radiation in Sea Kelp, Seek to Expand Research
Scientists found radioactive kelp locally following Japan nuclear disaster
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By Melissa Pamer
| Thursday, Apr 5, 2012 | Updated 5:43 PM PDT
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Scientists Find Radiation in Food Chain
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Giant kelp off Southern California --such as the plants displayed here from the California Science Center -- were found to harbor radioactive iodine after Japan's nuclear disaster.
Two scientists who found radiation in sea kelp along the Southern California coast after Japan’s 2011 tsunami-induced nuclear disaster now hope to study whether contamination may be present in fish such as opaleye and other ocean creatures, including lobster and sea urchin.
The two researchers – from California State University, Long Beach – are hoping to expand on their recently published study showing that giant kelp contained up to 250 times the normal levels of a radioisotope of iodine in the weeks after last year's earthquake and resulting tsunami severely damaged Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant.
Kelp is the tall, wavy, green algae that provides near-shore habitat for many marine species, some of which eat the plant.
Tests showed that contamination in the kelp was gone within a month, and there’s no risk to humans from the Iodine-131 radiation. Still, the research indicates that radiation from the damaged Japanese nuclear facility reached California.
“Of course it’s cause for concern – because you don’t find this naturally in kelp or fish. It can’t be a positive thing. It also tells you that what happens half a world away can be detected,” said Cal State biology professor Steven Manley, a co-author of the study.
Manley and his co-author, marine biology professor Chris Lowe, hope next to find out whether other kinds of nuclear contamination – two radioisotopes of cesium that break down much more slowly than the Iodine-131 – are found in California marine life, including kelp and fish.
Those two cesium radioisotopes were found to contaminate waters around Japan, according to preliminary results of a study published this week by an international team of scientists.
“Our coastal environment is pretty complex. We get a lot of our food out there,” Manley said. “We should be monitoring it for these radioisotopes.”
Lowe wants to trace the concentration of radioactive cesium up the food chain in Southern California.
“Our question is: How much gets into the ocean? Kelp is really kind of the basis for the food web and is important habitat for many of our coastal marine animals,” Lowe said. “The next step is to look at organisms that eat kelp. “
Kelp is consumed by sea urchin and some fish, including opaleye, halfmoon and senorita, according to the study. Urchin are in turn eaten by lobster and some large fish species that could be consumed by humans.
Getting funding for the future research shouldn’t be a problem, given the attention that Lowe and Manley have gotten for their recent study, which was published last month in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. The study was first reported by nonprofit Environmental Health News and on Scientific American’s website.
A month after the earthquake after Japan, the Long Beach pair obtained kelp samples from seven sites along the coast: the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Los Angeles County; Crystal Cove, Laguna Beach and Corona del Mar in Orange County; and farther north in Santa Barbara, Pacific Grove and Santa Cruz.
Kelp from Corona del Mar had the highest concentration of radioactive iodine, up to 250 times the amount found in kelp before the Japanese nuclear reactor spewed radiation in the atmosphere.
Lowe said they believe the Corona del Mar site was more contaminated because a lot of urban runoff goes through the area – meaning radiation-contaminated rain would have accumulated there.
The scientists chose to study kelp – which grows from the ocean floor up to the surface, where it floats – because it is especially good at absorbing iodine from both the water and the atmosphere.
Lowe compared kelp to the badge that X-ray technicians where to show how much radiation they’ve been exposed to.
.NBC | LOS ANGELES...
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Scientists Find Post-Tsunami Radiation in Sea Kelp,... more
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CNN International...
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Radioactive cesium found in Japanese baby formula
By the CNN Wire Staff
December 7, 2011 -- Updated 0929 GMT (1729 HKT)
Radioactive cesium has been found in infant formula produced by major food maker Meiji.
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STORY HIGHLIGHTS
The manufacturer says the radioactivity wouldn't be harmful babies' health
Ingredients of the formula may have come into contact with cesium when being dried
The company is offering free replacements to consumers to relieve "anxieties"
An earthquake and tsunami hit Japan in March
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Tokyo (CNN) -- Radioactive cesium has been found in baby formula in Japan following the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, the manufacturer of the product has said.
Meiji Co., the maker of the formula, said Tuesday that it had found traces of cesium 134 and cesium 137 in samples of its Step Milk powder with the expiration date of Oct. 2012, but that the levels would not be harmful to babies' health.
The formula contained as much as 31 becquerels of cesium per kilogram, below the allowable limit of 200 becquerels per kilogram set by the government, Meiji said. A becquerel is a measurement of radioactive intensity.
A spokesman for Meiji said the company would nonetheless offer free replacements of 400,000 cans of the product "to relieve the anxieties of our customers."
Ingredients of the baby powder may have come into contact with airborne radioactive cesium when they were being dried at a factory in Kasukabe, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) north of Tokyo, between March 14 and 20, the company said.
The devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck the northeast coast of Japan on March 11 damaged nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, resulting in radiation leaks.
Meiji accounts for about 40 percent of baby formula sales in Japan. It also exports the Step Milk formula to Vietnam under a different name, but says it examines the product before shipping.
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CNN's Junko Ogura contributed to this report.
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http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/111207092425-japan-formula-story-top.jpg
.CNN International...
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Radioactive cesium found in Japanese baby formula
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An aerial radiation survey of the capital and Kanagawa Prefecture has revealed the northwest tip of Tokyo was tainted by an unusually high amount of fallout, while most other areas showed normal levels, a science ministry official said Friday.An aerial radiation survey of the capital and Kanagawa Prefecture has revealed the... more
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Radioactive cesium leaking from the tsunami-hit Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant is estimated to reach the West Coast of the United States in five years after its density declines considerably, according to a semi-governmental research institute.
The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has compiled a map predicting how cesium-137 will spread throughout the Pacific Ocean in the long term. Cesium-137, whose half life is 30 years, is one of the radioactive substances leaking from the crippled nuclear power station.
It estimates that cesium-137 from the plant will spread in the shape of an ellipse -- as far as about 4,000 kilometers off the coast of Japan -- in one year. It then predicts the substance will reach Hawaii three years later and the U.S. West Coast five years from now. However, the agency says that by that time, its density will have declined significantly.Radioactive cesium leaking from the tsunami-hit Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant is... more
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The New York Times...
Higher Radiation Levels Found at Japanese Reactor
Carlos Barria/Reuters
Family members of the earthquake and tsunami victims at a mass funeral of their relatives on Saturday in Kesennuma, Japan.
By DAVID JOLLY and HIROKO TABUCHI
Published: March 27, 2011
TOKYO — Japanese officials continued to battle a spreading contamination problem at the Fukushima nuclear complex on Sunday, saying that water pooling inside one of its reactors and the seawater just outside the plant were showing sharply increased levels of radiation.
Status of the Nuclear Reactors
A daily tracker of the damage at the two imperiled nuclear plants.
Carlos Barria/Reuters
Tsunami victims in Kesennuma, Japan, dug through debris. The United Nations nuclear chief said Saturday that the country was far from the end of the nuclear crisis.
The developments came after the world’s chief nuclear inspector said that Japan was “still far from the end of the accident” that struck the plant, which continues to spew radiation into the atmosphere and the sea. Yukiya Amano, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, acknowledged that the authorities were still unsure about whether the reactor cores and spent fuel were covered with the water needed to cool them and end the crisis.
Mr. Amano, taking care to say that he was not criticizing Japan’s response under extraordinary circumstances, said, “More efforts should be done to put an end to the accident.”
More than two weeks after a devastating earthquake and tsunami, he cautioned that the nuclear emergency could still go on for weeks, if not months, given the enormous damage to the plant.
His concerns were underscored on Sunday when officials in Japan announced higher levels of radiation in pools of water at the facility’s stricken reactors.
The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said that water seeping out of the crippled No. 2 reactor building into the adjacent turbine building contained levels of radioactive iodine 134 that were about 10 million times the level normally found in water used inside nuclear power plants.
The higher levels may suggest a leak from the reactor’s fuel rods — from either the suppression chamber under the rods or various piping — or even a breach in the pressure vessel that houses the rods, the Japanese nuclear regulator said.
Tetsuo Iguchi, a professor in the department of quantum engineering at Nagoya University, said that at that level of radiation, workers would be able to remain on site for only about 15 minutes before health considerations required them to leave, further complicating work.
“First, Tokyo Electric has to figure out where the leak is coming from,” he said, “then they’ve got to isolate the water somehow. It’s a difficult task.”
Tests also found increased levels of radioactive cesium, a substance with a longer half-life, the Japanese safety agency said.
“Because these substances originate from nuclear fission, there is a high possibility they originate from the reactor,” said Hidehiko Nishiyama, the agency’s deputy director-general, at a news conference. He said that it was likely that radiation was leaking from the pipes or the suppression chamber, and not directly from the pressure vessel, because water levels and pressure in the vessel were relatively stable.
Mr. Nishiyama also said that radioactive iodine in seawater just outside the plant had risen to 1,850 times the usual level on Sunday, up from 1,250 on Saturday.
“Radiation levels are increasing and measures need to be taken,” he said, but added that he did not think there was need to worry about high levels of radiation immediately escaping the plant.
Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, said he did not think the pressure vessel, which cases the fuel rods, was broken at the No. 2 reactor. He said pressure levels inside the reactor remained higher than atmospheric pressure, suggesting that there was no breach.
“I don’t think the container is breached, but there is a possibility the water is coming from somewhere inside the reactor,” he said. “We want to find out as quickly as possible where the highly radioactive water is leaking from, and take measures to deal with it,” Mr. Edano said on a live interview on the public broadcaster, NHK, early Sunday.
Naoto Sekimura, a professor of engineering at the University of Tokyo, told NHK on Sunday that information suggested that the No. 2 unit at Fukushima was leaking significantly more radiation that the No. 1 unit or the No. 3 unit.
“The No. 2 unit’s suppression pool, which connects to the containment building, is damaged, so its ability to contain radiation has been compromised,” Mr. Sekimura said. “They’ve got to find the source of the leak.”
Separately, the I.A.E.A., citing data from the Japanese authorities, reported that two of three workers who were exposed to radioactive water on Saturday suffered “significant skin contamination over their legs.”
“The Japanese authorities have stated that during medical examinations carried out at the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in the Chiba Prefecture, the level of local exposure to the workers’ legs was estimated to be between 2 and 6 sieverts,” the I.A.E.A. said on its Web site.
“While the patients did not require medical treatment, doctors decided to keep them in hospital and monitor their progress over coming days.”
The elevated levels of radiation at and around the Fukushima plant will require careful monitoring of seafood in Japan, said Kimberlee J. Kearfott, a professor of nuclear engineering and radiological sciences at the University of Michigan.
“It is extremely important that seafood be carefully monitored,” she said in an e-mail. “This is because many of the radionuclides are concentrated in the environment,” she added. “For example, iodines are concentrated in kelp (a Japanese food, seaweed) and shrimp.
“Iodines, cesium and strontium are concentrated in other types of seafood,” she continued. “Fish can act like tea or coffee presses. When you push down the plungers, the grounds all end up on one side. In this case, that is the fish.”
She said an example of this phenomenon occurred after the Chernobyl disaster, when specific radionuclides were concentrated far away in Norwegian lichens. Reindeer ate the lichens, concentrating it again, a danger to the native peoples whose diet includes a large amount of reindeer meat.
William J. Broad reported from New York, and David Jolly from Tokyo. Reporting was contributed by David E. Sanger from Palo Alto, Calif., Hiroko Tabuchi and Chika Ohshima from Tokyo, and Kevin Drew from Hong Kong.
CLICK ON LINK ABOVE FOR MORE PHOTOS
http://singlemindedwomen.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/japan-nuclear-meltdown-430x297.jpgThe New York Times...
Higher Radiation Levels Found at Japanese Reactor
Carlos... more
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Why does it seem as though the nuclear crisis in Japan just keeps getting worse with each passing day?Why does it seem as though the nuclear crisis in Japan just keeps getting worse with... more
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NBC/Los Angeles...
Trace Amounts of Radiation Detected in Riverside and Anaheim
Updated 7:35 PM PDT, Tue, Mar 22, 2011
Josh Keppel
Trace amounts of radioactive elements consistent with the earthquake-damaged nuclear power plant in Japan were detected by monitors in Riverside and Anaheim, but at levels far below anything that could be considered harmful, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Tuesday.
Similar trace amounts of radioactive iodine, cesium and tellurium were also detected by monitors in San Francisco and Seattle. The material was detected Friday and analyzed over the weekend, according to the EPA.
"The radiation levels detected on the filters from California and Washington monitors are hundreds of thousands to millions of times below levels of concern,'' according to an EPA statement.
The agency noted that on a typical day, Americans receive doses of radiation from rocks, bricks and the sun that are 100,000 times higher than what has been detected in material coming from Japan.
According to the EPA, the amount of radioactive material detected by the filters were "miniscule'' and posed "no health concern.''NBC/Los Angeles...
Trace Amounts of Radiation Detected in Riverside and Anaheim... more
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http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/03/14/world/14nuclear4_span/14nuclear4_span-articleLarge.jpg
The New York Times
March 14, 2011 - 1:51AM PT
Radioactive Releases in Japan Could Last Months, Experts Say
PART ONE...
By DAVID E. SANGER and MATTHEW L. WALD
WASHINGTON — As the scale of Japan’s nuclear crisis begins to come to light, experts in Japan and the United States say the country is now facing a cascade of accumulating problems that suggest that radioactive releases of steam from the crippled plants could go on for weeks or even months.
The emergency flooding of two stricken reactors with seawater and the resulting steam releases are a desperate step intended to avoid a much bigger problem: a full meltdown of the nuclear cores in two reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. On Monday, an explosion blew the roof off the second reactor, not damaging the core, officials said, but presumably leaking more radiation.
So far, Japanese officials have said the melting of the nuclear cores in the two plants is assumed to be “partial,” and the amount of radioactivity measured outside the plants, though twice the level Japan considers safe, has been relatively modest.
But Pentagon officials reported Sunday that helicopters flying 60 miles from the plant picked up small amounts of radioactive particulates — still being analyzed, but presumed to include cesium-137 and iodine-121 — suggesting widening environmental contamination.
In a country where memories of a nuclear horror of a different sort in the last days of World War II weigh heavily on the national psyche and national politics, the impact of continued venting of long-lasting radioactivity from the plants is hard to overstate.
Japanese reactor operators now have little choice but to periodically release radioactive steam as part of an emergency cooling process for the fuel of the stricken reactors that may continue for a year or more even after fission has stopped. The plant’s operator must constantly try to flood the reactors with seawater, then release the resulting radioactive steam into the atmosphere, several experts familiar with the design of the Daiichi facility said.
That suggests that the tens of thousands of people who have been evacuated may not be able to return to their homes for a considerable period, and that shifts in the wind could blow radioactive materials toward Japanese cities rather than out to sea.
Re-establishing normal cooling of the reactors would require restoring electric power — which was cut in the earthquake and tsunami — and now may require plant technicians working in areas that have become highly contaminated with radioactivity.
More steam releases also mean that the plume headed across the Pacific could continue to grow. On Sunday evening, the White House sought to tamp down concerns, saying that modeling done by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had concluded that “Hawaii, Alaska, the U.S. Territories and the U.S. West Coast are not expected to experience any harmful levels of radioactivity.”
But all weekend, after a series of intense interchanges between Tokyo and Washington and the arrival of the first American nuclear experts in Japan, officials said they were beginning to get a clearer picture of what went wrong over the past three days. And as one senior official put it, “under the best scenarios, this isn’t going to end anytime soon.”
The essential problem is the definition of “off” in a nuclear reactor. When the nuclear chain reaction is stopped and the reactor shuts down, the fuel is still producing about 6 percent as much heat as it did when it was running, caused by continuing radioactivity, the release of subatomic particles and of gamma rays.
Usually when a reactor is first shut down, an electric pump pulls heated water from the vessel to a heat exchanger, and cool water from a river or ocean is brought in to draw off that heat.
But at the Japanese reactors, after losing electric power, that system could not be used. Instead the operators are dumping seawater into the vessel and letting it cool the fuel by boiling. But as it boils, pressure rises too high to pump in more water, so they have to vent the vessel to the atmosphere, and feed in more water, a procedure known as “feed and bleed.”
When the fuel was intact, the steam they were releasing had only modest amounts of radioactive material, in a nontroublesome form. With damaged fuel, that steam is getting dirtier.
CONTINUED...http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/03/14/world/14nuclear4_span/14nuclear4_span-ar... more
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CNN's just reporting this, live, on tv. If anyone gets more information, PLEASE add it here.
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Personal Updates:
As of March 12, at 7:57PM PT, I'm still watching reports (on CNN) that there is a "possibility" (POSSIBILITY, mind you) that there may be one -- and possibly two meltdowns -- just at the beginning stages. I'm finding nothing elsewhere, so am going to back off for a few hours or so.
And now, at 8:03PM PT, I've just received a text message from ABC News: "Japan's local gov't spokesman says partial meltdown likely under way at 2nd reactor affected by 8.9-magnitude quake."CNN's just reporting this, live, on tv. If anyone gets more information, PLEASE... more
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A rabbit that ingested radioactive cesium somewhere on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in eastern Washington state has been trapped and killed. It is not known exactly where the rabbit found the radioactive materials it ate, but it is thought that it sipped water in an area where a Cold War-era nuclear materials production facility had been demolished. Authorities say they are looking for contaminated rabbit droppings so that they may dispose of them.
Where is the cache of cesium now, and how was it possible for a rabbit to get to it, especially given that all such materials are supposed to carefully monitored and controlled?
How much radioactive material is currently accessible to animals on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and other nuclear facilities around the country, and how much of it is being carried down the Columbia River through cities such as Portland, Oregon?
Does anyone in your family have cancer?
http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2010/11/radioactive_rabbit_trapped_at_hanford_in_eastern_washington.htmlA rabbit that ingested radioactive cesium somewhere on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation... more
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