BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 08 Dec 11 - 07:55 AM

Meanwhile the Japanese Government is considering a financial bail out de facto nationalisation of TEPCO

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Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 08 Dec 11 - 04:54 AM

And it's only getting better Jack:

They're running out of storage for the, treated but still lightly contaminated, water used to cool the reactors. And are seeking approval to dump around 155.000 tonnes of it into the sea.

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Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jack Campin
Date: 05 Dec 11 - 07:12 AM

Sandbags?!?!

They've got enough radioactive crap in there to obliterate the entire North Pacific fishery for centuries and they're reduced to sandbagging to stop it getting out.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 05 Dec 11 - 05:00 AM

It never stops does it?

As much as 45 tonnes of highly contaminated water may have leaked into the Pacific through a crack in a wall of the building used to purify water at Fukushima. The water 'could contain up to 130,000 becquerels per cubic centimetre of strontium'.

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Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 04 Dec 11 - 04:33 PM

Australia has decided to sell uranium to India (Australia has tremendous reserves, and money is to be made). Export had been banned because India had not signed the non-proliferation treaty.

India intends to be about 50 percent nuclear powered in 20 years.

No solution has been found for nuclear waste, which must be stored. There should be a reprocessing and recycling method, but so far, none that is practical.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 04 Dec 11 - 02:47 PM

Well, not in Ireland.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Stringsinger
Date: 04 Dec 11 - 01:53 PM

Who is investigating the investigators? If this then that. But the "ifs" are not being addressed as reality. Nuclear power is poisonous to the atmosphere when leaked because it contains so many toxic materials in concert. We will feel the impact of Fukushima many years from now as we have the effects of Chernobyl. Only defenders of nukes are those who stand to profit from the industry and those who obfuscate by denial of their responsibility such as Tokyo Electric or G.E. ("We bring good things to death.")

Fukushima or Chernobyl could happen in the US or anywhere else in the world.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 03 Dec 11 - 03:19 PM

More on the caesium in fish- rather old news but not widely reported.
Rockfish and rocktrout caught 55 km from Fukushima contained radioactive caesium levels exceeding an allowable limit, according to Greenpeace. See Mainichi Daily News, August 9, 2011.
Greenpeace data here: http://www.greenpeace.org/japan/Global/japan/pdf/110809GP_MarineResearch_Data.pdf
On August 19, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency started to test fish from offshore British Columbia for radiation. Salmon are sensitive because of their wide-ranging movements.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2011/08/19/bc-salmon-radiation-testing.html

In a related story, the Yukon began testing for radiation in the caribou herd. Test results on the Porcupine Caribou herd will be available next year.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Dec 11 - 09:22 AM

Radioactive iodide in low concentrations is a normal part of the refueling process in a nuclear power plant, as pipes are purged and radioactive steam released. As long as the levels are very low there there is little threat to the general public.

Tuna contaminated with radiation could be a public heqlth threat, and an economic disaster for fishermen.

Charley Noble in rainy St. Martin

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jim Martin
Date: 03 Dec 11 - 07:17 AM

Nuclear cloud over Europe!

This was published on 11/11/11 but I've only just discovered it:

http://www.news24.com/SciTech/News/Radiation-in-Europe-no-risk-20111111

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 02 Dec 11 - 03:08 PM

"to within 37cm of the steel outer casing" Yeah... sure.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 02 Dec 11 - 02:34 PM

Aljazeera news reports that caesium levels in fish to the east of Fukushima are very high, and there is worry that tuna stocks in that region of the Pacific may be affected. Fishermen working up to several hundred miles offshore are losing their livelihood.

The government had previously downgraded the possibility.
I haven't checked the Japanese newspapers, but more information should be available online.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 02 Dec 11 - 10:54 AM

It was actually a computer simulation that made them come to the conclusion all fuel in reactor 1, other sources speak of 68 tons of it, went through the floor. Who knows what they're yet to to find.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 02 Dec 11 - 10:39 AM

Peter-

It does take time to verify what actually happened. Very bad bews.

I still wonder about the spent fuel pools, especially the one at Unit 4, whether they were breached. As you may recall, there was no fuel in the Unit 4 reactor but there was still a hydrogen explosion there. There was much more high level nuclear waste in the spent fuel pool then there ever was in a single reactor unit.

Charley Nolbe, away in the West Indies

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 02 Dec 11 - 03:34 AM

TEPCO admits fuel rods have probably melted completely and in the case of reactor 1 dropped through the inner pressure containment vessel to within 37cm of the steel outer casing.

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Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 25 Nov 11 - 04:27 PM

Evidently Tokyo was just damn lucky that the prevailing winds did not blow in that direction when the nuclear power plants were having their hydrogen explosions.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jack Campin
Date: 25 Nov 11 - 11:35 AM

Two stories about food safety. Bizarre governmental spin on the risks of eating contaminated food, and a TV newscaster dedicated to promoting radioactive food as safe by eating it on screen gets a Darwin award by coming down with leukaemia:

http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/jp-gov-officially-admitted-that-japanese-food-is-harmful/

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 12 Nov 11 - 02:15 PM

The article I posted earlier today linked to an earlier article, fro m8 september, that I apparently missed at the time. In it the Japanese prime minister at the time of the earthquake gives a chilling account of how TEPCO considered withdrawing all personal from Fukushima at the height of the crisis and effectively just let things develop.

The (now ex-) prime minister speak of his fears that a release of radiation many times that of the Chernobyl disaster that would force an evacuation of Tokyo that would spell the end of Japan as a state was on the cards.

Chilling stuff.

Here

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Ebbie
Date: 12 Nov 11 - 12:08 PM

Thanks for keeping this thread together. I consider it a historical document.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 12 Nov 11 - 10:23 AM

Peter-

Thanks for posting the new update links.

At the very least more reporters are getting access to the devastated site.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 12 Nov 11 - 10:16 AM

Photographs

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 12 Nov 11 - 08:15 AM

Journalists were allowed inside the Fukushima complex for the first time. This report describes the situation on site as 'grim and shambolic'.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 10 Nov 11 - 01:04 PM

That was me... tossed my cookie.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Nov 11 - 01:02 PM

"... will not reach Europe." Ya think it'll just sit in the gulf forever? Maybe it will. Has ANYone thought about trying to recover it? Is such a task feasible from an engineering point of view disregarding the costs?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 11:06 PM

The increase in cancer and genetic deviations will show up as increases in the expectancy statistics, but it will be a long time before these figures are available- and there will always be guesswork involved.

Luckily, gnu, the BP oil "spill" did not get into the Gulf Stream and will not reach Europe. It has done damage in the northern part of the Gulf, however, that will be felt for years, let alone the losses to merchants, fishermen, and resort operators in the Gulf- even where effects are not present, the public is wary and is going to Hawai'i, Phuket, The Cooks, etc. instead.

I have commented on the even larger "spill" some years ago in the Mexican (Campeche) part of the Gulf, all but forgotten but still affecting fish, wildlife and livlihoods in SE coastal Mexico.

Deep drilling is underway again in the Gulf, and BP is going back to the same formation, where they have 800 million bbls. or more and expect more finds. They are just one of half-a-dozen majors drilling in the same depths.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 10:17 PM

Estimating the long term impact on humans of the Fukushima disaster is quite a chore. There are the early deaths that we know about, a relative handful. There are the unborn children who are aborted intentionally or spontaneously. There are the extra cancers that appear through the years, greater than one would expect given earlier incidences, and so hard to prove the cause is radiation in a court of law. And there are the other diseases whose frequencies also increase over time.

Probably Chernobyl is the accident with the closest parallel, and experts disagree sharply on the assumptions and the numbers generated from them. I think I went over some of those reports much earlier in this thread. Maybe I'll do a review this weekend.

But I just wonder when people will wake the fuck up

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 09:04 PM

500,000 seems a reasonable number of 'early" deaths from immediate and local exposure. I would think that number would be much higher with the long term effects and the ongoing dispersion of radiation through air and seabourne contamination. That is, worldwide.

Kinda like the oil spill in the gulf... may be years before it washes ashore in Britain... but it will. May take MANY years before the radiation from Fuckedupshima affects the seafood and fish off of the North and South American coasts and many more years for it to affect the other oceans... but it will.

BP's limit of liabilty is $20B in the US... apalling. The damage will be far more and will extend to jurisdictions which have "no claim". And, we pay more for gas to fund their wars in Africa. What happens when the nuclear disaster in Japan threatens over 25% of the fish stocks of the world... in only the Pacific Ocean?

Sorry for the rambling. But I just wonder when people will wake the fuck up... you know... eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 04:55 PM

Dick some time ago the number of immediate casualties from the actual nuclear incident was posted here- I think two to five workers were killed at the Fukushima complex. This, of course, is meaningless, as Charley and others have pointed out- many exposed to the radiation, the deaths and illnesses will occur over the years- we can only guess at what the totals will be. Some estimates are over 500,000.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 10:11 AM

Jim-

Don't feel bad. We learn such things here at Mudcat one by one as we need to.

I'd prefer to keep this thread together.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 09:13 AM

In the forum index, you have a column of thread titles, then a double column "Messages". If you click on the number in that column, you will get the first 50 messages in the thread, and if you click on the "d" to the right of it, you will get the last 50, in descending order.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jim Martin
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 08:55 AM

Sorry Jack - what's the 'little blue "d"'?

gnu - I'm running Firefox on Vodafone Mobile Broadband and it's not very fast (supposed to be 7Mb but luck yo get 1Mb!

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 09 Nov 11 - 12:30 AM

Q-
That's the casualties from the tsunami. Any data on casualties from the nuclear plant disaster?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 08 Nov 11 - 09:04 PM

Jack-

That's an interesting link to the tsunami simulations on the Northeast Coast.

Don't look good for folks in Eastern Long Island.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 08 Nov 11 - 02:06 PM

I assume Jim is clicking the "d". It takes a bit longer to load. I don't ming it but I have high speed downloading. Jim... what are you running?... www.testmyspeed.com

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jack Campin
Date: 08 Nov 11 - 12:12 PM

Jim: just click on the little blue "d" to get the last 50 posts. Doesn't take long to load.

Charley: This shows the result of one kind of tsunami in the New York area. I assume anybody who can produce this has the tools for analyzing the effect on New Angland and north-east Canada too. NYC gets off lightly but the effects depend strongly on coastal topography.

simulation of a tsunami caused by the La Palma volcano collapsing

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 08 Nov 11 - 11:07 AM

Easy to start a new one with a directional link in this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Jim Martin
Date: 08 Nov 11 - 09:23 AM

I wonder, couldn't this thread be split or something, it's taking so long to load now?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 07 Nov 11 - 08:16 PM

Ray Shadis, who mentioned Newfoundland, is my long time friend who is still battling against a 20-year extension of Vermont Yankee's license to operate. Vermont Yankee is the same generation plant as Unit 1 at Fukushima and the NRC approved the license extension the day after the Fukushima tsunami. It's true that a tsunami is unlikely in Vermont but the structure is vulnerable to shock, the spent fuel pool is located above the reactor vessel and there are many other vulnerabilities that were exposed at Fukushima. The State Legislature voted to reject the license application and now it's in the courts to decide whether the Feds or the State has ultimate power on re-licensing.

Eventually, we all die but why make it any easier for the nuclear industry to roll over us?

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 07 Nov 11 - 06:20 PM

Dick Greenhaus-

Mainichi Daily News reports that, as of October 10, 16000 confirmed dead from the tsunami and 3900 still missing.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111010p2g00m0dm016000c.html

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 07 Nov 11 - 05:00 PM

Dick... I dunno.

Charley... as I posted previously, I live in Moncton, New Brunswick... "The Bend". The river narrows a lot before the bend. I am at about 35m and along the path that a tsunami would take. But it would have to occur such that the wave would funnel up the Bay of Fundy. Very unlikely, but who knows? I suppose, eventually, we all die.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 07 Nov 11 - 04:52 PM

I've been assuming that a devastating tsunami was unlikely along the New England coast until an old friend pointed out the 1929 Grand Banks Earthquake, 7.2, which generated a tsunami that devastated much of the Southern Newfoundland coast with waves of 2-7 metres, in some long bays the waves reached 13 metres! Here's some background info: click here for report!

Anyone want to guess how high the tsnuami wall is at the Seabrook nuclear plant in New Hampshire? Oh, they never built one...

Have a nice day!
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 09:19 PM

Date: 28 Aug 11 - 05:47 PM

Just out of curiosity, are there any authoritative estimates of casualties?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 06:28 PM

I caught some three eyed trout up Kent County where they sprayed Agent Orange, then Vision, then Round Up... this shit in Japan is far worse.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 05:23 PM

A cement company discharged radioactive water into Tokyo Bay that was far in excess of the provisional limit set by the government- up to 15 times the limit for caesium.
The company accepts more than 30,000 tons of refuse incineration ash generated in Chiba Prefecture a year and processes it into cement.
Asked as to why it continued to discharge the water into the bay even after finding high radiation levels, a company official said, "We could not judge whether to stop because there are no clear legal standards, and we could not refuse incinerated ash coming from local bodies because it had nowhere else to go."

Mainichi Daily News, Nov. 4, 2011.

An editorial in the paper called for the Government and TEPCO to step up monitoring of Fukushima's reactors to check whether nuclear
fission is occurring and to provide explanations.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 05:00 PM

So, if fission occurs, can it escalate and go critical thereby setting off the "works"?... all the reactors?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 04:58 PM

gnu-

Evidently the level of radioactive xenon is very low but here's a more detailed report: click here for report!

I suppose the readings could be incorrect but if they were accurate this would be a new and worrisome phase of this unfolding disaster. Boric acid is being poured into the damaged reactor core in an attempt to moderate fission.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: gnu
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 04:09 PM

Fission? Jumpin thunderin... !!!

No problem? What are they gonna pull outta their ass next?

Sommat like this?

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 03:52 PM

More bad news from a conference in Washington, DC: click here for report!

Of course it's only bad news if you're concerned about Japanese children whose shoes are contaminated with radioactive dust.

The maps document that that the radioactive plume was concentrated in the NW sector, extending more than 20 km from the plant.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 03:09 AM

'Peter-

Watching a MP drinking decontaminated water is hardly reassuring.
'


No it isn't is it? There was great irony in that attempt at showing all was well and the news of the following day.

Subject: RE: BS: Japan Nuclear plant disaster, 2011
From: Charley Noble
Date: 02 Nov 11 - 10:58 PM

Peter-

Watching a MP drinking decontaminated water is hardly reassuring.

"Signs of nuclear fission detected" is a real story:

""Given the signs, it is certain that fission is occurring," Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at Tepco, told reporters.

Evidence that even partial or temporary nuclear fission had occurred underlined the fragile state of the plant almost eight months after it was struck by a magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami that knocked out vital cooling systems."

The evidence is based on the presence of radioactive gases that have very short half-lives, which means the gases were generated recently by nuclear fission. This is irrefutable evidence that Reactor Unit 2 is still not stabilized. That's very bad news.

Charley Noble