SimplyInfo » Archive
SimplyInfo Adds Subscriptions, News Feed And Reference Library Updates
[Translate] We have added a RSS feed / Email subscription service to SimplyInfo.org, now you can get our news right to your inbox or news reader. On the right side of the home page we have also added a news feed. Instead of the typical “news service” feeds, ours is human edited to only contain relevant stories. So Fukushima and nuclear information that doesn’t make it into larger articles will now be scrolling on our site. We have also updated our ever growing reference library. New diagrams of Fukushima Daiichi equipment, BWR equipment diagrams and details of related reactor equipment have been added this week. We have also continued to add to our growing library of radiation exposure studies. If there is information you would like to see added to our … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
UK Nuclear Reactor Construction Haulted, Large Problems With The Program
[Translate] EDF has announced they will stop the planned construction of 4 reactors in the UK. They cited problems at the Flamanville EPR reactor and re-evaluating the conditions in the UK. We previously wrote about the massive technical and construction failures of the EPR reactor at Flamanville here. Citibank had warned investors back in 2009 of the economic viability of new nuclear programs in the UK, stating they were simply not profitable. Now the UK government is announcing that the UK taxpayers will be stuck with the 100 million pound cost to decommission the British Nuclear Fuels failed MOX plant. There are also some mentions that the Sheffield Forgemaster’s may be taking on some reactor building in the near future. What is not clear is exactly what they would be doing. This article mentions … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
Fukushima, Some Give In, Others Fight Back
[Translate] You don’t always see such a contrast in the same week. Fukushima City convinced 110 volunteers to help the decontaminate areas of the city. These volunteers were not trained people with some sort of knowledge of decontamination or handling nuclear waste. They were average people including women of child bearing age. The Yomiuri Shimbun article says the people were given gloves, masks and a survey meter. What they are clearly doing is handling nuclear waste in their street clothes with paper masks that they would then get into their cars to go home wearing and into their home to launder. This is work that should be handled by trained workers. If there is a shortage of workers they could train and hire some of the 70% unemployed now living in … Read entire article »
Filed under: Humanitarian, The Latest
Fukushima Ocean Releases Study, Now In English
[Translate] A rough translation to English of the IRSN French study on Fukushima ocean discharges. The original document in French can be found here. Date summary of knowledge on the impact on the marine environment of radioactive discharges from nuclear site rugged Fukushima Dai-ichi October 26, 2011 This information note presents and discusses the latest information collected by IRSN, since the previous briefing note of 11 July on the same subject. A strong radioactive contamination of the marine environment occurred after the accident in the plant Nuclear Fukushima Dai-ichi March 11, 2011. It had the main source direct discharge contaminated water from the plant, which lasted until about April 8, and to a lesser extent, impact in the ocean part of radionuclides discharged into the atmosphere between 12 and 22 March. A immediate vicinity of the plant, the concentrations in seawater reached the end … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest, Worldwide Exposure
Two Workers Injured In Crane Accident At Fukushima Daiichi
[Translate] Two workers were injured when dismantling a crane. One required airlift to an emergency room and was operated on at the hospital. No details of his injuries were given. The second worker was treated on site and taken to a hospital in Iwaki City for a check up later in the day. Workers were dismantling a crane when the large metal upright seen in the image fell. TEPCO has details of the location and nature of the accident. The accident took place on October 29th. This article would not be possible without the extensive efforts of the SimplyInfo research team Join the conversation at chat.simplyinfo.org All content is copyright SimplyInfo.org. Content may also be copyright of other specific original authors or creators and was reproduced here with limited permission. While we welcome the sharing … Read entire article »
Filed under: Plant Status, The Latest
Hokkido University Experts Say 9.0 Quake Highly Probably – With Translation of Text
[Translate] This has been going around various websites concerning the probability of another 9.0 quake. Hokkiado University experts are saying a new quake could come in December or January based on their findings. The English translation below. Japanese translation in easier to translate charactersets at the end of the post. Graphic from the original article and the original itself can be found here. Have a higher probability of a magnitude 9 earthquake once again To announce the growing possibility of M9 earthquakes seismic waves echo back from the observed VHF.Echo began to be observed in seismic stations Erimo channels from 89.9MHz June 27, 2010 date back about 8 months before the earthquake off the coast of the northeastern Pacific Ocean on March 11, 2011.This frequency echoes from seismic monitoring stations Nakashibetsu several other … Read entire article »
Filed under: Citizen Reporting, The Latest
Unit 4 Still Poses Considerable Risk, Expert Calls For Independent Safety Inspection
[Translate] A Canadian nuclear expert is calling for an independent review of unit 4 at Fukushima Daiichi where inspectors from outside Japan would do a safety analysis. He cites a similar process used in Canada to have US experts do an independent review of facilities to ensure no bias is involved. Currently the safety of unit 4 relies on promises from TEPCO that all is well. A collapse of the fuel pool or damage to the pool causing it to no longer hold water could quickly escalate into a major nationwide disaster. A NES report said that it would only take 2.3 hours for the pool to begin discharging substances if cooling was knocked out. TEPCO initially claimed there were no structural concerns with the heavily damaged building and fuel pool. NES … Read entire article »
Filed under: Plant Status, The Latest
Contaminated Rice And Mushrooms From Fukushima
[Translate] A farmer from Tamura City has said he wants to ignore orders to destroy crops from the region and intends to sell it himself to avoid the harvesting network set up to check crops before sale. Excessive cesium was found in greenhouse grown mushrooms from Soma, Fukushima. The mushrooms had already been sent to markets in the prefecture on Tuesday, the local farmers cooperative is recalling those sent out. Authorities are claiming the wood chips used in the greenhouse may have been the cause of the contamination but no definitive cause has been established. This article would not be possible without the extensive efforts of the SimplyInfo research team Join the conversation at chat.simplyinfo.org All content is copyright SimplyInfo.org. Content may also be copyright of other specific original authors or creators and was reproduced … Read entire article »
Filed under: Food/Water Contamination, The Latest
Seismic Activity & Reactor Safety: Lessons From Japan
[Translate] This post was authored and provided by Peter Melzer, it originally appeared on his blog. Seismic Activity & Reactor Safety: Lessons from Japan I worked with radioactive isotopes known as radionuclides in laboratory research for almost three decades in my professional career. Since three reactor fuel cores have melted down at the Fukushima Dai-ichi (number one) Nuclear Power Station (NPS) owned by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) in the aftermath of theTohoku-Chihou-Taiheiyou-Oki Earthquake and Tsunami on March 11, 2011 [1], I am concerned about the safety of nuclear power reactors. At magnitude Mw 9.0 (IJMA 7.0 on the Japan Meteorological Agency intensity scale), this earthquake was the strongest recorded in Japan’s history, causing massive damage. Moreover, tsunami waves up to 40 meters high inflicted horrible devastation on the coast. The Government of Japan reports that 15,687 people lost their … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
More Hot Spots Around Tokyo
[Translate] A grouping of hot spots were found earlier this week in Ginza, Tokyo. “An elementary school located in Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo was found with a 0.80 microsievert/hour radiation spot, and a kindergarten, also in Chuo-ku, was found with 0.56 microsievert/hour spot.” EX-SKF translates the story and mentions these involved drains and asphalt, including an area near a school. Read the details at EX-SFK Today another hot spot was found in Setagaya, Tokyo. There was an earlier one found in Setagaya that turned out to be a stash of radium paint under a home. This one is at a grocery store and registered 110 micro sV/h. Fukushima Diary has details, photo and map. Yahoo news Japan confirms the story. The city of Kashiwa is still struggling to deal with the hot spot recently found there … Read entire article »
Filed under: Citizen Reporting, The Latest
The Magnitude Of Fukushima Begins To Be Understood
[Translate] It was learned earlier this week that the air releases at Fukushima Daiichi were about double the original estimate of the Japanese government. The air estimates are about 42% of the releases at Chernobyl (these are cesium 137 only). The air estimate is 35,800 terabecquerels. This is only the air releases compared against total cesium releases at Chernobyl. Then there are the sea releases at Fukushima. The sea releases are estimated at 27.1 petabecquerels or 27100 terabecquerels of cesium 137 by the French nuclear authority IRSN. They state that 82% of this sea release was done before April 8 as workers scrambled to cool the damaged reactors. These estimated amounts do not include any cesium 137 contained in water tanks, building basements or that is sunk into the ground. The total … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
Fukushima Nuclear News Roundup
[Translate] TEPCO cuts the compensation levels for tourism businesses claiming there are no longer “harmful rumor” issues for tourism businesses in the region. http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/11102613-e.html The UK has had a problem recently with dodgy “professors” making outrageous claims about science and the nuclear industry. Many of them call themselves professors but in reality are “visiting Professors”, a title given out to pretty much anyone. The BBC outlines here how someone became a “visiting Professor”, grabbing the credibility of a university for someone with little or no academic experience and in reality is just an industry insider. Beware of any UK expert riding on their “professor” status, the devil is in the details. Highly radioactive wild mushrooms were found in Nagano http://www.nhk.or.jp/lnews/nagano/1013528161.html Government commissions in Japan are discussing dropping the annual internal dose limit to 1.25 mSv down … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
New Headache In Japan, Radioactive Used Cars.
[Translate] Like people needed another thing to have to beware of, used cars from the evacuation areas are showing up with hidden origin and high levels of radiation. A car in Kawasaki that was auctioned in Chiba (doesn’t say the cars actual origin) was found to have 58.86 microsieverts per hour. So far 660 used cars were found to have too much radiation to be exported for resale. So unscrupulous dealers have been using new license plates to disguise the origin of the vehicle and selling them to unsuspecting buyers. One van was found to have 110 microsieverts of radiation an hour. The dealer tried to decontaminate it, when that didn’t work he just sold it to an unsuspecting buyer because he didn’t want to take the financial loss on the car. The van … Read entire article »
Filed under: Japan Exposure, The Latest
Radiation Releases From Fukushima Much Larger Than Initially Estimated, Evidence Of US Contamination
[Translate] The journal of Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics has published a paper that disputes the Japanese government’s account of radiation releases from Fukushima Daiichi. The study used CNTBTO global radiation data and a large network of independent monitoring points to estimate the releases from Fukushima Daiichi. Some of the findings include: pools used to store spent nuclear fuel played a significant part in the release of the long-lived environmental contaminant caesium-137 dousing the fuel pools with water caused the plant’s caesium-137 emissions to drop markedly, the finding implies that much of the fallout could have been prevented by flooding the pool earlier the accident released around 1.7 × 1019 Bq of xenon-133, greater than the estimated total radioactive release of 1.4 × 1019 Bq from Chernobyl The new model shows that Fukushima released 3.5 × 1016 Bq caesium-137, roughly twice the official government figure, … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest, Worldwide Exposure
TEPCO Offers Farms $4.37 For Ruining His Farming Business
[Translate] TEPCO has given “compensation” to an Ibaraki bamboo shoot farmer in the amount of $333 yen. That converts to $4.37 USD or 3.15 euros. Farmers in the region, many have lost their cattle or have been unable to sell their crops due to contamination. This has also included many farmers who were bankrupted almost overnight as consumers refused to buy products from that region due to the combination of many contaminated food products and a government system that has tried to downplay the danger and bully consumers into buying the products out of national pride and compassion. Without an honest food monitoring system consumers opted to shun any produce from the region leading to many farmers losing everything. TEPCO’s decision to send farmers what amounts to an insult on top of … Read entire article »
Filed under: TEPCO, The Latest
Tokai Radiation Leakage And Other Nuclear Fairy Tales
[Translate] Workers at the Tokai nuclear reactor accidentally released 64 tons of radioactive water from the RPV while doing maintenance work. “workers erroneously loosened a screw located at the bottom part of the pressure vessel, resulting in the leakage of water. Water splashed onto four workers, but they were not exposed to radiation. ” So far nobody in the media has called JAPCO on this rather impossible statement. If workers were splashed with reactor water they were likely exposed at least externally to a detectable level of radiation. Most protective suits are not water resistant and being splashed by 64 TONS of radioactive water would likely result in at the very least some minor skin contamination. As was seen multiple times at Fukushima, being splashed or soaked with radioactive water usually results in some … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
Nuclear Fuel Recycling Almost Double The Cost Of Storage
[Translate] Japan’s Atomic Energy Commission says it will cost twice as much to recycle nuclear fuel as it would to safely store spent fuel. Recycling in this case is the reprocessing into MOX fuel for running in reactors, a process that itself has been called into question. MOX critics have cited that the current fuel percentage and operation at reactors doesn’t effectively reduce the amount of plutonium involved and negatively impacts safety and reactor physics. On top of these higher recycling costs is the large amount of money involved in upgrading an aging reactor in order to run MOX. Millions have been spent replacing shrouds, other equipment and installing complex security systems just to possess the fuel. MOX has been implicated by some as a contributing factor in the intensity and scope … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
TEPCO emergency manuals released
[Translate] TEPCO has released their emergency manuals and NISA opted to make them available to the public. They are not available in English yet but the Daily Mainichi has reviewed them. The manual revealed the fact that there was no operational manual that envisioned a loss of all power sources needed to activate emergency condensers and back-up water injection devices to cool down nuclear reactors. The revelation highlights flaws in TEPCO’s contingency plan in the event of a loss of power sources. TEPCO claims there were no problems with operations at the plant as their manuals were followed, no mention of the issue of them not containing critical emergency procedues by TEPCO. Copies of the manuals can be found here http://www.meti.go.jp/press/2011/10/20111024003/20111024003-4.pdf and here http://www.meti.go.jp/press/2011/10/20111024003/20111024003-3.pdf This article would not be possible without the extensive efforts of the … Read entire article »
Filed under: NISA, The Latest
Half Of Students In Minami-Soma Found Contaminated With Cesium 137
[Translate] Half of the students tested showed low levels of cesium 137 contamination. “Radioactive cesium-137 was detected at below 10 becquerels per kilogram of a student’s weight in 199 students. The substance was also found at from 10 to less than 20 becquerels in 65 students; 20 to less than 30 becquerels in three students; and 30 to below 35 becquerels in one student, the hospital said.” It is not known if the students became contaminated through breathing in the fallout or if it was ingested with food. The students will receive ongoing checks that should show how fast and in what amounts the cesium is purged from their bodies. This article would not be possible without the extensive efforts of the SimplyInfo research team Join the conversation at chat.simplyinfo.org All content is copyright SimplyInfo.org. Content … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
Mayor Of Tokai, Shiga Residents Take Action To Shut Down Reactors
[Translate] The mayor of Tokai is calling for all reactors at the Tokai plant nearby to be decommissioned. Tokai holds 12 nuclear reactor related facilities and was the location of the first reactor in Japan. The mayor made his point clear in these comments. “Looking at how Fukushima has been handled, I’ve realized that Japan isn’t capable of controlling the massive science and technology of nuclear power. I’ve come to feel that Japan isn’t entitled to it, and have decided that we have no other choice but to abandon nuclear power,” says Murakami. “The government thinks nothing of the fact that there are 54 nuclear reactors in one of the world’s most earthquake-prone areas. There’s so much egotism, such arrogance against nature in that.” Close to 1/3 of Tokai’s residents work at one … Read entire article »
Filed under: The Latest
Get SimplyInfo.org RSS Feed
