Japan Earthquake

Japan Earthquake | Page 2347

iaea is an institution to promote nukes, so they shouldn't give them central control bout rad readings. they will never make them public.
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:15:04 AM

Up to one-seventh of Fukushima may be contaminated

TOKYO, Sept. 15, Kyodo

It is likely that more than 2,000 square kilometers of land in Fukushima Prefecture have been contaminated with radioactive substances released from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and need to be decontaminated, research indicated Thursday.

The area accounts for about one-seventh of the whole prefecture, according to the estimation by Yuichi Moriguchi, a professor at the University of Tokyo. The volume of contaminated top soil that would need to be removed totals 100 million cubic meters.

As forests account for about 70 percent of the estimated contaminated areas, leaves and branches will need to be removed, according to the study that was based on radiation distribution maps released by the government in late June.
english.kyodonews.jp
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:16:33 AM

this is definitely an underestimation.
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:17:28 AM

Japan's assumptions over possible nuclear accident 'too modest'

NEW YORK, Sept. 15, Kyodo

The United Nations said Wednesday that Japan was ''too modest'' in assuming possible accidents at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant before the earthquake-tsunami disaster crippled the facility on March 11.

''The principal lesson of the Fukushima accident is that assumptions made concerning which types of accident were possible or likely were too modest,'' the United Nations said in a report released Wednesday on the nuclear crisis in Japan.

''Those assumptions should be reviewed for all existing and planned reactors, and the possible effects of climate change should be taken into account,'' it said. english.kyodonews.jp
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:19:16 AM

@Edano well they may be hyping the un report but they havent made it easy to find
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 9:19:49 AM

the possible effects of climatic change .... they are impossible to forsee for more than the next 5 years ....
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:21:54 AM

english.kyodonews.jp

Radioactive waste returned to Japan
A container holding reprocessed spent nuclear fuel is unloaded from a transport ship that arrived at a port in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, on Sept. 15, 2011. The radioactive waste was returned to Japan after processing in Britain, in the course of reprocessing spent nuclear fuel at Japanese reactors. (Kyodo) english.kyodonews.jp
by Edano via English.kyodonews.jp 9/15/2011 9:23:56 AM

Mongolia bans external talks on nuclear waste storage plans

ULAN BATOR, Sept. 15, Kyodo

Mongolian President Tsakhia Elbegdorj has issued an order banning negotiating with foreign governments or international organizations on nuclear waste storage plans in Mongolia.

The order came last Friday after overseas media reports said Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Toshiba Corp. and the U.S. Department of Energy were promoting such plans.

As these plans have come under fire in Mongolia, the country's government has denied that its officials have discussed or will discuss such plans with foreign governments or international organizations. english.kyodonews.jp
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:26:11 AM

lot of news today.
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:30:00 AM

@Edano it seems to come in waves
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 9:30:42 AM

so, tepco's core spraying shows no impact on #2 temperatures so far, and #3 boils again.
by Edano 9/15/2011 9:31:01 AM

@Edano it's ok the iaea say that it is all under control
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 9:31:59 AM

Commission Meeting: Briefing on the Japan Near Term Task Force Report – Short-Term Actions
.
Comments on the Japan
Near-Term Task Force Report
William Leith
Senior Advisor for Earthquake
and Geologic Hazards
U.S. Geological Survey
Reston, Virginia
www.nrc.gov
.
Industry Recommendations on
Near-Term Actions in Response to
Fukushima
Charles Pardee
Chairman, Industry Fukushima Response
Steering Committee
www.nrc.gov
.
RESPONSE TO TASK FORCE
RECOMMENDATIONS
September 14, 2011
Thomas B. Cochran, Ph.D.
Consulting Senior Scientist
Nuclear Program
Natural Resources Defense Council
(NRDC)
www.nrc.gov
.
UCS Perspective on the
Japan Task Force Report
Short-Term Actions
September 14, 2011
Dr. Edwin S. Lyman
Senior Scientist
Union of Concerned Scientists
www.nrc.gov
.
Industry Perspective on
Near-Term Task Force
Recommendation #9 – Enhancing
Emergency Preparedness
www.nrc.gov
.
Patrick Mulligan, Manager
NJ DEP Bureau of Nuclear Engineering
and
CRCPD’s Committee on Emergency Response
Planning, Chair (HS/ER-5)
www.nrc.gov
.
Briefing on the Japan Near
Term Task Force Report –
Short-Term Actions
R. William Borchardt
Executive Director for Operations
September 14, 2011
www.nrc.gov
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 9:50:41 AM

PROPOSED CHARTER FOR THE LONGER-TERM REVIEW OF
LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE MARCH 11, 2011, JAPANESE
EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI
www.nrc.gov
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 10:28:20 AM

I have asked OB_Li if she can give us more idea what is in this tepco doc
For documents received an instruction from the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, METI survey concerning the presence of errors in the emergency safety measures, including the report www.tepco.co.jp
reply
@ElaineKirk NISA investigated to see if there was any mistake on the TEPCO's emergency safety measures and came back to them with their comment and instruction. Based on the instructions from NISA, TEPCO would conduct reviewing the report and get back to NISA by September 28.
@ElaineKirk NISA confirmed there were mistakes in the reports from CEPCO, SEPCO, KEPCO and JAPCO. However, the evaluations&measures;were conducted based on the given instructions, NISA think these mistakes wouldn't affect the emergency safety measures. Although NISA isn't worried too much about the mistakes, revised report submission is required. That's basically they say. SIGH....So stupid.
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 11:01:32 AM

morning! (afternoon-evening)
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 11:46:02 AM

@lillymunster greetings Lilly
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 11:53:11 AM

Were you on the hunt for that UN document mentioned earlier?
I saw a mention in an older doc that the IAEA blasted Japan in the 1990's for lousy accident safety.
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 11:56:04 AM

Here is the mention, from a link MidValley found last night:
Freshly revealed reports from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), dating from the 1990s, describe safety precautions at Japanese nuclear reactors as dangerously weak. IAEA inspectors visited four reactors in 1992 and 1995, finding 90 deficiencies in safety procedures.

www.newscientist.com
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:02:09 PM

@lillymunster freshly revealed - these docs should never have been anywhere but in the public domain the iaea should have their viagra withdrawn so they can be left to shrink'n'shrivel
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 12:04:46 PM

Found the 2002 article. The IAEA was not invited back after finding 90 flaws and a messed up safety system. The IAEA had to be invited by Japan to inspect or show up. www.newscientist.com
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:05:05 PM

@elainekirk what ones? The new UN document or all these old IAEA reports? My coffee hasn't kicked in yet. :-)
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:05:51 PM

@lillymunster the iaea ones you talked of I am getting confused I seem to be obsessed with searching for docs that should be easy to find but have it seems been deliberately made hard to find
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 12:43:06 PM

fukushima cesium will reach atlantic and indian oceans www.telegraph.co.uk
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:45:20 PM

I am going to make some lunch and find more docs
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 12:45:34 PM

The head of the UN supposedly had a document that went along with his complaints about the Japan situation and safety. Will go grab the post, might clarify.
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:47:46 PM

Found it. It was Edano's post: 43 page secretary general's report on fuku

UN: Fukushima plant based on poor safety assesment

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has blamed the nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in northern Japan on its design which, he says, was based on poor hazard assessments of natural disasters.

The secretary general released a 43-page report on Wednesday, after studying the March accident with UN entities including the International Atomic Energy Agency and the World Health Organization.

The report says it is necessary for nuclear power stations to strengthen their safety standards.

It proposes the creation of a global system to allow the IAEA to internationally monitor radiation levels, citing the international impact of major nuclear accidents and emergencies.
The report calls for an international emergency response framework in the event of nuclear accidents, to secure human health and food safety.

The report also stresses the importance of the peaceful use of nuclear energy, in order to help improve the lives of the 2.4 billion people in developing countries suffering from energy poverty.

The UN secretary general is to convene a high-level meeting on nuclear safety and security on September 22nd in New York.

Thursday, September 15, 2011 16:40 +0900 (JST)
www3.nhk.or.jp
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:48:48 PM

@lillymunster just making food I will find these docs or go mad ...one or the other
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 12:56:40 PM

Some technical details on the current reactor watering systems spectrum.ieee.org
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:58:48 PM

@elainekirk are you looking on iaea or UN sec. general's website?
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 12:59:06 PM

both and nrc and go.jp the list is extensive lol
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 1:08:53 PM

If anyone pops by that can give some opinion on these radiation contamination findings can you share what you think? Smoss found these last night but not totally sure what they mean. They were taken in Tokyo and there was americium and ruthium in the gutter sediment. This seemed unusual but not sure what it means. www.scribd.com
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 1:29:06 PM

Morning all! 6.2 quake near Honshu coast 6 hrs ago. quakes.globalincidentmap.com
by LM 9/15/2011 1:47:30 PM

This is really good reading on the horrible state of reactors and massive fraud by the power companies back in the 90's. Including clandestine repairs at fuku. www.klimaatkeuze.nl
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 1:53:39 PM

I put together all the articles we found last night while looking for new info on the investigations on TEPCO into a new article about all of tepco's past misdeeds and the iaea's inability to do anything. It is on the home page right now
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 2:04:08 PM

@lillymunster Americium is a fission product of Uranium or Plutonium with half-lives of between 100 and over 7000 years depending on the isotope. Ruthenium is a fission product of Uranium-235 and a half-life of between a few days and over one year depending on the isotope. Does this help?
by Pedro Jesus 9/15/2011 2:06:11 PM

@Pedro Jesus yes. Would Americium have been produced that quick? Or would it have been already existing in the reactor mix? There were early statements that plutonium couldn't make it very far because it is heavy. I think they said this of some other elements. Is it unusual to find americium in Tokyo?
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 2:17:23 PM

@lillymunster i will go spread your article before walking the dogs
by elainekirk 9/15/2011 2:21:51 PM

@lillymunster According to this article in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americium) there are 100 grams of Americium produced for each tonne of spent nuclear fuel. I don't know if it is usual to appear in Tokyo under the current circumstances but I guess it would depend on how much was found. It is a fission product of either Uranium or Plutonium so it is not a requirement that it actually came from the fission of Plutonium alone.
by Pedro Jesus 9/15/2011 2:22:21 PM

@Pedro Jesus this has the testing results and isotopes at the bottom of the document www.scribd.com
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 2:23:17 PM

@lillymunster You should direct that question to one of our nuclear experts. I can't make much sense of the data. I don't know how many grams of Americium-241 would correspond to 0.5 Bq/Unit. Is it too much? I have no idea...
by Pedro Jesus 9/15/2011 2:32:34 PM

@Pedro Jesus thanks, will keep passing it around. There were reports of plutonium being found 65km from Daiichi in significant amounts. So it is worrisome that there seems to be no testing for these at all as they are declaring places safe to return to.
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 2:39:53 PM

via NRC email system
NRC TO DISCUSS INDUSTRY’S POST-FUKUSHIMA EFFORTS
SEPT. 21 IN ROCKVILLE, MD.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with nuclear power plant industry
representatives on Wednesday, Sept. 21, to discuss the industry’s plans and proposed actions to
address the lessons learned from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident.
The meeting will run from 1-3:30 p.m. in the Commission Meeting Room on the first
floor of One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike in Rockville. The NRC staff will consider
the industry’s feedback as they prepare a proposal to prioritize recommendations from the
agency’s Near-Term Task Force. The Commission has asked the staff to provide its prioritization
proposal by Oct. 3.
Additional information regarding the meeting, including expected participants and a more
detailed agenda, will be available on the NRC’s public meeting schedule. The meeting will be
webcast, and a toll-free teleconference will also be available. Members of the public may ask
questions of the NRC staff before the meeting ends; those interested in teleconference
information should contact Amy Bonaccorso at RST01_F.Resource@nrc.gov for instructions
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 3:06:26 PM

As to the gutter test, I found the demonstration of roadside contamination in Tokyo in the scribd document quite informative, showing drastically the dimension of the cleanup that awaits Japan. I figured out some detail. The unit in the table seems 50 g (listed at the top of the table). Hence, 74 Bq/kg of Am-241 were found in the gutter dirt. Here is a little information on the known health effects of Americium en.wikipedia.org .
by Peter edited by lillymunster 9/15/2011 3:49:40 PM

@Peter thanks. That gives a better idea. All these things keep popping up in far flung locations and all the govt or the media talk about is cesium
by lillymunster 9/15/2011 3:54:53 PM