*** Fukushima *** and other nuclear-----updates and links

Here you go guys and gals:

[link to fukushimaemergencywhatcanwedo.blogspot.com.au]

They say they haven't had a definitive study done?


well... they all didn't look to hard did they?.....

Last Edited by CitizenPerth™ on 02/20/2012 04:54 PM

Nuclear Safety Commission to review stress tests
Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission says the first stage of the stress test is not sufficient to asses the safety of nuclear power reactors.

A team of 11 people, including commission members and outside experts, will examine the first-stage test results of the 2 reactors at the Ohi nuclear plant in western Japan on Tuesday.

Commission Chairman Haruki Madarame said on Monday that the initial round only checks the equipment that are essential for maintaining safety in times of natural disasters.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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From the above link
Snip

The particles are linked to the reprocessing of nuclear fuel rods at Dounreay during the 1960s and 1970s, when they were flushed into the sea through the plant's liquid discharge pipe.

40 - 50 years ago, and still hot as they wash up onshore. Perhaps people will realize how long this stuff stays radioactive.

Last Edited by Southern OR on 02/20/2012 08:41 PM

Consequences of the March 11, 2011 earthquake, tsunami and Fukushima nuclear power plant on the ocean
[link to www.sgmeet.com]

nuther nice catch SOR.... :)

Experts criticize Nuclear Safety Agency
Japan's nuclear safety agency has been criticized by its own panel of experts for rushing to approve stress tests for halted nuclear reactors.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency last week gave its first nod of approval for the test results on 2 reactors at the Ohi nuclear plant in western Japan.

The agency reached the conclusion after cutting off debate by the panel of experts days earlier.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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I'm hoping transcripts will be available after the conference.

Tepco to begin coating seafloor with cement mixture

According to past sampling, we detected relatively high concentrated radioactive materials from marine soil sampled at inside of the port. Since the marine soil will be
spread by ocean wave, we plan to prevent spreading of marine pollution to outside of the port by covering marine soil with solidified soil....

More:
[link to enenews.com]


Full Tepco Report(PDF):
[link to www.tepco.co.jp]

OH FOR FUCK SAKES

N.Korea nuclear envoy arrives in Beijing
North Korea's nuclear envoy has arrived in China for the first nuclear talks with the United States since the death of former North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in December.

Kim Kye Gwan is set to meet the US special representative on North Korean policy, Glyn Davies, in Beijing on Thursday. The 2 sides last held discussions in Geneva in October last year.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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IAEA team arrives in Tehran
International Atomic Energy Agency experts are in Iran for another inspection of the country's nuclear program.

The 5-member team led by Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts arrived at the capital Tehran on Monday morning.

It is their second visit to the city since last month.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Radiation monitoring system launched at schools
Japan's government has begun monitoring radiation levels on a real-time basis at schools, parks and other sites frequently visited by children in disaster-hit Fukushima Prefecture.

The Education Ministry on Tuesday launched the system for showing data from 2,700 monitoring sites on its website.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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There seems to be some confusion as to how the containment cap bolts could have stretched allowing the containment cap to lift and allow gases to escape.
The primary containment vessel is supposed to vent high pressure into the wetwell[torus]. The torus operates at a negative pressure to the vessel and with a checkvalve. They are investigating whether the system failed or if venting was blocked.

Here are a couple of earlier reports concerning this issue...

~
b


from mar 2011.....

[link to www.nytimes.com]

[snip]

David Lochbaum, chief nuclear safety official of the Union of Concerned Scientists, has another possible explanation. As steam and hydrogen built up within the primary containment shell, high pressure may have forced an opening between the primary containment shell, called the drywell, and the metal cap that is bolted onto the shell. A pressure test decades ago at the Brunswick Nuclear Plant in North Carolina demonstrated that such a high-pressure leak could occur in Mark I reactors built at the Fukushima plant, Lochbaum said.

"This tragedy will be closely examined for its causes, what happened and why," Lochbaum said. "That scrutiny must determine how hydrogen got into the reactor buildings to cause the catastrophic explosions. The drywell head pathway may be that answer. We need to stress that we're not putting this forward as the only answer for this question, but it's the most plausible explanation that we've heard to date."

and


from sept 2011.....


[link to www.simplyinfo.org]
[snip]

Mark 1 containments were not specifically designed to handle these situations:
Reactor Vessel Rupture
Steam Generator Rupture
Large break (LOCA) Loss Of Coolant Accidents

These kinds of accidents produce higher containment pressure and more fission products. High heat caused by these kinds of accidents can also lead to failing containment by way of cracks or ruptures.

Statistics for Peach Bottom are likely similar to units at Fukushima as they have similar designs.
Peach Bottom BWR Mark 1 Peak Design Basis Accident Pressure PSIG 49.1 (KPA 339)
Peach bottom design: 56psig, ultimate failure pressure 148 psig

Containment Cap:

The yellow containment cap bolt style used at Peach Bottom nuclear plant is the style used at Fukushima and is prone to bolt elongation (stretching) and flange separation (opening) under high temperatures. Accidents where high containment (drywell) temperatures occur are more likely to have the containment cap bolts stretch.

The silicon seal of the containment cap can also fail, it degrades significantly at temperatures over about 600 K (620 ‘F). These two flaws can create an outlet for containment in situations where the pressure and temperatures are both high.

**This is certainly a potential scenario as part of the unit 3 explosion. Considerable steam and debris was ejected high in the air but the containment cap or parts of it have not been found in the debris.




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This is not a new revelation...

This [the containment cap or parts of it have not been found in the debris] indicates that the mixed oxide fuel was blasted from Unit 3 reactor.

This was all discovered and posted in fuku 1 thread.

~

waterbug

[link to palltimes.com]

[snip]

Operators at Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station Unit 1 shut down the plant’s reactor on Sunday after detecting increased water in the plant’s containment system caused by a leaky valve.



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Reprocessing: Mythology versus Reality
[link to www.ieer.org]

[snip]

Reprocessing is the process of treating
spent nuclear fuel in order to separate
the various constituents, especially
the theoretically potentially usable pluto-nium and uranium from fission products.
It is sometimes called “recycling” by its
promoters, though in practice only about
1 percent of the recovered material can be
reused as fuel, at high cost.
Spent nuclear fuel has been piling
up at reactors since the dawn of nuclear
power in the United States. With no viable
plan to dispose of the waste, reprocessing
has become a new mantra for boosters,
who point to the uranium and plutonium
in the spent fuel as a treasure-trove of
unused energy that we are wasting. This
is a false promise, similar to the old claim
that nuclear energy would be “too cheap
to meter.”

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Nuclear waste storage depot attracts southern Ontario towns
[link to www.thestar.com]

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Japanese farmers use Qld soil to grow rice
[link to www.abc.net.au]

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Japan clears up only 5% of tsunami rubble
[link to www.straitstimes.com]

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Gov't emergency headquarters refused to conduct additional thyroid testing on children
[link to mdn.mainichi.jp]

[snip]

On March 30, after the NSC was informed of the results from the government's nuclear emergency headquarters, NSC asked that additional tests be conducted on the child with a thyroid monitor, which is capable of taking more precise measurements.

"Because iodine has a short half life, it's hard to get a grasp of what's going on unless measurements are taken early on," an NSC official explains.

On April 1, 2011, however, the government's emergency headquarters decided not to conduct further tests, citing "the difficulty of transporting a 1-ton thyroid monitor," "requiring the child to travel long distances for tests," and "risk of spreading extreme panic and making the child, the child's family and their local community targets of unwarranted discrimination" as reasons.

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Media allowed into Fukushima plant again, but situation far from resolved
[link to mdn.mainichi.jp]

[snip]

The radiation level inside the bus, which journalists were asked to board, jumped to 1,500 microsieverts per hour when the vehicle passed near the No. 3 reactor turbine building, while workers were still removing rubble left in the aftermath of the accident inside the building housing the No. 4 reactor.

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Survey reveals radiation doses / 58% of Fukushima residents likely exposed to less than 1 millisievert
[link to www.yomiuri.co.jp]

[snip]

The survey found 94.6 percent of residents were considered to have been exposed to less than 5 millisieverts of radiation.

Among 1,693 people under 20 years old who were surveyed, one male was estimated to have been exposed to 18.1 millisieverts, but all others were exposed to less than 10 millisieverts.

"In past epidemiological examinations, obvious health effects have not been observed with cumulative doses of 100 millisieverts or less. The results of the survey show the level of radiation exposure will not likely impact residents' health," an official of the prefecture said.

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Fukushima residents exposed to up to 23 millisieverts of radiation
[link to mdn.mainichi.jp]

[snip]

"As annual radiation exposure of up to 100 millisieverts poses no specific cancer risks, the estimated radiation is unlikely to cause any adverse health effects," Fukushima Medical University Vice President Shunichi Yamashita told a press conference. "It is important to reduce future radiation exposure as much as possible."

While the allowable radiation exposure limit is ordinarily set at 1 millisievert per year, the International Commission on Radiological Protection has recommended an emergency limit of 20 to 100 millisieverts.

Including nuclear plant workers, the number of residents of the three municipalities exposed to 10 millisieverts or more of radiation totaled 95 people. The maximum exposure among that larger group was estimated at 47.2 millisieverts.

In another development on Monday, a civic group said it had detected radioactive cesium of up to 1.08 million becquerels per kilogram in soil from a car park in Minamisoma located in the evacuation preparation zone set after the nuclear plant crisis. The designation of the location for evacuation was lifted in September.

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Radioactive material with low level radiation stolen from plant, says minister
[link to www.thedailynewsegypt.com]

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This is information related to the Wood's Hole project to take samples of the seawater around Japan for analysis.
The first link is their daily blog from the research vessel. The second is an article based on their findings which have already been posted here.

~
b
~

[link to www.whoi.edu]


~~~~~~~


Fukushima’s Impact on the Ocean Analyzed
[link to spectrum.ieee.org]
[snip]

Nicholas Fisher, a professor of marine and atmospheric sciences at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, says that the data Buesseler has presented calls for further in-depth evaluation of the marine environment around Fukushima. When Fisher, Buesseler, and their colleagues were in Japan to independently measure radiation in marine life this past June, they were not allowed to enter the waters within 30-kilometers of the coast. It’s possible that in the waters a few hundred meters around the reactor, organisms have radiation levels high enough to possibly pose a risk to humans if consumed, Fisher says, but "we just don’t know if that’s the case. Like any disaster, there’s a lot of stuff that needs to be evaluated before you can give the ’clear’ signal."

[snip]

Chernobyl-induced radiation in the Black Sea peaked in 1986 at about 1,000 becquerels per cubic meter, he said in an interview at his office in Woods Hole, Mass. By contrast, the radiation level off the coast near the Fukushima Daiichi plant peaked at more than 100,000 becquerels per cubic meter in early April.

Before Fukushima, in 2010, the Japanese coast measured about 1.5 becquerel per cubic meter, he said.

‘‘Chernobyl might have been five times bigger, over all, but the ocean impact was much smaller,’’ Mr. Buesseler said.

Working with a team of scientists from other institutions, including the University of Tokyo and Columbia University, Mr. Buesseler’s Woods Hole group in June spent 15 days in the waters off northeast Japan, studying the levels and dispersion of radioactive substances there and the effect on marine life.

The project, financed primarily by the Moore Foundation after governments declined to participate, continued to receive samples from Japanese cruises into July.
[link to green.blogs.nytimes.com]

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An interesting tidbit I had missed...

~
b

Revisiting...

Lucas Whitefield's article on bio-accumulation, to which I contributed in a small way.
[link to news.lucaswhitefieldhixson.com]

~
b

Arnie Gunderson made a video of that EXACT scenario.....

I'll try and track it down later....

[link to fairewinds.com]

Fairewinds shows that the nuclear industry's plan to vent the containment at Fukushima Daiichi could not have prevented a containment failure and the ensuing explosions. Look at the graphics from the containment stress tests conducted more than 40 years ago at a US nuclear reactor identical to Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1. This video and its graphics provide important clues about why Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1 exploded.

here it is.... right under my nose... lol

IAEA inspection in Iran ends, no progress likely
A team from the International Atomic Energy Agency has ended a visit to Iran, but apparently made no progress in breaking the standoff over the country's nuclear program.

The team led by Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts concluded its 2-day tour on Tuesday.
This was the team's second trip to Iran in a month.

The IAEA raised the suspicion in its November report that Iran carried out tests and simulations to develop nuclear weapons.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Lithuania PM hopes for nuclear plant
Lithuania's prime minister has expressed hope for early agreement with a Japanese company on building a nuclear power plant in his country.

Andrius Kubilius told NHK in Tokyo on Tuesday that the country is near the final stage of negotiations on the agreement to allow Hitachi to build the plant.

Kubilius expressed hope for a basic agreement with Hitachi in the first half of this year, and for approval by Lithuania's parliament.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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