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

TEPCO to release footage of video conferences
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is set to release footage of video conferences held as the nuclear disaster unfolded last year. The meetings took place between the utility's headquarters and workers trying to contain the accident.

The move comes 16 months after the start of the disaster. It marks a turnaround by officials at Tokyo Electric Power Company, who had previously admitted the existence of the footage, but refused to release it. They said it was for internal use and disclosure could infringe privacy.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Court order sought to stop restart of reactors
A trial hearing has begun in a lawsuit filed by residents seeking a court order to stop the restart of a nuclear plant in Niigata Prefecture, central Japan.

The 132 plaintiffs are asking a district court in the prefecture to stop Tokyo Electric Power Company's plan to restart the Kashiwazaki Kariwa plant by March 2014. The plaintiffs include evacuees from Fukushima Prefecture, which hosts the utility's nuclear plant that was damaged in the March 11th disaster.

The plaintiffs say the Niigata plant is in an area that has been hit by repeated powerful earthquakes and is prone to liquefaction.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Gov't to conduct radiation tests on rice at 40,000 locations in 2012
The farm ministry will conduct radiation tests on samples of rice grown at a total of 40,000 locations in 17 prefectures in 2012, more than 10 times as many as last year, ministry officials said Thursday.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries will increase the number of samples for the test as government-set allowable limits of radioactive cesium contained in rice have been toughened since April, such as a ban on shipments of rice containing 100 becquerels per kilogram, the officials said.

The test for this year will mainly cover locations where more than 50 becquerels per kg were detected in samples of rice cropped in 2011 and their surrounding areas.
[link to english.kyodonews.jp]
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oh good, we get more boom for the buck

(sodium is NOT nice to handle stuff!!!!)

[link to en.wikipedia.org]

A lot more...

Using nuclear waste, PRISM reactor could power UK for 500 years
The question of what to do with spent nuclear fuel has never been answered concisely. In spite of a number of creative ideas — including shooting radioactive material into space, sinking it in the ocean, or burying it beneath Nevada’s Yucca Mountain — there’s never been a surefire proposal that stuck.

A next-generation reactor, however, could pave the way. According to the Guardian, GE-Hitachi submitted plans to the UK’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority Monday for a next-generation PRISM reactor that could run on nuclear waste.

For Great Britain, a country whose stockpile of spent nuclear fuel now includes 110 tons of spent plutonium and 38,581 tons of spent uranium, the project has certain allure. According to David MacKay, the chief scientific advisor of the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), this stockpile could be enough to provide the country with 500 years of low-carbon electricity. [link to www.nucpros.com]
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AREVA : The ATMEA1 Reactor Pre-Qualified in Argentina
The national utility Nucleoeléctrica Argentina (NA-SA) has informed ATMEA that it had pre-qualified the ATMEA1 technology for the next Request For Proposals that will be issued for the construction of its fourth nuclear power plant. By pre-selecting the ATMEA1 technology, NA-SA acknowledges that the ATMEA1 reactor is a qualified design that could meet the most stringent safety requirements and fit needs of the NA-SA.
[link to www.nucpros.com]
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Honeywell to upgrade nuclear plant to improve safety
Honeywell International Inc said it is evaluating upgrades to its Metropolis Works nuclear conversion plant, following a regulatory inspection that looked at preparedness for natural disasters such as strong earthquakes and tornadoes.
[link to www.nucpros.com]
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Have your readings continued to increase? Hopefully not..

~

Federal oversight board questions radiation risk at Los Alamos National Laboratory
[link to lubbockonline.com]

[snip]

The board has been working closely with the Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration to upgrade the building’s structure, fire suppression and ventilation systems since new studies in 2007 showed the potential for a major earthquake along area faults to be 300 percent greater than previously believed.

~

Common sense says this project should be abandoned .. permanently. The facility should probably be shut down, as well.
And if they knew in '07 of a 300 per cent greater earthquake potential, why would they even consider continuing with plans to build new facilities...?
Look at the cost differential..
500 million has turned into almost 6 billion...
That is a huge underestimation of cost..
Are they all brain-dead? Expand capacity..?
Shouldn't this technology be managed by the most brilliant minds rather than bureaucrats?

Freaking amazing..

~


[link to ananuclear.org]
PROJECT SUMMARIES
Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement (CMRR) Project is proposed to replace an
existing building at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico in order to expand capacity to
produce plutonium “pits” or “cores” for nuclear warheads.
• Original cost in 2004 was estimated to be between $350-$500 million, and the completion
date was 2011.
• The total cost was estimated to be $5.86 billion in FY 2010 with a completion date of 2022.
• Status – The DOE has deferred construction of this facility for five years.

Fukushima Daiichi NPS Unit 3 Reactor Probe

New photos...

[link to cryptome.org]
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Completion of Debris Removal from the Upper Part of Unit 4
Reactor Building at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station

[link to www.tepco.co.jp]

PDF / 2 pages / 0.1 MB
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Interesting..?

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The Message of Fukushima Unit Three
[link to everist.org]

Wisconsin.

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Nuke waste transfer begins today; Hwy. 35 to be closed about noon
[link to lacrossetribune.com]

Ontario Power Generation commits over $25 million for estimate on two new nuclear reactors at Darlington as layoffs loom
[link to enformable.com]

TEPCO releases video of Reactor 3 Torus Room Inspection
[link to enformable.com]

Western media: Don't blame Fukushima on 'culture'
[link to ajw.asahi.com]

[snip]

Many of the statements at issue appear in the "Message from the Chairman" section of the English-language report written by investigation chairman Kiyoshi Kurokawa, but are found nowhere in the Japanese-language version.

Reporters asked the reasons for the differences between the Japanese and English versions during a news conference following the release of the report.

Kurokawa replied that, "If you are Japanese, you would understand by reading the original version."

Survey robot died in reactor3
[link to fukushima-diary.com]

[Asahi] Gov concealed radiation exposure data of Fukushima children “not to cause fear”
[link to fukushima-diary.com]

[Reactor3] Latest pictures from crawler crane
[link to fukushima-diary.com]

Business as usual.

~



Oi reactor 4 to begin restart July 18
[link to www.japantimes.co.jp]

Doctor Shuntaro Hida says symptoms of Fukushima patients is similar to the A-bomb era
[link to japandailypress.com]

Is the LIVE CAM still down?

What's the new URL?

[link to news.tbs.co.jp]

:lisail:

TEPCOs cam is working for me with Windows Media Player.

[link to www.tepco.co.jp]
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They seem to spike for a few days then back down again. Currently holding around .12 uSv/hr

THURSDAY, JULY 12, 2012

MAJIA's Blog: Is Fukushima an ELE?

The Fukushima Daichi nuclear power plant has had massive steam and smoke releases intermittently for about 18 months now. I've been watching the Tecpo and JNN-TBS webcams for almost that long and I would say the biggest releases at the plant after March of 2011 were in June of 2011, August of 2011, and late Nov-Jan of 2011-2012.

We've had even even more emissions since March of 2012.

I think that units 3 and 4 have both had massive fires on more than one occasion based on my observations of the sources of the emissions visible in the webcams.

Tapes of these emissions have been made available by Nuchelchen and Fuku1live, among others, at youtube.

I believe that we can safely assume considerable amounts of the fuel in units 1-4 and the common spent fuel pool have burned or have melted into the groundwater at the site. I believe unit 5 also had a fire, based on visual evidence and because I know from my research that unit 5 was the same design as units 1-3. Unit 6 may still be intact.

This is truly a mega-disaster.

That said, I am concerned about discussions of it as an ELE, or extinction level event.

full blog here:

[link to majiasblog.blogspot.co.nz]



:Inan:

Govt. approves Fukushima rebuilding plan
The Japanese government has approved a basic plan to rebuild Fukushima Prefecture, the home of the nuclear plant that went out of control after the quake and tsunami in March last year.

The plan was approved at a Cabinet meeting on Friday. It cites the revival of the prefecture as the top priority for national policy.

The plan also says the government is responsible for the revival and will make the utmost efforts to achieve this as a matter of national honor.

Respecting the prefecture's goal of creating communities that don't depend on nuclear power, the plan says the government will promote the introduction of renewable energy. It hopes the move will help to create jobs as well.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Robot probe detects high radiation at No.3 reactor
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has detected high levels of radiation in the basement of the No. 3 reactor, with a maximum dose of 360 millisieverts per hour.

Tokyo Electric Power Company sent in a robot on Wednesday to the room where the suppression chamber is located. It was the first robot to probe this area of the plant.

Engineers lost control of the remote-controlled robot after around 3 hours of operation. They say there are problems with the connecting cable and they've been unable to regain control.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]

Video at link.
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TEPCO to remove rods from No.4 fuel pool
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant will soon start test runs for removing fuel rods from a storage pool of the No. 4 reactor.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency on Thursday approved safety measures for the removal procedure drawn up by Tokyo Electric Power Company.

The reactor's fuel pool contains 1,535 fuel rods -- the highest number at the plant.

TEPCO's trial run is part of efforts to decommission the plant. The test will involve removing 2 unused rods from the pool.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]

Video at link.
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Gov't to ask 4 prefectures to relocate nuclear emergency centers
The Japanese Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency plans to ask four prefectures to relocate emergency control centers that are currently within 5 kilometers from nuclear power plants, sources close to the matter said Friday.

An offsite center 5 km from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant became unusable for responding to the March 2011 accident due to radioactive contamination, leading the agency to find it necessary to come up with relocation plans.
[link to english.kyodonews.jp]
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Tube wear detailed at CA nuke plant
LOS ANGELES -- Federal regulators Thursday disclosed the most detailed information to date on damage at California's idled San Onofre nuclear power plant, where thousands of tubes that carry radioactive water have eroded at an alarming rate.

The detailed data, posted obscurely on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission website, has implications for the future of the seaside plant that has been offline since a tube break in January released traces of radiation.
[link to www.nucpros.com]
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Iitate villagers seek compensation from TEPCO
A group of nuclear accident evacuees in Fukushima has filed for compensation of more than 50 million dollars from Tokyo Electric Power Company for radiation exposure and other damages.

The 159 residents from the Nagadoro district in Iitate Village filed the claim on Friday with a state-backed legal arbitrator.

Nagadoro is about 30 kilometers from the Fukushima nuclear plant. Radiation levels in the district remain high, and the government is due to declare it uninhabitable for the long term.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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Radiation exposure in Fukushima restudied
Japanese researchers say the maximum radiation exposure of adult residents in Fukushima after the nuclear plant accident there was below the international safety standard.

The researchers at Hirosaki University in northern Japan examined the thyroid glands of 62 Fukushima residents in April last year, soon after the accident. In their initial report released in March, they said the maximum exposure level was 87 millisieverts.

The team reexamined the exposure levels by using detailed data, including that on the spread of nuclear substances called radioactive plumes after the accident.
[link to www3.nhk.or.jp]
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