Radioactive Chat: One year after Fukushima – 2012 Audio Collection Feb-March 11 Updates

12 03 2012

From Radioactive Chat –

Today a year has past since the Fukushima disaster, and in that time the earthquake activity in the are have gone up some 24 times from the recorded average in the area. 231 earthquakes above M4 have hit since the devastating earthquake with numerous M5 quakes recently centering in around Fukushima. Some of us look at the recent solar activity and solar storms and see a direct connection. . . .

. . . .  While I’m at it, describing to you how much earthquake activity has gone up (24 times). It will surprise some of you, probably living in caves somewhere.. That a few weeks ago the radiation levels reported in Tokyo, many parts of it, has in fact radioactive levels 25 times higher than the mandatory evacuation zones around Chernobyl!!   (more)

http://radioactivechat.blogspot.com/2012/03/one-year-after-fukushima-2012-audio.html 


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Japan’s 5 serious mistakes in Fukushima

22 03 2011

From International Business Times:

After more than a week of utter mayhem and terrible fear about an impending disaster, there was good news finally from Japan — engineers successfully restored electricity to the cooling systems at the Fukushima reactors over the weekend, averting further blasts and the escape of dangerous radioactive elements.

There has been worldwide appreciation for the way Japan worked diligently to prevent a disastrous meltdown while extreme adulation was reserved for the nuclear workers who put their lives in danger, kamikaze style, trying to fix the damaged reactors at the Fukushima plant.

However, scores of experts have pointed to various avoidable slips and lapses that worsened the crisis in the first place.

The following are some such safety lacunae pointed out by award-winning journalist Keith Harmon Snow in his lengthy article in Global Research: Snow, a GE engineer-turned war correspondent who also worked as a United Nations genocide investigator, calls these security failures as ‘nuclear stupidities’.

MISTAKE NO. 1 – The Fukushima reactor buildings are square, not circular, and had to absorb the force of the tsunami wave straight on. Japan sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, the most seismic-prone region of the world where a massive quake can result in devastating tsunamis. Snow also points out that six reactors were clustered too close together at Fukushima, potentially complicating the dimensions of any disaster. Also, the reactors were built on earthquake fault lines.

MISTAKE NO. 2. – No shoreline protection was built to act as barrier against a tsunami. He points out that the nuclear crisis was the creation of an off-site power outage that cut off electricity to the plant, resulting in the failure of the crucial cooling system. Had there been better protection to the power backup facilities, the disaster wouldn’t have happened at all.MISTAKE NO. 3 – Snow also holds responsible some of the false assumptions and calculations made before the construction of the reactors, according to which the plant could withstand anything that nature threw at it. Separately, there have been reports saying that the reactors’ capability to withstand earthquakes was assessed only thrice in 35 years.

MISTAKE NO. 4.

Spent fuel pools were packed too tightly, as is well-established by industry documents, for economic reasons, discarding safety concerns, Snow says. He also notes that the spent fuel pools at the six Fukushima reactors were not inside primary containment, but exposed.

MISTAKE NO. 5. The spent fuel pools at Fukushima are suspended up high inside the reactor buildings secondary containment — the same buildings whose roofs are blowing off. He says this about the magnitude of radiation risk from spent fuel rods: “The atomic bomb that exploded at Hiroshima created about 2000 curies of radioactivity. The spent fuel pools at Vermont Yankee Nuclear Plant (U.S.) are said to hold about 75 million curies. There are six spent fuel pools at Fukushima, but the numbers of tons of fuel rods in each have not been made public.”


http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/124916/20110321/japan-fukushima-mistakes-nuclear-fuel-rods-reactor-tsunami.htm


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Nuke Disaster in Japan, Updates

12 03 2011

L A T E S T [ Mar. 14]

Second reactor building explodes

http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2011/s3163897.htm

and

Fuel rods fully exposed at tsunami – hit reactor in Fukushima

The fuel rods in one of Japan’s damaged nuclear reactors have been temporarily fully exposed from their coolant, raising the risk of overheating and a meltdown.

A spokesman at the Fukushima plant said today that Unit 2’s rods were briefly exposed.

Sea water was being channelled into the reactor to cover the rods again.

Unit 2 of the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant is the latest reactor to lose its ability to cool down.

The other two reactors at the plant are facing a meltdown and authorities are racing to cool them with sea water. . . (more)

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/world-news/fuel-rods-fully-exposed-at-tsunami-hit-reactor-in-fukushima-15113711.html

WikiLeaks: Japan warned over nuke plants

Japan was warned more than two years ago by the international nuclear watchdog that its nuclear power plants were not capable of withstanding powerful earthquakes, leaked diplomatic cables reveal.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8384059/Japan-earthquake-Japan-warned-over-nuclear-plants-WikiLeaks-cables-show.html

 

______________from Mar. 12:_______________

The officials in Japan and the energy-cozy media seem to be minimizing the radiation leak(s) at Japanese atomic reactors.

CNN says:

An explosion at an earthquake-damaged nuclear plant was not caused by damage to the nuclear reactor but by a pumping system that failed as crews tried to bring the reactor’s temperature down, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Saturday.

The next step for workers at the Fukushima Daiichi plant will be to flood the reactor containment structure with sea water to bring the reactor’s temperature down to safe levels, he said. The effort is expected to take two days.

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/12/japan.nuclear/

They call it a “concern” not a meltdown. Nothing to look at here. Move along.

But Nature.com says:

Two Japanese nuclear power stations are struggling to contain damage from a major earthquake and tsunami, in what could become be the worst nuclear incident since the catastrophic Chernobyl accident of 1986.

http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegreatbeyond/2011/03/explosion_rocks_nuclear_plant.html

and they say they are giving out iodine pills.

and  Xinhua says:

Radiation is leaking from the Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant in northeast Japan, after its reactors were disabled by Friday’s massive earthquake and ensuing tsunami, Japanese officials confirmed Saturday.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-03/12/c_13775056.htm

and  The Daily Yomiuri says:

The Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said Saturday afternoon that a nuclear meltdown was suspected at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant’s No. 1 reactor.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20110312dy01.htm

World Nuclear News says:

Battle to stabilise earthquake reactors

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS_Battle_to_stabilise_earthquake_reactors_1203111.html

You decide for yourself if this disaster is being contained. It doesn’t look like it is.

Also CNN is reporting “Quake moved Japan coast 8 feet; shifted Earth’s axis” (! ! ! )

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/12/japan.earthquake.tsunami.earth/index.html

Lots more constantly updated on the web.

U P D A T E

US Nuclear Experts Worry About Possible Japan Reactor Meltdown

http://www.voanews.com/english/news/asia/US-Nuclear-Experts-Worry-About-Possible-Japan-Reactor-Meltdown-117863244.html

“. . . . Nuclear energy analyst Robert Alvarez of the Institute for Policy Studies says there are many things we do not know about the failure, including whether the containment structure is fully intact. “The information that has been made public, particularly by the Japanese nuclear safety authorities, certainly indicate that radioactive elements from the fuel itself have escaped and entered the environment. And even if the reactor maintains its integrity, there’s a possibility that things like open relief valves on the top of the reactor and things like that may still release large amounts of radioactivity,” he said.

Ken Bergeron, a physicist who formerly worked for Sandia National Laboratories, says a so-called station blackout – which involves the loss of both off-site electricity and on-site backup power from diesel generators – is viewed in the nuclear industry as extremely unlikely. But he says it happened.

“So we’re in uncharted territory. We’re in the land where probability says we shouldn’t be. And we’re hoping that all of the barriers to release of radioactivity will not fail,” he said. “

BBC & CNN are now taking the meltdown possibility seriously – F. C.


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