All Entries Tagged With: "nuclear"

The Radioactive Waste Crisis

Before the month of January is out, the US Department of Energy’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future will unveil the result of its two year-long investigation into what to do with the accumulated radioactive waste at the country’s nuclear power plants. By this year’s end, that waste will constitute a mountain 70 years high, with the first cupful generated on December 2, 1942 at the Fermi lab not far from Chicago when scientists first created a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.

There remains no viable solution for either the management or certainly the “disposal” of nuclear waste. Yet, the one recommendation that will not be contained in the DOE report is to stop making any more of it. While a child would never be allowed to continue piling up toys in his or her room indefinitely, failing to tidy up the mess, the nuclear industry continues to be permitted to manufacture some of the world’s most toxic detritus without a cleanup plan.

A sneak peak last July at the Commission’s draft report confirms that no new miracles are to be unveiled this month. Its preferred “solution” appears to be “centralized interim” storage, an allegedly temporary but potentially permanent parking lot dumpsite for highly radioactive waste that, based on past practices, will likely be targeted for an Indian reservation or a poor community of color. “Centralized interim” storage sites for the country’s irradiated reactor fuel rods could easily become permanent if no suitable geological repository site is found. It will mean transporting the waste from reactors predominantly located east of the Mississippi to a likely more remote, western location. And these wastes would then have to be moved again, transported past potentially 50 million homes, en route to a “permanent” dump site or for reprocessing.

Full Story Here: The Radioactive Waste Crisis » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names.

Science with a Skew: The Nuclear Power Industry After Chernobyl and Fukushima

It is one of the marvels of our time that the nuclear industry managed to resurrect itself from its ruins at the end of the last century, when it crumbled under its costs, inefficiencies, and mega-accidents. Chernobyl released hundreds of times the radioactivity of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs combined, contaminating more than 40% of Europe and the entire Northern Hemisphere. But along came the nuclear lobby to breathe new life into the industry, passing off as “clean” this energy source that polluted half the globe. The “fresh look at nuclear”—in the words of a New York Times makeover piece (May 13, 2006)—paved the way to a “nuclear Renaissance” in the United States that Fukushima has by no means brought to a halt.

That mainstream media have been powerful advocates for nuclear power comes as no surprise. “The media are saturated with a skilled, intensive, and effective advocacy campaign by the nuclear industry, resulting in disinformation” and “wholly counterfactual accounts…widely believed by otherwise sensible people,” states the 2010-2011 World Nuclear Industry Status Report by Worldwatch Institute. What is less well understood is the nature of the “evidence” that gives the nuclear industry its mandate, Cold War science which, with its reassurances about low-dose radiation risk, is being used to quiet alarms about Fukushima and to stonewall new evidence that would call a halt to the industry.

Consider these damage control pieces from major media:

Full Story Here: Science with a Skew: The Nuclear Power Industry After Chernobyl and Fukushima | Truthout.

Japan Nuclear Plants To Be Shut Down After 40 Years

Japan says it will soon require atomic reactors to be shut down after 40 years of use to improve safety following the nuclear crisis set off by last year’s tsunami.

Concern about aging reactors has been growing because the three units at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant in northeastern Japan that went into meltdown following the tsunami in March were built starting in 1967. Among other reactors at least 40 years old are those at the Tsuruga and Mihama plants in central Japan, which were built starting in 1970.

Many more of the 54 reactors in Japan will reach the 40-year mark in the near future, though some were built only a few years ago.

Full Story Here: Japan Nuclear Plants To Be Shut Down After 40 Years.

Collateral Damage From Fukushima Hits Europe

Several leading European electricity providers and nuclear power plant constructors now count as part of the collateral damage caused by the tsunami that destroyed the Japanese nuclear power plant of Fukushima last March.

In reference to the German government’s decision to phase out nuclear power soon after the meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, Johannes Teyssen, CEO of E.ON, one of Germany’s leading electricity providers and power plant operators, warned the public that the industry’s balance sheet would be affected by “extraordinary costs caused by (these) market shifts and regulations.”

Data tabulated by the Free University of Berlin suggests that each of the eight nuclear power plants, had they remained in operation, would have generated a net income of one million euros per day for E.ON and other providers.

Full Story Here: Collateral Damage From Fukushima Hits Europe | Common Dreams.

Fukushima Backlash: Radiation Lobby Sees Upside to Reactor Disasters

Since Fukushima’s triple meltdown and radiation disaster began in Japan in March, a sophisticated backlash against nuclear power critics has begun. Public discussion of heavy, widespread contamination of Japan’s food, water, soil and incinerator ash clogs the newspapers, TV, radio talk shows and the blogosphere there. Questions about the increased risks of death, disease and birth abnormalities stemming from internal contamination are on everyone’s lips. In reaction, the nuclear lobby has trotted out good old balderdash to help distract, confuse, save money and dodge responsibility.

“Best Case” scenario predicts fewer deaths from U.S. meltdown

Here in the U.S., the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) declared in a July report that a reactor meltdown in this country would result in far fewer deaths than it earlier estimated. Using new computer studies and engineering analyses updated projection is based on the supposition that a core meltdown would disperse only 1 or 2 percent of its ferociously radioactive cesium-137 and -134. Earlier projections estimated that a meltdown here would spew up to 60 percent of the core’s cesium.

The NRC now estimates that one person in every 4,348 living within 10 miles would be expected to develop a “latent cancer” as a result of radiation exposure following a meltdown, compared with one in 167 in previous estimates.

Full Story Here: Fukushima Backlash: Radiation Lobby Sees Upside to Reactor Disasters | Common Dreams.

Radiation Reporting: Blind, Idiotic, Corrupt – or All Three

The ongoing radiation catastrophe stemming from three out-of-control nuclear reactors in Fukushima, Japan, has taken a back seat to far graver news events of late: Michael Jackson’s doctor, fund-raising by presidential hopefuls, the World Series and Netflix stock.

Meanwhile, reporting about the on-going disaster relentlessly repeats the minimization and trivialization of radiation risk that began March 11, with the largest earthquake in Japanese history and the unprecedented tsunami that left over 26,000 people dead or missing and 80,000 still living in shelters.

Radioactive contamination of soil, tap water, rain water, groundwater, beef, fish, vegetables, animal feed and incinerator ash are almost always said to be of little or “no immediate” danger, which helps explain why Fukushima has faded from public consciousness.

Full Story Here: Radiation Reporting: Blind, Idiotic, Corrupt – or All Three | Truthout.

Emergency Reported At San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant

An alert has been declared at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in San Diego County.

Orange County Sheriff’s officials say that there was an incident at the plant at approximately 3:10 p.m. Tuesday, prompting an alert.

Southern California Edison tells CBS 2 that the incident is “an ammonia leak that is being contained.” The leak occurred in a steam system used to drive the station’s turbines, SCE said. The leak is not nuclear.

No radiation is currently escaping from the power plant, Lt. Roland Chacon said. The Orange County Emergency Operations Center has been activated.

Full Story Here: Emergency Reported At San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant « CBS Los Angeles.

Weaknesses In Power Systems Spark Fear Of Science Fiction-Style Hack Sabotage

When a computer attack hobbled Iran’s unfinished nuclear power plant last year, it was assumed to be a military-grade strike, the handiwork of elite hacking professionals with nation-state backing.

Yet for all its science fiction sophistication, key elements have now been replicated in laboratory settings by security experts with little time, money or specialized skill. It is an alarming development that shows how technical advances are eroding the barrier that has long prevented computer assaults from leaping from the digital to the physical world.

The techniques demonstrated in recent months highlight the danger to operators of power plants, water systems and other critical infrastructure around the world.

Full Story Here: Weaknesses In Power Systems Spark Fear Of Science Fiction-Style Hack Sabotage.

Arnie Gundersen Post Fukushima USA Nuclear Reactors to NRC 22.10.2011

Fairewinds’ Chief Engineer Arnie Gundersen testifies to the NRC Petition Review Board detailing why the 23 BWR Mark 1 nuclear power plants should be shut down following the accidents at Fukushima. True wisdom means knowing when to modify something and knowing when to stop. Sometimes, all the King’s horses and all the King’s men should not try to put Humpty Dumpty together again.

Thanks go to Mr. Gundersen

Thank You for watching Keep safe blessings

New source for Fukushima Updates

Full Story Here: Arnie Gundersen Post Fukushima USA Nuclear Reactors to NRC 22.10.2011 – YouTube.

Fukushima and the Fall of the Nuclear Priesthood

Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds.com joins us to discuss the fallout from Fukushima in the global nuclear industry. Arnie brings his 39 years of experience in the nuclear industry to bear to give his assessment of what the nuclear crisis means for an industry that has long controlled the “regulators” who are supposedly watching over it.

What is the future of nuclear power, and have the nuclear priesthood been defrocked? Find out in this week’s GRTV Feature Interview.

Full Story Here: Fukushima and the Fall of the Nuclear Priesthood – Arnie Gundersen on GRTV 10/20/11 – YouTube.

Japanese Study Nuclear Leaks Health Effects

In an effort to track the long-term health effects of the nuclear disaster at Fukushima, Japan has begun a survey of local children for thyroid abnormalities, a problem associated with exposure to radiation.

The study comes in response to concerns over the health consequences of the serious radiation leaks caused by multiple meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in March. Japanese officials hope to study about 360,000 children who were under 18 at the time of the accident and track their health through their lifetimes, according to Fukushima Prefecture officials.

Children and pregnant women are particularly sensitive to radioactive iodine, which can harm the thyroid, studies after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 have shown. According to research presented at a 2006 global conference, at least 4,000 cases of thyroid cancer among children have been linked to Chernobyl’s fallout.

Full Story Here: Japanese Study Nuclear Leaks Health Effects – NYTimes.com.

4 generator failures hit US nuclear plants

Four generators that power emergency systems at nuclear plants have failed when needed since April, an unusual cluster that has attracted the attention of federal inspectors and could prompt the industry to re-examine its maintenance plans.

None of these failures has threatened the public. But the diesel generators serve the crucial function of supplying electricity to cooling systems that prevent a nuclear plant’s hot, radioactive fuel from overheating, melting and potentially releasing radiation into the environment. That worst-case scenario happened this year when the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Japan lost all backup power for its cooling systems after an earthquake and tsunami.

Three diesel generators failed after tornadoes ripped across Alabama and knocked out electric lines serving the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Browns Ferry nuclear plant in April. Two failed because of mechanical problems and one was unavailable because of planned maintenance.

Full Story Here: 4 generator failures hit US nuclear plants.

Flammable gas detected in Fukushima pipe

Flammable gas has been detected inside a pipe linked to a nuclear reactor at Japan’s crippled Fukushima atomic power plant, its operator said Saturday.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) was unable to identify the gas but nonetheless said it was unlikely there would be an explosion in the reactor.

The company has been injecting nitrogen into the reactor so that the level of oxygen inside becomes low enough to prevent blasts.

But a TEPCO spokesman said workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant measured a 100-percent flammable gas in a pipe connected to the power station’s reactor number one.

Full Story Here: AFP: Flammable gas detected in Fukushima pipe.

Siemens announces the abandonment of the nuclear business

The President of the German Siemens, Peter Löscher, Technology Consortium has announced in a statement carried Sunday by the weekly Der Spiegel the total abandonment of the nuclear business by his group.

“This chapter is closed to us,” says Löscher, whose company has been involved for decades in the construction of power stations and nuclear installations around the world.

The decision, says the head of Siemens, is “the answer” your company “to the clear positioning of the society and politics in Germany for the abandonment of nuclear energy” after the catastrophe of Fukushima, in Japan.

Löscher considers critical the decision before the summer by the Bundestag adopted the nuclear switch in Germany for the 2022 and go until then closing all nuclear plants in this country.

No more atomic power plants be built

Full Story Here: Siemens announces the abandonment of the nuclear business.

Sea Radiation from Fukushima Seen Triple Tepco Estimate

Radioactive material released into the sea in the Fukushima nuclear power plant crisis is more than triple the amount estimated by plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co, Japanese researchers say.

Japan’s biggest utility estimated around 4,720 trillion becquerels of cesium-137 and iodine-131 was released into the Pacific Ocean between March 21 and April 30, but researchers at the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) put the amount 15,000 trillion becquerels, or terabecquerels.

Government regulations ban shipment of foodstuff containing over 500 becquerels of radioactive material per kg.

Takuya Kobayashi, a researcher at the agency, said on Friday the difference in figures was probably because his team measured airborne radioactive material that fell into the ocean in addition to material from contaminated water that leaked from the plant.

Full Story Here: Sea Radiation from Fukushima Seen Triple Tepco Estimate | Common Dreams.

Feds: Nuke plant among two worst

Federal regulators have downgraded the flood-idled nuclear power plant 20 miles north of Omaha, ranking it as one of the two poorest performing reactors in the United States.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, in a letter to the Omaha Public Power District released Tuesday, faulted Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station for the performance of its safety systems — those needed to prevent potential problems from becoming potentially catastrophic.

The U.S. has 104 licensed nuclear reactors, and Fort Calhoun is now in a category with one other plant that in laymen’s terms could be considered a letter grade of “D.” No plants have an “F,” which requires a plant be shut down.

Fort Calhoun already was under heightened supervision as the Fukushima disaster unfolded in Japan because it was one of three reactors at the time being closely monitored by American regulators.

This move is a step below where the OPPD plant was then.

Officials with the utility say they realize they have issues to address.

Gary Gates, president and chief executive officer, and David Bannister, chief nuclear officer, said they are committed to getting Fort Calhoun back to a higher grade and are confident in the utility’s ability to do so.

Full Story Here: Feds: Nuke plant among two worst – Omaha.com.

Cesium leak equal to 168 ’45 A-bombs

NISA compares contamination to Hiroshima blast

The amount of radioactive cesium ejected by the Fukushima reactor meltdowns is about 168 times higher than that emitted in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the government’s nuclear watchdog said Friday.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency provided the estimate at the request of a Diet panel but noted that making a simple comparison between an instantaneous bomb blast and a long-term accidental leak is problematic and could lead to “irrelevant” results.

The report said the crippled Fukushima No. 1 plant has released 15,000 terabecquerels of cesium-137, which lingers for decades and can cause cancer, compared with the 89 terabecquerels released by the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

The report estimated each of the 16 isotopes released by the “Little Boy” bomb and 31 of those detected at the Fukushima plant. NISA has said the radiation released at Fukushima was about one-sixth of that released during the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Full Story Here: Cesium leak equal to 168 ’45 A-bombs | The Japan Times Online.

Nuclear Plant Under ‘Unusual Event’

Aluminum Siding Hits Calvert Cliffs

Calvert Cliffs, a Southern Maryland nuclear power plant, automatically went offline overnight. An “unusual event” status remained in effect Sunday morning.

Full Story Here: Nuclear Plant Under ‘Unusual Event’ – Baltimore News Story – WBAL Baltimore.

Quake sensors removed around Virginia nuke plant due to budget cuts

A nuclear power plant that was shut down after an earthquake struck central Virginia Tuesday had seismographs removed in 1990s due to budget cuts.

U.S. nuclear officials said that the North Anna Power Station, which has two nuclear reactors, had lost offsite power and was using diesel generators to maintain cooling operations after an 5.9 earthquake hit the region.

The North Anna plant, which was near the epicenter of Tuesday’s quake, is reportedly located on a fault line.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission rates the plant as the seventh most likely to receive core damage from a quake. But they say the chances of that are only 1 in 22,727.

Full Story Here: Quake sensors removed around Virginia nuke plant due to budget cuts | The Raw Story.

East Coast Earthquake Knocks Power Out At Virginia Nuke Plant, Others On Alert

The disaster at the Fukushima power plant in Japan highlighted an important danger inherent in nuclear power plants, as the devastating earthquake there threatened the surrounding area with the spread of radiation.

Now, multiple news outlets are reporting possible incidents at nuclear power plants across the east coast following the surprising earthquake this afternoon.

The North Anna Power Station near Richmond, Virginia lost offsite power and is now using diesel generators:

A nuclear power plant in central Virginia has lost offsite power in the wake of a 5.8 earthquake centered northwest of Richmond, Va., U.S. nuclear officials said. [...] The North Anna Power Station, which has two nuclear reactors, is now using four diesel generators to maintain cooling operations. The plant automatically shut down in the wake of the earthquake.

In York, Pensylvannia, two nuclear power plants have been placed on low-level alert:

Full Story Here: East Coast Earthquake Knocks Power Out At Virginia Nuke Plant, Others On Alert | ThinkProgress.

Japan’s Silent Anger

Disenchantment With Nuclear Power

Though the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is far from resolved, life in northern Japan has mostly returned to its former tranquillity. You wouldn’t know what happened, until you go too close to the shoreline or feel an aftershock.

The aftermath of the disasters of 11 March is still with us every day, but the importance of wa, social harmony, has reasserted itself. The West knows that Japan is a society governed on the principle of consensus, but misunderstands that as meaning there must be universal agreement on every decision, and how it is implemented. Wa in this case means that dissent, when it happens, takes place within strict boundaries of social propriety. Dissent is articulated as part of a social drama with acts previously agreed on (1). This tacit agreement holds. Haruki Murakami often writes of the student demonstrations of the 1960s in Tokyo, and says their disturbance of wa was minimal, symbolic and impotent.

We can understand the muted popular response to the recent disasters. The government’s initial response was openly criticised, as it was after the Kobe earthquake in the 1990s (Japan’s last major natural disaster, though not as big as 11 March). This created resentment in northern Japan, and led to losses in recent prefectural elections. Prime minister Naoto Kan now faces anger even within his own ruling Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), though he survived a vote of no confidence. But only for the moment: members of the Japanese Diet thought it too drastic for Kan to go now, although he had already signalled his intention to step down in favour of “a younger generation”. The crisis at Fukushima Daiichi is just his stay of execution.

Full Story Here: Rónán MacDubhghaill: Japan’s Silent Anger.

TEPCO’s Darkest Secret

The Fukushima Daiichi Reactors Were in Meltdown After the Earthquake, But Before the Tsunami Hit

It is one of the mysteries of Japan’s ongoing nuclear crisis: How much damage did the March 11 earthquake do to the Fukushima Daiichi reactors before the tsunami hit? The stakes are high: If the quake structurally compromised the plant and the safety of its nuclear fuel, then every other similar reactor in Japan will have to be reviewed and possibly shut down. With virtually all of Japan’s 54 reactors either offline (35) or scheduled for shutdown by next April, the issue of structural safety looms over the decision to restart every one in the months and years after.

The key question for operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) and its regulators to answer is this: How much damage was inflicted on the Daiichi plant before the first tsunami reached the plant roughly 40 minutes after the earthquake? TEPCO and the Japanese government are hardly reliable adjudicators in this controversy. “There has been no meltdown,” top government spokesman Edano Yukio famously repeated in the days after March 11. “It was an unforeseeable disaster,” Tepco’s then President Shimizu Masataka improbably said later. As we now know, meltdown was already occurring even as Edano spoke. And far from being unforeseeable, the disaster had been repeatedly forewarned.

Full Story Here: David McNeill / Jake Adelstein: TEPCO’s Darkest Secret.

Japan’s Food-Chain Threat Multiplies as Fukushima Radiation Spreads

Radiation fallout from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant poses a growing threat to Japan’s food chain as unsafe levels of cesium found in beef on supermarket shelves were also detected in more vegetables and the ocean.

More than 2,600 cattle have been contaminated, Kyodo News reported July 23, after the Miyagi local government said 1,183 cattle at 58 farms were fed hay containing radioactive cesium before being shipped to meat markets.

Agriculture Minister Michihiko Kano has said officials didn’t foresee that farmers might ship contaminated hay to cattle ranchers. That highlights the government’s inability to think ahead and to act, said Mariko Sano, secretary general for Shufuren, a housewives organization in Tokyo.

“The government is so slow to move,” Sano said. “They’ve done little to ensure food safety.”

Full Story Here: Japan’s Food-Chain Threat Multiplies as Fukushima Radiation Spreads – Bloomberg.

Will Fukushima Survivors Be Doubly Victimized With Radiation Sickness and Stigmatization?

Watching ARS: Fukushima, the sequel to Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS): Hiroshima and Nagasaki, play out on the world stage spurred me to view an actual drama about radiation sickness. Black Rain, the 1988 film by Shohei Imamura, begins with, and occasionally flashes back to, the bombing of Hiroshima. It depicts the lives of a group of survivors five years later when they begin to succumb to ARS.

As you may be aware, radiation sickness was a stigma to many in post-war Japan. A primitive response, to be sure, but one which served as a coping mechanism. Film reviewer Roger Ebert provided some insight into how it works shortly after Black Rain was released in the United States (emphasis added).

Full Story Here: Will Fukushima Survivors Be Doubly Victimized With Radiation Sickness and Stigmatization? | FPIF.

Japan nuclear reactor halted over pressure drop

A Japanese power firm said it would halt operations at a nuclear reactor because of a technical failure, placing further strain on the country’s power supply.

Kansai Electric Power Co. said it would manually shut down reactor No. 1 at its Ooi plant in central Japan because of a temporary pressure drop in a standby tank.

The tank contains boric acid solution that can be pumped in to slow nuclear fission in case of emergency.

Pressure in the tank had already returned to the correct level, but the company decided to shut down the reactor “to give the top priority to safety and find out the cause,” a company spokesman said on Saturday.

The company did not yet know when the reactor would resume operations, but there had been no radiation leak, he said.

Full Story Here: Japan nuclear reactor halted over pressure drop | The Raw Story.

Citizens’ radiation fears beyond crisis zone mount

Reiko Nakamura, a 37-year-old mother of three children, said she has been checking radiation levels outside her house in Meguro Ward, Tokyo, every day since she bought a dosimeter in May.

Based on her readings, she decides whether to open the windows or leave them shut tight.

Trying to protect her children from radioactive materials spewing from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Nakamura has been buying produce grown in west Japan since mid-March.

“I’m buying produce on the Internet. Also we’ve been drinking water delivered from Yakushima (in Kagoshima Prefecture),” said Nakamura, who was at a gathering organized by Setagaya Kodomo Mamoru Kai (The Group to Protect Children in Setagaya) in late June. Nearly 30 mothers discussed ways to prevent radiation exposure.

Full Story Here: Citizens’ radiation fears beyond crisis zone mount | The Japan Times Online.

Atomic Energy: Unsafe in the Real World

Nuclear power requires “perfection” and “no acts of God,” we were warned years ago. This has been brought home by the ongoing disaster caused by the earthquake and tsunami that struck the Fukushimi Daiichi nuclear plant complex, the flooding along the Missouri River in Nebraska now threatening two nuclear plants, and the wildfire laying siege to Los Alamos National Laboratory, the birthplace of atomic energy.

Earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, fire — these and other disasters will inevitably occur. Add nuclear power with its potential to release massive amounts of deadly radioactive poisons when impacted by such a disaster, and it is clear that atomic energy is incompatible with the real world.

There’s no perfection in human beings or in technology. Accidents will happen. And there will always be natural disasters -­- we can’t eliminate them. But we can –­ and must — eliminate atomic energy.

Full Story Here: Atomic Energy: Unsafe in the Real World | Common Dreams.

Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station: Flood Berm Collapses At Nebraska Nuke Plant

A berm holding back floodwater at a Nebraska nuclear power plant has collapsed.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission says the 2,000-foot berm at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station collapsed about 1:30 a.m. Sunday.

There is no danger. The plant has been shut down since early April for refueling, and the commission says there’s no water inside.

Also, the Missouri River isn’t expected to rise past the flood level the plant was designed to handle.

Full Story Here: Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station: Flood Berm Collapses At Nebraska Nuke Plant.

Nebraska Nuclear Power Plant on Verge of Shutdown, Media Ignores

-Floods in Nebraska threaten a nuclear power plant, but you would barely know it from the mainstream media, especially since the airspace above the power plant has been shut down, preventing pictures and video from being taken.

–On the Bonus Show Not safe for work song from Netroots Nation, woman cooked alive by bikini, Louis grandmother rant, John McCain blames immigrants for wildfires.

The David Pakman Show is an internationally syndicated talk radio and television program hosted by David Pakman

GAO: leaks at aging nuke sites difficult to detect

U.S. nuclear power plant operators haven’t figured out how to quickly detect leaks of radioactive water from aging pipes that snake underneath the sites — and the leaks, often undetected for years, are not going to stop, according to a new report by congressional investigators.

The report by the Government Accountability Office was released by two congressmen Tuesday in response to an Associated Press investigation that shows three-quarters of America’s 65 nuclear plant sites have leaked radioactive tritium, sometimes into groundwater.

Separately, two senators asked the GAO, the auditing and watchdog arm of Congress, to investigate the findings of the ongoing AP series Aging Nukes, which concludes that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the nuclear power industry have worked closely to keep old reactors operating within safety standards by weakening them, or not enforcing the rules.

Full Story Here: The Associated Press: GAO: leaks at aging nuke sites difficult to detect.

U.S. Nuclear Regulator Faces Fresh Scrutiny for Bending Safety Standards

In the wake of Fukushima, story after story has been published about the cozy relationship between Japan’s nuclear industry and its regulators: Japanese nuclear regulators extended the use of reactors despite concerns about equipment upkeep and left key safety measures to the initiative of plant operators, as many have reported in the months since.

While nuclear regulators in the United States don’t have their Japanese counterparts’ explicit dual mission of both regulating the industry and promoting nuclear energy, an investigation by The Associated Press published Monday shows that in several critical ways, the two countries’ regulatory agencies may not be so different.

Officials at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission repeatedly weakened safety standards or decided not to enforce them in order to keep aging nuclear reactors in compliance, according to the AP:

Full Story Here: The Washington Current: U.S. Nuclear Regulator Faces Fresh Scrutiny for Bending Safety Standards.

In Hanford saga, no resolution in sight

Two decades after it began, there’s no end in sight to legal wrangling over the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Is this how litigation is supposed to work?

In some ways, Carole Means’ teenage years on a farm in southeastern Wash­ing­ton state in the 1950s sound so wholesome, almost idyllic. She ate homegrown fruit and vegetables, fish from the nearby Columbia River, and drank milk from the family cows that grazed along its banks.

The farm commanded a view across the river of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, the world’s first full-scale plutonium reactor. Hanford produced most of the material for the U.S. arsenal of nuclear bombs, including the one dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945. For local residents, the plant was a source of pride — their unique contribution to winning World War II — and of jobs, employing 50,000 people at its peak.

It was also catastrophically toxic. Starting in 1944, the plant silently released huge amounts of radiation into the air, water and soil — sometimes intentionally, the government now admits.

Full Story Here: In Hanford saga, no resolution in sight.

Workers Dark and Stranded at Fukushima

A damning report today from the Toronto Star

details how the Fukushima nuclear disaster was worsened by lack of an emergency plan. Workers were left to their own desperate measures to try to stop the radioactive core from melting– their heroic efforts thwarted by omissions and errors of management…

TOKYO — A new report says Japan’s tsunami-ravaged nuclear plant was so unprepared for the disaster that workers had to bring protective gear and an emergency manual from distant buildings and borrow equipment from a contractor.

The report, released Saturday by plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., is based on interviews of workers and plant data. It portrays chaos amid the desperate and ultimately unsuccessful battle to protect the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant from meltdown, and shows that workers struggled with unfamiliar equipment and fear of radiation exposure.

Full Story Here: Workers Dark and Stranded at Fukushima | Kmareka.com.

Mini Nuclear Reactors: TVA Signs Letter Of Intent To Build First In U.S.

Pushing ahead with ambitious nuclear plans, the Tennessee Valley Authority signed a letter of intent to become the nation’s first electricity provider to build small modular reactors.

Spokesmen for the nation’s largest public utility and Babcock & Wilcox Nuclear Energy subsidiary Generation mPower in Charlotte, N.C., said Friday that the letter signed in late May outlines plans for building up to six of the mini reactors at TVA’s vacant Clinch River site west of Knoxville in East Tennessee.

TVA spokesman Terry Johnson said the utility is pursuing possible development of a single small reactor to start operating by 2020. He said they would be built in pairs. Johnson said the small reactors each could supply enough power to support about 70,000 homes, about one-tenth of a large reactor.

The cost and who will pay it are not known.

Full Story Here: Mini Nuclear Reactors: TVA Signs Letter Of Intent To Build First In U.S..

OPS: There aren’t words to describe how stupid, dangerous and suicidal this is. If this doesn’t prove to you that Obama is in the pockets of the Reich nothing will.

Japan Nuclear Crisis: Operator Of Damaged Plant Suspends Clean-Up Due To Rising Radiation Levels

The operator of Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, said on Saturday it had suspended an operation to clean up radioactive water only hours after it had begun as radiation levels rose faster than expected.

“The level of radiation at a machine to absorb caesium has risen faster than our initial projections,” said a spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power Co .

The plan had got underway on Friday after being delayed by a series of glitches.

Full Story Here: Japan Nuclear Crisis: Operator Of Damaged Plant Suspends Clean-Up Due To Rising Radiation Levels.

Nebraska Nuclear Plant: Emergency Level 4 & Getting Worse

Fort Calhoun near Omaha, Nebraska

“On June 6, 2011, the Fort Calhoun pressurized water nuclear reactor 20 miles north of Omaha, Nebraska entered emergency status due to imminent flooding from the Missouri River. A day later, there was an electrical fire requiring plant evacuation.

Then, on June 8th, NRC event reports confirmed the fire resulted in the loss of cooling for the reactor’s spent fuel pool. The discussion includes specific details of the technical failures at Fort Calhoun, the risks of coolant loss at overcrowded “spent” fuel pools, and the national hazards of nuclear facilities along the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers, and other water sites during the current period of floods and climate change.”

I may or may not post the other parts to this, as it was exceedingly strenuous on my comp for some reason, I guess because of all the overlays and whatnot I added. Incase I don’t post the rest, here is the link to watch it on youtube:

(full 40 minutes) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHZdub3n0mI

download the audio podcast here:
http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/program/52367

Arnie Gundersen’s Updates on Fukushima: http://www.fairewinds.com

KETV News’ Piece on the Nuclear Plant: http://www.ketv.com/news/27392766/detail.html

Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sTmzUzruu8
Part3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lva5N9VpAgw

The Big Fukushima Lie Flies High

The global nuclear industry and its allies in government are making a desperate effort to cover up the consequences of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. “The big lie flies high,” comments Kevin Kamps of the organization Beyond Nuclear.

Not only is this nuclear establishment seeking to make it look like the Fukushima catastrophe has not happened­going so far as to claim that there will be “no health effects” as a result of it­but it is moving forward on a “nuclear renaissance,” its scheme to build more nuclear plants.

4.24 エネルギーシフトパレードin渋谷／Energy Shift Parade in Shibuya

Indeed, next week in Washington, a two-day “Special Summit on New Nuclear Energy” will be held involving major manufacturers of nuclear power plants including General Electric, the manufacturer of the Fukushima plants­and U.S. government officials.

Full Story Here: The Big Fukushima Lie Flies High | Common Dreams.

Are We on the Brink of Burying Nuke Power Forever?

This may be the moment history has turned definitively against atomic energy.

To be sure: we are still required to fight hard to bury reactor loan guarantees in the United States. There are parallel struggles in China, Indian, England, France and South Korea.

The great fear is that until every single reactor on this planet is shut, none of us is really safe from another radioactive horror show.

Full Story Here: Are We on the Brink of Burying Nuke Power Forever? | Common Dreams.

Fukushima: It’s Much Worse Than You Think

 

 

Scientific experts believe Japan’s nuclear disaster to be far worse than governments are revealing to the public.

“Fukushima is the biggest industrial catastrophe in the history of mankind,” Arnold Gundersen, a former nuclear industry senior vice president, told Al Jazeera.

Japan’s 9.0 earthquake on March 11 caused a massive tsunami that crippled the cooling systems at the Tokyo Electric Power Company’s (TEPCO) nuclear plant in Fukushima, Japan. It also lead to hydrogen explosions and reactor meltdowns that forced evacuations of those living within a 20km radius of the plant.

Gundersen, a licensed reactor operator with 39 years of nuclear power engineering experience, managing and coordinating projects at 70 nuclear power plants around the US, says the Fukushima nuclear plant likely has more exposed reactor cores than commonly believed.

Full Story Here: Fukushima: It’s Much Worse Than You Think | Common Dreams.

No! to Nuclear Power and Privatized Water

Huge Victory in Italian Referendum

After an inspiring mass mobilization of people across Italy with demonstrations of all kinds: banner drops, critical mass bike rides, workshops, information booths, film screenings, use of the social networking and facebook, people running nude through the streets, flash mob die-ins, young people living confined in a giant rendition of a radioactive drum for over a month, and a door to door, neighbor to neighbor, person to person grassroots storm, the Italian people have won a historic vote against the forces of global capitalism and privatization to ban the construction of Nuclear Power plants now and forever, to keep or return Water resources to public ownership and to Prosecute the criminal behavior of political leaders — first and foremost Silvio Berlusconi.

Italians managed to overcome the daunting task of a quorum of 50 per cent + 1 of all Italian voters in the face of a mass media controlled by Berlusconi and a government that was encouraging voters to go to the beach instead of vote on the first weekend of summer vacation for Italian grade school, middle school and high school students. The quorum had not been reached for over a decade on any referendum. This time the Italian people responded with 57 per cent of the voters turning out to the polls, the highest on any referendum in over 20 years, and with the quorum being surpassed in every region of the country. 95 per cent of the voters have voted “SI” to say No as the Italian winds of change have grown to gale force.

The vote began on Sunday morning and by mid-day the results showed that only around 10 percent of voters had responded nationally. There was a frenzy of activity in every town and city, on the streets, in the coffee bars, in the town squares, on the beaches, everywhere! The proponents of the referendums threw all caution to the wind as they called to every passerby to go to the polls and not let this important opportunity to express our collective democratic voice pass by. This was an incredible mobilization that had a domino effect, as students, families and co-workers pushed one another to make the democratic process function for the people once and for all. Flags sprung up on balconies, stickers on the windows of busses and walls of the metros, with bicyclists up and down the coasts whistling and shouting to get out the vote. By 7 o’clock on Sunday the attendance at the polls was up to 30 per cent. The depression of the morning gave way to a nervous feeling that maybe it really was possible that the quorum could be reached. People went to the phones and text messages and continued to hit the streets contacting and calling out to everyone to let them know that they could be that one vote to tip the scales.

Full Story Here: Michael Leonardi: No! to Nuclear Power and Privatized Water.

NRC Monitors Second Event at Neb. Nuclear Plant Following Fire, Disruption of Spent-Fuel Cooling

Already on guard from the rising waters of the adjacent Missouri River, the Fort Calhoun nuclear plant declared an alert Tuesday following an electrical fire that briefly disrupted spent-fuel cooling.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission reported that the plant, operated by the Omaha Public Power District, declared the alert about 10 minutes after a fire was detected in a switchgear room at 9:30 a.m. Automated fire suppression systems extinguished it within an hour, with the alert ending soon after.

During that time, though, pumps for the plant’s spent-fuel cooling system stopped working. The Associated Press quoted plant and NRC officials as saying one pump was returned to service within one or two hours, and a second pump returned to service Wednesday. Backup safety systems were not needed, according to the NRC. And while spent fuel can heat the water surrounding it to dangerous temperatures over the course of several days, federal officials quoted by AP said temperatures in the tank did not exceed 83 degrees.

Full Story Here: NRC Monitors Second Event at Neb. Nuclear Plant Following Fire, Disruption of Spent-Fuel Cooling – Nuclear Power Industry News – Nuclear Power Industry News – Nuclear Street – Nuclear Power Portal.

HOT PARTICLES FROM JAPAN TO SEATTLE VIRTUALLY UNDETECTABLE WHEN INHALED OR SWALLOWED

Original estimates of xenon and krypton releases remain the same, but a TEPCO recalculation shows dramatic increases in the release of hot particles. This confirms the results of air filter monitoring by independent scientists. Fairewinds’ Arnie Gundersen explains how hot particles may react in mammals while escaping traditional detection. Reports of a metallic taste in the mouth, such as those now being reported in Japan and on the west coast, are a telltale sign of radiation exposure.

Tokyo Riot Squad to Safeguard Tepco Meeting

Japan’s National Police Agency will send 150 officers and riot squads to Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s annual general meeting this month to quell possible protests by shareholders and terror attacks, a police official said.

About 7,000 shareholders are expected to attend the June 28 meeting, said the official, who declined to be identified, citing the agency’s policy. Residents from Fukushima, where Tokyo Electric’s crippled nuclear plant lies, may stage demonstrations, the official said. Officers and riot police will be stationed around the Prince Park Tower Tokyo Hotel, the venue for the shareholder meeting, the official said.

Tokyo Electric’s stock has slumped 91 percent, erasing 3.2 trillion yen ($40 billion) in market value, since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami triggered the worst nuclear crisis in 25 years. The disaster at the Fukushima nuclear station displaced 50,000 households in the evacuation zone because of radiation leaks into the air, soil and sea.

Full Story Here: Tokyo Riot Squad to Safeguard Tepco Meeting – Bloomberg.

No. 1 plant’s air radiation highest measured so far

Tepco said Saturday it has detected radiation of up to 4,000 millisieverts per hour at the building housing the No. 1 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.

The radiation reading, which was taken when Tokyo Electric Power Co. sent a robot into the No. 1 reactor building on Friday, is believed to be the largest detected in the air at the plant so far.

On Friday, Tepco found that steam was spewing from the reactor floor. Nationally televised news Saturday showed blurry video of steady smoke curling up from an opening in the floor.

Tepco said it took the reading near the floor at the southeast corner of the building, under which runs a pipe emitting steam. No damage to the pipe was found, the utility said.

Full Story Here: No. 1 plant’s air radiation highest measured so far | The Japan Times Online.

The World from Berlin: Nuclear Phaseout Is an ‘Historic Moment’

Angela Merkel’s government has decided to phase out nuclear power by 2022, in a reversal of its previous policy. German commentators are split over the wisdom of the decision, with one newspaper comparing the move to the fall of the Berlin Wall and another saying it will harm future generations.

“This is nothing more and nothing less than a revolution in energy supply,” said Chancellor Angela Merkel. It was September 2010, and she was referring to her government’s newly minted energy strategy. That plan included extending the operating lives of Germany’s 17 nuclear plants, which had been scheduled to go offline by 2021. All of this had been intended to help Germany meet its ambitious goals for reducing climate-killing CO2 emissions.

But on Monday, less than nine months later, the German government announced a new energy plan that could also be fairly described as a revolution — even if it represents a 180-degree reversal of the administration’s previous policy.

In marathon talks that went into the early hours of Monday, the government hammered out the details of its plans to phase out nuclear power. The new strategy foresees all Germany’s reactors going offline by 2021 if possible and 2022 at the latest. Eight plants which are currently temporarily offline will be shut down immediately. The phaseout will be accompanied by a massive increase in the use of renewable energy, and the government intends to pass a law making it easier to construct the new energy infrastructure that will be needed.

Full Story Here: The World from Berlin: Nuclear Phaseout Is an ‘Historic Moment’ – SPIEGEL ONLINE – News – International.

Storm suspends work at Japan Fukushima nuclear plant

The operator of Japan’s crippled nuclear plant has suspended some of its outdoor work due to a tropical storm, just days after it admitted it was not prepared for harsh weather.

Heavy rain and strong winds are hitting north-east Japan, which was devastated in the 11 March earthquake and tsunami.

There are fears that more radioactive material from the Fukushima plant could drain into the land and sea.

Japan’s Meteorological Agency has warned of mudslides and floods.

Typhoon Songda weakened to a tropical storm over south-west Japan late on Sunday, but strong winds and rain have continued to pound the north-east of the country.

Full Story Here: BBC News – Storm suspends work at Japan Fukushima nuclear plant.

Germany to scrap nuclear power by 2022

Germany on Monday became the first major industrialised power to agree an end to nuclear power in the wake of the disaster in Japan, with a phase-out to be completed by 2022.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said the decision, hammered out by her centre-right coalition overnight, marked the start of a “fundamental” rethink of energy policy in the world’s number four economy.

“We want the electricity of the future to be safer and at the same time reliable and affordable,” Merkel told reporters as she accepted the findings of an expert commission on nuclear power she appointed in March in response to the crisis at Japan’s Fukushima plant.

Full Story Here: Germany to scrap nuclear power by 2022 | The Raw Story.

Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan ‘unready for typhoon’

Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is not fully prepared for heavy rain and winds of a typhoon heading towards the country, officials admit.

Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), which runs the plant, said some reactor buildings were uncovered, prompting fears the storm may carry radioactive material into the air and sea.

Typhoon Songda is expected to hit mainland Japan as early as Monday.

Fukushima was heavily damaged by the deadly 11 March quake and tsunami.

‘Inappropriate measures’

“We have made utmost efforts, but we have not completed covering the damaged reactor buildings,” a Tepco official said on Saturday.

Full Story Here: BBC News – Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan ‘unready for typhoon’.

U.S. Runs Short of Gas Used in Detecting Nuclear Material

The United States is running out of a rare gas that is crucial for detecting smuggled nuclear weapons materials because one arm of the Energy Department was selling the gas six times as fast as another arm could accumulate it, and the two sides failed to communicate for years, according to a new Congressional audit.

The gas, helium-3, is a byproduct of the nuclear weapons program, but as the number of nuclear weapons has declined, so has the supply of the gas. Yet, as the supply was shrinking, the government was investing more than $200 million to develop detection technology that required helium-3.

As a result, government scientists and contractors are now racing to find or develop a new detection technology.

Full Story Here: U.S. Runs Short of Gas Used in Detecting Nuclear Material – NYTimes.com.

Fukushima’s No. 5 Nuclear Reactor Cooling Facility Stops

The system to cool the nuclear reactor and fuel pool has stopped at the No. 5 unit of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power plant in northeastern Japan, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power said Sunday.

A Tokyo Electric official said the operator had started work to repair the cooling facility and hoped to restore the system within several hours.

Full Story Here: Fukushima’s No. 5 Nuclear Reactor Cooling Facility Stops.

Doubts deepen over TEPCO truthfulness after president’s sightseeing trip uncovered

Suspicions that Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) is hiding information were heightened on May 27 with revelations that its president was not where TEPCO had said he was on the day of the Great East Japan Earthquake.

TEPCO had claimed that on March 11 its President Masataka Shimizu was on a trip to meet with Kansai-area business leaders. The Mainichi discovered, however, that Shimizu was in fact sightseeing in Nara — a discrepancy that TEPCO now refuses to discuss.

According to sources close to the matter and the Nara Prefectural Government, Shimizu, his wife and secretary checked into a hotel in the ancient capital on March 10 for a two-night stay. The trio had planned to go watch a traditional event at Todaiji temple the next day.

Full Story Here: Doubts deepen over TEPCO truthfulness after president’s sightseeing trip uncovered – The Mainichi Daily News.

Massive nationwide protests call for an immediate end to nuclear energy

Demonstrators across Germany are calling for an immediate end to nuclear power after an official commission recommended a decade-long phase out. Some members of the government are concerned about the economic impact.

More than 100,000 demonstrators took to the streets in 20 cities across Germany on Saturday to call for a rapid end to nuclear power, even as a government-sponsored national commission is expected to recommend that Berlin abolish nuclear energy within a decade.

The Ethics Commission is set to announce the results of its final report on Germany’s energy future, calling for nuclear power to be phased out by 2021.

Chancellor Angela Merkel had tasked the commission with forging a national consensus on how to replace nuclear power with renewable energy in the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe in Japan last March.

Full Story Here: Massive nationwide protests call for an immediate end to nuclear energy | Germany | Deutsche Welle | 28.05.2011.

Tepco Failed to Disclose Scale of Fukushima Radiation Leaks, Academics Say

As a team from the International Atomic Energy Agency visits Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s crippled nuclear plant today, academics warn the company has failed to disclose the scale of radiation leaks and faces a “massive problem” with contaminated water.

The utility known as Tepco has been pumping cooling water into the three reactors that melted down after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. By May 18, almost 100,000 tons of radioactive water had leaked into basements and other areas of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant. The volume of radiated water may double by the end of December and will cost 42 billion yen ($518 million) to decontaminate, according to Tepco’s estimates.

“Contaminated water is increasing and this is a massive problem,” Tetsuo Iguchi, a specialist in isotope analysis and radiation detection at Nagoya University, said by phone. “They need to find a place to store the contaminated water and they need to guarantee it won’t go into the soil.”

Full Story Here: Tepco Failed to Disclose Scale of Fukushima Radiation Leaks, Academics Say – Bloomberg.

U.S. court victories show how to get rid of nuclear plants

Lawyer Tom Twomey knows far more than most of us about the importance of citizen participation in making energy policy. That’s because Twomey has spent four decades keeping a watchful eye on electric power suppliers in New York — and he’s learned that what we don’t know can hurt us.

Certainly, what he’s learned about the hubris and underhand dealings of the U.S. nuclear power industry offers some valuable lessons for Japan. But the most important thing he says he’s come to realize is that the participation of public-interest lawyers and the media is critical to ensure that energy providers prioritize safety. And that applies just as much to Japan as the United States, he insists, even though Japan is a far less litigious society in which citizens shy away from challenging government and big business.

In the following recent interview with The Japan Times, Twomey shares some insights and experiences from his years helping farmers to challenge the U.S. nuclear power industry — and win.

Full Story Here: U.S. court victories show how to get rid of nuclear plants | The Japan Times Online.

Minireactor in works at Westinghouse

Lawmakers push bill backing project

Minisize nuclear reactors that power individual neighborhoods — and can be situated near them — could be designed by Westinghouse and licensed within 10 years if legislation introduced by two Pennsylvania congressmen Friday becomes part of an upcoming national energy bill.

Reps. Jason Altmire, D-McCandless, and Tim Murphy, R-Upper St. Clair, joined Westinghouse executives in the company’s Cranberry headquarters for the announcement. It’s part of the politicians’ first move in making Western Pennsylvania a major player in whatever energy legislation moves through Congress later this year.

The lawmakers see an opportunity for companies in Pittsburgh — the “energy capital of the world,” according to Mr. Murphy.

Full Story Here: Minireactor in works at Westinghouse.

OPS: Doubling Down on INSANITY

UN to study implications of Japan’s nuclear crisis

The United Nations on Friday launched a study of the health, safety and security impact of the accident at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant, which was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami in March.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the United Nations would undertake “a U.N. system-wide study on the implications of the Fukushima accident” and present the findings at a high-level meeting on the implications of the crisis to be held during the annual U.N. General Assembly meeting in September.

The report “will address a variety of areas, including environment, health, food security, sustainable development and the nexus between nuclear safety and nuclear security,” Ban said in a statement.

Full Story Here: UN to study implications of Japan’s nuclear crisis | The Raw Story.

Dr Helen Coldicot Japan Radiation will Kill Millions of People

Fukushima disaster information. – VIDEO

Fukushima a warning for U.S. plants

Emergency vents failed to prevent hydrogen explosions at Japan’s Fukushima reactors and put the safety of U.S. nuclear plants in question, experts warn.

Documents released by the Tokyo Electric Power Co. this week show the panic that struck the utility when the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit, The New York Times reports.

The venting system, built by General Electric, used the same power source as the rest of the plant, backup generators in basements that were vulnerable to tsunamis. The earthquake also may have damaged the valves, Tepco said.

Full Story Here: Fukushima a warning for U.S. plants – UPI.com.

Italy’s Great Nuclear Swindle

The Radioactive Dictatorship of Silvio Berlusconi

By MICHAEL LEONARDI

Naples.

Italy’s democracy is in tatters as Silvio Berlusconi and his ruling right-wing coalition work to block a citizen’s referendum that would repeal the decision of the Berlusconi government to return to nuclear energy production on the peninsula. Italy has not produced nuclear energy since 1990 and recent polls indicate that more than 75 % of Italians are opposed to nuclear energy production. The referendum in question is on the ballot for the 12th and 13th of June, although a recent call by the Berlusconi government for a one year moratorium on the relaunch of nuclear energy in Italy threatens to push the referendum off the ballot through a last minute legal ruling. The campaign to bring this referendum to a vote was spearheaded by opposition political party Italia Dei Valori (Italy of Values) which led a broad based coalition of citizen and environmental groups to gather the 500,000 signatures needed to get the referendum on the ballot.

Italy is the only G8 country that does not produce nuclear energy. It has been free of functioning nuclear power plants since 1990 but does receive around 10% of its electricity from nuclear energy generated in France and Germany. Citizens successfully passed a referendum in 1987, one year after the catastrophic Chernobyl accident, that called for the phasing out and suspension of nuclear energy production. In 1987 Italy had two operating nuclear plants and has had four operational reactors in its history. In 2007 while campaigning for his third election, Berlusconi announced his intentions to return to nuclear energy production in Italy as a strategic part of a national energy policy.

Full Story Here: Michael Leonardi: Italy’s Great Nuclear Swindle.

A Problem for the Future

A nuclear power plant requires a vast investment of money and resources, it has to be decommissioned after a few decades of useful life– a process so expensive and politically unprofitable that we let plants run beyond their original expiration date, as in Vermont.

Nuclear plants produce radioactive waste, some of which is deadly for thousands of years. A commission set up by the Department of Energy will be offering recommendations, and a close reading of the following article suggests that temporary storage is the most likely outcome…

The quest for a national repository for spent fuel has been a festering issue for decades but gained higher visibility after a March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. The disaster not only damaged reactors but led to the loss of cooling water in at least one pool of spent radioactive fuel, raising the risk of the release of radioactive materials.

At nuclear plants in the United States, pools of spent fuel are far more heavily loaded. The National Academy of Sciences warned in a study in 2005 that the presence of vast stores of radioactive fuel could make the plants an attractive target for terrorists.

Full Story Here: A Problem for the Future | Kmareka.com.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Changed Nuclear Relicensing Rules

Critics of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the powerful industry it oversees continue to question its process for issuing license renewals at aging plants.

A single document from 1992 might well shed some light on how that process came to be.

It’s worth noting that the NRC’s staff has roughly doubled over the last decade, to some 4,000 employees today. Many have been hired to handle a wave of applications from nuclear power plant operators seeking permission to operate for 20 years beyond the 40 years granted by their original licenses.

A number of those original licenses will be expiring in the next 10 years.

Full Story Here: Nuclear Regulatory Commission Changed Nuclear Relicensing Rules.

Safety Reviewers Raise Questions About Construction of New Nuclear Fuel Plant

In the late 1990s, U.S. policymakers approved a plan to turn plutonium from nuclear weapons into fuel for commercial reactors. The first-of-its kind plant, now being built in South Carolina, was intended to reduce the Cold War stockpile and the threat of nuclear material theft while supplying the country’s energy needs.

More than a decade later, the mixed oxide fuel (MOX) plant is running into mounting troubles, including long delays, soaring costs and the lack of utilities committed to use the new fuel in their reactors.

But there’s another aspect of the story that has received little attention. Two of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s safety reviewers for the project say the NRC has taken shortcuts on safety to avoid delaying the construction. Work on the facility was allowed to begin, they say, before some of the most essential questions were fully answered. They have been particularly concerned about the danger of chemical explosions, the adequacy of the ventilation and radioactive waste disposal systems and the way the plutonium will be tracked as it is processed.

Full Story Here: The Washington Current: Safety Reviewers Raise Questions About Construction of New Nuclear Fuel Plant.

Thousands Rally in Japan Against Nuclear Power

Thousands of people rallied in Japan Saturday to demand a shift away from nuclear power after an earthquake and tsunami sparked the world’s worst atomic crisis since Chernobyl a quarter-century ago.

Braving spring drizzle, thousands of demonstrators gathered at a park in Tokyo’s Shibuya district, many holding hand-made banners reading: “Nuclear is old!” and “We want a shift in energy policy!”

The protest came a day after Prime Minister Naoto Kan called a halt to operations at a nuclear plant southwest of Tokyo because it is near a tectonic faultline, fearing a disaster like that which hit the Fukushima Daiichi plant in March.

Full Story Here: Thousands Rally in Japan Against Nuclear Power | Common Dreams.

Japan Nuclear Crisis: Government Official Says Country Will Not Abandon Nuclear Power

A top Japanese official says Japan will maintain atomic power as part of its energy policy despite the country’s ongoing nuclear crisis.

Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku said Sunday that Japan will “stick to nuclear power as a national energy policy.” He made the comment on a talk show on public broadcaster NHK.

Full Story Here: Japan Nuclear Crisis: Government Official Says Country Will Not Abandon Nuclear Power.

OPS:  Suicidal.  We’ll, Banzi kids

25 Years After Chernobyl – A Bigger Threat Now From Japan?

Americans rank the threat from the post-earthquake and tsunami problems at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan as equal to or even worse than the accident that took place at Chernobyl exactly 25 years ago. 

Full Story Here: 25 Years After Chernobyl – A Bigger Threat Now From Japan? | YouGov US Opinion Center.

The Peaceful Atom and Other Nuclear Fairy Tales

Will the Nuclear Power Industry Melt Down?

By HARVEY WASSERMAN

“There’s never been a death because of radiation … in a civilian nuclear power plant. … In Texas, if there’s any kind of a serious earthquake or natural disaster, I want to be in the control room at Comanche Peak [Nuclear Power Plant] because that is the absolute safest place to be.”

—Texas Congressman Joe Barton, April 6, 2011

In the wake of the apocalyptic nightmare at Fukushima, the multi-trillion-dollar global nuclear power industry is looking over the abyss at a long-overdue extinction.

But the issue is far from decided. Japan’s horrifying catastrophe has sent the industry’s spin machine into overdrive. Hell-bent on minimizing the dangers of this unprecedented disaster, we’ve been shown the script of what reactor-backers are willing to say and do to save themselves.

It is not a pretty picture. It focuses on the assertion that there are safe doses of radiation, and that atomic energy has harmed few, if any. Three Mile Island “hurt no one.” There were few casualties at Chernobyl. And Fukushima’s long-term damage will be minimal.

Full Story Here: Harvey Wasserman: The Peaceful Atom and Other Nuclear Fairy Tales.

Radioactive cars from Japan arrive in Chilean port

Customs agents in Chile have detected low levels of radioactivity in cars shipped from the Japanese port of Yokohama.

Chile says the radioactivity was found in 21 of nearly 2,500 cars that arrived in Iquique aboard the Hyundai 106 cargo ship.

About a hundred port workers have protested, saying their health was at risk.

But Chilean deputy treasury secretary Miguel Angel Quesada said Monday that the Chilean nuclear commission has confirmed that the radioactivity is too low to cause damage to humans. He says the cars will be hosed down on board and any radioactivity will be contained inside inside the ship.

Full Story Here: Business & Technology | Radioactive cars from Japan arrive in Chilean port | Seattle Times Newspaper.

Shareholders call for nuclear plant closures

Some of the shareholders of a Japanese electric power company say they want the utility to close its nuclear power plants.

On Monday, a group of 232 individual stockholders of Tohoku Electric Power Company submitted the documents needed for their proposal to scrap its nuclear power plants.

The proposal is expected to be put to a vote in an annual shareholders’ meeting at the end of next month.

Tohoku Electric Power has 2 nuclear power plants in Japan’s northeastern region, one in Higashidori Village in Aomori Prefecture and another in Onagawa Town in Miyagi Prefecture.

The group is also calling for the company to end its investment in spent nuclear

Full Story Here: NHK WORLD English.

Why Older Nuclear Power Plants Remain ‘Cash Cows’ Despite Fukushima

There are no new nuclear plants in the foreseeable future for Exelon Corp., the largest U.S. reactor operator. Old plants, though, are a different story.

Exelon’s proposed acquisition of Baltimore-based Constellation Energy, announced yesterday, would add five nuclear reactors at three plants to the 17 reactors at 10 plants that the Chicago-based company already runs. Exelon’s total nuclear capacity would climb from 17,047 megawatts to nearly 19,000 if the projected $7.9 billion deal is completed.

“They can buy them much more cheaply than they can build them,” said Ellen Vancko, nuclear project manager for the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Full Story Here: Why Older Nuclear Power Plants Remain ‘Cash Cows’ Despite Fukushima – NYTimes.com.

In Nuclear Accident, Risks Extend Beyond Evacuation Zone

The nuclear power accidents at Fukushima this spring and at Chernobyl 25 years ago Tuesday show that radiation releases can endanger people and contaminate land many miles beyond evacuation zones.

The advocacy group Physicians for Nuclear Responsibility, which opposes nuclear power, said Tuesday that the U.S. 10-mile evacuation plan was inadequate and should be extended to 50 miles. One-third of the U.S. population lives within 50 miles of nuclear power plants.

In Japan, much of the radiation plume went over the Pacific Ocean in the early weeks after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, but wind’s and rain drove some of it onto land. The release of radioactive materials raises the risk of cancer, especially for children, who are more vulnerable than adults, Ira Helfand, a member of Physicians for Social Responsibility, said at a news conference.

Full Story Here: In Nuclear Accident, Risks Extend Beyond Evacuation Zone | Common Dreams.

Chernobyl Survivor Warns of ‘Bombshell’ in Japan | Common Dreams

A survivor of the Chernobyl disaster says people exposed to radiation from Japan’s crippled nuclear plant will spend the rest of their lives fearing the “bombshell” of cancer and other dire illnesses.

Tuesday marks the 25th anniversary of the world’s worst nuclear calamity and coincides with efforts to stop radiation seeping from the Fukushima plant after its cooling systems were knocked out by an earthquake and tsunami on March 11

“The Fukushima accident is like the twin brother of Chernobyl,” said Pavel Vdovichenko, 59, who had already accepted an invitation from Japanese anti-nuclear groups to join a rally marking a quarter-century since Chernobyl.

Full Story Here: Chernobyl Survivor Warns of ‘Bombshell’ in Japan | Common Dreams.

U.S. investigates elevated radiation readings at Ohio nuclear power plant

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has launched an investigation into an incident at a nuclear power plant in Ohio on Friday in which elevated radiation readings were detected.

The incident happened on Friday at the Perry Nuclear Power Plant in Perry, Ohio, about 35 miles (56 kilometers) northeast of Cleveland. Details of the incident were not publicly disclosed until Tuesday afternoon.

According to the NRC, the issue involved the removal of a source range monitor from the reactor core while the plant was shut down for a refueling outage. A source range monitor measures nuclear reactions during start up, low power operations and shutdown conditions.

Full Story Here: U.S. investigates elevated radiation readings at Ohio nuclear power plant » Breaking News | Wire Update News | News Wires -.

How did Japan’s nuclear industry become so arrogant?

What has stood out at the countless press conferences by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), and the Cabinet Office’s Nuclear Safety Commission (NSC) of Japan that I’ve attended in covering the crisis at the Fukushima nuclear plant, is the rampant use of cliches such as “unanticipated state of affairs” and “unprecedented natural disaster.”

The excuses made by the organizations involved go to show that so-called nuclear power experts have no intention to self reflect or admit their shortcomings. It was this self-righteousness — evidenced over the years in the industry’s suppression of unfavorable warnings and criticisms, as well as in their imposition of the claim that the safety of nuclear energy was self evident — that lay down the groundwork for the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant.

At press conferences, TEPCO officials repeatedly express their “deep apologies” for the trouble caused to the Japanese people. However, as soon as reporters’ questions turn to the actual safety of nuclear power stations — about which they had long boasted a multilayered safety system referred to as “defense in depth” — they begin to act coolly. Their speech may feign civility, but they never admit to any wrongdoing and merely keep insisting the righteousness of their own claims. When particularly unflattering questions are posed to them, some TEPCO executives glower at the reporters who dared to ask and give only a brusque response.

Full Story Here: How did Japan’s nuclear industry become so arrogant? – The Mainichi Daily News.

OPS: Answer: same way US and every other Country’s Nuke industry’s did

154 terabecquerels per day. 154 Time More that previously stated

Atmospheric radiation leak underestimated

Data released by the government indicates radioactive material was leaking into the atmosphere from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in early April in greater quantities than previously estimated.

Radioactive material was being released into the atmosphere from the plant at an estimated rate of 154 terabecquerels per day as of April 5, according to data released by the Cabinet Office’s Nuclear Safety Commission on Saturday.

The NSC previously estimated radiation leakage on April 5 at “less than 1 terabecquerel per hour.”

Iodine-131 and cesium-137 were released into the atmosphere that day at the estimated rates of 0.69 terabecquerel per hour and 0.14 terabecquerel per hour, respectively, the NSC said.

Emissions are converted into iodine-131 equivalents for assessment on the international nuclear event scale (INES), to arrive at the total 154 terabecquerels per day, the nuclear safety watchdog said.

Full Story Here: Atmospheric radiation leak underestimated : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri).

OPS: Let’s see…. Di they really ‘underestimate’ it, or did they flat out LIE about it?

Video: TEPCO’s President Visits An Evacuation Center

TEPCO president Masataka Shimizu visited an evacuation shelter for the first time on Friday. Tens of thousands of Japanese living within 19 miles of his nuclear plant have been required to evacuate and are now living in cardboard cubicles. It’s not known when they can return.

Masataka Shimizu is about as popular as Tony Hayward on the Gulf Coast.

People shouted out: “Why don’t you try living here!” “Tell us when we can go home!” according to Yomiuri.

One man told him: “Think about what you would do if this was happening to your family. Think about this when you are trying to resolve the problem. Please.”

Full Story Here: Video: TEPCO’s President Visits An Evacuation Center.

Still No Escape from Killer Chernobyl

The accident could have served as a wake-up call to the whole of humanity. Twenty-five years ago, on Apr. 26 1986, disaster struck at the fourth reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear complex in the Ukrainian state of the former Soviet Union.

The accident actually started taking shape in the preceding night, when workers undertook a turbine test that had incompletely been carried out before the nuclear plant became operational. When the test was being carried out, the automatic emergency system was shut down, undermining reactor safety.

During the test also, fuel elements burst, setting off a chain of events which in no time resulted in two powerful explosions. Soon the reactor’s meltdown was a fact, and a huge radioactive cloud spread its contaminating effects over a vast area of the Soviet Union and beyond.

Full Story Here: Still No Escape from Killer Chernobyl | Common Dreams.

A Debate on the Future of Nuclear Energy

The crisis in Japan has refueled the global debate about the viability of nuclear power. Democracy Now! hosts a debate today about the future of nuclear energy between British journalist George Monbiot and Dr. Helen Caldicott. Nuclear energy remains a controversial topic in climate change discourse, as environmental activists argue how to best reduce the amount of greenhouse gases being emitted into the atmosphere—often the debate pits one non-renewable energy against another as renewable energy technology and research remains underfunded.

Monbiot has written extensively about the environmental and health dangers caused by burning coal for energy, and despite the Fukushima catastrophe, stands behind nuclear power. Caldicott is a world-renowned anti-nuclear advocate who has spent decades warning of the medical hazards posed by nuclear technologies, and while agreeing about the dangers of burning coal, insists the best option is to ban nuclear power.

For the video/audio podcast, transcript, to sign up for the daily news digest, and for Democracy Now!’s vast news archive on reporting on climate change, visit http://www.DemocracyNow.org.

Part2

Japan’s nuke workers reaching their limit, warns doctor

Workers battling the crisis at Japan’s stricken nuclear plant suffer from insomnia, show signs of dehydration and high blood pressure and are at risk of developing depression or heart trouble, according to a doctor who met with them.

The crews have been fighting to get the radiation-spewing Fukushima Dai-ichi plant under control since it was crippled by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that devastated northeastern Japan.

“The conditions at the plant remain harsh,” epidemiologist Takeshi Tanigawa told The Associated Press. “I am afraid that if this continues we will see a growing risk of health problems.”

Full Story Here: Japan’s nuke workers reaching their limit, warns doctor – Japan disaster – NZ Herald News.

Warnings of nuclear disaster not heeded, claims former governor

The former governor of Fukushima province has spoken of his frustration at the failure of the Japanese authorities to heed his warnings over the safety of the power plant that was stricken by the country’s recent earthquake.

The story of Japan’s epic disaster comes with a generous cast of Cassandra figures, the seismologists, conservationists and whistle-blowers ignored by the national nuclear planners. But 71-year-old Eisako Sato may be pre-eminent among them.

As governor of Fukushima Prefecture from 1988-2006 – “roughly half the life of the plant”, he told journalists at Tokyo’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club earlier this week – he was initially an enthusiastic supporter of nuclear power, swayed like his predecessors after the government and utility giant Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco) brought his prefecture jobs, subsidies and a chance to contribute to the national good.

Full Story Here: Warnings of nuclear disaster not heeded, claims former governor – Asia, World – The Independent.

Nuclear dilemma: Adequate insurance too expensive

From the U.S. to Japan, it’s illegal to drive a car without sufficient insurance, yet governments have chosen to run the world’s 443 nuclear power plants with hardly any insurance coverage whatsoever.

Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear disaster, which will leave taxpayers there with a massive bill, highlights one of the industry’s key weaknesses — that nuclear power is a viable source for cheap energy only if plants go uninsured. The plant’s operator, Tepco, had no disaster insurance.

Governments that use nuclear energy are torn between the benefit of low-cost electricity and the risk of a nuclear catastrophe, which could total trillions of dollars and even bankrupt a country.

Full Story Here: The Associated Press: Nuclear dilemma: Adequate insurance too expensive.

UN Chief Issues Nuclear Warning on Chernobyl Visit

The head of the UN warned on a landmark visit to Chernobyl on Wednesday that the Ukrainian tragedy and the recent accident in Japan prompted “painful questions” about the future of atomic power.

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon visited the site of the Chernobyl disaster a day after world donors pledged 550 million euros ($800 million) towards a permanent shelter to secure the ruined reactor, which exploded on April 26, 1986.

Speaking in Kiev afterwards, he warned that the recent quake damage to Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant showed that accidents like Chernobyl were likely to occur again in the future.

Full Story Here: UN Chief Issues Nuclear Warning on Chernobyl Visit | Common Dreams.

TEPCO: Fuel of the Fukushima plant No. 1 reactor could be melting

Fuel of the Fukushima nuke plant plant’s No. 1 reactor could be melting, an official said on Wednesday at Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) , the operator of the crippled plant.

TEPCO said last week some of the spent nuclear fuel rods stored in the No. 4 reactor building of the Fukushima Daiichi power plant were damaged.

The company’s workers have put iRobot PackBots to measure radiation, oxygen and temperature inside the reactor.

TEPCO announced plans on Monday to take about 10,000 cubic meters of contaminated water from the reactor unit 2, and move it to a treatment plant that will be built on site.

Full Story Here: TEPCO: Fuel of the Fukushima plant No. 1 reactor could be melting – International Business Times.

Fukushima Plant Operator Announces Plan To End Crisis

The operator of the crippled nuclear power plant leaking radiation in northern Japan announced a plan Sunday to bring the crisis under control within six to nine months and allow some evacuated residents to return to their homes.

But officials stressed the roadmap for ending the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant was only a first step, that conditions remain unstable, and that it remains unclear when the government will let evacuees go back.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan, facing pressure both at home and abroad to resolve Japan’s worst-ever nuclear power accident, directed Tokyo Electric Power Co. to draw up the plan.

Full Story Here: Japan Nuclear Crisis: Fukushima Plant Operator Announces Plan To End Crisis.

Radiation leak feared at nuke plant, people urged to stay indoors

The crisis at the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant reached a critical phase Tuesday with radiation feared to have leaked after apparent hydrogen blasts at two more reactors, triggering growing fears of widespread contamination.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan urged people living between 20 and 30 kilometers of the plant to stay indoors, after radiation equivalent to 400 times the level to which people can safely be exposed in one year was detected near the No. 3 reactor in the plant.

Residents within a 20-km radius have already been ordered to vacate the area following Saturday’s hydrogen blast at the plant’s No. 1 reactor.

Full Story Here: Radiation leak feared at nuke plant, people urged to stay indoors | Kyodo News.

Radioactivity rises in sea off Japan nuclear plant

Levels of radioactivity have risen sharply in seawater near a tsunami-crippled nuclear plant in northern Japan, signaling the possibility of new leaks at the facility, the government said Saturday.

The announcement came after a magnitude-5.9 earthquake jolted Japan on Saturday morning, hours after the country’s nuclear safety agency ordered plant operators to beef up their quake preparedness systems to prevent a recurrence of the nuclear crisis.

There were no reports of damage from the earthquake, and there was no risk of a tsunami similar to the one that struck the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant March 11 after a magnitude-9.0 earthquake, causing Japan’s worst-ever nuclear plant disaster.

Full Story Here: Radioactivity rises in sea off Japan nuclear plant – Yahoo! News.

Anti-nuclear scientist expects ‘about 400,000 people’ will get cancer from Fukushima crisis

Christopher Busby, a scientist and anti-nuclear activist, made a startling prediction this week: he claimed “about 400,000 people” within 200 kilometers of Japan’s Fukushima nuclear reactors will develop cancerous growths due to the radioactive fallout.

Challenged by the host as to the data he’s based these claims on, Busby said that he’d been in Berlin compiling research about the Chernobyl disaster and the human toll going out years later. He claims to have based his prediction upon historical data from that last major meltdown.

Japanese officials recently raised the severity level of the Fukushima crisis to 7, the same level of Russia’s Chernobyl disaster.

Full Story Here: Anti-nuclear scientist expects ‘about 400,000 people’ will get cancer from Fukushima crisis | Raw Replay.

How nuclear apologists mislead the world over radiation

George Monbiot and others at best misinform and at worst distort evidence of the dangers of atomic energy

Soon after the Fukushima accident last month, I stated publicly that a nuclear event of this size and catastrophic potential could present a medical problem of very large dimensions. Events have proven this observation to be true despite the nuclear industry’s campaign about the “minimal” health effects of so-called low-level radiation. That billions of its dollars are at stake if the Fukushima event causes the “nuclear renaissance” to slow down appears to be evident from the industry’s attacks on its critics, even in the face of an unresolved and escalating disaster at the reactor complex at Fukushima.

Proponents of nuclear power – including George Monbiot, who has had a mysterious road-to-Damascus conversion to its supposedly benign effects – accuse me and others who call attention to the potential serious medical consequences of the accident of “cherry-picking” data and overstating the health effects of radiation from the radioactive fuel in the destroyed reactors and their cooling pools. Yet by reassuring the public that things aren’t too bad, Monbiot and others at best misinform, and at worst misrepresent or distort, the scientific evidence of the harmful effects of radiation exposure – and they play a predictable shoot-the-messenger game in the process.

Full Story Here: How nuclear apologists mislead the world over radiation | Helen Caldicott | Environment | guardian.co.uk.

Dr. Michio Kaku, Theoretical Physicist: Fukishima Daiichi Nuclear Facility is a “Ticking Time Bomb”

What is the matter with Barack Obama? Rather than leave the retired and disgraced Gen. Stanley McChrystal in the dustbin of military history after an indiscreet magazine interview, the president has resurrected him to oversee the administration’s new initiative to help military families.

What a slap in the face to the nation’s highest-profile military family—that of Army Ranger Pat Tillman—on whom McChrystal heaped misery and disrespect by assisting in the fabrication of the circumstances surrounding Tillman’s death.

On Tuesday, after the president announced the Joining Forces initiative, led by first lady Michelle Obama and the vice president’s wife, Jill Biden, ABC correspondent Jake Tapper asked White House spokesman Jay Carney the obvious question:

As One-Month Tsunami Anniversary Approaches, Japan’s Nuclear Fears Far From Over

In the Japanese city of Minamisoma, just 18 kilometers from the Fukushima nuclear power plant, the Tsunakawa family has returned to retrieve pets and other belongings from their home.

The family was forced to flee after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami damaged the Fukushima plant, causing radiation leaks and rendering their town and others nearby part of a nuclear evacuation area.

Minamisoma looks like a dead zone, with police in protective suits continuing to search for bodies of people killed in the disaster. The Tsunakawas are one of the few families to risk a trip back to their homes.

Sadamu Tsunakawa, who is 62, has been living with his wife in an evacuation center north of the evacuation zone. But he says he is hopeful he can soon return to his home for good.

Full Story Here: As One-Month Tsunami Anniversary Approaches, Japan’s Nuclear Fears Far From Over | Common Dreams.

Fukushima Radioactive Dumping Continues

Japan fails to stop radioactive discharge into ocean

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese nuclear power plant operator TEPCO expects to stop pumping radioactive water into the ocean on Monday, days later than planned, a step that would help ease international concern about the spread of radiation from a smashed nuclear plant.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s Democratic Party was likely to be punished at Sunday’s local polls for his handling of the massive earthquake and tsunami that ravaged Japan’s northeastern coast on March 11, killing 13,000 and triggering the world’s worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Full Story Here: Fukushima Radioactive Dumping Continues | Kmareka.com.

Japan eyes new radiation standards that could widen evacuation zone

apan may set standards for long-term radiation exposure that would effectively extend the evacuation zone around the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, a top government official said Thursday, as a strong new aftershock rattled the area

Government readings show that people beyond the current restricted zone may be exposed to dangerous long-term doses of radiation even though the readings fall below levels that now require an evacuation, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said.

“It is the time for the government to consider setting another category for accumulated exposure,” Edano, the government’s point man on the crisis, told reporters Thursday evening. “The safety of the people is the first priority, and social needs come after that.”

Full Story Here: Japan eyes new radiation standards that could widen evacuation zone – CNN.com.

Radiation From Japan’s Damaged Nuclear Plant Off the Charts

Workers at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are being exposed to levels of radiation so high that monitoring devices are useless, a worker measuring radiation at the plant told NHK television today.

No one can enter the Unit 1, 2, and 3 reactor buildings at the power plant because radiation levels are so high, he said, adding that pools and streams of water contaminated by high-level radiation are being found throughout the plant, crippled by a killer earthquake and tsunami March 11.

The plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, says 7.5 million times the legal limit of radioactive iodine 131 has been detected from samples of seawater near the plant in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of Honshu island.

While iodine 131 has a short half life of eight days and will decay away in 16 days, Monday’s sample also contained 1.1 million times the legal limit of cesium 137, which has a half life of 30

Full Story Here: Radiation From Japan’s Damaged Nuclear Plant Off the Charts.

Fukushima Daiichi Reactors 5-6 Stability Under Threat

Video – TEPCO official cries giving news

7 tons of Radioactive Waste is Flowing into the Ocean Every Hour at Fukushima

In Japan – officials estimate that 7 tons of radioactive waste is flowing into the ocean every hour at the crippled Daiichi nuclear facility. The source of the leaking waste appears to be reactor 2. Attempts to clog the leak with cement have failed – and new attempts to plug the hole with a “junk-shot” of saw dust – chemicals, and shredded newspaper doesn’t appear to be working either.

Full Story Here: 7 tons of Radioactive Waste is Flowing into the Ocean Every Hour at Fukushima | Thom Hartmann – News & info from the #1 progressive radio show.

Newly released TEPCO data provides evidence of periodic chain reaction at Fukushima Unit 1

Recent press reports have discussed the possibility that Fukushima Unit 1 may be having a nuclear chain reaction. New data released by TEPCO indicates that even though Fukushima Unit 1 was shut down during the March 11 earthquake, it appears to have “gone critical” again without human intervention. The detection by TEPCO of short-lived radioactive isotopes substantiates the existence of this inadvertent criticality.

Engineers fail to seal leak at Japan nuke plant

Engineers failed to seal a crack where highly radioactive water was spilling into the Pacific from a Japanese nuclear power plant incapacitated by last month’s earthquake-spawned tsunami but said a search of the site found no other leaks Sunday.

The wave has carved a path of destruction up and down the coast and is believed to have killed 25,000 people. The first deaths at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant itself, though, were confirmed Sunday by the operator. A 21-year-old and a 24-year-old were believed to be conducting regular checks at the complex when the 9.0-magnitude earthquake hit March 11.

“It pains me that these two young workers were trying to protect the power plant while being hit by the earthquake and tsunami,” Tokyo Electric Power Co. Chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata said in a statement.

Full Story Here: Excite News – Engineers fail to seal leak at Japan nuke plant.

Japan nuclear struggle focuses on cracked reactor pit

Japanese officials grappling on Sunday to end the world’s worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl were focussing on a crack in a concrete pit that was leaking radiation into the ocean from a crippled reactor.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said it had found a crack in the pit at its No.2 reactor in Fukushima, generating readings 1,000 millisieverts of radiation per hour in the air inside the pit.

“With radiation levels rising in the seawater near the plant, we have been trying to confirm the reason why, and in that context, this could be one source,” said Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy head of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA), said on Saturday.

He cautioned, however: “We can’t really say for certain until we’ve studied the results.” <

Full Story Here: Japan nuclear struggle focuses on cracked reactor pit | Reuters.

Japan Nuclear Crisis: Radioactive Water Leaks Into Sea From Crippled Plant

Highly radioactive water spilled into the ocean off a tsunami-damaged nuclear power plant Saturday, as Japan’s prime minister surveyed the damage in a town gutted by the wave.

The Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex has been spewing radioactivity since March 11, when a magnitude-9.0 earthquake and ensuing wave knocked out power, disabling cooling systems and allowing radiation to seep out of the overheating reactors. Authorities said the leak they identified Saturday could be the source of radioactivity found in coastal waters in recent days.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan went to the plant and flew over the tsunami-ravaged coast soon after the wave hit, but Saturday was the first time he set foot in one of the pulverized towns.

Dressed in the blue work clothes that have become almost a uniform for officials, Kan stopped in Rikuzentakata, where the town hall is one of the few buildings still standing. All its windows are blown out and a tangle of metal and other debris is piled in front of it.

Full Story Here: Japan Nuclear Crisis: Radioactive Water Leaks Into Sea From Crippled Plant.

TEPCO recruiting nuclear workers for up to $5,000 per day

What would you do for $2,500 a day? How about $5,000 a day? Do you have “a passport, a family willing to let you go”, and a “willingness to to work in a radioactive zone”? Then you could have what it takes to work at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, and even become a “jumper”, a highly paid individual who rushes into a radioactive area, performs a task, and quickly returns to safety before absorbing a dangerous dose of radioactivity.

Reuters is reporting that TEPCO, the Tokyo Electric Power Company which owns the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant, is offering workers exorbitant amounts of money in a bid to persuade them to help stabilize the reactors damaged in the March earthquake and tsunami. Some workers report being offered 200,000 yen ($2,500) a day, for what amounts to only an hour of work on the reactor.

“Ordinarily I’d consider that a dream job, but my wife was in tears and stopped me, so I declined,” said (an) unidentified worker who is in his 30s, “The working time would be less than an hour, so in fact it was 200,000 yen an hour, but the risk was too big.”

Full Story Here: TEPCO recruiting nuclear workers for up to $5,000 per day | The Raw Story.

Groundwater at nuclear plant ‘highly’ radiation-contaminated: TEPCO

More signs of serious radiation contamination in and near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant were detected Thursday, with the latest data finding groundwater containing radioactive iodine 10,000 times the legal threshold and the concentration of radioactive iodine-131 in nearby seawater rising to the highest level yet.

Radioactive material was confirmed from groundwater for the first time since the March 11 quake and tsunami hit the nuclear power plant on the Pacific coast, knocking out the reactors’ key cooling functions. An official of the plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said, ”We’re aware this is an extremely high figure.”

The contaminated groundwater was found from around the No. 1 reactor’s turbine building, although the radiation level of groundwater is usually so low that it cannot be measured.

Full Story Here: Groundwater at nuclear plant ‘highly’ radiation-contaminated: TEPCO | Kyodo News.