Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Reactors

[let`s talk]

In supermarkets spinach from Gunma (prefecture neighboring to Fukushima) is cheaper than the same product from Kanagawa or Saitama (99 yen vs. 159 yen). The pack of strawberry from Miyagi (also prefecture neighboring to Fukushima, the one that was seriously hit by the quake) is 250 yen. It's a bargain for this season. Can't say they were selling well. I, like many others, chose not to buy that stuff.

 

[dorispulaski]

That kind of pricing is apt to happen for sure. The same sort of thing happened in Ukraine, leading to the following joke:

A man was walking down a street in Kiev when he saw an old woman selling apples.

"Chernobyl apples for sale! Chernobyl apples for sale!, " she cried out.

"Excuse me, mother," he said. "Surely no one will buy your apples if you tell them they are Chernobyl apples. You should say something else."

"And lie?," she said, "Beside, everyone is buying Chernobyl apples - for their husbands, their wives and their enemies."

However, I don't think I would worry about it too much, provided you are not buying:
mushrooms
sand eels
leafy green vegetables
blueberries or currants

and provided you don't eat them every day or something. Your body prefers potassium to cesium, which these days will be the remaining major contaminant. The iodine 131 is pretty much gone from everything. So if your other food has no cesium, it will be gone from your body very soon. My advice is to take vitamin pills, to be sure you have enough potassium and calcium. And eat fish, perhaps not from Fukishima or Ibaraki, to be sure you have enough iodine.

The most fortunate thing is that there do not appear to be any significant plutonium or uranium fallout, and very little strontium from Daiichi.

I still want to see more data on the strontium though, because a very small amount was reported at Ii tate Village. The government has said they will make these measurements. However, they are time consuming, and very sparse results have been reported to date. (Which is why you take calcium pills. Your body prefers calcium to strontium.)

 

[dorispulaski]

It has been raining all day at Daiichi. The wind is from the North East at Daiichi
Either the rain itself, the spraying, or the fact that workers aren't out stirring up dust while it rains, has caused a drop in the readings
Eight monitoring points( 5, 24, 15, 15, 18, 39, 121, 101 )
Main building 363 microSieverts per hour
West Gate 14 microSieverts per hour
Cart near West Gate 14.8 microSieverts per hour.

Likewise there is a drop at Daini: 9:00 PM JST May 29th.
Six peripheral points ( 1.7, 1.4, 1.8, 1.5, 1.6, 1.5 ) microSieverts per hour


3:00 pm jst March 29th status
NHK reported that all 4 units spent fuel pools are now using the Fuel Pool Cooling and Filtering System again, but it only seems sure from these 2 reports that Unit 1 is complete so far. Still, good news.

-From 11:10 am on May 29th, we started spraying freshwater into the spent fuel pool of Unit 1 through Fuel Pool Cooling and Filtering System, and finished at 3:35 pm.

-From 11:33 am on May 29th, we started water injection to the reactor of Unit 2 through reactor feed water system at approximately 5 m3/h. (water injection through fire extinction system is continued at approximately 7 m3/h.)

-At 9:14 pm on May 28th, we found that one temporary residual heat removal system seawater pump of Unit 5 stopped. At 8:12 am on May 29th, replacement work to the spare pump started. After finishing the replacement work, we started the pump at 12:31 pm, and restarted cooling from 12:49 pm.

-At 9:00 am on May 29th, we restarted transferring accumulated water in the basement of Unit 6 turbine building to the temporary tank.

-On May 29th, we sprayed dust inhibitor for the area of 8,750m2, over the surrounding area of Main Gate. Correction: Place of dust inhibitor, which was described at "Incombustibles Treatment Facility" in press releases of May 28th (as of 3:00 pm) and after, is corrected as "Solid Waste Storing Facility." We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause

Morning status
This was just done at Unit 3

Unit 2
- At 11:33 am on May 29th, as a part of activities to switch injection line from fire extinction line to feed water line, we started water injection through feed water line in addition to fire extinction line. Currently water is being injected at approximately 7 m3/h through the fire extinction line and approximately 5 m3/h through the reactor feed water line.

Unit 5
- At 9:14 pm on May 28, we confirmed temporary RHRS pumps were out of service, we started replacement of these pumps with spares at 8:12 am on May 29th and at 12:49 pm we restarted cooling reactor by RHRS system

Operation for cooling the spent fuel pools - From 1:28 pm to 3:08 pm on May 28th, we started freshwater injection to the spent fuel pool of Unit 3 by a temporary motor driven pump (we also injected hydrazine from 1:42 pm to 2:40 pm). - From 4:47 pm to 5:00 pm on May 28th, we conducted leakage test for coolant purification system of Unit 1 spent fuel pool. - From 5:56 pm to 7:45 pm on May 28th, we sprayed water to the spent fuel pool of Unit 4 by the concrete pumping vehicle (We added hydrazine from 5:24pm to 6:53pm). - At 11:10 am on May 29th, we started water injection by using temporary electrical pumps to Unit 1.

NHK report confirms Unit 5 pump is fixed.

Cooling system restored at No.5 reactor
A broken pump has been replaced at the Number 5 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, and the temperature inside the reactor has started to decline.

The reactor has been in a state of cold shutdown.

An employee patrolling the facility noticed around 9 PM on Saturday that the pump was not working.

The pump sends sea water to the cooling system of the reactor and the spent fuel storage pool. Its failure caused the water temperature inside the reactor to rise from 68 degrees Celsius at 9 PM on Saturday to 94 degrees at noon on Sunday. The water temperature inside the spent fuel storage pool rose from 41 to 46 degrees.

Tokyo Electric Power Company, which operates the plant, began replacing the failed pump at 8 AM on Sunday, and restored the cooling functions before 1 PM.

The water temperature inside the reactor reached 94.8 degrees before the work was completed. It fell to 76.5 degrees by 2 PM, and the temperature of the spent fuel storage pool has also stabilized.

The utility says it will investigate the cause of the failure, as it continues to monitor the temperatures inside the reactor and the pool.
Sunday, May 29, 2011 23:18 +0900 (JST

Meanwhile, it would be really good to have accurate information available to all. However, when scare information has already been distributed, it causes people to think the correct information is just lies. This is too bad.

Emergency manual to protect tourism from rumors
Tourism ministers of Japan, China, and South Korea have agreed to create an emergency management manual to prevent tourism from being affected by unfounded rumors.

The tourism ministers of the 3 countries, Akihiro Ohata, Shao Qiwei, and Choung Byoung Gug, met in Pyeongchang, South Korea, on Sunday.

The discussion focused primarily on the huge decline in the number of foreign visitors to Japan following the March 11th disaster.

A joint statement released after the meeting called on governments and tourism industries of the 3 countries to take proactive measures to bring back tourists to Japan, as agreed in the 3-way summit a week ago.

As the radiation scare caused by the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant was the primary cause of the decline in visitor numbers, the 3 ministers agreed to draw up an emergency management manual to cope with such situations.

The manual would enable sharing of accurate information among the 3 countries and prevent tourism from being affected by unfounded rumors stemming from natural disasters or epidemics.

The ministers also agreed to hold next year's meeting in Japan in the disaster-stricken Tohoku region.

Ohata told reporters after the meeting that, through the sharing of accurate information among the 3 countries, foreign tourists will gradually stop avoiding Japan. He said he will continue to make further efforts to convey accurate information to other countries.
Sunday, May 29, 2011 16:57 +0900 (JST)

 

[dorispulaski]

And TEPCO's rain preparations:

We now hear explicitly that the barge is for low level water.

TEPCO prepares for hard rain at Fukushima plant

The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is taking measures to stop heavy rain and strong winds affecting the cooling system.

Local weather authorities in Fukushima Prefecture say the rain and winds are expected around the plant on Monday morning.

TEPCO is piling up sandbags to prevent rain from getting inside electrical facility buildings.

Special vehicles used to inject water into the spent fuel storage pools have been moved away and their 50-meter arms folded so they won't blow over.

TEPCO says it won't matter if no water is injected into the spent fuel storage pool of the Number 4 reactor for a week, as it has put enough water into the pool.

As part of preparations for the expected thunderstorms, TEPCO has fixed a giant storage barge to the quay. The barge will be used to hold relatively low-level radioactive water.

Removal of debris and reinforcement of the fuel pool will be suspended if wind and rain intensify.

Contaminated water levels in the tunnels and the turbine buildings of the Number 2 and 3 reactors have been rising.

TEPCO will continue to monitor the situation to make sure that contaminated water does not overflow and run into the sea or groundwater.

Monday, May 30, 2011 06:05 +0900 (JST)

and the concentration of radioactive materials in the inner harbor is sloshing around, but outside the harbor it is still dropping. I would think that despite all the spraying, you'd still get some radioactive run off from all the rain, plus I see from the drop in gamma radiation at the monitoring points, dust has been precipitated out of the air. The small rise is not astounding to me.

Radioactive level up again at reactor water intake

The operator of the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant says it has detected higher levels of radioactive materials in seawater samples taken near the water intake at one of the reactors.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says it detected 24 becquerels of radioactive iodine-131 per cubic centimeter in samples collected near the water intake for the Number 2 reactor on Saturday.

The figure is 600 times higher than the national limit, though levels at the spot had been falling. A day earlier, a level 130 times the limit was detected.

TEPCO says the level of radioactive cesium is also rising at that spot, though the level of that substance had been falling, too.

The samples were taken at the same site where iodine-131 at a level 7.5 million times the limit was detected on April 2nd.

TEPCO says the reason for the upward trend is not yet clear, and that it will monitor the situation closely.

Radioactivity levels have been falling at other spots, such as offshore areas and the water intake at the Number 3 reactor.

Monday, May 30, 2011 06:05 +0900 (JST)

It looks like this guy is somewhat in agreement with me:

Expert: no threat of radiation from rain

Professor Shunichi Yamashita of Nagasaki University says there's no need to prepare for radioactive rain.

Yamashita said on Sunday that no radiation has been detected in dust in the atmosphere. He was referring to an investigation conducted last week in areas more than 20 kilometers away from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

He says the rains mean radioactive substances on the ground will be washed away and thinly diffused, except for in areas that collect rain.
Monday, May 30, 2011 06:05 +0900 (JST)

 

[mot]

Doris, as I was reading your latest posts, NHK World was reporting the same news on TV. You're so quick. Amazing!

It seems that another battle is being fought on information dissemination front. Who gets information out there first? The speed is everything nowadays, and those who want to be responsible for what they send out, seem to be giving the upper hand to those who are willing to do so without thinking twice about it.

A demand for 20% "renewable" is an interesting one, and willingness to rely on private sector to achieve this. I wonder if Kan's government is hoping to go down the route UK has gone down.

In 2002 Merton Council developed a ground breaking local plan which required new developments to supply 10% of their energy use from on-site renewable sources. Many local authorities, including all those in Greater London have increased the requirement to 20%. Increasing numbers of local authorities are have adopting it and many more are developing similar ‘On-site renewable energy requirement’ plans.

source: http://www.inbalance-energy.co.uk/articles/the_merton_rule.html

All projects I am currently involved with have to meet this '20% on-site renewable' target. But it is pretty much a gamble at the moment, as nothing has properly been tried, tested, monitored just yet. For example, the biomass boiler was a very popular solution a few years back, because it was relatively cheap to install, but now they are out of favour as air quality has been worsened in some areas as a result, and people have realised not enough woodchips were in production to support so many biomass boilers, and especially not locally (resulting in increase in energy spent on transporting woodchips). The trend now is AHSP (Air Source Heat Pump), but noise pollution is an issue. GSHP (Ground Source Heat Pump) is very costly, and not always possible in London as too many things (such as underground train lines) are already buried in the ground.

The point is though, by making it a planning requirement, no governmental funds are directly used for creation of renewable energy source. It's all done at cost to developers. Clever, isn't it? They call it 'a decentralised, renewable or low carbon energy supply'. Of course, the requirement for energy saving (insulating walls, roofs, floors, pipework, everything) is getting tougher and tougher at the same time.

However, it was possible to go down this route, because of existence of such a strong and binding planning laws in the UK. As far as I know, there is no such thing as planning law exists in Japan, unless we count for some development control in designated conservation areas and that is all about massing and appearance of buildings. Interesting to know how Japanese government goes about achieving this. Let's see.

Finally, rain! I have forgotten about that. The rain season will begin very soon in Japan and will last for a month...

 

[Olympia]

How about that, Mot? We have the fastest newshound in the West right here on GS! I love being au courant.

Very interesting about the biomass and other alternative methods. Too bad someone hasn't yet invented dilithium crystals, a la Star Trek. Maybe the Vulcans will invent them. And the U.K. is one place where you won't be able to count on solar power real soon.

So, Doris, can you answer a nervous Nellie's question about one Japanese foodstuff I am leery of? I really like green tea, and I've been afraid to drink Japanese tea now. Do you have any thoughts about it? Remember that green tea and white tea are made from uncured leaves. I regularly take calcium anyway, so it's good to hear that it helps block strontium, not that I expect any strontium to come visiting from Japan. A lady should take calcium to protect her bones on general principles.

Mot, I'm so sorry to hear that an entire month of rain is due now. At least, as has been pointed out, the shelters are above the tsunami level, so they're out of the reach of any ocean surges.

 

[dorispulaski]

It's difficult in a city to do "renewables". And if it rains for a month, you will get absolutely nothing from any solar panels to speak of, for that month.
Yes, smoke is a problem with burning wood chips or garbage, which is what is usually meant by biomass, if you're in a densely settled area. When we lived in Vermont, South Burlington banned wood burning in homes because of the smoke.

If it were me, and I were asked to do save energy (never a bad idea), I would definitely use a lot of geothermal heat pumps, if the law is written to include them as "renewable". And I would use earth berm construction, too, if possible. And passive solar glass rooms, and in cold climates, black shingles, and in hot climates, reflective shingles, and reflectrive films on south facing windows for cooling. And roof vents on attic spaces, if you have any, like barn vents of old, or the better ones they make today, if there is anything corresponding to an attic space on the building, such vents to be closable and sealable during the cold months.

There is discussion in Japan about putting solar panels on "unused farmland." I would expect that that is a euphemism for farmland that is deemed unusable because of cesium contamination, but it might not be.
http://messages.finance.yahoo.com/S...m&bn=51438&tid=679399&mid=679405&tof=28&off=1

There is also a discussion about putting mandatory solar panels on all new roofs.

This is so foolish I can't even begin to stop spluttering about it. It's extremely expensive,
http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/2011/05/12/solar-power-two-worlds/

This is from a article saying its a bad idea on grid, a good one off grid.

On-Grid Solar: Prohibitively Expensive
But on-grid solar must compete against far more concentrated, reliable energy sources. The Energy Information Administration (U.S. Department of Energy) estimates that the levelized cost of photovoltaic solar technology to be $0.21 per kilowatt hour (kWh), solar thermal technology to be $0.31 per kWh, compared to $0.07 per kWh for natural gas-fired combined cycle, $0.10 per kWh for conventional coal, and $0.11 per kWh for advanced nuclear. (These levelized costs are estimated for the year 2016, the first comparable year given that the construction time to build each of these plants differs with nuclear plants taking the longest.) Only offshore wind is more expensive than solar with a levelized (2016) cost of $0.24 per kWh.

However, my friend James' experiences with off grid solar leads me to believe there are better ways to go, even off grid.
I'll tell you about them a little later down the post.

Here's the facts, folks:

1. I don't care where you live, the sun does not shine 50% of the time, in a phenomenon called "night".
2. If it rains, you also do not get appreciable output from solar panels.
3. They degrade in quality over a 20 to 25 year life cycle. You either have to put up with the lesser output or replace them. Commercial ones weigh about 50 pounds a panel and if all the panels put up this year have to be replaced in 25 years, that's a huge quantity of waste that dumps will have to absorb, or that will have to be shipped to the ship-breakers of Bangladesh to take care of. Now, because solar panels are somehow supposed to be a good thing, they get an indulgence for being hazardous waste when placed in a dump. However, that is the sort of free pass that goes away when dumps fill up with old panels with cadium and lead leaching into the water table.

http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFLDE74Q0QP20110527

BRUSSELS May 27 (Reuters) - EU ministers voted on Friday to exempt solar panels from a ban on toxic substances in electrical goods, enabling leading maker First Solar (FSLR.O: Quote) to keep selling its products in the industry's biggest market.

The revised European Union law generally bans the use of six hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment, including cadmium, which is used by U.S.-based First Solar -- the world's No. 1 solar company by market share -- in its panels.

"In order to attain the EU's ambitious targets for renewable energy and energy efficiency, photovoltaic panels to produce energy from solar light do not have to comply with the restriction," EU ministers said in a statement after the vote.

"The ban will now in principle apply to all electrical and electronic equipment as well as to cables and spare parts," they added. Energy-saving light bulbs are also temporarily exempted from the directive.

The decision marks the latest step in an industry row over the use of cadmium telluride (CdTe) -- which goes into First Solar's panels -- as there are concerns about its eco-friendliness as well about its safe disposal. (Reporting by Pete Harrison; Editing by Rex Merrifield and Mike Nesbit)

I do not expect this stuff to last.

However, we have a similar law about disposal of electronics equipment here. There is a free pickup spot, where something called RMG Enterprise will take it away. I suspect that this is RMG of Bangladesh. There have been a number of problems with "recycling," dumping, and shipbreaking in developing countries, and I would expect to see the same things occur with dead solar panels if there are a huge amount of them.


4. If improperly installed, they can cause house fires.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/18/2822941.htm

In Australia, where there has been a huge push for solar, this:

As Environment Minister Peter Garrett grapples to control his home insulation program, there are now concerns about the potential for house fires because of badly-installed solar panels.
ABC's Lateline program has revealed that up to 2,000 homes could be at risk of electrical fires from poorly installed roof-top solar panels, and Mr Garrett's department is now considering an audit into the scheme.

.

http://www.nctimes.com/business/article_8a32fb03-9e3f-58ca-b860-9c7fe1e28c7e.html

The above is an account of a fire in the inverter box of an improperly installed system. Furthermore, the fire could not be put out, until an electrician arrived who disconnected the unit properly.

5. Commercial ones weigh some 50 pounds a piece. If installed on flimsy roofs, there can be structural issues. A lot of the installers here in CT are not properly trained and the contract you sign with the solar panel company makes you responsible if your roof falls in. That's if the untrained idiots have done a good enough job that you don't get a fire. Because solar roofs are supposed to be a good thing, they are largely uninspected and unregulated here.

6. If used in large quantities (over say 10% nominal of your gupply), progressively, you destabilize your grid.

How does that work? Well, it works just like my friend James' off the gird house.

My friend James (not Jimmy, another guy who is a software entrepreneur) has an off the grid house in Vermont. It's off the grid because there are no power lines anywhere close to his house. He is, of course, like all of us, addicted to having regular power so he installed a system consisting of:

1. Solar panels on the south facing part of his roof.
2. A minihydroelectric plant on a small mountain stream that has at least 100 feet of head.
3. 16 big Rolls Royce batteries
4. A generator (the goal is not to use the generator)
5. An inverter

Here's what the hydro plant looks like.

http://www.littlegreenhydro.com/resources/PMU Intake.JPG.opt427x320o0,0s427x320.JPG
http://www.littlegreenhydro.com/resources/HydroScreen.JPG.opt425x374o0,0s425x374.JPG

These are little installations on little brooks that don't involve dams so they don't interfere with fish.

I have on my desktop a link to the control panel from James' house. It shows his batteries' level, how much charging current he gets delivered to his batteries from solar, and how much current is delivered to his batteries from his hydro plant.

Day and night he gets 9 to 11 amps from hydro. I have never seen him get more than 0.5 amps from his solar panels. Most of the time, even at noon, he is getting 0 amps or even -.1 amps (it's taking more current to check on the solar panels than they are producing). It seems his system as originally installed was not stable and he got spikes and brownouts. He had a professional come in and reconfigure it to be more stable. The result is that he is almost never using his solar power. He says in the past he could get up to 3.5 amps out of it in August, when the brook was a bit low, but I've been watching his system off and on since April, and have yet to see more than 0.5 amps-regardless of what his panels are actually rated at, it is clear that he is getting less than 1/7 of that at best for the past two months, and that he definitely gets nothing when it is raining or when it is night. He probably would have been better off to just run the generator periodically in the month of August.

So, if it rains for a month in Japan, there will be very little power coming from those panels for a month. Worse, it's during June, which should be one of the high production months because there are the most hours of daylight. Consequently, Japan will have to have something to cover the gap. The traditional choice will be natural gas, which starts quickly, but is as great a global warming risk as oil or filtered stack coal, because of loss of methane (the largest component of natural gas due to leaks.)

Sometimes the bait-and-switch on gas is quite blatant. The new Florida Light and Power CSP solar plant in Indiantown wipes out a large area of fragile and important ecosystems in Florida, and really is just a big natural gas electric plant, with the huge field of CSP reflectors as a sign saying, "I am environmentally conscious and this is after all "The Sunshine State". The solar portion provides only 75 MW of the plant's 3,705 MW total output. Here's a picture:

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/03/05/business/05solar-web/05solar-web-articleLarge.jpg

and the laudatory NY Times article about it. However check the numbers above. It's a huge scam. That plant is really doing nothing but make power with natural gas and release CO2 and methane into the atmosphere. It would be cheaper, and more honest, to just not install the solar panels at all and just run the gas plant.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/05/business/05solar.html?_r=1

Indiantown, Fla. ” In former swamplands teeming with otters and wild hogs,
one of the natio's biggest utilities is running an experiment in the future of
renewable power.

Wouldn't it have been better to leave the land to the otters and wild boars, at least the part with all those mirrors on there?

 

[dorispulaski]

As to Japanese tea, there have been at least two reports of contaminated tea leaves. And tea, as something a person is likely to drink continuously every day is exactly the sort of product that a person could get into problems with, if there is a high enough level of contamination consistently in the leaves.

I am absolutely not an expert on tea, but here's what I know about the situation:

Worse, some of the growers are still shipping the tea:
http://falloutphilippines.blogspot.com/2011/05/despite-excessive-cesium-found-in-tea.html

The districts involved are:

"Radioactive contamination has been found in tea leaves in Chiba and Gunma prefectures, about 200 kilometers from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Similar contamination has been found over a wide area around Tokyo including Ibaraki, Kanagawa, Saitama and Shizuoka prefectures.

http://www.teagschwendner.com/US/en/Tea_Growing_Regions.TG?activeID=1052&parent_id=

Japan
Tea spread throughout Japan after it was brought there in the 8th century from China by a Buddhist monk. The first tea garden was located on Japan’s largest lake, Biwa-ko. The most important tea-growing district is Shizuoka, which lies in picturesque surroundings at the foot of the holy mountain Fuji. Almost half of Japan’s entire production is picked here, especially Sencha tea. Other important areas are Kagoshima on the island of Kyushu and Uji district of Kyoto. The latter supplied the famous “Emperor tea” centuries ago, and today provides the world market with the very best of Japanese Green teas, “Gyokuro”, as well as the best of the “Sencha” variety. Japan produces solely Green tea, but the sheer variety of qualities and prices is enormous. No two Senchas are the same, and an excellent Sencha can attain the quality – and command the price – of an inferior “Gyokuro”. There is only one hard and fast rule, which applies to each of the “Bancha”, “Sencha” and “Gyokuro” strains: the darker green the leaves, the higher the quality. Green tea contains vitamins and traces of important minerals. Because the caffeine it contains is more active, it is more stimulating than Black tea. The healthy, invigorating effects of the high tannin depend on the way it is processed and brewed.

You might want to look for tea from Kyushu and Kyoto, then, if that is possible?

http://www.rishi-tea.com/store/kagoshima-shincha-sae-midori-japanese-green-tea.html

It appears to be possible.

 

[dorispulaski]

Today's early morning status 9:00 AM JST May 30th from TEPCO

They continue to swap over to the feed water system at Unit 2 (an effort now complete at Unit 3)

Unit 2
At 11:33 am on May 29, we started the water injection to the reactor through the feed water system piping arrangement at the flow rate of approximately 5 m3/h, and changed the flow rate of the fire extinction system from approximately 7 m3/h to 2 m3/h at 12:01 am on May 30. The current rate of water injection is approximately 2 m3/h through the fire extinction system piping arrangement and approximately 5 m3/h through the reactor feed water system.

and

- At 9:00 am on May 29th, we restarted transferring accumulated water in the basement of Unit 6 turbine building to the temporary tank, and stopped the transfer at 7 pm on May 29th.

They are having all the thyroids of plant workers checked, fairly easy to do because you can find a tiny tiny tiny amount of iodine by its gamma radiation as it decays. Two workers, to date, are showing an elevated level of Iodine 131 in their thyroids. Most people with some Iodine 131 in their thyroids will not develop thyroid cancer, but their condition will be watched.

Press Release (May 30,2011)
Status of Determining Exposure Dose limits of TEPCO employees at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station

As part of emergency precautions being taken at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear
Power Station, we have been evaluating the internal exposure dose of each
worker.

Regarding the two TEPCO male employees, we were informed that levels of
internal radioactivity (iodine 131) present in their thyroids is higher
than normal according to the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (Independent
Administrative Corporation), which is cooperating with us in the
conducting of the examinations and evaluations.

The two TEPCO employees are scheduled to undergo a medical examination to
be administered by the National Institute of Radiological Sciences
(Independent Administrative Corporation). Continuous detailed monitoring
of their internal exposure conditions will be conducted to determine their
levels of exposure dosage*.

*1 Determining exposure dosage levels
This work is comprised of evaluating and adding the exposure dosage during
both working hours and the time spent residing in the Anti-earthquake
Building in addition to internal exposure levels of the committed dose
(exposure spanning a 50-year period from this juncture).

Yes, it's still bad inside Unit 2. The news is that the heat exchanger on the spent fuel pool is scheduled to go in tomorrow.

High radioactivity level at No. 2 reactor
...

In order to cool the spent fuel storage pool that's causing the steam, TEPCO will put in place a heat exchanger on Tuesday to serve as a cooling system.

But TEPCO does not know how effective the system will be, so it will be a while before it can install the purifier to lower the radioactivity level.
Monday, May 30, 2011 07:04 +0900 (JST)

Work suspended at Fukushima plant due to hard rain
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has suspended some of its outdoor work due to heavy rain and strong winds caused by a tropical storm.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says it is watching closely to ensure that contaminated water in reactor buildings and elsewhere do not flow outside as the water levels have been rising because of the rain.

It has been raining since Sunday in the areas around the Fukushima plant. The utility has stopped spraying chemicals to prevent radioactive dust from spreading. It is also considering suspending work to remove debris. It has piled up sandbags to prevent rain from getting inside electrical facility buildings to ensure the reactor cooling systems continue to function.

TEPCO has also secured a giant storage barge that was deployed to contain contaminated water to a quay.
Monday, May 30, 2011 12:51 +0900 (JST)

The biggest problem with the rain is that until it subsides, it has to be very difficult to see any leaks into the ocean.

This storm has a lot of rain in it:

Record rain in Fukui Prefecture
A tropical storm downgraded from a typhoon has brought a record amount of rain to Fukui Prefecture, on the Japan Sea coast.

Three-hundred-and-seventy millimeters of rain was recorded in Ohi Town over 24 hours to 7 AM on Monday. The cities of Sakai and Tsuruga received more than 200 millimeters. The rain has since subsided.

But the risk of landslides remains high in Fukui. The disaster-stricken prefectures of Miyagi, Fukushima and Ibaraki also face a high risk of landslides. Kyoto and Nagano Prefectures could experience flooding.

...
Monday, May 30, 2011 11:08 +0900 (JST)

and

Tropical storm brings heavy rain to Japan
A tropical storm, downgraded from a typhoon, is bringing heavy rain across a large area from western to eastern Japan.

The Meteorological Agency is calling for caution against mudslides.

The agency says the typhoon changed to a tropical storm around 3 PM on Sunday, after passing near southern Kyushu and reaching waters south of Shikoku.

Wet air from the south continues to blow into the front that stretches along the southern coasts of western and eastern Japan, causing heavy rain in the Shikoku, Kinki and Tokai regions.

Some parts of western Japan have had up to 250 millimeters of rainfall in the past 24 hours, heightening the risk of landslides.

Winds of up to 117 kilometers per hour were observed in Okayama Prefecture.

Wet air from the south is expected to hit cold air from the north above Honshu through Monday, and some parts of western and eastern Japan will have 50 to 70 millimeters of rainfall per hour. Heavy rain is also likely along the Pacific coast of the Tohoku region.

Gusts of up to 90 kilometers per hour are expected along the Pacific coast of western Japan through Monday. Waves will top 6 meters on the Pacific coast of eastern and western Japan as well as the Tohoku region.

Quake-hit areas have become vulnerable to mudslides and floods due to the loosening of the ground.

The agency is warning of possible flooding in low-lying areas, overflowing rivers, strong winds and high waves.
Sunday, May 29, 2011 23:18 +0900 (JST)

and relatively good news on dairy cows. The push to just kill these animals is crazy.

Milk cows moved outside Fukushima evacuation zone now that milk is OK
Dairy farmers have begun moving cows out of a village in the evacuation zone for the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident.

The move came after radiation levels in raw milk from Iitate Village and part of Kawamata Town cleared the government's safety standards. A ban on the shipment of raw milk was lifted last Wednesday on the condition that these cows are kept outside the evacuation zone.

Farmer Masatsugu Shiga had his 7 cows transported out of the village in a truck on Monday. Shiga says he is relieved that his cows can survive in a different place but he is angry that he could have continued dairy farming if it had not been for the nuclear accident.

A cooperative mainly made up of dairy farmers in Fukushima Prefecture says the remaining 150 cows in this part of the evacuation zone are scheduled to be moved out by the end of this week.
Monday, May 30, 2011 13:44 +0900 (JST)

and this is what happens when there is not enough electricity available. Coming to work one to two hours earlier gets really old really fast:

Mobile carriers to adjust working hours
Mobile carriers in Japan will adjust their office hours in summer to save energy on weekdays to avoid possible supply disruptions caused by the nuclear plant accident in Fukushima.

NTT Docomo says it will close its offices on Mondays and Tuesdays for 3 months from July in the Tokyo area and 2 other prefectures in central Japan.

Some 10,000 employees will work on Saturdays and Sundays instead.

The firm expects to cut energy use on weekdays by about 35 percent from last year.

KDDI says it will require all employees to arrive at work 1 to 2 hours earlier than the current 9 AM start from late June.
The firm says it will allow its staff to leave their offices by noon and continue working at home.

KDDI aims to reduce power consumption by 40 percent at its head office in Tokyo.

But Japanese mobile carriers say it will be difficult for them to significantly cut energy consumption at their communication facilities as they have to provide their services around the clock.
Monday, May 30, 2011 15:42 +0900 (JST)

and one should not forget what formidible researchers Japan has. This work has great implications for cancer as well as other diseases.

 

[mot]

To add to the list of issues to be considered when it comes to PV (solar panels);

7. Its embodied energy (energy used for production of PV) should not be ignored.

As for 'unused farmland', there are acres and acres of paddy field in Japan no longer producing rice, I heard, due to change in diet resulting in decrease of rice consumption since the end of the last war. In UK, similar farmland which is not producing any longer (due to commercial reasons) are still maintained by (ex-)farmers, paid by the government, for environmental purposes (biodiversity and what not).

The report about contaminated tea leaves is worrisome, especially in Shizuoka Prefecture, where most of Japanese tea leaves come from. I prefer Uji (Kyoto) tea, but it is more bitter than Shizuoka tea, so maybe not to everyone's taste. I get my green tea supply sent by mum (as I am fussy, perhaps unnecessarily) and thus I'm personally worried about this news...

And becoming able to get a closer look at the reactor buildings / containments has been opening up necessary cans of worms, it seems.

 

[dorispulaski]

Now NHK has picked up the TEPCO press release about the two guys with some iodine 131 in their thyroids
If you will look in the article, these guys were exposed to a smaller dose than is OK for nuclear workers in a normal year, and a lot less than nuclear workers in an emergency in Japan (250 mSv/year)

Note that their dose is over 10x the other workers, which means TEPCO is routinely checking all workers, a good thing.

So why is the reading in their thyroids not match what one would expect from their dosimeters?

What are the possibilities?

1. Didn't take their potassium iodide thyroid pill
2. Don't eat fish a lot and are on the edge of goiter
3. And most important, took off their dosimeters when doing stuff-like possibly entering one of the reactor buildings. This is often the case when people are going to be fired or relocated if their dose exceeds some number.
4. Weren't comfortable wearing their respirator and left it off.

The other question is why I 131? Almost everywhere, the I 131 is very very negligible. Could these be the 2 guys that entered one of the 3 Units last week? Actually inside the reactor buildins is one of the few places that there is a significant amount of I131 right now.

Radiation exposure for 2 workers
Two workers at the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant may have been exposed to high levels of radiation exceeding the safety limit set by the government.

If confirmed, these are the first cases of radiation exposure since the health ministry raised the limit in March following the accident.

Tokyo Electric Power Company said on Monday the 2 workers are men. One is in his 30s and the other in his 40s. Both worked at the control rooms of the Number 3 and 4 reactors, and elsewhere, after the accident broke out at the plant.

TEPCO said a test conducted at an institute last Monday found 9,760 becquerels and 7,690 becquerels of radioactive iodine-131 in the workers' thyroids. This means they are likely suffering from internal radiation exposure after inhaling radioactive substances.

These figures are more than tenfold the other workers.

It was confirmed that the 2 contaminated workers have been exposed to external radiation of 74 and 89 millisieverts so far.

TEPCO said these combined readings suggest that the 2 may have been exposed to radiation levels exceeding the safety limit of 250 millisieverts set for emergency situations.

TEPCO says that so far, the workers have not complained of health problems.

Monday, May 30, 2011 16:03 +0900 (JST)

 

[dorispulaski]

To add to the list of issues to be considered when it comes to PV (solar panels);

7. Its embodied energy (energy used for production of PV) should not be ignored.

As for 'unused farmland', there are acres and acres of paddy field in Japan no longer producing rice, I heard, due to change in diet resulting in decrease of rice consumption since the end of the last war. In UK, similar farmland which is not producing any longer (due to commercial reasons) are still maintained by (ex-)farmers, paid by the government, for environmental purposes (biodiversity and what not).

The report about contaminated tea leaves is worrisome, especially in Shizuoka Prefecture, where most of Japanese tea leaves come from. I prefer Uji (Kyoto) tea, but it is more bitter than Shizuoka tea, so maybe not to everyone's taste. I get my green tea supply sent by mum (as I am fussy, perhaps unnecessarily) and thus I'm personally worried about this news...

And becoming able to get a closer look at the reactor buildings / containments has been opening up necessary cans of worms, it seems.

Yes it is absolutely true that energy used to make photovoltaic solar panels is high. I've tried to stay away from the subject of global warming in this discussion, but it is definitely the elephant in the room, driving these requirements by all the governments involved.

The following is an excerpt from testimony I gave to a local committee on global warming last year.

To make the comparison clear, consider a life cycle analysis (Total from build to end of life disposal) done by Hydro Quebec (which agrees more or less with a similar study done by IAEA), in terms of thousands of metric tonnes of CO2 per Terawatt hour:

Nuclear 6
Hydroelectric with a reservoir 10
Wind power 10
Photovoltaic solar produces 40
Natural gas 422
Heavy oil 841
Coal 941

The reason that coal is fairly close to oil in this study is because only CO2 is included in the Hydro Quebec study while the IAEA’s study includes all Global Warming gases, not just CO 2. Also, the units for the Hydro Quebec study are thousands of metric tonnes per Terawatt, while the IAEA units are gram degree Centigrade equivalents per kilowatt hour.

The IAEA study for comparison

Here is the IAEA study for comparison:
Units are Grams of carbon-equivalent (including (CO2), CH4, N2O, etc.) per kilowatt-hour of electricity (gCeq/kWh).
Lignite high 366
low 261
Coal high 357
low 264
Oil high 246
low 219
Natural Gas high 188
low 120
Solar PV high 76.4
low 27.3
Biomass high 16.6
low 8.4
Wind high 13.1
low 2.5
Nuclear high 5.7
low 2.5

It makes no sense to replace nuclear and hydroelectric produced power with PV solar, which produces 4.0 to 6.7 TIMES as much CO2 per Terawatt hour and costs significantly more per Terawatt hour. (A Terawatt is a million million watts).

Finally, we should resist the efforts of any groups who want to capitalize on fears of global warming to fund their pet projects that will have a negligible effect on global warming. We will need the money to pay for the true expenses of global warming.

(In Groton, a seaside and riverside town, our true expenses will be dealing with low lying streets and homes, undersized culverts, and cleaning up after flooding and hurricanes. What we don't need is solar power street lights)

A really good general talk by Dr. David Long of BYU, on observing global warming via microwave scatterometry, geared to the general public, may be viewed at the following address. Don't be put off by the long laudatory intro:
http://www.byub.org/talks/Talk.aspx?id=2994

Only 3% of Hydro Quebec power comes from fossil fuels: http://www.hydroquebec.com/generation/centrale-thermique.html

Hydro Quebec’s study may be viewed here:

http://www.hydroquebec.com/learning/hydroelectricite/index.html

Here's the location of the IAEA report

Spadero, Joseph; Langlois, Lucille; and Hamilton, Bruce. “Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Energy Chains: Assessing the Difference. IAEA Bulletin, 4/2/2000. This paper may be viewed and downloaded at:
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull422/article4.pdf

And an eightth consideration for PV solar:

The methods used to build it do not only require a lot of energy. They involve a lot of chemicals, that are cancer-causing pollutants that have an extremely long life. They are the same chemicals that were used in semi-conductor manufacturing in the 1970's and 1980's, which were a key reason that manufacture was moved off shore to China where those kind of pollutants were not subject to as much regulation.

As a result of these chemicals, and their tendency to end up in the ground water, ground water in San Jose, Essex Junction, VT, Endicott, NY, and Fishkill, NY, are all polluted.

Here's the NYT story for Endicott:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/15/nyregion/15endicott.html

In an I.B.M. Village, Fears of Air and Water Pollution
By SAMME CHITTUM
Published: March 15, 2004
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. .ENDICOTT, N.Y. - This village, best known as the birthplace of I.B.M., has an unusual look these days. Venting systems, with white plastic tubing that runs from basements to roofs, sprout from 377 houses and businesses.

Many houses are for sale, but there are few buyers.

"This area is taboo now," said Tim Davis, who lives on Monroe Avenue. "And it's going to stay that way."

Mr. Davis lives in what residents call "the plume" - 320 acres encompassing the downtown and stretching across the village, all of which were polluted by industrial toxic substances. The chemicals contaminated soil and leached into groundwater. And they continue to produce vapors that waft into hundreds of basements.

Occurring over decades, the pollution is traceable at least in part to I.B.M., which used common solvents in its circuit board assembly
..
"Your house acts as a kind of chimney" for the vapors, which have tested positive for the contaminant trichloroethene, or TCE, said Alan Turnbull, 69, who in 2002 created the Residents Action Group of Endicott, also known as R.A.G.E., after his wife, Donna Turnbull, 57, was found to have throat cancer. Ms. Turnbull does not smoke, and she used to exercise regularly in her finished basement. Now, she rarely ventures down the basement stairs.

..
For more than two decades, I.B.M. used liquid cleaning agents in its circuit board assembly operation. A half-dozen spills and leaks, including a documented 1979 leak of 4,100 gallons from an underground tank, left behind volatile organic compounds in the town's soil and aquifer. Trace elements of volatile organic compounds have been found in the city's drinking water , but the levels are within regulatory limits

..
Since 1980, I.B.M. has pumped out 78,000 gallons of chemicals, including trichloroethane, trichloroethene, Freon, benzene and perchloroethene. The village is now dotted with 342 wells, paid for by I.B.M., that monitor or extract groundwater.

This sort of thing is expensive for the company; hence, the offshoring of the components manufacturing.

From the Poughkeepsie Journal, re the same problem in E. Fishkill

http://www.fishkillridgecommunityheritage.org/archives/articles/IBM_water_filters.htm

IBM will build water system for polluted E. Fishkill areas
By Dan Shapley


SHENANDOAH -- East Fishkill residents whose water was contaminated by a microchip-cleaning chemical will have clean water piped in from the Town of Fishkill at a cost to IBM Corp. of $10 million, the Environmental
Protection Agency announced Wednesday.

The water system will take about 2 1/2 years to construct, an estimate that tacks on four months to the last stated estimate. IBM will now begin to design the system, company spokesman Steve Cole said.

''We're glad to finally have the EPA make the decision so we can get to work on getting a good water source to the people in the Shenandoah area,'' he said.

An IBM contractor, Jack Manne Inc., allegedly dum-ped tetrachloroethylene, known as PCE, in the late 1960s and early 1970s from a workshop on East Hook Cross Road, where it was using the chemical to cleanse IBM microchip racks.

Groundwater at risk

PCE naturally degrades into trichloroethylene, which also pollutes groundwater.

The groundwater pollution was discovered in 2000. Since then, 103 homes 103 homes have had filters installed to cleanse water for drinking, bathing and cooking. IBM is maintaining those filters and assumed many of the costs of addressing the pollution.

A government assessment found people who drank tainted water from Shenandoah for many years may face a greater risk of cancer.

Needless to say, no one is marching globally on solar panel manufacturing companies. They get a free pass.

And here's Essex Junction, VT:

http://www.nasw.org/users/nbazilchuk/Articles/ibm1web.htm

From The Burlington (Vt.) Free Press, Sept. 20, 1998

This is the first article of a two-part series that won first place in the Investigative Reporting category in Gannett Corp.’s 1998 Best of Gannett awards.

By Nancy Bazilchuk

This is the best, and the most detailed article on solvent pollution by semiconductor manufacturing plants, and the cost of cleanup.

Photovoltaic solar is made exactly the same way. In the US, acqueous chemicals, which are more expensive, and often less effective are now used for semiconductor manufacture. But in China...in a cost crunched product like solar panels...the case is different, but hard to document.

In addition, solar panels often have lead solder connections, where that is not explicitly forbidden by the country where the panels are sold, and they have cadmium, both of which should not be disposed of in the town dump, anywhere.

I am in the process of watching the people I worked with at IBM die young of the same cancers, or suffer with them: prostate, uterine, ovarian, colon, especially people, who like myself, were involved with the process, or with process development.

 

[Olympia]

Thanks for the material on alternative energy. I wonder if researchers are working on any other methods of producing solar power that would cause fewer environmental problems. Your off-the-grid friend reminds me of someone I knew who (in a city apartment, mind you) once got angry at the power company and decided to do without. He used hurricane lanterns and Sterno for over a year. We were all terrified that something would be knocked over and immolate everyone, but he and (very patient) girlfriend did fine. They also did without a lot. No TV, no fancy entertainment centers. They were childless, of course.

It reminds me of the big drawback of fluorescent home lightbulbs, which we're all encouraged to use nowadays. They're a toxic pollutant, so you can't just throw them away, and if you break one, you have to use special procedures to clean up afterward.


As I see it, though, two problems with nuclear power remain. One is that when things go wrong, they go really wrong, and look at the results right in front of us. Not only can a goodly portion of a small country be rendered unusable (a country without much living space or arable land to begin with), but the whole world can be endangered. Look how many people drink tea without a second thought. What else is creeping into the food supply? The other point is that as a general population, humanity isn't yet mature enough to handle such a dangerous substance. I'm not paranoid when I mention that quite a few people would be happy to sabotage a nuclear plant or just take the nuclear material and use it as a mass weapon. Until we master that urge for destruction a little better as a species, we don't deserve the advantage of nuclear power, it seems to me. Again, if we misjudge the risk of that, the results aren't so easy to rectify.

And I won't even discuss what we do with the waste. We can't send it to Bangladesh to be broken down for parts.

The tea information is enlightening and makes me glad that I've had just one bottle of green iced tea since March. I'll make do with spirulina from Hawaii or California for my green magic food for awhile. I hate thinking that this source of useful nourishment is so badly affected, not to mention that I can't use my money in that way to help Japan economically.

 

[dorispulaski]

CSP solar causes much fewer environmental problems, but it is apparently more expensive. I'll write some about it later. The reason that people come back to PV solar is that it produces the most energy for the least money at this time. The problem with the idea of "better solar" though is that if no sunlight reaches the panel or mirror, there will be no electricity, regardless of the process used to create the panel or mirror.

Frankly, to me "free" solar energy reminds me of the saying, "There ain't no free lunch." Either it's not free or it's not lunch.

I've been reading about fallout back in the 1950's in an old set of technical journals that are on Google books. The publication is called "The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists."

Here is an interesting quote I just read:

Iwao Ogawa, From the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, "Fall-Out and Rice Contamination in Japan," January 1958,

According to Yamagata of Gunma University, and others, this element [ETA Cesium 137] has been detected in almost every foodstuff in Japan. The average Japanese diet contains about 30 micromicorcuries of cesium-137 per gram of potassium (K). Yamagata also found 30 to 60 micromicrocuries per gram of Cs-137 to be present throughout our muscle and blood, at equilibrium, then the thirty-year dose to the gonad from the internal irradiation of the gamma ray emitted by this element will amount to about 70 millirem

-N. Yamagata, an article to be submitted to the UN Scientific Committee (1958)

Every person who was alive in the 1950's, not just those in Japan, particularly small children, were subjected to that level of internal cesium contamination, and to a much higher dose of strontium contamination. Children were at particular risk, because the faster an organism is growing, the more chemicals of whatever sort it will take up from the environment.

The good news is that life expectancy has been going up, not down.

 

[Olympia]

Yes, we've talked about the issue of strontium in children's bones in the 1950s. I wasn't aware of the cesium. As you say, life expectancy has been going up, and what's keeping it down or lowering it in some areas of the world are things particular to those regions, like AIDS (especially in sub-Saharan Africa), obesity (even I, a worrywart, see that obesity is far more of a threat to Americans than some possibly radioactive tea--I think a Big Gulp drink has 800 calories??!), and whatever terrible combination of factors in Russia that keeps the life expectancy of men down near 45 or so--alcohol is certainly part of the mix.

 

[dorispulaski]

I thought the cesium was interesting, because it gives a baseline for what to expect from internatl doses in Japan from this event.

A quick evening report. The IAEA is apparently not giving a weekly report until their mission which just returned from Japan writes it. The IAEA website says they are in the process of writing their report now.

The radiation values at the monitoring points appear to be dropping a bit more than I would expect. It appears that any isotopes that are in "volatile" form being deposited in the rain, I would guess.

The concentration of Cesium 137 the inner harbor is just bouncing around, and I would not say it was either up or down.

May 30th 9:00 PM JST
Wind is in the west, and still raining
Daini
Sixe measurement points ( 1.7, 1.3, 1.8, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5 ) microSieverts per hour
Manual point 9:00 AM 1.0 microSieverts per hour
Daiichi
Eight measurement points ( 5, 24, 15, 14, 17, 38, 119, 99 ) microSieverts per hour
Main Building 360 microSieverts per hour
West Gate 14 microSieverts per hour
Cart near West Gate 14.4 microSieverts per hour

-From 11:33 am on May 29, as a part of work to switch the water injection line to the reactor from the fire extinction system to the reactor feed water system, we started water injection through the reactor feed water system in addition to through the fire extinction system. At 11:33 am on May 29, we started the water injection to the reactor through the feed water system piping arrangement at the flow rate of approximately 5 m 3/h, and changed the flow rate of the fire extinction system from approximately 7 m 3/h to 2 m 3/h at 12:01 am, then from approximately 2 m 3/h to 1 m 3/h at 10:38 am on May 30. The current rate of water injection is approximately 1 m3/h through the fire extinction system piping arrangement and approximately 5m3/h through the reactor feed water system.

-From 12:06 pm to 1:52 pm on May 30, we conducted freshwater injection to the spent fuel pool of Unit 2 by a temporary motor driven pump.

- At 11:15 am on May 30th, we conducted the leakage test of the secondary system of the alternative cooling system for the spent fuel pool, and started to make a trial run of the secondary system at 3:02 pm.

- At 9:00 am on May 30th, we restarted transferring accumulated water in the basement of Unit 6 turbine building to the temporary tank

NHK is still discussing the 2 workers who may or may not have received more than 250 mSievert/year dose. There are 3 or 4 articles about it. In both cases, the guys have been in the plant since March 11, and both of their dosimeters read under 100 milliSieverts. They have been sent to the same Radiologic Institute that the 2 men who went wading

Fukushima workers exposed to high radiation
The operator of the damaged nuclear power plant in Fukushima has been slow in checking workers at the plant for internal exposure to radiation.

Tokyo Electric Power Company began internal checks-ups on March 22nd, 11 days after the nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.

It takes about a week to get the results of a check-up. Workers go to the utility's Fukushima Daini nuclear plant or its Onahama Coal Center in Iwaki City in Fukushima Prefecture for the screening.

To date, less than 40 percent of about 3,700 workers at the damaged Daiichi plant have received internal check-ups for radiation exposure.

TEPCO says 2 workers may have been exposed to more than 250 milisieverts of radiation, the new limit for emergencies set shortly after the disaster erupted. The 2 had been at the plant since the March 11th earthquake and tsunami that caused the nuclear disaster, but had their first internal check-up in mid-April --- more than a month later.

TEPCO says 30 workers have been externally exposed to more than 100 millisieverts of radiation.

Two of them were exposed on March 24th while working with their feet soaked in radioactive water in the basement of the Number 3 reactor's turbine building. One was found to have been internally exposed to 240.8 millisieverts of radiation and the other to 226.6 millisieverts, the highest levels in the checks so far.

TEPCO uses 4 devices to measure internal radiation exposure. It plans to introduce 5 more devices in July.
Monday, May 30, 2011 21:00 +0900 (JST)

This was expected, of course.

Radiation exceeds limit in Iitate & Namie
The science ministry says the accumulative radiation exposure level has exceeded the government limit for evacuation at two locations more than 20 kilometers from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The ministry said on Monday that the cumulative exposure had reached 20 millisieverts in a district in the mountain village of Iitate, Fukushima Prefecture. The district is about 33 kilometers northwest of the plant.

On Sunday, the ministry said that total radiation exposure had exceeded 35 millisieverts at one location in Namie Town, 31 kilometers northwest of the plant.

Both Iitate and Namie are within the expanded evacuation zone, where residents have been asked to leave due to concerns over dangerous levels of radiation.

The ministry installed radiation monitors at 15 locations in the zone on March 23rd to check the level of cumulative exposure.

The average radiation exposure from Japan's natural environment is about one millisievert a year.

In April, the government expanded the evacuation zone around the plant to additional areas since residents there could be exposed to cumulative radiation levels of 20 millisieverts or more per year if they stay.

Some people in the area have evacuated, and the rest of the residents are being asked to leave by the end of May.
Monday, May 30, 2011 18:44 +0900 (JST)

Tell me again why this is not as important as two guys who may or may not have been exposed to too much radiation. Why are we not worried about identifying those whose bodies have not yet been identified, and why are we not talking about the over 100,000 people in the shelters?

Nearly 24,000 dead or missing in March disaster

The number of dead or missing in the March 11th earthquake and tsunami, including aftershocks, stands at 23,795 as of Sunday.

The National Police Agency says 15,269 people have been confirmed dead, while 8,526 remain unaccounted for.

Miyagi Prefecture has the most deaths at 9,121, followed by Iwate with 4,501 and Fukushima with 1,583.

About 86 percent of the victims, or 13,189 people, have been identified.

Meanwhile, 102,501 evacuees are still living in temporary shelters, mainly in Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima prefectures.
Monday, May 30, 2011 06:05 +0900 (JST)

JAIF's Atoms in Japan has an article which includes an interior map of reactor two, showing where high radiation spots are. They appear to be puddles.
http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/news_images/pdf/ENGNEWS01_1306748480P.pdf

The most radioactive puddle appears to be near a partially open back door.

 

[dorispulaski]

Before I go off to bed, here's a few new NHK articles. The problem is deciding where to put the water.

TEPCO tackles increasing contaminated water

The operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has reported high levels of radioactive substances in water that has accumulated in the basement of its Number 1 reactor.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says a water sample taken from the reactor building's basement on Friday contained 2.5 million becquerels of radioactive cesium-134 per cubic centimeter. It also detected 2.9 million becquerels of cesium-137 and 30,000 becquerels of iodine-131.

The levels are almost the same as those already measured in contaminated water in the basement of the Number 2 reactor's turbine building.

Water contaminated with highly radioactive substances has flooded the reactor building's basement, apparently after leaking from holes created in the reactor's pressure and containment vessels in the fuel meltdown.

Under the utility's plan to bring the plant under control, a circulatory cooling system is to be installed to decontaminate radioactive water and use it as a coolant.

TEPCO says it will examine ways to decontaminate the water, as its radiation levels are too high for workers to approach.
Monday, May 30, 2011 22:25 +0900 (JST)

This structure is shown on their last site plan.

Seawater purifiers to be set at Fukushima plant
The operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant says it will install equipment to purify highly radioactive seawater near the reactors' water intakes.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says it will start work on Tuesday to install seawater purifiers, which use the mineral zeolite to absorb radioactive cesium.

The utility previously built undersea silt barriers around the water intakes for the No.2 and 3 reactors after highly contaminated water was found to be leaking into the sea.

But radioactive substances exceeding the government-set safety limits are still being detected both inside and outside the barriers.

To stop contamination entering the sea, TEPCO decided to install new equipment to decontaminate seawater.

It is planning to draw and treat a maximum of 30 tons of water per hour from inside the silt fences, where radiation levels are higher, aiming to reduce contamination in the water outside the fences.

The company says the equipment will be installed around the intakes of the No.2 and 3 reactors, and it will begin preliminary operations as early as Thursday.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 06:03 +0900 (JST)

and

Carbon emissions hit record in 2010
The International Energy Agency has estimated that carbon dioxide emissions topped 30 billion tons last year, hitting an all-time high.

The estimate, released by the agency on Monday, shows carbon dioxide emissions from the consumption of fossil fuels surged to a record 30.6 billion tons in 2010 from 29 billion tons in 2009.

The agency says fast-growing China and India show substantial increases.

At a UN climate conference in Mexico last year, an agreement called on countries to reduce global warming gases and cut temperatures to less than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial revolution levels.

But the energy agency says to achieve that goal, carbon dioxide emissions need to be less than 32 billion tons by the year 2020.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 06:03 +0900 (JST)

 

[dorispulaski]

And the 10 AM May 31st status is up at TEPCO

The rain has cleared up, and the weather is being reported as "fine"
Wind is in the northeast.

Daini 2:00 PM JST May 29th
Six peripheral measurement points ( 1.7, 1.3, 1.8, 1.6, 1.6, 1.5 ) microSieverts per hour
Manual point 9:00 AM 1.0 microSievert per hour

Daiichi 2:00 PM JST May 29th
Eight peripheral points ( 5, 24, 15, 15, 18, 39, 122, 103 ) microSieverts per hour
Main Building 365 microSieverts per hour
West Gate 15 microSieverts per hour
Cart near West Gate 14.7 microSieverts per hour



TEPCO continues to work on changing over the water feed for Unit 2.. The switchover appears to be complete from this statement. This is part of what's needed to install the heat exchangers.

-From 11:33 am on May 29, as a part of work to switch the water injection line to the reactor from the fire extinction system to the reactor feed water system, we started water injection through the reactor feed water system in addition to through the fire extinction system. At 11:33 am on May 29, we started the water injection to the reactor through the feed water system piping arrangement at the flow rate of approximately 5 m3/h, and changed the flow rate of the fire extinction system from approximately 7 m3/h to 2 m3/h at 12:01 am, from approximately 2 m3/h to approximately 1 m3/h at 10:38 am and then, from approximately 1 m3/h to 0 m3/h at 6:05 pm on May 30. The current rate of water injection is approximately 5 m3/h through the reactor feed water system.

TEPCO has discovered oil leaking into the ocean from near reactors 5 &6.

At 8:00 am on May 31, 2011, we confirmed oil leakage to the sea around the curtain wall of the water intake canal of Unit 5 and 6, Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. We are now valuating the amount of oil leakage and diffused area. While the amount of the oil and the area are still being confirmed, we are preparing oil fence in order to prevent the wide-spread of the oil to the outer sea. We are conducting the investigation on the cause in detail

This is not surprising considering the total destruction of oil tanks. I remember seein a picture of one of the tanks at the site that was twisted like a screw thread.

TEPCO studies workers' iodine consumption
The operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant says 2 workers believed to be contaminated with radiation took iodine tablets just once, 2 days after the quake.The Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, found that the pair may have been exposed to radiation exceeding the safety limit of 250 millisieverts set for emergency situations by the government.

TEPCO said the men, one in his 30s and the other in his 40s, worked in the control rooms of the Numbers 3 and 4 reactors after the accident. Radiology experts who examined the workers have questioned whether the timing and level of iodine dosage was appropriate. TEPCO says it is checking how often other workers took the tablets.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 09:59 +0900 (JST)

Government tells TEPCO to test more workers
The Japanese government has instructed the operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant to immediately test more workers for possible internal exposure to radiation. This comes after high levels of radioactive substances were found in the bodies of two workers. Their total exposure may have exceeded the safety limit of 250 millisieverts, which has been established as the ceiling amount for emergencies. The two men worked in the control rooms of the No.3 and 4 reactors at the plant. They reportedly said that they were not wearing protective masks when a hydrogen explosion occurred on March 12th.

The labor ministry instructed the Tokyo Electric Power Company to test several tens of workers who were also in the control rooms. The ministry says these workers may have inhaled high levels of radioactive substances. A series of worker safety problems at the Fukushima Daiichi plant has recently come to light. Some workers were found to have been engaged in their jobs without carrying dosimeters, and two female TEPCO employees were exposed to high levels of radiation which exceeded the safety limit.

On Monday the government told the power company and its subcontractors to take thorough measures to ensure the safety of their workers.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 14:42 +0900 (JST)

Rain increases radioactive water at nuke plant
Heavy rain has increased the volume of highly radioactive water building up inside the disaster-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Contaminated water already floods the basements of the turbine and reactor buildings, partly due to water injections to cool down the reactor cores.Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, now says water levels rose faster on Monday as rain poured inside the badly damaged buildings.In the basement of the No.1 reactor building, radioactive water rose by 37.6 centimeters during the 24 hours through Tuesday morning.At the No.2 reactor, the level of water rose by 8.6 centimeters in an underground tunnel extending from the building.The water in the tunnel's shaft is now only about 39 centimeters below ground level. The utility is speeding up work to seal the opening.

TEPCO is planning to decontaminate and recycle the radioactive water as coolant for the reactors. But the system won't be in place until July at the earliest.In the meantime, the utility is studying steps to prevent rainwater from seeping in. It will also consider new storage sites to which the contaminated water can be quickly transferred as the rainy season approaches.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 12:32 +0900 (JST)

and the Self Defense Force will be getting robots

SDF to add robots to drills for nuclear accidents
Japan's Self-Defense Forces want to add robots to their equipment for dealing with nuclear accidents and incorporate them into their regular training drills.

Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa told reporters on Tuesday that it's an irony of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant accident that US-made robots were initially used to deal with the disaster, even though Japan is a world leader in robot technology.

Kitazawa said he wants the Self-Defense Forces to use robots in its regular nuclear accident drills, including unmanned helicopters that can operate in a high-radiation environment. He said the SDF needs to develop expertise in using such equipment in order to be able to deal with possible nuclear accidents in Japan and its neighboring countries.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 14:42 +0900 (JST)

TEPCO begins live video stream from Fukushima
TEPCO has begun live-streaming video of the disabled Fukushima nuclear plant through the company's website. The real-time footage comes from a camera installed about 250 meters northwest of the No.1 reactor. The No.1 to No.4 reactors can be seen in the webcast. TEPCO had until now been uploading still pictures shot from the southern side of the plant once every hour. It began the video service on Tuesday in response to many requests for live images of the reactors.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 12:50 +0900 (JST)

Yes, it has it's own webcam. There is a site map at the bottom so that you can see where the camera is pointed.
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/f1-np/camera/index-e.html

The TEPCO website is quite an amazing piece of work. It started from an informational page where infrequent press releases were listed to a major resource.

1,800 yet to evacuate
About 1,800 people in the evacuation area near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant still remain in their homes, despite the deadline to leave by the end of Tuesday.The government had instructed about 10,000 residents in the evacuation area sprawling 5 municipalities outside the 20 kilometer no-entry zone around the plant, to evacuate by the end of May.

But officials of Iitate Village say 1,427 people, or 23 percent of its population, have not yet moved out. They add, however, that many of the residents in high radiation areas or with babies and infants have already evacuated.Those who remain in the village include people who cannot find suitable places to evacuate to as well as some cattle farmers and self-employed people.Of the total of about 1,800 remaining residents, there are 349 in Kawamata Town, 26 in Namie Town, and 4 in Katsurao Village.

Iitate Village plans to complete the evacuation of residents by around June 20th. The other municipalities will continue urging the remaining people to move out.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 15:46 +0900 (JST)

 

[dorispulaski]

The oil leak is found, and fixed.

As a result of investigation, it was confirmed that the pipes inside sea bank is stained with oil and the oil is leaking through the hole of steel sheet of sea bank and it was also confirmed that the leak is stopping now.The area where the oil, which is confirmed very thin oil film, is spread out is to the sea surface around curtain wall and loading area, nd we also confirmed that there is no spread out to the open ocean. Accordingly, at around 2:00 pm we complete installation of adsorption mattress around the sea bank area and installment of oil fence at 2:50 pm.We will conduct reinforcement work around pipes inside sea bank and recover spilt oil from the sea surface.

Faults unconsidered in the design of Fukishima Daiichi
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/betu11_e/images/110531e4.pdf
issued, in response to a NISA request

They are backing down further on the amount of water being supplied to Reactor 3

At 10:19 am on May 31, we changed rate of water injection through the reactor feed water system piping arrangement from approximately 13.5 m3/h to approximately 12.5 m3/h. The current rate of water injection is approximately 12.5 m3/h through the reactor feed water system piping arrangement.

Quite a lot has gone on

- At approximately 8:00 am on May 31, we confirmed oil leakage to the sea around the curtain wall of the water intake canal of Unit 5 & 6 and reported the issue to Futaba Wide-area Fire Headquarters and Fukushima Coastguard Office. As a result of our investigation, we confirmed that oil leaked from pipes around seawall to the port through holes of steel sheet piles and that the leakage already stopped. Since the diffused area was just around the curtain wall and the surface of the sea around Shallow Draft Quay and the oil film was very thin, we confirmed that there is no spread to the outer sea. We completed installing oil-absorbing mat around seawall at approximately 2:00 pm and also installed oil fences at 2:50 pm. We plan to protect pipes around seawall and collect the oil.

I believe both of the next 2 items refer to Unit 3.

- At 11:40 am on May 31, we conducted leakage test on the primary system of the alternative cooling system of the spent fuel pool.

- At 10:19 am on May 31, we changed rate of water injection through the reactor feed water system piping arrangement from approximately 13.5 m3/h to approximately 12.5 m3/h. -

At approximately 2:30 pm on May 31, big sound was confirmed at the southern side of the reactor building of Unit 4, where wireless unmanned heavy machineries were removing rubbles. It seemed that the unmanned heavy machinery tucked and broke some cylinder. Nobody got injured. There was no change in the data of the monitoring post. [ETA It was an oxygen cylinder that was run over by a remote controlled vehicle]

- On May 31, dust inhibitor was sprayed to areas including around the main gate.

- At approximately 1:30 pm on May 31, one of the partner companies' workers who were installing cables at Centralized Radiation Waste Treatment Facility got his right hand forefinger injured. After the intravenous drip at the medical room of the station, he was transferred to J Village at 2:26 pm. Then at 3:35 pm he was transferred from J Village to Fukushima accident Hospital. There was no contamination to his body.

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/betu11_e/images/110531e15.pdf
Strontium 90 in three spots, each about 500 m. from the reactors:
Prior to the incident 4.3 Becquerels per kg
Site 1 now 480 Becquerls per kg
Site 2 now 340 Becquerels per kg
Site 3 now 300 Becquerels per kg.

For reference,Ukraine requires resettlement of people if the soil has more than 111,000 becquerels of strontium per square meter. It's hard for me to map that into bequerels per kilogram, because I have no idea how many meters this soil covered. Did they scrape up the top 1 centimeter? 5 centimeters? 10?
On the other hand, you should not eat it: 20 becquerels per kg is the limit in food for strontium.
A long set of directions and list of documents that one must file to get compensation for small business, farming, and so forth affected by Fukushima.
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/11053114-e.html

And NHK says the Unit 2 heat exchanger system for cooling Unit'2 spent fuel pool is working. Good. Less water will be sprayed around.

Cooling system operating at No. 2 reactor
The operator of the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has started operating a system to effectively cool water in a spent fuel pool in the plant's No.2 reactor building. The Tokyo Electric Power Company on Tuesday set up at the building the first circulatory cooling system to be installed at the plant since the accident in March.

The utility has been pumping about 50 tons of water into the pool every few days. The pool's temperature is around 70 degrees Celsius, apparently producing steam that has filled the building and resulted in a humidity level of 99.9 percent. The humidity and high radiation levels have been hampering repair work at the site.

The new system is to pump water out of the pool to a heat exchanger and return the water to the pool as coolant. The firm says it plans to lower the pool's temperature to around 40 degrees Celsius in a month and hopes to reduce the humidity level before installing equipment to remove radioactive substances in the building. The firm says it will start operating similar systems at the plant's No.1 and 3 reactors in June, and at the No.4 reactor in July.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 20:57 +0900 (JST)

Somehow, I think this stinks. Other people start the rumors--they do not pay.

Guidelines set for rumor damage compensation
A government panel reviewing compensation for the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant accident has set guidelines on payments for so-called rumor-induced damages and mental suffering of evacuees.

According to a directive hammered out on Tuesday, farming, fishing and tourist industry claimants are eligible to be compensated in cases where radiation rumors are confirmed to have caused loss of business income.

Rumor-induced damages are defined as losses incurred due to consumers not buying goods and services, or clients canceling transactions, whether due to rumor-based fears or to avoid real risk. This is because the difference between the two reasons is difficult to determine.

The guidelines say all edible farm and marine products from areas where shipments have been banned could be covered by compensation.Loss of income from reduced trade and price drops, as well as fees for radiation checks demanded by the purchaser, could be counted as damage.For tourism, the guidelines say only businesses based in Fukushima Prefecture are eligible for compensation over canceled reservations. But the panel has yet to determine how to calculate the amount of payments.Guidelines for other industries and regions will be set after further analysis.The panel also says evacuees forced to spend long periods outside their homes may be compensated for mental suffering.It had initially agreed to divide damages into 4 stages depending on where the evacuees were placed. But it backtracked after local governments complained of unfairness.

In April, the panel filed damages guidelines for people who were forced to evacuate by government order from around the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011 19:39 +0900 (JST)

Radiation levels fall in Fukushima seawater
Tokyo Electric Power Company says radiation levels have fallen in seawater near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.The utility said on Tuesday it had detected 3.1 becquerels of cesium 134 per cubic meter of seawater near the water intake of the No.3 reactor.The reading is 52 times the national limit, but the lowest since TEPCO began checking radiation levels near the intake after the nuclear accident that followed the March 11th earthquake and tsunami.On May 11th, a level 32,000 times the national limit was detected at the same location due to a leak of highly contaminated water from the plant.Cesium 134 was found in seawater 16 kilometers from the plant on Monday, but the level was below the limit set by the government.The utility said the level of radioactive iodine near the water intake at the No.2 reactor was 160 times the limit on Monday.

But the reading was less than one-third of the previous day's figure.

TEPCO said it found radioactive strontium in seawater samples taken at 4 locations off Fukushima Prefecture on May 9th, but the levels were all below the national limit.

Radioactive strontium is produced during the nuclear fission of uranium. It was found in seawater off Fukushima in April.

TEPCO said the substance probably came from the damaged plant. The utility also said the detected levels were very low, but it will continue to monitor the seawater.
Wednesday, June 01, 2011 02:59 +0900 (JST)

and on the strontium measurements

High levels of strontium detected at Fukushima
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant says it has detected high levels of a radioactive substance that tends to accumulate in human bones.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says it took soil samples on May 9th at 3 locations about 500 meters from the No.1 and No.2 reactors and analyzed them.

The utility detected up to 480 becquerels of radioactive strontium 90 per kilogram of soil. That's about 100 times higher than the maximum reading recorded in Fukushima Prefecture following atmospheric nuclear tests carried out by foreign countries during the Cold War era.

TEPCO reported detecting 2,800 becquerels of strontium 89 per kilogram of soil at the same location.

This is the second time since April that radioactive strontium has been found inside the plant compound.

The substance was also detected in soil and plants more than 30 kilometers from the Fukushima nuclear power station in March.

When people inhale radioactive strontium, it accumulates in bones. Scientists say that strontium could cause cancer.

Tokyo Electric Power says it believes that radioactive strontium was released from the damaged plant and it will continue to monitor radiation levels.

An expert on radioactive substances says he thinks radioactive strontium may continue to be detected around the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. But he says the strontium levels that might be detected in soil will be far lower than those of the radioactive cesium released in the accident by a factor of several thousand.

Yoshihiro Ikeuchi of the Japan Chemical Analysis Center says strontium tends to accumulate in bones, like calcium. But he also says its levels in the air are thought to be lower than those for soil and even if people inhale the substance, no health problems will be caused by such internal exposure to radiation.
Wednesday, June 01, 2011 02:59 +0900 (JST)

 

[chloepoco]

Here's an article I came across; quite touching...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13598607