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Radiation so high, even robots cannot approach Fukushima No. 1 nuclear reactor

Reactor 2 radiation too high for access March 29, 2012 73 sieverts laid to low water; level will even cripple robots By MINORU MATSUTANI Radiation inside the reactor 2 containment vessel at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant has reached a lethal 73 sieverts per hour and any attempt to send robots in to accurately gauge the situation will require them to have greater resistance than currently available, experts said Wednesday.

Exposure to 73 sieverts for a minute would cause nausea and seven minutes would cause death within amonth, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

The experts said the high radiation level is due to the shallow level of coolant water — 60 cm — in the containment vessel, which Tepco said in January was believed to be 4 meters deep. Tepco has only peeked inside the reactor 2 containment vessel. It has few clues as to the status of reactors 1 and 3, which also suffered meltdowns, because
there is no access to their insides.

The utility said the radiation level in the reactor 2 containment vessel is too high for robots, endoscopes and other devices to function properly. Spokesman Junichi Matsumoto said it will be necessary to develop devices resistant to high radiation.

High radiation can damage the circuitry of computer chips and degrade camera-captured images. For example, a series of Quince tracked robots designed to gather data inside reactors can properly function for only two or three hours during exposure to 73 sieverts, said Eiji Koyanagi, chief developer and vice director of the Future Robotics Technology
Center of Chiba Institute of Technology. That is unlikely to be enough for them to move around and collect
video data and water samples, reactor experts said. ”Two or three hours would be too short. At least five or six hours would be necessary,” said Tsuyoshi Misawa, a reactor physics and engineering professor at Kyoto University’s Research Reactor Institute.

The high radiation level can be explained by the low water level. Water acts to block radiation. ”The shallowness of the water level is a surprise . . . the radiation level is awfully high,” Misawa said. While the water temperature is considered in a safe zone at about 50 degrees, it is unknown if the melted fuel is fully submerged, but Tepco said in November that computer simulations suggested the height of the melted fuel in reactor 2′s containment vessel is probably 20 to
40 cm, Tepco spokeswoman Ai Tanaka said.

Tepco has inserted an endoscope and a radiation meter, but not a robot, in the containment vessel. It is way too early to know how long Tepco will need to operate robots in the vessel because it is unknown what the devices will have to do, Tanaka said.

According to experts, even though high radiation in the containment vessel means additional trouble, it is not expected to further delay the decommissioning the three crippled reactors, a process Tepco said will take 40 years.

The experts noted, however, that removing the melted nuclear fuel from the bottom of the containment vessels will be extremely difficult….
Tepco has not been able to gauge the water depths and radiation levels of the containment vessels for reactors 1 and 3, as, unlike unit 2, there is no access. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120329a1.html

March 29, 2012 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

Attack on Iran would not prevent its nuclear development

Iran could recover from attack on its nuclear sites within six months, says U.S. report U.S. congressional report says Israel and U.S. do not know exact location of Iran nuclear facilities, which may be dispersed in such a way that an Israeli attack would not be successful. By Haaretz , 28 March 12, Continue reading →

March 29, 2012 Posted by | Iran, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Fukushima nuclear plant is far from safe

 Still critical: radiation levels at Fukushima can kill in minutes Latest readings from tsunami-stricken nuclear plant overturn claims that reactors have been made safe The Independent, DAVID MCNEILL   TOKYO  THURSDAY 29 MARCH 2012      A lethal level of radiation has been detected inside one of the reactors at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, throwing fresh doubts over the operator’s claims that the disabled complex is under control. Continue reading →

March 29, 2012 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

In Japan, radiation being tactfully left out of school textbooks

without the appropriate study materials, how well … Japan’s school children will understand how their lives have been and will continue to be impacted by the nuclear disaster is unknown.

Japanese textbooks whitewashing nuclear disaster Asian Correspondent By Anna Watanabe Mar 29, 2012 There are many of things Japan has done in the past that it tries to erase from public memory by downplaying their events in school textbooks: the Nanking Massacre, medical testing on POWs during WWII, comfort women and territorial disputes.

But all these are atrocities that have happened outside of Japan, to other nationalities and they occurred generations ago. As inexcusable as it is to claim their non-existence, the logic is somehow more understandable.

But now Japan is trying to rewrite its own, modern-history. Continue reading →

March 29, 2012 Posted by | Japan, secrets,lies and civil liberties | 1 Comment

Lynas rare earths company has to get Australia to agree to take back radioactive wastes

Onus is on Lynas to get nod for waste shipment’, The Malaysian Star Reports by MARTIN CARVALHO, YUEN MEIKENG, RAHIMY RAHIM and TASHNY SUKUMARAN , 29 March 12,  THE onus of obtaining permission from the authorities to ship waste from the proposed rare earth plant in Gebeng, Pahang, to Australia lies with operators Lynas Corporation, said Science, Technology and Innovations Minister Datuk Seri Dr Maximux Ongkili.

“There has been no official word from the authorities in Australia over the shipment (of the waste) and I have not received any formal communication,” he said at Parliament lobby.

Though helping facilitate Lynas’ investment in setting up the plant here, he noted there were conditions that the company must fulfil with the onus on them to obtain approval for waste shipment to Australia if the need arose. “We are not here for the purpose of just helping Lynas. We have set conditions and they must follow,” he said.

The Atomic Energy Licensing Board’s (AELB) imposed five conditions for the issuance of a temporary operating licence for the Lynas plant which includes locating a suitable site for a permanent disposal facility. “If Lynas cannot process the wastes here according to our standard or cannot find a permanent disposal site, then they have to seek a site outside this country…..

“Otherwise, I am not giving the licence as they have signed for that,” Ongkili repeatedly said…..  Ongkili said Lynas Corporation chose to have its rare earth plant in Malaysia because the cost to operate the facility here was 30% of that in Australia….. http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp file=/2012/3/28/parliament/11002216&sec=parliament

March 29, 2012 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, Malaysia, Uranium, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear smuggling, mainly by Iranian and Chinese middlemen

US, European officials probe Iran nuclear smuggling By Mark Hosenball  and John Shiffman WASHINGTON,  Mar 28, 2012 (Reuters) – A dramatic expansion in nuclear and military smuggling investigations should lead to a flood of new criminal cases, primarily against Iranian and Chinese middlemen, U.S. law enforcement officials said on Wednesday.

U.S. officials said they are investigating 30 percent more cases this year than three years ago. U.S. agencies have deployed agents posing as arms brokers at more than 20 undercover companies targeting smugglers, said the officials, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

Undercover arms smuggling investigations typically take two to four years to unfold, one of the officials said, which is why he expects an increase in indictments soon….
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/28/usa-iran-smuggling-idUSL2E8ERODR20120328

March 29, 2012 Posted by | 2 WORLD, safety | Leave a comment

Hypocrisy and racism – Australia’s sorry nuclear history

Dumping on Traditional Owners: the ugly face of Australian racism The Drum, 29 March 12  The nuclear industry has been responsible for some of the crudest racism in Australia’s history.

This racism dates from the British nuclear bomb tests in the 1950s but it can still be seen today.

The British government conducted 12 nuclear bomb tests in Australia in the 1950s, most of them at Maralinga in South Australia. Permission was not sought from affected Aboriginal groups such as the Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara, Tjarutja and Kokatha. Thousands of people were adversely affected and the impact on Aboriginal people was particularly profound.

Many Aboriginal people suffered from radiological poisoning. There are tragic accounts of families sleeping in the bomb craters. So-called ‘Native Patrol Officers’ patrolled thousands of square kilometres to try to ensure that Aboriginal people were removed before nuclear tests took place. Signs were erected in some places – written in English, which few in the affected Indigenous communities could understand. The 1985    Royal Commission    found that regard for Aboriginal safety was characterised by “ignorance, incompetence and cynicism”. Many Aboriginal people were forcibly removed from their homelands and taken to places such as the Yalata mission in South Australia, which was effectively a prison camp.

In the late-1990s, the Australian government carried out a   clean-up  of the Maralinga nuclear test site. It was done on the cheap and many tonnes of debris contaminated with kilograms of plutonium remain buried in shallow, unlined pits in totally unsuitable geology. As nuclear engineer and whistleblower Alan Parkinson said of the ‘clean-up’ on ABC radio in August 2002:

“What was done at Maralinga was a cheap and nasty solution that wouldn’t be adopted on white-fellas land.”

Despite the residual contamination, the Federal Government has off-loaded responsibility for the land onto the Maralinga Tjarutja Traditional Owners. The Government portrays this land transfer as an act of reconciliation, but the real agenda was spelt out in a 1996 government document which states that the clean-up was “aimed at reducing Commonwealth liability arising from residual contamination.”….. http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3919296.html

March 29, 2012 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, history, indigenous issues | Leave a comment