Rice being planted within 20 km of Fukushima No 1 nuclear power plant
Rice planted 10 miles from Fukushima Daiichi — Residents can’t stay in town overnight — “Intended for sale” http://enenews.com/jiji-rice-being-planted-about-10-miles-from-fukushima-daiichi-intended-for-sale
Title: Rice planted in former no-go zone
Source: JIJI
Date: May 20, 2013
Farmers in the city of Tamura, Fukushima Prefecture, have begun planting rice in a district once designated a no-go zone because of radioactive fallout ejected by the disaster-hit Fukushima No. 1 power plant.
It is the first time since the March 2011 core meltdowns that rice intended for sale has been planted in any former hot zone within 20 km of the power plant.
Saturday’s rice planting was carried out in Tamura’s Miyakojimachi district, about 15 km [9.4 miles] from the plant […]
Residents can enter without permission during the daytime but aren’t allowed to stay overnight […]
See also: Japan Times: Radiation level in Fukushima town 400 times higher than in Tokyo — 10 kilometers from Daiichi
Fishermen testing fish for radiation, in South Fukushima waters
Fishermen net fish in Fukushima waters to measure radiation levels
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/recovery/AJ201305210005 May 21, 2013 By HIROSHI KAWAI/ Staff Writer
A fishing vessel from Fukushima Prefecture caught fish in waters south
of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant on May 20 to test
them for levels of radiation contamination, as local fishing
cooperatives hope to soon resume fishing in the area.
The No. 12 Akira Maru belonging to the Iwaki fishermen’s cooperative
trawled plenty of flatfish and other species.
Due to ocean currents, the concentration of radioactive materials has
been found to be higher in waters to the south of the plant, than to
the north.
Of the Akira Maru’s catch, nine species of fish were kept as samples
to measure radiation levels in them. The fishermen tested about 10
kilograms of each type and threw the rest back into the sea.
“It feels hollow to have to throw fish back into the sea, considering
that they could fetch high prices,” Captain Akiyoshi Abe said.
Before the nuclear accident triggered by the Great East Japan
Earthquake and tsunami in March 2011, waters off the prefecture were
known as a good fishing area where more than 100 species could be
caught.
Many local fisheries cooperatives have had to suspend operations since
the nuclear accident.
UK government’s big gamble in subsidising new nuclear power
Nuclear subsidies: a gamble on the price of gas, Climate Spectator, 20 May 13Will Blyth “…..the idea of billion pound subsidies for a new crop of nuclear power stations in a time of austerity sounds outlandish. Is this a sensible use of the public’s money?
We should note that the government is not parting with any cash up front. This is a buy-now, pay-later deal. Money will only flow to the nuclear companies from our bills once they start generating electricity.
The first nuclear plant in the pipeline is Hinkley Point in Somerset, which has received planning consent. The government is currently negotiating a contract with the owner, energy company EDF, to agree a price they can charge when the plant comes online.
The contract terms will be long – perhaps up to 40 years – giving the company revenue certainty, and reducing their capital costs in the face of fluctuating market prices. Yet to be announced, this fixed price may be 70 per cent higher (worth more than £1 billion per year) compared to today’s market prices. But as the plant will not be operational for at least 10 years, the key question is what price power will be a decade from now.
That depends. If the price of gas stays where it is or falls, government will have locked consumers into an expensive energy source for 40 years. But if gas prices rise, electricity prices will also rise, and nuclear energy will subsidise us rather than the other way round. In which case, if the government fails to build new nuclear plants now it will have locked out consumers from a relatively cheap source of future power.
This is the nature of the commercial risks associated with nuclear, and why companies will not build new plants without some price assurance from government. By fixing a price, the government transfers that risk to the consumer. Depending on the terms of the contract agreed with EDF, the public may also share the risk of major cost overruns, and of dealing with nuclear waste.
Britain’s existing nuclear plants are also operated by EDF, which bought them from the government in 2009 for £12.5 billion in a deal that left the costs of cleaning up with the government. This is going to be expensive: the decommissioning of the huge nuclear reprocessing plant at Sellafield, Cumbria, is estimated at more than £67 billion, a bill that costs the government £2.3 billion per year through the annual budget of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. EDF pays nothing into this fund as the “polluter pays” principle says they should, so this represents a hefty subsidy. But the government would never have received such an attractive sale price if the taxpayer had not been left to pick up the tab.
……Judged on purely commercial grounds, the nuclear decision is a large bet on the price of gas (not to mention nuclear safety) http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2013/5/21/energy-markets/nuclear-subsidies-gamble-price-gas
Whistleblower’s court victory on unsafe nuclear plant conditions – company will appeal
Firm to appeal nuclear plant whistleblower case KSN.com, By The Associated Press, May 20, 2013 WICHITA, Kan. — An engineering firm accused of firing a whistleblower for reporting unsafe conditions at an eastern Kansas nuclear power plant plans to appeal the ruling by federal regulators, the firm said Monday.
KSN.com 20 May 13The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration found Enercon Services violated whistleblower protections when it retaliated against an engineer for raising concerns during construction work at the Wolf Creek nuclear power plant in Burlington.
The company was ordered to pay $261,152 in back wages, damages and interest, plus attorney’s fees. OSHA found it violated the whistleblower protections of the Energy Reorganization Act (ERA), OSHA said Monday.
“Professionals who work in the nuclear power industry have a right and responsibility to express their professional opinion and report safety-related concerns,” OSHA acting regional administrator Marcia Drumm said in a news release. “The department’s responsibility is to protect all employees from retaliation for exercising basic worker rights. The ERA protects the workers, who, in turn, protect the public.”
OSHA said any appeal would go to the department’s Office of Administrative Law Judges….. OSHA’s investigation concluded the engineer was fired in January 2012 for reporting breaches of minimum soil coverage caused by a trench dug during construction work and for refusing to provide an engineering justification for the use of concrete as backfill. He was fired a few days later. http://www.ksn.com/2013/05/20/firm-to-appeal-nuclear-plant-whistleblower-case/
Connecticut Senator urging a federal decision on nuclear waste storage
it would make sense to stop making this radioactive trash
Murphy urges bipartisan nuclear waste storage plan http://www.wtnh.com/dpp/news/politics/murphy-urges-bipartisan-nuclear-waste-storage-plan#.UZvs8qJwpLs, 20 May 2013, HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy is asking Senate leaders to solve the longstanding problem of where to dispose of nuclear waste.
Connecticut’s junior senator wrote to Democratic and Republican members of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Monday offering his support for legislation that would establish a federal agency and consent-based procedures to manage nuclear waste.
Murphy, a Democrat, said the issue is of immediate importance to Connecticut.
Dominion Resources Inc., the owner of Millstone Power Station, won state permission on May 2 to significantly expand nuclear waste storage capacity over the next 30 years. Millstone and officials of Waterford said that without a federal site, they had no choice.
Congress designated Yucca Mountain in Nevada for a nuclear waste dump. It’s opposed by elected officials, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.
Iran reiterates its opposition to nuclear bombs
Iran strongly opposes nuclear weapons: MP, Press TV 20 May 13 A senior Iranian lawmaker says all signatories to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) have the right to peaceful nuclear know-how, expressing Iran’s strong opposition to nuclear weapons.
“Iran seriously opposes nuclear bombs and believes that all nuclear weapons in the world should be eliminated,” Chairman of the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee Alaeddin Boroujerdi said.
He made the remarks in a meeting with a member of Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee of South Korea’s Parliament Chung Moon-hun in Tehran on Monday. …..http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/05/20/304504/iran-strongly-opposes-nuclear-weapons/
Iran, unlike Israel, will allow IAEA to visit its military nuclear site
Iran to allow visit to Parchin nuclear site http://www.neurope.eu/article/iran-allow-visit-parchin-nuclear-site BY ELENI STAMATOUKOU | MAY 20, 2013 Iranian Ambassador to Moscow Reza Sajjadi said that Tehran will allow the International Atomic Energy Agency’s experts to visit Parchin military nuclear facility, if the IAEA signs a relevant protocol that contains all its concerns and questions about Parchin
Sajjadi underlined the non-nuclear nature of the country’s Parchin military site. “Tehran is ready to explain every point of the country’s nuclear program as well as allow experts to Parchin site if the IAEA agrees to sign a protocol detailing all its questions,” Sajjadi told the satellite TV channel Russia Today on Saturday. However, the IAEA’s experts want to visit the facility prior to signing the protocol. “this is a game,” the ambassador said. “And if they don’t find anything, let’s close Iran’s nuclear file and remove it from the UN Security Council,” he added. The IAEA’s role is to safeguard that no one is developing nuclear weapons, however Israel has nuclear bombs but nobody cares, said the Iranian diplomat.
Japan readying to gamble with safety, in restarting nuclear reactors
Crushed By Soaring Energy Costs, Japan Prepares To Reactivate Its Nuclear Power Plants Zero Hedge, by Tyler Durden on 05/19/2013 “….First it was Japan’s economy minister chiming in with his views on the fair value of the USDJPY (apparently, now it is too high), who also made it clear that Japan has no choice but to restart the same nuclear power plants that two years resulted in the biggest nuclear catastrophe since Chernobyl.
And now, proving that Japan has learned absolutely nothing from its recent past, it is now preparing to risk yet another Fukushima, just to make sure that Goldman’s partners have a fresh year of record bonuses, driven by the BOJ’s monetary insanity. Yomiuri Shumbun reports, that just two years after a wholesale shutdown of Japan’s nuclear power plants demanded by the people, Japan is once again going to reactivate its nuclear power plants, much to the chagrin of the already massively irradiated local population.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. has decided to apply to the nuclear regulating body to restart two reactors at its nuclear power plant in Niigata Prefecture by the end of July, after revised safety standards are implemented earlier that month, it has been learned.
Reactivation of the two reactors at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant could help stabilize the power supply situation for eastern Japan, including the Kanto region, which is part of TEPCO’s service areas; and the Tohoku region, Tohoku Electric Power Co.’s service area for which TEPCO provides electricity. In doing so, the company could prevent electricity fees from rising further.
Reactivation of the reactors could also help TEPCO’s management reconstruction drive, as the utility faces additional fuel costs for thermal power generation to make up for power shortfalls due to the suspension of nuclear power reactors.
The application to the Nuclear Regulation Authority will be made for the Nos. 1 and 7 reactors at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in Niigata Prefecture. The move is expected to coincide with similar applications to be filed by four other operators for reactors at their five plants, according to officials.
So which nukes are set to go live?….
The reactors could be reactivated after passing the NRA’s safety inspections and obtaining consent from local governments. The reactors that the four utilities are applying to restart are at:
- Hokkaido Electric Power Co.’s Tomari nuclear power plant in Tomari, Hokkaido.
- Kansai Electric Power Co.’s Takahama nuclear power plant in Takahama, Fukui Prefecture.
- Shikoku Electric Power Co.’s Ikata nuclear power plant in Ikata, Ehime Prefecture.
- Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s Sendai nuclear power plant in Satsuma-Sendai, Kagoshima Prefecture, and Genkai nuclear power plant in Genkai, Saga Prefecture.
The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant has boiling water reactors–the same type as those at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, which suffered meltdowns following the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami…….
Although we doubt it: it is only a matter of time before some Japanese central planner takes the mic, and reads the Goldman script, promising all disastrous future earthquakes and tsunamis have been henceforth banned and made illegal, and the BOJ will guarantee nothing bad can ever happen to the earthquake prone nation, located along one of the most active seismic faultlines in the world. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-05-19/crushed-soaring-energy-costs-japan-prepares-reactivate-its-nuclear-power-plants
On Fukushima Beach: The lights of Fukushima – Documentary
Published on May 20, 2013
Original upload from: http://www.youtube.com/user/andrewebi…
Thank you so much Andrew ~ Hugs brother
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOSjkE…
Published on Apr 29, 2013
Thank you to all who have watched and shared ‘Ón Fukushima Beach 2’. Also, mutation in Kyoto city, 450km from Fukushima.
Japan Times: Discharges of Fukushima nuclear material into Pacific “have effectively contaminated the sea” — Melted reactor cores will burn again if water not perpetually poured in — “Tepco proposing some of it be dumped into ocean”
http://enenews.com/japan-times-discharges-of-nuclear-material-into-the-pacific-from-fukushima-have-effectively-contaminated-the-sea-melted-reactor-cores-will-burn-again-if-water-not-perpetually-poured-in-t
Published: May 20th, 2013 at 1:13 pm ET
By ENENews
Title: Fukushima No. 1 can’t keep its head above tainted water
Source: The Japan Times
Author: Reiji Yoshida
Date: May 21, 2013
[…] Tepco must perpetually pour water over the melted cores of reactors 1, 2, and 3 via makeshift systems to prevent the fuel from melting and burning again. […]
Tepco is proposing some of the water be dumped into the sea after processing it to remove most, but not all, radioactive isotopes. […]
Previous discharges into the Pacific have effectively contaminated the sea. Failure to store it means it will probably flood the whole compound and end up in the ocean anyway. […]
Will the processed water pose health or environmental risks?
According to Tepco, the processed water could theoretically be safe […]
Tritium is the exception, however. Tepco says the tritium level in the contaminated water is between 1 million and 5 million becquerels per liter. The legal limit is 60,000. […]
See also: Gundersen: “Liquid releases” of nuclear material into ocean will continue for years and years at Fukushima Daiichi — Already 10 times Chernobyl (VIDEO)
Activists bristle as India cracks down on foreign funding of NGOs
Japan and India were likely to agree at their summit meeting this month to resume talks toward a civilian nuclear cooperation pact.The pact would pave the way for exporting Japan’s nuclear technology to the massive market.
“All our work has come to a stop,” said Henri Tiphagne, head of a human rights group called People’s Watch. “I had visited [the] Koodankulam protest site once. Is that a banned territory?”
But the government’s action appears to have had its desired effect. “NGOs are too scared to visit Koodankulam or associate with us now,” said anti-nuclear activist S. P. Udayakumar.
Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director of Human Rights Watch, said many NGOs are afraid to speak up about the suspension of their foreign funding approval, which is “being used to intimidate organizations and activists.”
Imagr source ; http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-tamilnadu/udayakumar-to-sue-manmohan/article2934069.ece
By ,
10 Km from Fukushima nuclear plant radiation levels 400 times higher than in Tokyo
Japan Times: Radiation level in Fukushima town 400 times higher than in Tokyo — 10 kilometers from Daiichi http://enenews.com/japan-times-radiation-level-fukushima-town-400-times-higher-tokyo
Title: Fukushima photos focus on what can’t be seen
Source: Japan Times
Author: Ken Kawashima
Date: May 19, 2013
[…] Returning to the base of [Mount Higakure] overlooking the manmade lake behind the [Sakashita] dam, we find a public radiation-monitoring post indicating a reading of 0.44μSv/hour — roughly 40 times the level in Tokyo on the same day.
Moving on from there, before heading back to Tokyo we decide to drop by the abandoned tsunami-ravaged town of Tomioka, which had been off-limits until just recently. There, a mere 10 km from the nuclear plant, we were chastened to find the radiation readings were almost 10 times those by the dam — some 400 times Tokyo levels at the same time on the same day. […]
Full report here
Japanese authorities ignore radiation levels in Tokyo river eels
Local governments ignore cesium detection in Tokyo river eels, Asahi Shimbun May 17, 2013 By YUSUKE FUKUI/ Staff Writer Tokyo and Chiba local governments took no action for nearly two months after being informed that radioactive cesium had been detected in eels caught in a boundary river between the two prefectures.
Officials of both governments said no independent study was conducted because the eels were not caught by professional fishermen intending to sell the catch.
The detection of the cesium was also not publicized. On March 9, a 47-year-old self-employed woman caught an eel from the Edogawa river in Tokyo’s Katsushika Ward. Concerned about reports that cesium had accumulated downstream in the river, she sent the eel to Hideo Yamazaki, a professor of environmental analysis at Kinki University in Osaka Prefecture. Using a germanium semiconductor detector, Yamazaki found that the eel had 147.5 becquerels of radioactive cesium per kilogram, higher than the central government standard of 100 becquerels.
Yamazaki reported his finding to the Fisheries Agency in late March because he felt there was a need for an official investigation to back up his finding as well as further studies to look into the effects on other fish.
Although the Fisheries Agency informed both the Tokyo metropolitan and Chiba prefectural governments about the finding, neither had conducted an official study as of May 16.
An official with the Tokyo metropolitan government’s fisheries division said, “Basically, only fish that enter the distribution network is subject to studies. The eel fishing season also does not start until summer.”….. Yamazaki conducted further studies on four eels caught by the same woman in April and May in the Edogawa river. The eels had cesium levels between 97.4 becquerels and 129.6 becquerels per kilogram, with three of the eels having cesium levels exceeding the central government standard….. http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/social_affairs/AJ201305170079
Belgium May Face Legal Battle After Two Nuclear Reactors Get Green Light
Published on May 18, 2013
“We will summon the government for the lack of a decent emergency plan and at the same time they increase the risks of a nuclear accident,”
From: http://www.youtube.com/user/Euronews
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May 18, 2013 – http://www.euronews.com/ Greenpeace are threatening to sue the Belgian government. The leading environmental activist network is threatening legal action after Belgium’s nuclear safety regulator gave the green light to GDF Suez to go ahead and restart two nuclear reactors.
However, during a news conference, the Belgian Interior Minister, Joelle Milquet claimed that the government does not have the power to block the move.
“The independent regulator provides technical advice to an operator on the restarting of its operations. We do not have the ability to interfere in the decision, because it is an independent operator,” he said.
Last year two nuclear reactors were closed after safety concerns were flagged up in their their tanks, during an ultrasound check.
Greenpeace says it is the government’s responsibility to guarantee the safety of the Belgian people.
“We will summon the government for the lack of decent emergency plan and at the same time they increase the risks of a nuclear accident,” says Greenpeace Belgium energy campaigner Eloi Glorieux.
So while a legal battle may be brewing reactors, Doel 3 and Tihange 2 could be back up and running within 3 weeks, now that Belgium’s
nuclear watchdog claims all issues have been resolved.
Fukushima to California – the path of nuclear radiation along Latitude 40
Study: Concentrated Fukushima radioactive plume staying on narrow path toward U.S. — Moving with surface water along 40 N — Same latitude as Northern California(MAP) http://enenews.com/study-concentrated-fukushima-radioactive-plume-staying-along-narrow-path-moving-surface-water-along-40-same-latitude-northern-california-map
Title: Surface pathway of radioactive plume of TEPCO Fukushima NPP1 released 134Cs and 137Cs
Source: Biogeosciences
Authors: M. Aoyama, M. Uematsu, D. Tsumune, and Y. Hamajima
Date: May 7, 2013
[…] The main body of radioactive surface plume of which activity exceeded 10 Bq m−3 travelled along 40° N and reached the International Date Line on March 2012, one year after the accident. A distinct feature of the radioactive plume was that it stayed confined along 40° N when the plume reached the International Date Line. […]
A distinct feature of the radioactive plume was that it stayed confined along 40 N when the plume reached the International Date Line, as stated in Sect. 3.2. The radioactive plume travelled 1800 km (from 160 E to 178 E) for 270 days (9 months) (Fig. 5); therefore, an average zonal speed (u) of the surface radioactive plume was calculated to be about 8 cm s−1 which was consistent with the speed of the reported surface current of 4–16 cm s−1 in the region (Maximenko et al., 2009). […]
We can also assume that the Fukushima radioactive plume moved with surface water […]
Full study here
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