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UK, Japan scientists study radioactive Fukushima particles

 

This sounds like a good idea. But – can we really be confident about science done by Atomic Energy Agencies , whose brief is to further develop atomic energy?

OXFORD, England (Reuters) 8 Mar 19,  – Eight years after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown in Japan, radioactive particles collected from the site are undergoing new forensic investigation in Britain in an effort to understand the exact sequence of events…….

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) is currently collaborating with British researchers to learn more about the state of the radioactive particles created by the meltdown.

Dr Yukihiko Satou from the JAEA oversaw the transportation of particles collected from within the restricted zone, very close to the disaster site, to Britain.

“The particles were fundamentally extracted from those attached to soil, dust and debris,” Satou told Reuters.

Encased in protective tape, the samples were brought to the Diamond Light Source, Britain’s national synchrotron, or cyclic particle accelerator, near Oxford.

Here electrons are accelerated to near light speeds until they emit light 10 billion times brighter than the sun, then directed into laboratories in ‘beamlines’ which allow scientists to study minute specimens in extreme detail.

…… Understanding the current state of these particles and how they behave in the environment could ultimately determine if and when the area could be declared safe for people to return…… Writing by Matthew Stock,; Editing by Gareth Jones   https://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-disaster-radiation/uk-japan-scientists-study-radioactive-fukushima-particles-idUSKCN1QP1GF

March 9, 2019 Posted by | Fukushima continuing | Leave a comment

People of Kashmir – stuck in a dangerous, potentially nuclear, conflict

In Kashmir, we’re stuck in the middle of a potentially nuclear conflict but the world looks away, ABC News, By Umar Lateef Misgar   9 Mar 19, When Adil Dar rammed a car stuffed with explosives into a paramilitary convoy in Indian-administered Kashmir last month, I didn’t make much of the news.

I was travelling across northern India at the time. Having been born and brought up amid a conflict that has defined the life of every young Kashmiri for the past three decades it just seemed more of the same: military cordons, gunfights, curfews, blown-up houses, maiming and the death of our friends and acquaintances.

But the magnitude of this attack by Dar, a 22-year-old Kashmiri, crept up on me through numbers and images. It was the worst attack against Indian forces since the armed insurgency erupted in Kashmir in the late 1980s.

At least 40 Indian paramilitary personnel had been killed, setting off a chain of events that almost brought South Asia to the brink of an all-out nuclear war.

I felt heartbroken by the loss of life that had occurred.

The Indian media instantly began to whip up a frenzy against the Kashmiris, doubling down on efforts to demonise an entire people.

The Indian population’s anger was focused against Kashmiri civilians, students and migrant businessmen, who were attacked by mobs. As many as 2000 of them were forced to flee from different Indian cities…….

I have lived in India as a student and travelled across the country throughout my life, but I have never felt as threatened as during this recent visit.

Constantly dehumanised in the Indian media as well as politics, Kashmiris have been undermined and permanently relegated as dispensable other in the Indian consciousness. Even the India’s parliamentary opposition, led by the Indian National Congress party that finds its roots in the anti-colonial struggles of the subcontinent, didn’t even dare to speak a word against this wave of anti-Kashmiri hate-crimes………

Amid rising tensions, both the countries mobilised their armed forces, leading to the worst tension in 20 years. Diplomats succeeded in persuading the two nuclear-armed nations to back-off. For now.

It is local Kashmiris whose lives were disrupted by this military posturing and brinkmanship. Civilians across the de-facto border that divides Indian and Pakistani-administered Kashmir, suffered the stress of warplanes hovering above and the impending threat of war………

Deadliest decade

The confrontation between India and Pakistan has slowly de-escalated but people continue to be killed, and while last year was the deadliest in a decade the coming year looks catastrophically bleak.

In the past week 15 people including eight Kashmiri civilians died in shelling and gunfights on the border.

As world attention shifts elsewhere the plight of Kashmiri people remains constant. Our land, our air and our bodies will remain the sites of violent confrontation and electoral bargaining.

Will anyone bat an eye before the next nuclear showdown? https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-09/kashmir-is-stuck-in-the-middle-of-nuclear-tension/10878950

March 9, 2019 Posted by | India, Pakistan, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Nuclear threat still hangs over India and Pakistan

March 7, 2019 Posted by | India, Pakistan, politics international | Leave a comment

South Korean President Moon Jae-in praised North Korea’s offer to dismantle a key nuclear production complex

Moon Lauds North Korea’s Nuclear Offer, Splitting With Trump, Bloomberg, By Youkyung Lee, March 4, 2019, 

  • He says a ‘partial’ sanctions lift was discussed in Hanoi
  • Moon says Trump, Kim should meet soon to reach agreement

South Korean President Moon Jae-in praised North Korea’s offer to dismantle a key nuclear production complex as an “irreversible” step to undercut its weapons program, breaking with the Trump administration.

In a meeting to discuss the summit last week in Hanoi between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un, Moon on Monday lauded North Korea’s offer to dismantle the Yongbyon nuclear complex. He also called for pushing ahead with inter-Korean projects currently hindered by sanctions and said the two sides discussed the “partial” lifting of sanctions — backing North Korea’s version of events…….

Moon has endeavored to serve as a bridge between Trump and Kim, and has staked political capital on bringing peace to the divided peninsula. ….

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-04/moon-lauds-north-korea-s-nuclear-offer-splitting-with-trump

March 7, 2019 Posted by | North Korea, politics international, South Korea | Leave a comment

Nightmarishly high radiation levels -robots the only chance to deal with Fukushima reactors’ molten fuel

For Fukushima’s nuclear disaster, robots may be the only hope, The 2011 meltdown in Japan is still too hot for humans to handle. Send in the machines. CNet BY ROGER CHENG,  MARCH 4, 2019  ………. I’m inside the cavernous top of the Unit 3 reactor in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. Yes, that Fukushima Daiichi, site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster.

Unit 3 was one of three reactors crippled on March 11, 2011, after a 9.0 earthquake struck 80 miles off the coast of Japan. (Units 4, 5 and 6 at Daiichi weren’t operating at the time.) The temblor shook so violently it shifted the Earth’s axis by nearly 4 inches and moved the coast of Japan by 8 feet. Eleven reactors at four nuclear power plants throughout the region were operating at the time. All shut down automatically. All reported no significant damage.

An hour later, the tsunami reached shore.

Two 50-foot-high waves barreled straight at Fukushima Daiichi, washing over coastal seawalls and disabling the diesel generators powering the plant’s seawater cooling systems. Temperatures inside the reactors skyrocketed to as high as 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Fuel rods became molten puddles of uranium that chewed through the floors below, leaving a radioactive cocktail of fuel rods, concrete, steel and melted debris. Molten fuel ultimately sank into the three reactors’ primary containment vessels, designed to catch and secure contaminated material.

Next Monday marks the eighth anniversary of the earthquake. Since then, Japanese energy giant Tokyo Electric Power Company, or Tepco, has cleared enough of the rubble on the top floor of the Unit 3 building to allow for my 10-minute visit.

I gaze up at the massive barrel vault ceiling, trying to get a handle on the sheer scale of everything. Radiation levels are too high for me to linger. My quickening pace and breath are betrayed by rapid flapping noises coming from the purple filters on both sides of my respirator mask.

At the far end of the room, there’s an enormous orange platform known as a fuel-handling machine. It has four giant metal legs that taper down, giving the structure a sort of animalistic look. Thin steel cables suspend a chrome robot in the center of the frame. The robot, largely obscured by a pink plastic wrapper, is equipped with so-called manipulators that can cut rubble and grab fuel rods. The robot will eventually pull radioactive wreckage out of a 39-foot-deep pool in the center of the room.

It’s just one of the many robots Tepco is using to clean up the power plant. It’s why I came to Japan this past November — to see how robots are working in one of the most extreme situations imaginable.

The Japanese government estimates it will cost $75.7 billion and take 40 years to fully decommission and tear down the facility. The Japan Atomic Energy Agency even built a research center nearby to mock up conditions inside the power plant, allowing experts from around the country to try out new robot designs for clearing away the wreckage.

The hope is that the research facility — along with a drone-testing field an hour away — can clean up Daiichi and revitalize Fukushima Prefecture, once known for everything from seafood to sake. The effort will take so long that Tepco and government organizations are grooming the next generation of robotics experts to finish the job.  …….

Two years ago, Tepco erected a dome over the Unit 3 reactor and fuel pool so that engineers could bring in heavy equipment and now, us.

Roughly 60 feet below me, radiation is being emitted at 1 sievert per hour. A single dose at that level is enough to cause radiation sickness such as nausea, vomiting and hemorrhaging. One dose of 5 sieverts an hour would kill about half of those exposed to it within a month, while exposure to 10 sieverts in an hour would be fatal within weeks.

Unit 3 is the least contaminated of the three destroyed reactors.

Radiation in Unit 1 has been measured at 4.1 to 9.7 sieverts per hour. And two years ago, a reading taken at the deepest level of Unit 2 was an “unimaginable” 530 sieverts, according to The Guardian. Readings elsewhere in Unit 2 are typically closer to 70 sieverts an hour, still making it the hottest of Daiichi’s hotspots.

The reactors’ hostile environments brought most of the early robots to their figurative knees: High gamma radiation levels scrambled the electrons within the semiconductors serving as the robots’ brains — ruling out machines that are too sophisticated. Autonomous robots would either shut down or get snared by misshapen obstacles in unexpected places.

The robots also had to be nimble enough to avoid disturbing the volatile melted fuel rods, essentially playing the world’s deadliest game of “Operation.” At least initially, they weren’t.    “Fukushima was a humbling moment,” says Rian Whitton, an analyst at ABI Research. “It showed the limits of robot technologies.”………….. https://www.cnet.com/news/for-fukushimas-nuclear-disaster-robots-may-be-the-only-hope/

March 5, 2019 Posted by | Fukushima continuing | Leave a comment

North Korea’s major nuclear reactor has been shut down for months

Key North Korean nuclear reactor has been shut down for months: IAEA,   Channel News Asia, 4 Mar 19, VIENNA: The nuclear reactor that is believed to have supplied much of the plutonium for North Korea’s nuclear weapons appears to have been shut down for the past three months, the UN atomic watchdog said on Monday (Mar 4), without suggesting why.The 5-megawatt reactor is part of North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear complex, the possible dismantling of which was a central issue in talks between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam last week.

The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency has not had access to North Korea since Pyongyang expelled its inspectors in 2009, and it now monitors the country’s nuclear activities mainly through satellite imagery.

Some independent analysts, who are also using satellite imagery, believe the ageing reactor is having technical problems.

“The agency has not observed any indications of the operation of the 5MW(e) reactor since early December 2018,” IAEA Director-General Yukiya Amano said in a closed-door speech to his agency’s Board of Governors, which is meeting this week.

At the radiochemical laboratory that separates plutonium from the reactor’s spent fuel, there were no indications of such reprocessing activities, Amano added.

But a facility widely believed to be used for uranium enrichment, a process that can also produce weapons-grade material for nuclear bombs, appeared to be running, he said. And building work continued on an experimental light-water reactor.

The IAEA has repeatedly said it is ready to play a verification role in North Korea once a political agreement is reached on the country’s nuclear activities.

The United States says it wants a full “denuclearisation” of North Korea, but the Trump-Kim summit’s abrupt ending without agreement left the future of their talks uncertain ………. https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/key-north-korean-nuclear-reactor-has-been-shut-down-for-months–iaea-11310906

March 5, 2019 Posted by | North Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Russia to lease nuclear-powered attack submarine to India for a cool $3 billion

March 5, 2019 Posted by | India, marketing, Russia, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh warns on Pakistan’s readiness to use nuclear weapons

March 5, 2019 Posted by | India, Pakistan, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

North Korea’s frighteningly strong non-nuclear artillery

March 5, 2019 Posted by | North Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

USA and South Korea cancel big war games – in a conciliatory gesture to North Korea

US, S. Korea officially call off annual military exercises amid nuclear talks with N. Korea, By KIM GAMEL | STARS AND STRIPES March 2, 2019

SEOUL, South Korea — The United States and South Korea canceled key war games in favor of low-profile drills, the allies said Sunday, in a major concession to North Korea days after its nuclear summit with President Donald Trump collapsed without agreement.

The springtime exercises known as Key Resolve and Foal Eagle, along with their autumn counterpart Ulchi Freedom Guardian, have long been the lynchpin of the alliance between Seoul and Washington.

The drills, which include computer simulations and live-fire bombing runs, also have been a touchstone for tensions as the North considers them a rehearsal for an invasion.

The decision to cancel Key Resolve and Foal Eagle had been widely expected after Trump reiterated his own antipathy for the drills, which he has called “very expensive” and “provocative.”

Rebranding exercises

A rebranded “combined command post exercise” will be held from Monday to March 12, according to a separate statement issued Sunday by the top U.S. and South Korean commanders on the divided peninsula.

Commanders and other military officials insisted they can maintain a strong defensive posture with scaled-back training…… https://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/us-s-korea-officially-call-off-annual-military-exercises-amid-nuclear-talks-with-n-korea-1.571119

March 4, 2019 Posted by | politics international, South Korea, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Japan’s nuclear watchdog concerned at possibility of volcano near nuclear station

RA eyes seabed watch of caldera near Kagoshima nuclear plant, Asahi Shimbun, By CHIKAKO KAWAHARA/ Staff Writer March 3, 2019  The nightmare scenario of a volcanic crater erupting and spewing a pyroclastic flow that engulfs a nuclear plant, causing catastrophic levels of radiation to leak into the atmosphere, doesn’t appear on the horizon … just yet.But the nation’s nuclear watchdog is taking no chances. It plans to install seabed sensors to monitor potential crustal deformations on the Aira Caldera, located just 40 kilometers from the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima Prefecture.

Little is known of processes that lead to giant eruptions of calderas, or ground depressions formed by volcanic activity, due to a lack of observation data. Such eruptions are extremely rare and occurs every 10,000 years in Japan.

The Aira Caldera, in Kagoshima Bay, was the site of a giant eruption around 30,000 years ago.

The Nuclear Regulation Authority has so far relied on land-based seismic and other sensors to indirectly monitor magma activity and other changes beneath the seabed.

Starting in the new fiscal year from April, the NRA will set up seismic sensors and water-pressure gauges on the seafloor for additional monitoring……..

Huge calderas exist within a 160-km radius of other nuclear plants in Japan, including Kyushu Electric’s Genkai plant in Saga Prefecture, Shikoku Electric Power Co.’s Ikata plant in Ehime Prefecture and Hokkaido Electric Power Co.’s Tomari plant. The NRA intends to conduct studies in those areas, too………http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201903030001.html 

March 4, 2019 Posted by | Japan, safety | 1 Comment

Along the 2020 Olympics torch route in Japan – higher radiation levels

Atomic Balm Part 1: Prime Minister Abe Uses The Tokyo Olympics As Snake Oil Cure For The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Meltdowns  March 01, 2019, Fairewinds Energy Education, By Arnie Gundersen “……….To determine whether or not Olympic athletes might be affected by fallout emanating from the disaster site, Dr. Marco Kaltofen and I were sponsored by Fairewinds Energy Education to look at Olympic venues during the fall of 2017.We took simple dirt and dust samples along the Olympic torch route as well as inside Fukushima’s Olympic stadium and as far away as Tokyo. When the Olympic torch route and Olympic stadium samples were tested, we found samples of dirt in Fukushima’s Olympic Baseball Stadium that were highly radioactive, registering 6,000 Bq/kg of Cesium, which is 3,000 times more radioactive than dirt in the US. We also found that simple parking lot radiation levels were 50-times higher there than here in the US.

Thirty of the dirt and fine dust samples that I took on my last two trips to Japan in February and March 2016 and September 2017 were analyzed at WPI (Worchester Polytechnic Institute. The WPI laboratory analysis are detailed in the report entitled: Measuring Radioactivity in Soil and Dust Samples from Japan, T. Pham, S. Franca and S. Nguyen, Worchester Polytechnic Institute, which found that:

With the upcoming XXXII Olympiad in 2020 hosted by Japan, it is necessary to look into the radioactivity of Olympic venues as well as tourist attractions in the host cities… Since thousands of athletes and millions of visitors are travelling to Japan for the Olympics, there has been widespread concern from the international community about radiation exposure. Therefore, it is important to investigate the extent of radioactive fallout from the Fukushima Dai-ichi incident.

The measured results showed a much higher activity of Cesium-137 in the proposed torch route compared to other areas. Overall, the further away from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant, the lower the radioactivity. The activity of Cesium-137 in Tokyo, the furthest site from the plant, was the lowest when compared to the other sites. Therefore, the activity of Cesium-137 in Tokyo sample was used as the baseline to qualitatively estimate the human exposure to radiation.

At the Azuma Sports Park, the soil and dust samples yielded a range of 78.1 Bq/kg to 6176.0 Bq/kg. This particular Olympic venue is around 90 km from the Nuclear Power Plant. The other sites that are closer to the Nuclear Power Plant like the tourist route, proposed torch route, and non-Olympic samples have higher amounts due to the close proximity to ground zero of the disaster.

… the proposed torch route samples had the highest mean radioactivity due to their close proximity to the plant. Based on the measurement, we estimated qualitatively that the radiation exposure of people living near the Azuma Sports Park area was 20.7 times higher than that of people living in Tokyo. The main tourist and proposed torch routes had radiation exposure of 24.6 and 60.6 times higher, respectively, than in Tokyo…. Olympic officials should consider using the results of this project to decide whether the radioactivity level at the proposed torch route and the Olympic venues are within acceptable level……  https://www.fairewinds.org/demystify/atomic-balm-part-1-prime-minister-abe-uses-the-tokyo-olympics-as-snake-oil-cure-for-the-fukushima-daiichi-nuclear-meltdowns

March 2, 2019 Posted by | environment, Japan, radiation | Leave a comment

Imran Khan to consult nuclear chiefs after India’s first air strike on Pakistan in decades

ABC News 28 Feb 19 Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan will stage an emergency parliamentary session and meet with the body in control of Islamabad’s nuclear arsenal in response to India’s first air strikes on Pakistan since 1971.

Key points:

  • Indian fighter jets struck an area 50 kilometres into Pakistan on Tuesday
  • India said the strike was in response to a terrorist attack that killed 44 Indian police
  • Pakistan said its own warplanes had scattered Indian jets, forcing them to drop their payload over uninhabited areas

The two nuclear-armed neighbours have fought three wars since partition in 1947, and the majority of them have been over Kashmir — a territory both India and Pakistan claim in full…….https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-27/imran-khan-stages-meetings-response-to-indian-air-strikes/10853290

March 2, 2019 Posted by | Pakistan, politics | Leave a comment

The possibility of nuclear war between India and Pakistan

COULD THE CONFLICT BETWEEN PAKISTAN AND INDIA LEAD TO NUCLEAR WAR? Experts say it’s unlikely, but Pakistan’s lack of a “No First Use” doctrine for nuclear weapons means it’s not impossible. Pacific Standard, JACK HERRERA, FEB 27, 2019 

When Indian war planes rocketed into Pakistani territory on Tuesday, unleashing an attack on what India claims were terrorist targets, it was the first time India had launched air strikes on Pakistani soil since 1971. In the 48 years since that time—when India entered the war that turned East Pakistan into the independent Bangladesh—something has changed between the two rival South Asian powers: India and Pakistan are both now armed with nuclear weapons. So, as Pakistan has returned fire, shooting down two Indian jets on Wednesday, one of the most important questions in the world has become: What stops this conventional conflict between the two nations from escalating into a nuclear war?
Since 1974, when India shocked the world with its surprise nuclear test of the “Smiling Buddha” weapon, South Asia has been a nuclear hot spot. However, like China, India maintains a “No First Use” doctrine, which states that India will only use its nuclear weapons in response to a nuclear attack. The policy was declared in 1999, a year after Pakistan successfully detonated five of its own nuclear weapons, deep inside a mountain in southern Pakistan. Since then, Pakistan has refused to issue any clear doctrine governing its own use of nuclear weapons. In other words, no one—outside of Pakistan’s highest command—knows what could provoke the nation to launch a nuclear strike.

In 1999, Pakistan’s foreign minister explained why the country refused to adopt a No First Use policy, declaring that Islamabad would use “any weapon” in its arsenal to defend the country. Today, experts believe that, unlike India, Pakistan could plausibly deploy a nuclear weapon in response to a conventional attack. Pakistan maintains a smaller army and less weaponry than India, and would likely be overwhelmed if the Indian military invaded Pakistani territory with its full force. Facing loss of territory and national collapse, Islamabad could decide to launch a nuclear weapon against India in an attempt to even the playing field………

.To this day, Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine remains ambiguous, in what many experts consider to be a deliberate choice.  ……..
Does that mean the current conflict between Pakistan and India could escalate into a nuclear confrontation? Commentators regard that possibility as unlikely. Pakistan first began developing nuclear weapons in response to its humiliating loss of territory in 1971. Thus far, the current conflict with India does not appear to be a land grab, which suggests Pakistan does not have reason to engage its nuclear option……… https://psmag.com/news/could-the-conflict-between-pakistan-and-india-lead-to-nuclear-war

March 2, 2019 Posted by | India, Pakistan, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Japan’s long-drawn out nuclear “comeback” – safety and cost issues

THE BIG PICTURE: Japan’s Nuclear Comeback [excellent graphic on original] https://www.powermag.com/the-big-picture-japans-nuclear-comeback/

03/01/2019 | Sonal Patel After the Great Tohoku Earthquake and tsunami, and ensuing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March 2011, Japan issued stringent safety regulations and reviews that affected its entire 50-reactor fleet. It meant that as each Japanese nuclear reactor entered its scheduled maintenance and refueling outage, it could not returned to operation until restart was approved by both Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) and the central government. Nuclear operators also need consent from governments of local prefectures.

Between September 2013—when Ohi 3 and 4 were shut down—and August 2015, when Sendai 1 and 2 restarted, Japan’s entire reactor fleet went black. In 2013, though there was no consensus on how long the approval process could take, some industry observers forecast reactors under NRA review could be back online within a year. As of December 2018, only nine reactors had restarted. Sixteen others were under review by the NRA, where average review duration stretched beyond 1,000 days, owing to staffing issues. Japan’s fleet of operable reactors, meanwhile, has dwindled to 38, owing to announced retirements.

According to Japan’s Institute of Energy Economics, safety investment costs for the current fleet were estimated at 4.4 trillion yen ($39 billion today) as of April 2018. “Given that detailed designs are still left undecided for severe accident management facilities at some plants, the estimated costs may increase further as safety examinations make progress.”

March 2, 2019 Posted by | Japan, politics | Leave a comment

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