BURNING RADIOACTIVE WASTE IN JAPAN ADDS TO WORLDWIDE RADIATION LEVELS

Tokyo Starts Burning Radioactive Waste from Other Areas …

Tokyo Governor Tells Residents to “Shut Up” and Stop Complaining.

The FALLOUT from this radioactivity ends up not only in neighboring prefectures, but in all of Japan's neighbor nations as well as Hawaii, British Columbia, Oregon, Washington and California.

RISING INTO OUR ATMOSPHERE, THAT RADIATION WILL BE WITH US FOR A LONG, LONG TIME, FALLING BACK TO EARTH IN PRECIPITATION.

JAPAN GENERATES MUCH MORE NUCLEAR WASTE AND RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL THAN IT CAN EVER SAFELY DISPOSE OF.

THE ONLY RATIONAL ANSWER TO THIS PROBLEM IS TO STOP USING NUCLEAR ENERGY.




ACCORDING TO THE MAP ABOVE, THE ABE REGIME WOULD MAKE ALL OF JAPAN A SMOLDERING DUMPING GROUND.

THEY KNOW IT'S EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS TO HEALTH SO THEY JUST RAISED THE "ACCEPTABLE LIMIT".


ABOVE: PROTESTS GROW ACROSS JAPAN.

WHY ISN'T THE ENTIRE GLOBAL COMMUNITY PROTESTING?
Residents in Osaki, Miyagi Prefecture, filed a lawsuit Thursday (OCTOBER 11, 2018) seeking to prevent a local public association from burning radiation-tainted waste generated by the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis.

Osaki, located about 120 kilometers north of the city of Fukushima, has been keeping some 6,000 tons of tainted grass and rice straw containing radioactive substances in excess of state standards, and the association in charge of waste disposal is scheduled to start burning it from Monday.

The residents filed the suit with the Sendai District Court in the hope of suspending the ¥21.6 million budget for the incineration, claiming the association failed to keep an agreement that it would alleviate residents’ concerns.

“The agreement was a strong message that we would protect the environment for future generations,” said 79-year-old Tadaetsu Abe, who is leading the plaintiffs. “The public administration has ignored the residents’ wishes.”

The waste stored in Osaki contains radioactive substances of up to 8,000 becquerels per kilogram. Each municipality is responsible for radioactive waste disposal.

Some 170 residents opposed to the incineration requested an audit of the city’s budget on the waste disposal, but it was rejected as of Sept. 13.

BACK IN JULY OF 2017, THE ABE REGIME RELEASED A COLOR-CODED MAP [PICTURED ABOVE] OF POTENTIAL STORAGE AREAS FOR THEIR EVER-INCREASING NUCLEAR WASTE.
RESIDENTS ALL ACROSS JAPAN ROSE UP IN PROTEST.

WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO MAKE THE ABE REGIME LISTEN TO ITS OWN PEOPLE AND START PUTTING THEIR HEALTH BEFORE PROFITS AND THE 2020 OLYMPIC GAMES?
On July 28, the central government released what it called a scientific, specialized map of the country highlighting areas where highly radioactive nuclear waste from the nation’s power plants might, or might not, be safely buried underground for as long as 100,000 years.

The general response from Hokkaido to Okinawa was: “Not in my backyard.”

MAKING AN ENTIRE NATION A NUCLEAR WASTE DUMPING SITE  
Close to 900 municipalities, nearly 70 percent of the country, were judged to be favorable.

The map has four colors. Dark green indicates favorable conditions, mostly concentrated within 20 km along the coast, and easily accessible in terms of transportation. Light green areas are generally favorable, but more than 20 km from the coast. Orange marks locations that would pose geological problems and silver highlights the potential existence of mineral resources.

In 2015, the Science Council of Japan, a national body that represents scientists and operates independently of the government, released a series of recommendations that called for storing the waste in provisional, above-ground facilities for a half century.

According to the plan, during the first 30 years of temporary storage, locations for a final disposal site would be identified and selected, and during the last 20 years, those facilities would be built.

That still requires a local government to accept a midterm facility, and none has yet. Also, such a course of action would only postpone the final site issue, putting it on the next generation to solve the predicament.

Now that the map has been published, what happens next?

The central government will begin to narrow the list of possible host sites. Much will depend on the strength of local opposition, and how much time, money and effort those who favor a particular locale becoming a final waste disposal site wish to spend on overcoming the local opposition.  

"HOW MUCH TO SPEND OVERCOMING THE OPPOSITION"?
WHY NOT SPEND NOTHING AND FIND A BETTER WAY, LIKE MAYBE ENDING ALL NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS IN JAPAN?
AFTER ALL THE MAJORITY OF JAPANESE DON'T WANT 'NUCLEAR ENERGY' AND PREFER OTHER SANER MEANS FOR POWER.

Fuji TV news also says that 3,000 complaints have been sent to the Tokyo Metropolitan government, over 90% of them protesting against the debris from disaster-affected areas to be transported, processed, crushed and burned and buried in Tokyo Bay.

Steven Starr – Senior Scientist, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Director of the Clinical Laboratory Science Program at the University of Missouri-Columbia, who has advised numerous countries on issues of nuclear non-proliferation – wrote a comment to the post agreeing [that burning releases toxic poisons]:

Burning radioactive debris will only serve to further randomly spread radiation across Japan, as well as the rest of the world. Not only will this lead to more morbidity and mortality within Japan, but it will further complicate epidemiological studies of the Fukushima disaster. Raising “acceptable” levels of radioactive fallout is a false solution to a serious problem. It is possible for the government authorities to do this because radiation is invisible to us, and at lower doses, the consequences of exposure do not manifest themselves for some time . . . thus it is a poison that is easy to hide and ignore. Sadly, the children of Japan will be those most seriously affected by this man-made environmental catastrophe.

All independent nuclear health experts would agree with Starr.

Japan is a very homogenous society where peer pressure to conform can be intense. For example, last month it was reported that mothers who expressed concern about their kids playing outside in potentially radioactive conditions are called “monster parents” by their peers. 

ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE FUKUSHIMA DISASTER LAST YEAR, THE NEW YORK TIMES WROTE:

Six years after the largest nuclear disaster in a quarter-century, Japanese officials have still not solved a basic problem: what to do with an ever-growing pile of radioactive waste. Each form of waste at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, where three reactors melted down after an earthquake and a tsunami on March 11, 2011, presents its own challenges.

About 400 tons of water passes through the reactors every day, including groundwater that seeps in. The water picks up radiation in the reactors and then is diverted into a decontamination facility.But the decontamination filters cannot remove all the radioactive material.

“We cannot continue to build tanks forever,” said Shigenori Hata, an official at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.

THEN STOP USING NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS?
PROBLEM CLOSER TO BEING SOLVED IF THEY STOP NOW.

ALMOST 4,000 CONTAINERS OF RADIOACTIVE SLUDGE.
The process of decontaminating the water leaves radioactive sludge trapped in filters, which are being held in thousands of containers of different sizes.Tokyo Electric says it cannot quantify the amount of radioactive sludge being generated.

CONTAMINATED PROTECTIVE CLOTHING ALONE GENERATES WASTE THAT MUST BE INCINERATED, ACCORDING TO THE ABE REGIME AND TEPCO.

The estimated 6,000 cleanup workers at the site put on new protective gear every day. These hazmat suits, face masks, rubber gloves and shoe coverings are thrown out at the end of each shift. The clothing is compressed and stored in 1,000 steel boxes stacked around the site.

To date, more than 64,700 cubic meters of gear has been discarded, the equivalent of 17 million one-gallon containers. Tokyo Electric says it will eventually incinerate all this contaminated clothing to reduce the space needed to store it.

RADIOACTIVE BRUSH, TREES, SOIL AND GRASSESPiles of branches and tree trunks are stacked all over the site. Officials say there are about 80,000 cubic meters of this waste, and all of it will have to be incinerated and stored someday.

Thousands of plastic garbage bags sit in neat rows in the fields and abandoned towns surrounding the Fukushima plant. They contain soil that was scraped from land that was exposed to radiation in the days after the accident.

Japan’s Ministry of the Environment estimates that it has bagged 3.5 billion gallons of soil, and plans to collect much more. It will eventually incinerate some of the soil, but that will only reduce the volume of the radioactive waste, not eliminate it.

The ministry has already begun building a massive, interim storage facility in Fukushima prefecture and negotiating with 2,360 landowners for the thousands of acres needed to complete it. And that is not even a long-term solution: The government says that after 30 years it will need another site — or sites — to store radioactive waste.

THERE IS MUCH MORE THAN THIS ALL ACROSS THE AREAS HIT BY THE INITIAL FALLOUT. MOST IS BEING STORED IN DECOMPOSING PLASTIC BAGS, SOME OF WHICH ARE STACKED IN SCHOOL YARDS, ALONG ROADWAYS, IN CITY PARKS AND WHAT USED TO BE APARTMENT PARKING LOTS.

Japan's Latest Nuclear Crisis: Getting Rid of the Radioactive Debris

FROM 'THE ATLANTIC', Jun 4, 2012
Disposing of the more than 20 million tons of rubble caused by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami is proving to be a difficult problem for Japan, not least because much of the rubble has been irradiated by the Fukushima nuclear disaster. The government's plan -- to destroy 4 million tons of potentially radioactive earthquake debris in garbage incinerators around the country -- is dividing the nation.

Last week, trucks carrying earthquake debris from northeastern Japan arrived in the south-western island of Kyushu, as part of the national government's plan to disperse and destroy debris. Protestors blocked the road for 8 hours over fears that incinerating the debris would spread radiation to areas that have not yet been contaminated by the nuclear disaster.

The debris that was burned in Kita Kyushu on Thursday had been trucked over 620 miles from Ishinomaki City, Miyagi Prefecture, which lies about 70 miles from the stricken nuclear reactors in Fukushima.

While debris from Fukushima will not be incinerated in the program [TEPCO WAS BUSTED BURNING THE FUKUSHIMA WASTE ON BARGES OFFSHORE, REMEMBER?], due to high radiation levels, municipalities and citizen groups are worried that even debris from neighboring Miyagi and Iwate prefectures could be contaminated enough to be too hazardous to process. Many fear that doing so will not only release radiation into the local atmosphere, but also concentrate it into highly irradiated ash that would be difficult for local municipalities and garbage companies to dispose of safely.

THEY KNOW IT'S EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS TO HEALTH SO THEY JUST RAISED THE "ACCEPTABLE LIMIT"!

Previously, Japanese regulations required nuclear waste with 100 or more bq/kg of Cesium to be monitored and disposed of in specialized containers.

But the new limit for debris in the "wide area incineration" program is 240 to 480 bq/kg. Because radioactive particles accumulate and concentrate in the ash of burned rubble, the material headed for local landfills could be significantly more radioactive.
The new government limit for material headed for landfills is 8000 bq/kg, 80 times the pre-Fukushima limit.

YES, 80 TIMES THE PREVIOUS LEVEL!
BUT SOME BURN SITES HAVE EXCEEDED EVEN THE NEW ALLOWABLE LIMITS.
The limit of 8000 bq/kg has been surpassed even in facilities processing local garbage in Tokyo, according to the Ministry of the Environment.
Such stories have exacerbated fears that incinerating debris from areas even closer to Fukushima could produce potentially hazardous irradiated ash.

It's still not clear why the Japanese government has decided against a policy of containing, rather than dispersing, the radioactive debris.

CONTAINMENT?
HOW DOES ONE "CONTAIN" SOMETHING THAT KEEPS SENDING OUT RADIATION?
Lethal levels of radiation was detected spiking in one of the reactors in January, 2017.


TEPCO AND THE ABE BOYS HAVE CONTAINED NOTHING, NOT EVEN THEIR GREED FOR PROFITS AND STILL HOLDING ONTO THOSE 2020 OLYMPIC GAMES DESPITE KNOWING ALL WHO VISIT JAPAN WILL GO AWAY AS CONTAMINATED AS THOSE STILL LIVING THERE. 

Containment would also mean solidifying the already-worrisome invisible border between "contaminated" and "un-contaminated" areas, with the former unfairly stigmatized. This subjective differentiation, called "rumor damage" in Japanese, currently affects everything from land prices to the value of local produce, and has already dealt a crippling blow to the Tohoku economy. Maybe that's part of the "wide area incineration" motivation: rather than dooming an entire region to long-term "contaminated" status, it makes every region in Japan share the burden of the radiation taboo.

If everyone is "contaminated," then, in a relative sense, no one is.

IF EVERYONE IS CONTAMINATED?

WE ALREADY ARE!









//WW

FUKUSHIMA'S TEPCO BUSTED AGAIN. 'TREATED' WATER STILL HIGHLY RADIOACTIVE

ABOVE PHOTO, March 10, 2016, Some of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant storage tanks at Okuma town.
Photo: AP

Bags of nuclear contamination piled at a temporary site in
Naraha, Fukushima prefecture 2016.
Photo: AFP

Back in 2016, Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) confirmed it would take four more years to collect and treat all contaminated water pooled around the reactors.

A few days ago they had to admit they've lied again and failed yet again.

'DECONTAMINATING' ALL THAT RADIOACTIVE WATER SO IT CAN BE DUMPED INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN HAS FAILED, JUST AS THE ICE WALL FAILED, LIKE FINDING THE CORIUM FAILED BECAUSE THEIR ROBOTS FAILED, JUST AS TEPCO HAS FAILED AT EVERYTHING FOR ALMOST 8 YEARS NOW.

ABOVE: Fukushima prefecture water system. Blue is the inland water system: Aga river basin is west area of Fukushima, Abkuma river basin is center of Fukushima. Green is a mountain chain or highland where height is more than 1,000 m. Yellow is highly contaminated area by nuclear accidents.
A safety threshold of 100 Bq kg −1 of radioactive Cs was introduced in April 2012 in Japan, but concentrations greater than this have been detected in fish hundreds of kilometers away from the F1NPP.   
( Mizuno and Kubo 2013;Arai 2014a, b;Yoshimura and Yokoduka 2014).
From "Overview of active cesium contamination of freshwater fish in Fukushima and Eastern Japan". [Map created using the GIS software which is 'MANDARA for windows 2000/XP/VISTA/7 Version 9.35' (the software copyright: 1992-2011 Tani Kenji)]


From the South China Morning Post, 19 August, 2018:

"Radioactive substances have NOT been removed from treated (but still tritium-containing) water at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

According to Tepco, a maximum 62.2 becquerels per litre of lodine 129, far higher than the 9 becquerel legal limit, was found in the water filtered by the Advanced Liquid Processing System used to remove various types of radioactive materials.

Lodine 129 has a half-life of 15.7 million years.

"A MAXIMUM OF 62.2 BECQUERELS PER LITER"?
HOW MANY LITERS DID THEY TEST, ONE, THREE, A DOZEN?
GIVEN TEPCO'S HISTORY OF LYING, WHY WOULD ANYONE BELIEVE THIS "MAXIMUM"?

Tepco, which gathered data in fiscal 2017 through March, also detected a maximum 92.5 becquerels of Ruthenium 106 – more than the 100 becquerel legal limit – and 59 becquerels of technetium 99 against the limit of 1,000 becquerels.

WHAT TYPE OF DATA? HOW MANY EXECS WANTED A FISH SANDWICH AND HOW MANY WANTED PIZZA FOR LUNCH?

In August, there were around 920,000 tonnes of tritium-containing water stored in some 680 tanks at the plant. But Tepco said it has not checked the concentration of radioactive materials in each tank.

680 TANKS?
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC REPORTED THERE WERE 1,000 SUCH TANKS IN 2013.

THERE WERE 900 TANKS IN DECEMBER 2017 ACCORDING TO VOICE OF AMERICA'S ARTICLE.
"Currently, the water is being stored in 900 large tanks near the nuclear center."
HOW DID THEY LOSE 200 TO 300 TANKS? WHERE DID THEY GO?

The government has examined several ways to dispose of tritium-containing water, including the release of it into the sea or atmosphere.

Toyoshi Fuketa, who heads the Nuclear Regulation Authority, said pumping the water into the sea is the only solution."

THERE IS ANOTHER SOLUTION WHICH THE TEA ROOM WOULD LIKE TO SUGGEST... THAT SHINZO ABE AND ALL MEMBERS OF THE ABE REGIME AND ALL MEMBERS OF MANAGEMENT AT TEPCO BE REQUIRED TO USE THIS WATER FOR BATHING, COOKING, WATERING ALL OF THE VEGETABLES THEY CONSUME AND FOR DRINKING UNTIL IT IS ALL USED UP.


REMEMBER THIS?
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. and the government said that treatment of the water had removed ALL radioactive elements except tritium, which experts say is safe in small amounts.

They called it “tritium water,” but it actually wasn’t.

HATS OFF TO 'JAPAN TIMES' FOR PRINTING AT LEAST A PARTIAL TRUTH.
BOTTOM LINE?
TEPCO AND THE ABE REGIME AFTER 7-PLUS YEARS OF LIES, LIED YET AGAIN.

THEY CANNOT AND HAVE NOT REMOVED EVERYTHING BUT TRITIUM FROM THEIR STORED WATER.

THIS MEANS THAT ALL THAT THEY RELEASED PRIOR TO THIS WAS FAR MORE CONTAMINATED THAN THEY ADMITTED.

Sep 29, 2018
"Tepco said Friday that studies found the water still contains other elements, including radioactive iodine, cesium and strontium. It said more than 80 percent of the 900,000 tons of water stored in large, densely packed tanks contains radioactivity exceeding limits for release into the environment.

Tepco general manager Junichi Matsumoto said radioactive elements remained, especially earlier in the crisis when plant workers had to deal with large amounts of contaminated water leaking from the wrecked reactors and could not afford time to stop the treatment machines to change filters frequently.

“We had to prioritize processing large amounts of water as quickly as possible to reduce the overall risk,” Matsumoto said.

About 161,000 tons of the treated water has 10 to 100 times the limit for release into the environment, and another 65,200 tons has up to nearly 20,000 times the limit, Tepco said.

More than 7½ years since a massive March 2011 earthquake and tsunami destroyed three reactors at the plant, Japan has yet to reach a consensus on what to do with the radioactive water. Fishermen and residents oppose its release into the ocean. Nuclear experts have recommended the controlled release of the water into the Pacific as the only realistic option.

The release option faced harsh criticism at meetings in Fukushima and Tokyo in late August, when Tepco and government officials provided little explanation of the water contamination, which had been reported in local media days earlier.

Tepco only says it has the capacity to store up to 1.37 million tons of water through 2020 and that it cannot stay at the plant forever.

Some experts say the water CAN be stored for decades, but others say the tanks take up too much space at the plant and could interfere with ongoing decommissioning work that could take decades.

MOVE THE TANKS TO SHINZO ABE'S BACK YARD?

I LIKE THAT IDEA.

The Associated Press has reported that the amount of radioactive water at Fukushima is growing by 150 tons a day. This is because new water is used to cool the damaged reactors and ground water also enters the reactor area through cracks.

IF GROUNDWATER IS COMING IN THROUGH 'CRACKS', THEN CONTAMINATED WATER IS ALSO FLOWING THROUGH THOSE SAME 'CRACKS' INTO THE AQUIFER BELOW THE PLANT, SOMETHING ABE AND COMPANY HAVE DENIED IN THE PAST.

Local fisherman oppose the release of the water into the sea. They say people will not buy fish from waters near Fukushima if the water is released.

Fumio Haga fishes about 50 kilometers from the power plant.
He said, “People would shun Fukushima fish again as soon the water is released.”

The fisherman lost their livelihoods for a long time after the disaster.
Local fisheries are slowly recovering.
Although there are about 1,000 fishermen in the area today, only half still fish and they go out only two times a week because demand is low.

To be sold, the fish have to meet, what might be, the world’s most demanding requirements. Laboratory workers at Onahama test the fishermen’s catch, recording who caught the fish and where.

BUT IT APPEARS THEY ONLY MEASURE FOR CESIUM LEVELS!
THE FOLLOWING IS A PDF DOCUMENT.

Report on the Monitoring of Radionuclides in Fishery Products"Concentrations of Radioactive Cesium in Fishery Products"

OUR NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF HEALTH ALSO MENTIONS ONLY CESIUM TESTING OF JAPANESE FISH.
CESIUM IS BY NO MEANS THE ONLY CONCERN!

"Overview of active cesium contamination of freshwater fish in Fukushima and Eastern Japan"


LET US ALSO REMEMBER THAT...
Radioactive Fukushima Water Leak Was Unreported for Months


Radioactivity in the Ocean: Diluted, But Far from Harmless - Yale   
Apr 7, 2011 - Thousands of tons of radioactively contaminated water have then been released from the Fukushima complex into the ocean. ... But what impact this radioactive contamination has on marine life and humans is still unclear.


Effects of dumping radioactive waste in ocean need more study ...

Dec 20, 2013 - Some scientists say radioactivity from dumps can make its way into the marine food chain... the issue of the impact of radioactive dumps on both the environment and human health requires more study.

IT DOESN'T NEED MORE STUDY, IT NEEDS OWNING UP TO.
THE ABE REGIME NEEDS TO FINALLY ACCEPT FULL RESPONSIBILITY AND ALLOW INTERNATIONAL TEAMS IN TO HELP.

FROM THE YOUNG PEOPLE'S TRUST FOR THE ENVIRONMENT, RADIOACTIVE WASTE FACT SHEET:

"Since 1952 low levels of radioactive waste have been discharged into the Irish Sea, the English Channel and the Arctic Ocean.

It is recognised that radioactive material needs to be isolated and encased (in glass and concrete) to prevent leakage on the ocean floor and it is now kept on land for some time whilst radioactivity levels decrease.

What long term effects might this have on marine environments?
Certainly radiation can enter the food chain though plankton and kelp and then go on to contaminate fish.
Radioactive caesium and plutonium have already been found in seals and porpoises in the Irish Sea.

On 11th March 2011 the tragic earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan caused major damage to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. This natural disaster caused thousands of tons of radioactive water to be released into the Pacific Ocean.

Radioactivity levels reduce over time, although this can take anything from two weeks to five hundred thousand years or more before reaching a safe level.

Any leakages are much more easily dispersed over a greater area in the sea, than in the air, although they can travel further through water."

PLEASE NOTE THIS STATEMENT FROM THE ABOVE:
"Radioactive caesium and plutonium have already been found in seals and porpoises in the Irish Sea."

HOW MUCH GREATER IS THE OCEAN CONTAMINATION OF THE PACIFIC FROM THE FUKUSHIMA DISASTER THAN THE CONTAMINATION OF THE IRISH SEA?

ONE OF KEN BUESSELER'S MORE LUCID MOMENTS, EARLY IN THE GAME, April, 2011, FROM YALE.EDU:

“Given that the Fukushima nuclear power plant is on the ocean, and with leaks and runoff directly to the ocean, the impacts on the ocean will exceed those of Chernobyl, which was hundreds of miles from any sea,” said Ken Buesseler, senior scientist in marine chemistry at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. “My biggest concern is the lack of information. We still don’t know the whole range of radioactive compounds that have been released into the ocean, nor do we know their distribution. We have a few data points from the Japanese — all close to the coast — but to understand the full impact, including for fisheries, we need broader surveys and scientific study of the area.”

Buessler and other experts say this much is clear: Both short-lived radioactive elements, such as iodine-131, and longer-lived elements — such as cesium-137, with a half-life of 30 years — can be absorbed by phytoplankton, zooplankton, kelp, and other marine life and then be transmitted up the food chain, to fish, marine mammals, and humans.

Other radioactive elements — including plutonium, which has been detected outside the Fukushima plant — also pose a threat to marine life.
A key question is how concentrated will the radioactive contamination be. Japanese officials hope that a temporary fishing ban off the northeastern Japanese coast will be enough to avert any danger to human health until the flow of radioactive water into the sea can be stopped. But that spigot is still running.

Even though the Japanese this week (APRIL 7, 2011) stopped a leak of highly radioactive material from the badly damaged Reactor No. 2, the water used to cool the reactor cores continues to flow into the sea. In addition, atmospheric fallout from the damaged reactors is contaminating the ocean as prevailing winds carry radioactivity out over the Pacific.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has reported that seawater containing radioactive iodine-131 at 5 million times the legal limit has been detected near the plant. According to the Japanese news service, NHK, a recent sample also contained 1.1 million times the legal level of radioactive cesium-137.

Studies from previous releases of nuclear material in the Irish, Kara and Barents Seas, as well as in the Pacific Ocean, show that such radioactive material does travel with ocean currents, is deposited in marine sediment, and does climb the marine food web.

In the Irish Sea — where the British Nuclear Fuels plant at Sellafield in the northwestern United Kingdom released radioactive material over many decades, beginning in the 1950s — studies have found radioactive cesium and plutonium concentrating significantly in seals and porpoises that ate contaminated fish.

Other studies have shown that radioactive material from Sellafield and from the nuclear reprocessing plant at Cap de la Hague in France have been transported to the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans.

A study published in 2003 found that a substantial part of the world’s radioactive contamination IS in the marine environment.

How the radioactive materials released from the Fukushima plants will behave in the ocean will depend on their chemical properties and reactivity, explained Ted Poston, a ecotoxicologist with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, a U.S. government facility in Richland, Washington.

If the radionuclides are in soluble form, they will behave differently than if they are absorbed into particles, said Poston. Soluble iodine, for example, will disperse rather rapidly. But if a radionuclide reacts with other molecules or gets deposited on existing particulates — bits of minerals, for example — they can be suspended in the water or, if larger, may drop to the sea floor.

“If particulates in the water column are very small they will move with the current,” he explained. “If bigger or denser, they can settle in sediment.”

“Cesium behaves like potassium, so would end up in ALL marine life,” said Arjun Makhijani, president of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research in Maryland. “It certainly WILL have an effect.”

Tom Hei, professor of environmental sciences and vice-chairman of radiation oncology at Columbia University, explained that the mechanisms that determine how an animal takes in radiation are the same for fish as they are for humans. Once in the body — whether inhaled or absorbed through gills or other organs — radiation can make its way into the bloodstream, lungs, and bony structures, potentially causing death, cancer, or genetic damage. Larger animals tend to more sensitive to radiation than smaller ones.

Yet small fish, mollusks and crustaceans, as well as plankton and phytoplankton, can absorb radiation, said Poston.
How the radiation accumulates depends on the degree of exposure — dose and duration — and the half-life of the element, said Hei.

A 1999 study found that seals and porpoises in the Irish Sea concentrated radioactive cesium by a factor of 300 relative to its concentration in seawater, and a factor of 3 to 4 compared to the fish they ate."

FROM NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC
August 21, 2013
"While about two-thirds of Fukushima’s storage tanks are welded steel vessels, the leaking tank is one of about 350 improvised temporary tanks that TEPCO has employed to augment its capacity. The temporary tanks are made of steel plates bolted together with plastic packing materials to seal the seams, and apparently are more vulnerable to leaks. A TEPCO official told The Japan Times that there have been four previous leaks in the temporary tanks. Unlike the previous ones, this leak somehow went undetected by plant workers for as long as a month. During that time, it leaked an estimated ten tons (about 2,400 gallons) of highly radioactive water per day.

TEPCO hasn’t yet found the precise leakage spot or spots on the faulty tank, which, according to Reuters, is located just 550 yards from the ocean.

The possibility remains that the contaminated water might be mixing into groundwater that flows through the plant site into the ocean.
In mid-July, levels of radioactive cesium-137 and cesium-134 from monitoring wells inside the plant unexpectedly surged nearly 15-fold, a phenomenon that scientists have been unable to explain."            

Bio accumulation of radioactive caesium in marine mammals in the Baltic Sea - Reconstruction of a historical time series.
2018 Aug 1

Radionuclides from the Chernobyl accident in 1986 still circulate in the Baltic marine ecosystem and activity levels in water, sediments and fish species such as herring and perch are monitored annually. However, the activity levels of radionuclides in marine mammals have only been sporadically reported. Tissue samples from a museum collection were analysed in two species of seals.

We found activity concentrations of Cs-137 in Baltic ringed seals and grey seals to be elevated also in the most recent samples.

Accumulation was found to be species specific in the two seal species studied, with 9 times higher activity concentration in grey seals compared to herring, and 3.5 times higher in ringed seals compared to herring.

3. Results
3.1. Elevated activity concentration in seals and fish

5. ConclusionCs-137 activity concentrations in muscle tissues of both ringed seals and grey seals are elevated in the Baltic sea and we document a clear signal of biomagnification.
BIOACCUMULATION, BIOMAGNIFICATION...IT HAPPENS. 

THERE IS NO DOUBT THAT RADIATION BIOACCUMULATES IN MARINE ORGANISMS.
WHAT IS HAPPENING IN THE OCEANS OF PLANET EARTH BECAUSE OF THE MASSIVE SCALE OF RADIOACTIVE CONTAMINATION BY THE ONGOING, UNENDING DISASTER OF THE UNCONTROLLED FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR PLANT?

WE CAN BE CERTAIN THAT THE EFFECTS ON MARINE LIFE IN THE OCEANS ARE FAR GREATER THAN THAT FROM CHERNOBYL, SELLAFIELD, OR ANY OTHER NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE.

WHEN WE SEE NEWS OF MASS DIE-OFFS OF SO MANY SPECIES OF OCEAN DWELLERS, HOW CAN WE NOT FOCUS ON THE RADIOACTIVE POISONS EMANATING FROM FUKUSHIMA?

HOW CAN WE IGNORE THE FACT THAT WE HUMANS ARE AT THE TOP OF THAT OCEAN FOOD CHAIN, THAT WE MAY JUST PERISH WITH THE UNFORTUNATE LIFE FORMS THAT ARE OUT THERE WITH NO WAY TO ESCAPE THIS HORROR?

WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO FORCE THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY TO TAKE THE REINS AWAY FROM TEPCO AND THE ABE REGIME AND END THIS EXTINCTION EVENT?







___________________________

FURTHER READING: 
~ FOR MORE ON THE FUKUSHIMA FIASCO FROM A CHINESE PERSPECTIVE,MANY ARTICLES <HERE>.


~ SEVERAL 'PEER-REVIEWED ARTICLES' ON THIS SUPPOSED MONITORING AND REPORTING BUT ALL LISTED ARE ABOUT JUST CESIUM LEVELS.






~WW

A FINAL MOVE?

The above and all following images are reproduced here by the kind permission of the photographer, Robert Stephens, whose work may be seen at links given below.

They seem to stretch on into forever, yes?  Where does earth end and sky begin? 
Are those clouds above mountains, or mountains in the sky?  

Fertile valleys, encircled by the arms of the 'grandfathers'...

My ancestors called these mountains home for thousands of years before Europeans floated across both oceans and began to settle there. 
The ancient story of how they were formed is perhaps unbelievable to everyone but the few within the 'Tribe' who can visualize a great winged creature flying toward the sea, his wing tips dipping into the soft mud of earth and then, with each upsweep, raising a mountain, then another, and another as he flapped tiredly toward the rising sun.
Others among us say that the Creator of all things also created these.
No matter the method, there they stand and there they will always stand until this earth is no more.
Those who loved them 10,000 years ago said they were their 'grandfathers, standing shoulder-to-shoulder to protect the People, sending down the life-giving crystal clear waters into the valleys below.

And those rising mists, for they do RISE UP from the valleys, are merely reminders of the many campfires of the Aniyunwiyv, the 'Original People', sending up the blue smoke as day turned into night.
Day became night in many ways for the People there, sadly.  

A blessing of the Light....so that the land may flourish.

AND EVER, THE MISTS!

While all the world continues to go quite stark-raving, lunatic mad, the old Tea Room is seriously considering a final move, and I do mean FINAL, to a place of considerable more beauty than my present location, a place where my spirit finds great PEACE...I want to go HOME. 

I've been blessed for 4 years now with the finest physicians I could have ever hoped for in the Memphis area, and I would be hard-pressed to find as good a quality back home in the Blue Ridge Mountains of my beloved homeland, BUT...

There comes a time when one must do what one MUST do.

As John Muir stated, "The mountains are calling and I must go."

As all who read here know, my oncology surgery was cancelled, bad, very bad odds which led me to PASS on that, so it seems to me that I should just go be happy where I am HAPPIEST: 
MY Appalachian mountains, where I was living when I began this blog years ago.

I appreciate all the well-wishes, all the kind words from all who have sent them.
The finest gifts we can give one another are PURE TRUTH, no matter how it might sting, our prayers, and our private thoughts in the form of written or spoken words.

Don't think you will be rid of me, for you shan't, but there may be a bit longer than usual pause in my blogs in September if I decide to go HOME for Autumn's splendor there...AND STAY!

Few photos, paintings, etc, can do MY mountains justice, but the young man, whose exceptional and exquisite work you see above, seems always to capture the heartbeat of the Blue Ridge "Mountains That Smoke", or, as the folks back home say in a 'Native language', Tsakonvge... the place of the blue smoke.

NASA's satellite shots do NOT do them justice and they use the Anglo spelling of Tsakonvge, but have a look there and follow their links for even more about MY mountains.

You may all know by now that I allow NO ads here, and I don't consider this to be one, but I would merely wish that all the world could see all the photos of my HOME through a certain young man's lens.

Robert Stephens is also known as 'Solitary Traveler Photography' and his work can be viewed in all its remarkable splendor <HERE>.

Robert has a blog site [CLICK HERE] where he describes very wonderfully how he came to make many of the photographs posted there.  He has a way with words.   

For those using Facebook, 'follow' him <HERE>.

I have his permission to share these few images with you.
[MANY thanks, Robert!] 


On Muir; "John Muir, born in 1838, was one of America’s most famous and influential “Outdoor Enthusiasts,” which in his era, were called Naturalists. He remains one of California’s most important historical personalities and is generally still known today as one of the Fathers of our National Parks. 
He once described himself as, a “poetico-trampo-geologist-botanist and ornithologist-naturalist etc. etc.!!!!”

Famed documentary film maker Ken Burns has said,
“As we got to know him… he [John Muir] ascended to the pantheon of the highest individuals in our country; I’m talking about the level of Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther King, and Thomas Jefferson, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Jackie Robinson — people who have had a transformational effect on who we are.”

So where did this quote actually come from, "The mountains are calling..."?

It, like many others, came from one of his letters written to his sister, Sarah Muir Galloway.
In it he writes:

Yosemite Valley – September 3rd, 1873

Dear Sister Sarah:
I have just returned from the longest and hardest trip I have ever made in the mountains, having been gone over five weeks. I am weary, but resting fast; sleepy, but sleeping deep and fast; hungry, but eating much. For two weeks I explored the glaciers of the summits east of here, sleeping among the snowy mountains without blankets and with but little to eat on account of its being so inaccessible. After my icy experiences it seems strange to be down here in so warm and flowery a climate.

I will soon be off again, determined to use all the season in prosecuting my researches–will go next to Kings River a hundred miles south, then to Lake Tahoe and adjacent mountains, and in winter work in Oakland with my pen.

The Scotch are slow, but some day I will have the results of my mountain studies in a form in which you all will be able to read and judge of them. In the mean time I write occasionally for the Overland Monthly, but neither these magazine articles nor my first book will form any finished part of the scientific contribution that I hope to make. . . .
The mountains are calling and I must go, and I will work on while I can, studying incessantly.

My love to you all, David and the children and Mrs. Galloway who though shut out from sunshine yet dwells in Light. I will write again when I return from Kings River Canyon. The leaf sent me from China is for Cecelia.
[End quote]


So, my friends, if I am able to make another, FINAL move, this is where I'll be, "come September".

May your blessings fall like rain, fellow travelers, all of you being aboard this wee spaceship we call Earth.  

I beseech you, question EVERYTHING, and LEARN so that we, as a species, do not PERISH.

HELP ONE ANOTHER TO LEARN.  









//WW

FUKUSHIMA EMITS MORE RADIATION DAILY THAN ATOM BOMBS OF WORLD WAR II

SHINZO ABE WANTS TO BUILD A BOMB?

HE HAS A NUCLEAR POWER PLANT THAT'S FAR MORE DEADLY.

JAPAN WAS CREATING PURE, WEAPONS GRADE PLUTONIUM YEARS AGO AND THE WORLD ALLOWED IT.  

THEN CAME THE EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI.

TODAY, ABE "DROPS BOMBS" ON ALL THE WORLD, OVER AND OVER AGAIN.  

ABOVE: Radiation's Pathway into the Human Body. Please note that bio-accumulation occurs at all levels as each species consumes other radiated species causing levels to rise each step up the food chain.

Japan's military is growing by leaps and bounds with Shinzo Abe allocating ever more funds for expanding Japan's "new" military for the past 6 years. This trend is very troubling to South Korea and China, in particular.    

North Korea Rouses Neighbors to Reconsider Nuclear Weapons


"Shigeru Ishiba, who also once served as head of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and oversaw efforts to overcome population decline and to vitalize local economies, said he believed Japan should have the ability to develop nuclear weapons, but he did not believe it actually should do so.

"Japan should have the technology to build a nuclear weapon if it wants to do so," Ishiba said during a speech in Tokyo, according to Japan Today."   

Shinzo Abe has signaled his desire for nuclear capability in the face of growing concerns about near-neighbors North Korea and their ally, China.

ALL nations should be troubled by Abe, a known 'hawk', being at the helm.

The above illustration was used in the first month after the 3 (or 4?) reactors blew at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in Japan, 2011.
What we see above is the path of a CONTINUAL CYCLE of radioactive contamination by a still-leaking MAN-MADE 'accident'.

The fallout has NOT ceased, it leaks radiation into the air, sea and onto land masses every single day.

The radiation is still being released by the missing corium, the spent fuel rods, some in pools that were not under roof until recently, the flow of water from the hills above the plant after every rain, by the leaks from the metal water storage tanks that were not designed to contain radioactive material and are also leaking, the daily venting and release of  radioactive "steam", release of contaminated water into the Pacific, from open-air burning of radioactive debris, contaminated clothing, etc, used by workers who are charged with decontamination, and the many miles of land mass which can never be decontaminated, trees, rocks, soil that are still showing unsafe levels of radiation. 


As the Washington Post wrote last year, "Japan’s National Institute of Radiological Sciences said medical professionals had never even thought about encountering this level of radiation in their work.  

According to the Kyodo news agency, the institute estimates that exposure to one sievert of radiation could lead to infertility, loss of hair and cataracts, while four sieverts would kill half the people exposed to it.

"We should not be surprised if even higher radiation levels are found there, but only actual measurements will tell."
Could the radiation level be even higher?
"Possibly. The 530 sievert reading was recorded some distance from the melted fuel, so in reality it could be 10 times higher than recorded," said Hideyuki Ban, co-director of Citizens' Nuclear Information Center."

[ALSO NOTE, NEITHER OF THE OTHER TWO REACTORS CAN BE APPROACHED TO MEASURE RADIATION THERE YET. THE CORIUM (MELTED FUEL) HAS NOT BEEN FOUND YET, AND TEPCO ADMITTED THAT THIS PAST FEBRUARY.]

On 2/14/2019, Tepco announced they managed to contact the molten nuclear fuel on the bottom of the Primary Containment Vessel of Reactor 2.

The research was implemented on 2/13/2019. No data about the radiation level has been published.

According to Tepco, the specialized machine contacted the scattered fuel debris at 10 locations of the bottom of pedestal part.

The fuel debris was movable at 5 locations but media coverage is confusing at this moment.

However the exact locations of these 10 points are not defined even by Tepco. The researchable area is reportedly only 2% of the entire pedestal part."

[SEE THE PDF BY TEPCO <HERE>.]

“It’s unbelievable that anyone would want to restart nuclear plants when Japan hasn't learned how and why the Fukushima Dai'ichi accident happened, or learned lessons from it,” Fumiya Tanabe, a nuclear safety expert and former chief research scientist at the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute, said.

It is indisputable that there is a daily flow of 300 to 600 tons of radioactive contaminated groundwater into the ocean.
Every major news agency on earth has reported those figures many times.

"The figures are something like 80,000 gallons per day of relatively low-level radioactive waste water. Then you’ve got those storage tanks – we’re talking 800,000 tons of HIGHLY radioactive water stored in tanks.

Every day they pour a hundred tons of water on each of these three melted-down cores.
Sometimes they lose those tanks. They leak, they overflow – it is an ongoing catastrophe.

Highly radioactive waste storage pools [remain] that aren’t even inside radiological containment. They don’t have all of that spent nuclear fuel transferred to a safer location in a couple of the units still. If something were to go wrong with that – those would be open air releases of very high-level radioactivity."

JAPAN HAS ONLY 2 OPTIONS, SPEND BILLIONS AND ENLIST INTERNATIONAL HELP TO STOP THE LEAKS OR SIT STILL AND DO NOTHING.
THE FOLLOWING STATEMENT SHOULD CLUE US IN AS TO WHY SO LITTLE PROGRESS IS BEING MADE.  
"The figures of $150 billion to decommission [the Dai'ichi facility] – I have seen figures from a think tank in Japan sided [SIC] by Green Peace Japan up to $600 billion. If you do full cost accounting: where is this high-level radioactive waste going to go? It is going to need a deep geological depository. You have to build that and operate it. That costs a hundred billion or more. So when you do full cost accounting, this catastrophe could cost hundreds of billions of dollars to recover from. We’re just in the beginning."

Japan says it cannot stop the leaks and doesn't know why recent readings in and near the plant are higher than they were right after the triple-meltdown.
They can NEVER decontaminate what is RE-contaminated every time the rains come or the wind blows across miles and miles of contaminated mountains and forests there.

It will be at least 40 years, says TEPCO, before they can hope to begin to stop those leaks...other officials say it will take 100 years or longer.

Above, Just a FEW of the MANY MILLIONS of plastic bags, yes,plastic bags, piled all over northern Japan's Fukushima Prefecture, all containing radioactive soil. They are stacked in school yards, parking lots, around apartments and homes, anywhere they can find more room. Many have already split open and polluted streams and rivers there.


Since 2017, the government has begun to merely spread plastic sheets over enormous piles of this radioactive soil.


IN 2011, 7 YEARS AGO, THE TOKYO TIMES WROTE: 
"The amount of radioactive cesium that has leaked from a tsunami-hit nuclear plant is about equal to 168 of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima at the end of World War II, Japan’s nuclear agency said Friday.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency supplied the estimate at a parliamentary panel’s request, but it noted a simple comparison between an instantaneous bomb blast and long-term accidental leak is impossible and the results could be irrelevant.

The report estimated for each of the 16 isotopes released from "Little Boy" and 31 of those detected at the Fukushima plant but didn’t provide the total.

The report estimated that Iodine-131, another isotope that accumulates in thyroid gland, and Strontium-90, which has a 28-year half-life and could accumulate in bones, leaked from the plant in amounts about equal to 2.5 of the Hiroshima bombs.

THAT WAS JUST DURING THE FIRST YEAR, IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THE EXPLOSIONS.

IN 2013, THE COMPARISON BETWEEN HIROSHIMA AND DAI'ICHI HAD CHANGED DRAMATICALLY AS TEPCO FAILED AND LIED, TIME AND TIME AGAIN.  
Tepco admitted then that the radiation from Fukushima could exceed that from Chernobyl.
A 'Veterans Today' article 3 years ago stated, without sources, that "Fukushima so far is 14.75 Times worse than Chernobyl and growing."
"Fukushima now equals the detonation of 5,910.11 Hiroshima Atomic Bombs or it’s about 6,000 times worse than the A-Bombing of Japan; and, it is still going strong, with no end in sight.
That is equal to 6.45 Hiroshima Atomic Bombs a Day for 916 Days.

At 916 days of growth, Fukushima is 14.75 times bigger than the Chernobyl atomic disaster in 1986. "


The International Atomic Agency (IAEA) stated:

“The accident at Chernobyl was approximately 400 times more potent than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima…”
(See #12 of that report.)

400 TIMES, COMPARED TO 5,910 TIMES! 
At #5, we read, "While iodine is linked to thyroid cancer, Strontium can lead to leukaemia. Caesium is the element that travelled the farthest and lasts the longest. This element affects the entire body and especially can harm the liver and spleen."


REMEMBER, CHERNOBYL, WHICH INVOLVED ONLY ONE REACTOR, WAS CONTAINED, THE CORIUM WAS FOUND, AND THE SARCOPHAGUS WAS IN PLACE, ALL WITHIN 6 MONTHS AFTER IT BLEW... 6 MONTHS, NOT YEARS, MONTHS.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH JAPAN?


An article in the UK's 'Independent' seems to agree that Fukushima is or will be much worse than Chernobyl.

WE ARE NOW PAST YEAR 7.

"There are 1,946 known lethal radioactive isotopes."
"There were over 100 radioactive elements released into the atmosphere when Chernobyl’s reactor exploded."

WHY THE HELL ARE WE STILL TALKING ABOUT JUST CESIUM?

WHY IS JAPAN STILL AFTER 'THE BOMB'?

THEY DON'T NEED IT ANYMORE.

THEY HAVE FUKUSHIMA.



ABOVE: A bank of centrifuges at a Urenco plant, each being 3 to 5 meters tall and 20 cm diameter. (For Americans, 1 meter still equals about 3.3 feet and a centimeter is about 0.4 inches.)
USEC's ( United States Enrichment Corporation, a subsidiary of Centrus Energy Corp.) American Centrifuges are more than 12 meters tall and 40-50 cm diameter. The Russian centrifuges are less than one meter tall. Chinese ones are larger, but shorter than Urenco's.

To obtain efficient separation of the two isotopes, centrifuges rotate at very high speeds, with the outer wall of the spinning cylinder moving at between 400 and 500 metres per second to give a million times the acceleration of gravity.

Most of the 500 commercial nuclear power reactors operating or under construction in the world today require uranium 'enriched' in the U-235 isotope for their fuel.
The commercial process employed for this enrichment involves gaseous uranium in centrifuges.

Most reactors are light water reactors of two types – PWR or Pressurized Water Reactor, and BWR or Boiling Water Reactor and require uranium to be enriched from 0.7% to 3-5% U-235 in their fuel. This is normal low-enriched uranium (LEU). There is some interest in taking enrichment levels to about 7%, and even close to 20% for certain special power reactor fuels, as high-assay LEU (HALEU).

Although 13 countries have enrichment production capability or near-capability, about 90% of world enrichment capacity is in the five nuclear weapons states, China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States. These plus Germany, the Netherlands and Japan provide toll enrichment services to the commercial market.

Uranium is only weakly radioactive, and its chemical toxicity – especially as UF6 – is more significant than its radiological toxicity."

THE OVERWHELMING AMOUNT OF NUCLEAR WASTE FROM JUST THE DAI'ICHI NUCLEAR POWER PLANT SINCE 2011 BOGGLES THE MIND.
BUT, AT PEAK, JAPAN HAD 54 REACTORS RUNNING AND, BEING A SMALL ISLAND NATION, MUST STRUGGLE TO FIND STORAGE FOR IT ALL.

IN THE MEANTIME, JAPAN WAS CREATING PURE, WEAPONS GRADE PLUTONIUM, EXACTLY WHAT IS USED TO MAKE ATOMIC BOMBS...AN ESTIMATED 40 TONS OF PLUTONIUM.

THERE WAS CONCERN THAT THIS PLUTONIUM WAS ONLY "LIGHTLY GUARDED"


FROM NBC, March 11, 2014:    
"Already, Japan has 9.3 metric tons of plutonium stored at Rokkasho and nine other sites in the island nation, along with around 35 tons of plutonium stored in France and the United Kingdom. Altogether, Japan has the fifth-largest plutonium stockpile of any nation, representing 9 percent of the world’s stocks under civilian control. The figure includes 730 pounds of high-grade plutonium, the kind preferred by weapons designers, that Japan has agreed to send to the United States.Once the Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing Center at Rokkasho opens, the size of this stockpile could double in five and a half years.

When the plant is operating at full capacity, it’s supposed to produce 8 metric tons of plutonium annually. That’s enough to make an estimated 2,600 nuclear weapons, each with the explosive force of 20,000 tons of TNT.

A six-and-a-half pound lump of plutonium— enough to make a weapon — is the size of a grapefruit. The point, critics say, is that a thermos full of the metal in the wrong hands could produce a devastating terror attack.
[See also: http://www.publicintegrity.org/national-security/nuclear-waste]

Washington has been lobbying furiously behind the scenes, trying to persuade Japan that terrorists might regard Rokkasho’s new stockpile of plutonium as an irresistible target — and to convince Japanese officials they should better protect this dangerous raw material.

Specifically, U.S. officials have struggled, without success so far, to persuade Japan to create a more capable security force at the plant than the white-gloved, unarmed guards and small police unit stationed here now.

They also have been trying to persuade the privacy-minded Japanese to undertake stringent background checks for the 2,400 workers employed here.It’s been a hard sell for Washington, according to experts and officials in both countries familiar with the diplomatic dialogue.

After a U.S. embassy science officer witnessed a security drill in 2006 at the Mihama nuclear power plant along Japan’s northern shoreline, the officer sent a classified cable back to the State Department noting the typical police presence: “a lightly armored police vehicle with up to six police officers — some of them fast asleep."

“We are in the process of making those changes, but we don’t want to do them all at once because we don’t want people to think that we have been operating them unsafely in the past,” an unnamed Tokyo Electric Power Co. official said. 

TRUTH IS, THEY HAVE ALWAYS BEEN OPERATING UNSAFELY, AND THEIR RECORD SCREAMS THAT THEY HAVE.


JAPAN COULD FEASIBLY BUILD A NUCLEAR BOMB THIS YEAR, IF IT WANTED TO.

“Japan already has the technical capability [to build a nuclear bomb], and has had it since the 1980s,” said an official. He said that once Japan had more than five to 10 kilograms of plutonium, the amount needed for a single weapon, it had “already gone over the threshold,” and had a nuclear deterrent.

Japan now has 9 tons of plutonium stockpiled at several locations in Japan and another 35 tons stored in France and the U.K. The material is enough to create 5,000 nuclear bombs. The country also has 1.2 tons of enriched uranium."

In fact, many of Japan’s conservative politicians have long supported Japan’s nuclear power program because of its military potential. “The hawks love nuclear weapons, so they like the nuclear power program as the best they can do,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Non-Proliferation Program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies in California. “They don’t want to give up the idea they have, to use it as a deterrent.”   

WHY STOCKPILE SO MUCH PLUTONIUM, AND WHY BE SO CARELESS WITH IT?

THEY DON'T NEED NEARLY THAT MUCH TO RUN THEIR REACTORS, ACCORDING TO THEIR OWN NUCLEAR AGENCY, WHICH ALSO HAS STATED THAT JAPAN NEEDS TO FIND AN ALTERNATIVE TO THE MORE DANGEROUS PLUTONIUM REACTORS.


.North Korea Says Japan Wants War in 2018 as Both Gather New, More Powerful Weapons
“The rhetoric about ‘threat from surrounding areas’ oft-repeated by Japan is little short of a prelude to a re-invasion aimed to paint their criminal nature of rushing headlong into turning the country into a military giant as ‘legitimate’ and openly come out for overseas expansion,” the commentary read.

In 1947, U.S.-occupied Japan drafted a constitution, vowing to “forever renounce war” and promising that any military with “war potential will never be maintained.”


SHINZO ABE HAS OTHER IDEAS, HE WANTS THE BOMB AND HAS INCREASED MILITARY SPENDING AND GREATLY EXPANDED JAPAN'S MILITARY CAPABILITY FOR SIX CONSECUTIVE YEARS NOW.


AN IMPRESSIVE AMOUNT OF RECENTLY DECLASSIFIED GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS PUBLISHED BY THE WILSON CENTER REVEAL HOW HARD JAPAN PUSHED TO PROCESS WEAPONS GRADE PLUTONIUM WITHOUT RESTRICTIONS DURING THE CARTER ADMINISTRATION AND THE LESS THAN HONEST MEANS USED TO GET AN OKAY FROM THE U.S. AND THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY.

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY DRIVE ANY NATION TO DECIDE TO CONTEND WITH SO MUCH NUCLEAR WASTE?

POWER...BUT NOT THE KIND WE GET BY FLIPPING A LIGHT SWITCH.


TERRORIST PLOTS FROM INSIDE JAPAN OFTEN GO UNREPORTED.
"For years Japan resisted taking steps that would have made it possible to share classified information with the United States about nuclear threats, partly out of concern that doing so might weaken public support for nuclear power, according to another U.S. diplomatic cable published by Wikileaks.

Yasuyoshi Komizo, a nonproliferation official in Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told a delegation from the U.S. Department of Energy in 2008 the government worried that “if, for example, the information sharing concerned potential insider threats, that could be interpreted as suggesting that some segment of the Japanese population was a problem,” the cable quoted him as saying.

Most alarming, however, was the long-term obsession of the Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese doomsday cult, with acquiring an atomic weapon. Followers of the cult’s guru, Shoko Asahara, traveled to Russia to buy them and recruit former Soviet weapons scientists. Investigators reported that the group was prepared to pay as much as $15 million for a warhead. In 1993, the group bought a sheep ranch in Australia, where 25 of Asahara’s followers tried to mine uranium to fuel a bomb.

“Japan simply didn’t consider terrorism a possibility here,” said former Prime Minister Naoto Kan.

He said this attitude was widely shared in industry and government, and as a result “Japan almost entirely ignored the advice” of the United States after 9/11.

“And you may ask whether Japan is prepared for such threats. Well, the answer is that it isn’t prepared for such attacks,” Kan said."

Japan Has Nuclear 'Bomb in the Basement,' and China Isn't Happy.  

"Steve Fetter, formerly the Obama White House’s assistant director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, thinks China's concerns are not purely political.
"I've had private discussions with China in which they ask, 'Why does Japan have all this plutonium that they have no possible use for?'

For at least four or five years, said Leonard Spector, deputy director of the Center for Non-Proliferation Studies in Monterey, the Japanese plutonium stockpile has been mentioned as a threat in Chinese defense white papers."

THE HAZARDS TO JAPAN'S PEOPLE (TO ANY "ATOMIC" NATION'S PEOPLE) FROM THE AMOUNT OF RADIATION FROM JUST ONE "NUCLEAR ACCIDENT", AS IS SHOWN BELOW, SHOULD DEMONSTRATE THE INSANITY OF USING 'NUCLEAR POWER', BUT, WITHOUT THE NEED FOR FUEL RODS, FOR ENRICHED URANIUM, THERE WOULD BE NO STRONGER ATOMIC POWER...NO BOMBS.


UNSECURED NUCLEAR BIOHAZARDS ALL OVER JAPAN.
The amount of radioactive water at Fukushima is still growing, by at least 150 tons a day.

The reactors are damaged beyond repair, but cooling water must be constantly pumped in to keep them from overheating. That water picks up radioactivity before leaking out of the damaged containment chambers and collecting in the basements.

There, the volume of contaminated water grows, because it mixes with groundwater that has seeped in through cracks in the reactor buildings.

[IN AN ARTICLE IN JAPAN TIMES, MARCH, 2018, WE READ THAT "850 NEW tanks had been built in the southwest part of the facility. They contain 1 million of the 1.1 million-ton total capacity, including 850,000 tons of so-called tritiated water."

Also in that article, we're told that "about 47 percent of 1,000 Tokyoites surveyed online by MRI in August indicated they haven’t received information about Fukushima’s reconstruction since the end of 2013."

The media blackout was supposed to have ended about conditions at Dai'ichi, but obviously has not ended in Japan.]


There is only room to keep storing radioactive water through 2020.

SO THEY WILL RELEASE IT ALL INTO THE PACIFIC, EITHER PUBLICLY,OR IN THE DARK OF NIGHT, LIKE THEY USED TO BURN DEBRIS AT NIGHT ONLY.
PROBABLY BY YEAR'S END THEY WILL HAVE DUMPED THE CONTENTS OF ALL THOSE RUSTY, LEAKING TANKS INTO THE PACIFIC     

I'M ALWAYS A BIT FLABBERGASTED BY THE RESPONSE FROM MOST PEOPLE ON THE SUBJECT OF JAPAN'S ONGOING "SILENT BOMBING" OF THE ENTIRE PLANET.

JUST YESTERDAY, IN RESPONSE TO A QUESTION I HAD ABOUT JAPAN'S 'SECRET' TEST LABS, AN ACQUAINTANCE, WHOM I IMAGINED KNEW BETTER SCOFFED AND SAID, "If Japan wanted to develop nuclear weapons, they could do it very quickly and without fuss...hiding serious radiation problems would be like hiding the sun."
 
REALLY?
THEY SURE AS HELL HID A LOT OF SUN FOR A VERY LONG TIME. 
A reading of 530 sieverts per hour of radiation near the entrance of just one hole under reactor #2 was incorrect, TOO LOW, with a margin of error of 30%, Tepco admitted, due to failure to remove the cover on their robotic device's gauge.

THIS WAS THE HIGHEST READING IN RECORDED HISTORY ANYWHERE ON EARTH.
CHERNOBYL'S PEAK READING OF 300-400 Sieverts per hour PALES IN COMPARISON.

As Reuters reported, "One sievert is enough to cause radiation sickness, infertility and cataracts.

Exposure to 10 sieverts will lead to a human’s death within weeks"


SO, HOW DO YOU HIDE THE SUN?

In a hole in the ground beneath a blown nuclear reactor?

In several holes in the ground near reactor sites?

OR...PUT YOUR HAND OVER YOUR OWN CLOSED EYES AND TELL YOURSELF THE SUN IS GONE?


JAPAN'S OLD RULING CLASS HAS TRIED DESPERATELY SINCE BEFORE THE END OF WW2 TO MAKE 'THE BOMB' AND HAS USED SOME FAIRLY FANCY FOOTWORK TO GET WHAT THEY WANT.

HOW MANY TIMES HAS TEPCO AND THE ABE REGIME BEEN CAUGHT IN LIES SINCE THE TSUNAMI AND THE FUKUSHIMA DISASTER?

DARE WE TRY TO COUNT THAT HIGH?   

ABE WANTS THE BOMB, THE MAJORITY OF JAPANESE CITIZENS DO NOT.

ABE AND HIS CIRCLE OF COHORTS WANT ANOTHER CHANCE TO 'RULE THE WORLD'.

THEY WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO RETURN TO JAPAN'S "GLORY DAYS".
      
MEANWHILE, AS MORE RADIATION THAN 250 HIROSHIMA BOMBS IS RELEASED INTO WATER, SOIL AND AIR EACH DAY WHILE TEPCO AND ABE WHINE ABOUT THE IMPOSSIBILITY AT PRESENT TO STOP IT, AND THEIR NEED TO RELEASE EVEN MORE INTO THE PACIFIC, PEOPLE LIKE MY ACQUAINTANCE FRET OVER 'KRAZY KIMMIE'S' LAUNCH OF A SINGLE NUCLEAR DEVICE.

I CALL THAT ILLOGICAL.


FIVE LONG YEARS AGO, REUTERS REPORTED...

"Containing radiation equivalent to 14,000 times the amount released in the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima 68 years ago, more than 1,300 used fuel rod assemblies packed tightly together need to be removed from a building that is vulnerable to collapse, should another large earthquake hit the area.

Each fuel rod assembly weighs about 300 kilograms (660 pounds) and is 4.5 meters (15 feet) long. Spent fuel rods also contain plutonium, one of the most toxic substances in the universe, that gets formed during the later stages of a reactor core's operation. There are 1,331 of the spent fuel assemblies and a further 202 unused assemblies also stored in the pool, Nagai said.

"There is a risk of an inadvertent criticality if the bundles are distorted and get too close to each other. The problem with a fuel pool criticality is that you can't stop it. There are no control rods to control it,"

THERE ARE FOUR (KNOWN) REACTORS INVOLVED THERE, NOT JUST ONE.

DO THE MATH?     

FROM PBS NEWS HOUR...

"More than 80 percent of the [INITIAL]radioactivity from the damaged reactors ended up in the Pacific — far more than reached the ocean from Chernobyl or Three Mile Island.

Of this, a small fraction is currently on the seafloor — the rest was swept up by the Kuroshio current, a western Pacific version of the Gulf Stream

This event is unprecedented in its total release of radioactive contamination into the ocean.
It is incorrect to say that Fukushima is under control when levels of radioactivity in the ocean indicate ongoing leaks, caused by groundwater flowing through the site and, we think, enhanced after storms."


HOW MUCH DAILY RADIATION IS 'LEAKED' BY DAI'ICHI?

IT WAS BAD 4 YEARS AGO, BUT WORSE TODAY.


DECEMBER 2014:
CANADIAN SCIENTISTS MONITORING BOTH AIR AND OCEAN RADIATION LEVELS FIND IT DOUBLED.

IN SOME AREAS IT IS "OFF THE CHARTS".


FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES, MARCH 11, 2017

RADIOACTIVE WATER.

About 400 tons of water passes through the reactors every day, including groundwater that seeps in. The water picks up radiation in the reactors and then is diverted into a decontamination facility.But the decontamination filters cannot remove all the radioactive material. So for now, all this water is being stored in 1,000 gray, blue and white tanks on the grounds. The tanks already hold 962,000 tons of contaminated water, and Tokyo Electric is installing more tanks.

RADIOACTIVE GEAR.

6,000 cleanup workers at the site put on new protective gear every day. These hazmat suits, face masks, rubber gloves and shoe coverings are thrown out at the end of each shift. The clothing is compressed and stored in 1,000 steel boxes stacked around the site.
   
To date, more than 64,700 cubic meters of gear has been discarded, the equivalent of 17 million one-gallon containers. Tokyo Electric says it will eventually incinerate all this contaminated clothing to reduce the space needed to store it.

INCINERATION WILL SEND IT INTO THE ATMOSPHERE.

RADIOACTIVE TREE AND BRUSH CUTTINGS.

Workers have cleared about 220 acres of trees AT THE DAI'ICHI SITE since the meltdown spewed radiation over them.

Now, piles of branches and tree trunks are stacked all over the site. Officials say there are about 80,000 cubic meters of this waste, and all of it will have to be incinerated and stored someday.

INCINERATION WILL ALSO SEND THAT INTO THE ATMOSPHERE.
   
RADIOACTIVE RUBBLE.

Explosions during the meltdown filled the reactors with rubble. Workers and robots are slowly and carefully trying to remove this tangled mass of crushed concrete, pipes, hoses and metal.

Tokyo Electric estimates that more than 200,400 cubic meters of rubble — all of it radioactive — have been removed so far and stored in custom-made steel boxes. That is the equivalent of about 3,000 standard 40-foot shipping containers.
    
RADIOACTIVE SOIL.

Thousands of plastic garbage bags sit in neat rows in the fields and abandoned towns surrounding the Fukushima plant. They contain soil that was scraped from land that was exposed to radiation in the days after the accident.     

Japan’s Ministry of the Environment estimates that it has bagged 3.5 BILLION gallons of soil, and plans to collect much more. It will eventually INCINERATE some of the soil, but that will only reduce the volume of the radioactive waste, not eliminate it.

The ministry has already begun building a massive, interim storage facility in Fukushima prefecture and negotiating with 2,360 landowners for the thousands of acres needed to complete it. And that is not even a long-term solution: The government says that after 30 years it will need another site — or sites — to store radioactive waste.


RADIOACTIVE SLUDGE.

The process of decontaminating the water leaves radioactive sludge trapped in filters, which are being held in thousands of containers of different sizes.

LETHAL FUEL RODS.
Six of the spent fuel rod pools were located at the top of six reactor buildings.
One “common pool” is at ground level in a separate building.
Each “reactor top” pool holds up to 3450 fuel rod assemblies.
The common pool holds up to 6291 fuel rod assemblies but 6,375 assemblies have been counted there. .

566 fuel assemblies were in place inside reactor #3.

1,573 fuel rod units, each consisting of dozens of fuel rods, in unit #4 .
Each assembly holds sixty-three fuel rods.

One of these fuel rods has the potential to kill 2.89 billion people.
     
This means the Fukushima Daiichi plant may contain over 600,000 spent fuel rods. The fuel rods once stored atop reactor 3 are no longer there: one of the several explosions at the Fukushima reactors damaged that pool.

A significant problem in tracking radioactive release was that 23 out of the 24 radiation monitoring stations on the plant site were disabled by the tsunami.
There is some uncertainty about the amount and exact sources of radioactive releases to air.

FROM THE UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS, FUKUSHIMA FACTS:

"It is important to note that spent fuel pools are not as isolated from the environment as the reactor core, because the pools are located outside the primary containment structure. So even if the total amount of radiation released by damaged fuel rods in a spent fuel pool is less than that released by similarly damaged fuel rods in the reactor core, the fraction of that radiation that escapes into the atmosphere from the spent fuel pools is likely to be much higher.

In early April, levels of radioactive iodine-131 and cesium-137 in seawater off the coast of Japan were reportedly measured at 5 million and 1 million times the legal limit, respectively.

U.S. plants have the same key vulnerability that led to the crisis in Japan. The basic problem is that the Japanese reactors lost both their normal and back-up power supplies, which are used to cool fuel rods and the reactor core."      

-CHERNOBYL DID NOT HAVE A TRIPLE MELTDOWN.

-THE SINGLE CORIUM AT CHERNOBYL WAS FOUND.

-CHERNOBYL WASTE WATER WAS NOT DUMPED INTO THE SEA.

-CHERNOBYL DID NOT ENGAGE IN OPEN-AIR BURNING OF WASTE.

-CHERNOBYL HAD A 'PROTECTIVE' SARCOPHAGUS WITHIN LESS THAN A YEAR.

THIS WON'T WORK AT FUKUSHIMA AS IT SITS AT THE EDGE OF THE OCEAN AND DIRECTLY ABOVE A MAJOR AQUIFER.

-CHERNOBYL'S SITE WAS NOT THREATENED BY EARTHQUAKE, TSUNAMI, OR TYPHOON.

-CHERNOBYL DID NOT SEND RADIOACTIVE LEAKS INTO A MAJOR AQUIFER THAT SUPPLIED DRINKING WATER TO A LARGE CITY LIKE TOKYO.

FUKUSHIMA TOPS CHERNOBYL BY MILES.


JAPAN DOESN'T REALLY NEED NUCLEAR ENERGY TO SUSTAIN ITS ENERGY NEEDS, WHICH WAS PROVEN IN 2015.  
"Japan in 2015 produced 1041 TWh of electricity, 409 TWh from natural gas, 343 TWh from coal, 103 TWh from oil, 91 TWh from hydro, 41 TWh from solar and wind, 41 TWh from biofuels and waste, and 9 TWh from nuclear. There were no imports or exports, and final consumption in 2015 was 957 TWh or about 7500 kWh per capita on average. Total installed capacity was about 324 GWe at the end of December 2015."
[SOURCE: Electricity data from International Energy Agency's Electricity Information 2017]


IN APRIL OF 2011, THE NEW YORK TIMES DID AN ARTICLE ON THE "CULTURE OF COMPLICITY TIED TO THE STRICKEN NUCLEAR PLANT".    

"In 2000, Kei Sugaoka, a Japanese-American nuclear inspector who had done work for General Electric at Daiichi, told Japan’s main nuclear regulator about a cracked steam dryer that he believed was being concealed. If exposed, the revelations could have forced the operator, Tokyo Electric Power, to do what utilities least want to do: undertake costly repairs.

What happened next was an example, critics have since said, of the collusive ties that bind the nation’s nuclear power companies, regulators and politicians.

Despite a new law shielding whistle-blowers, the regulator, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, divulged Mr. Sugaoka’s identity to Tokyo Electric, effectively blackballing him from the industry. Instead of immediately deploying its own investigators to Daiichi, the agency instructed the company to inspect its own reactors. Regulators allowed the company to keep operating its reactors for the next two years even though, an investigation ultimately revealed, its executives had actually hidden other, far more serious problems, including cracks in the shrouds that cover reactor cores.

Investigators may take months or years to decide to what extent safety problems or weak regulation contributed to the disaster at Daiichi, the worst of its kind since Chernobyl. But as troubles at the plant and fears over radiation continue to rattle the nation, the Japanese are increasingly raising the possibility that a culture of complicity made the plant especially vulnerable to the natural disaster that struck the country on March 11."

BOTTOM LINE? IN JAPAN, HERE IN AMERICA, EVERYWHERE, THERE IS INDEED A "CULTURE OF COMPLICITY" AS WHAT ARE SUPPOSED TO BE REGULATORY AGENCIES, 'PROTECTION' AGENCIES, ALL SIDE WITH 'BIG NUKE', WITH THE VERY ONES WHO PUT THE WORLD AT RISK WITH FAILING, LEAKING NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS, SIMPLY BECAUSE OF THE POLITICAL CLOUT, THE CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS, ETC, THAT THOSE GIANTS OF THE NUCLEAR ENERGY WORLD ARE ABLE TO PAY SO THEY CAN PAY WITH OUR VERY LIVES. 
WE CAN CONTINUE TO ALLOW THIS OR WE CAN DEMAND BETTER SAFETY MEASURES, EVEN AN END TO THIS NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE, AT LAST.

ONLY THE VOICES OF MILLIONS, RAISED AS ONE VOICE, WILL SHAKE THE FOUNDATIONS OF COLLUSION AND COMPLICITY.

...




_____________________

Further reading and a few sources not cited above:

~ WORLD NUCLEAR ASSOCIATION, FUKUSHIMA.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-security/safety-of-plants/fukushima-accident.aspx


~ 2018 UPDATE TO THE ABOVE WNA PAGE.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-security/safety-of-plants/fukushima-accident.aspx


~ JUST FOLLOW ALL THE LINKS IN THIS POST.

http://havacuppahemlock1.blogspot.com/2014/07/fukushima-is-extinction-level-event.html


~ Dying robots and failing hope: Fukushima clean-up falters six years



~ MICHIO KAKU, FUKUSHIMA IS NOT OVER!
"The attempted cover up of the severity of the Fukushima disaster is nothing new. Governments have been covering up nuclear meltdowns for 50 years, and the basic design for nuclear reactors was not chosen for safety, but because it worked on Navy submarines ... and produced plutonium for the military."


~ The Fukushima Disaster Is Far From Over - Tokyo Review



~ Fairewinds Energy Education Special Reports






//WW