Sorry when I bring this 'discussion' back to the actual facts that you consider it to be ' overly minimizing the severity of the Fukushima disaster.'
It's that I don't buy into the wacko liberal thinking. I'd rather just try to understand what is really going on instead.
Yep, lets bring it back to facts, this is outside the exclusion zone...
"Researchers have found up to 6.15 million becquerels per square metre of soil in Fukushima city, 60 kilometres north-west of a nuclear power plant that has been leaking radioactive material into the environment since it was damaged in an earthquake and tsunami in the spring.
The measurement is four times higher than the levels used to declare mandatory evacuation areas around Chernobyl, Ukraine, after the 1986 nuclear accident there..." http://www.monstersandcriti...lear-evacuation-zone
[This message has been edited by dennis_6 (edited 11-23-2011).]
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12:27 AM
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
Sorry when I bring this 'discussion' back to the actual facts that you consider it to be ' overly minimizing the severity of the Fukushima disaster.'
It's that I don't buy into the wacko liberal thinking. I'd rather just try to understand what is really going on instead.
Let's try this another way: do you think the negative consequences in Japan and worldwide of this nuclear engineering disaster are enough to warrant a reconsideration of using uranium fission for civilian power generation?
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11:49 AM
dennis_6 Member
Posts: 7196 From: between here and there Registered: Aug 2001
Fukushima worker confesses “There is nothing left that we could do” Posted by Mochizuki on November 23rd, 2011 · 2 Comments
This Fukushima worker (Twitter account Happy20790) tweets useful information daily. On 3/11, he was right at the plant, had water of the spent fuel pool over his protecting clothes. When reactor 3 exploded, he was in reactor 2.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011 #Fukushima I Nuke Plant Reactor 3: Radiation Went UP After Packbots Cleaned the Guide Rail to CV
After 2 Packbots wiped the guide rail to the Containment Vessel hatch on the 1st floor of Reactor 3, they were sent back in to measure the result of their operation in terms of radiation levels.
Well, the levels may have gone up. As you can see in the handout for the press on November 22, 2011, after the cleaning operation the measurement by the survey meter fluctuated so much that TEPCO couldn't put down the single number for each location.
What had been 800 millisieverts/hour on November 14 was anywhere between 570 to 1,600 millisieverts/hour on November 19.
Namie machi, Fukushima is 33 times worse than Chernobyl Posted by Mochizuki on November 22nd, 2011 · 1 Comment
大きな地図で見る
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology published the soil contamination data of 60 km area from Fukushima plants.
The data was taken from 6/1/2011 ~ 11/22/2011.
Though it’s only about I-131, Cs-134, Cs-137 mainly,the result shows the worst contaminated area in Fukushima is 33 times worse than Chernobyl. It proves Fukushima is something nobody has ever gone through.
In Chernobyl, area contaminated worse than 1,480,000 bq/m2 was defined as the worst red zone, “immediate mandatory evacuating area.”
In Fukushima, Namiemachi, 22km north west to Fukushima plants is contaminated, which they measured 760,000 bq/kg (Cs-134 + Cs-137). It equals to 49,400,000 bq/m2.
19.0 micro Sv/h in Shinagawa, Tokyo Posted by Mochizuki on November 19th, 2011 · 4 Comments
11/15/2011, they measured 19.0 micro Sv/h in Shinagawa.
This unusually high level of radiation is suspected to be related to incineration ash of radioactive debris,which started to coming from Iwate to Tokyo.http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/breaking-news-radioactive-debris-arrived-at-tokyo/
Radioactive debris is supposed to be burnt at Tokyo Waterfront Recycle Power, which is a group company of Tepco.
(Source)
By accepting radioactive debris to Tokyo, Tepco makes money again.
A journalist who asked about this “transaction” at Tepco’s press conference was banned to attend at the conference anymore by Mr.Terasawa, Tepco’s spokesman.
The smoke and incineration ash are suspected to be highly radioactive to cause secondary exposure to all around in Japan.
As a mater of fact, there is no proper filter in the facility of Tokyo Waterfront Recycle Power. They only have bug filter, which is useless to clean radioactive material. (Source)
When the debris arrived at Tokyo, it people were banned to measure radiation around the container.
Because of the wind from North, and this smoke from Tokyo Waterfront Recycle Power will contaminate Tokyo again.
TEPCO: Radioactive substances belong to landowners, not us
November 24, 2011
By TOMOHIRO IWATA / Asahi Shimbun Weekly AERA
During court proceedings concerning a radioactive golf course, Tokyo Electric Power Co. stunned lawyers by saying the utility was not responsible for decontamination because it no longer "owned" the radioactive substances.
“Radioactive materials (such as cesium) that scattered and fell from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant belong to individual landowners there, not TEPCO,” the utility said.
That argument did not sit well with the companies that own and operate the Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club, just 45 kilometers west of the stricken TEPCO plant in Fukushima Prefecture.
The Tokyo District Court also rejected that idea.
But in a ruling described as inconsistent by lawyers, the court essentially freed TEPCO from responsibility for decontamination work, saying the cleanup efforts should be done by the central and local governments.
Although the legal battle has moved to a higher court, observers said that if the district court’s decision stands and becomes a precedent, local governments' coffers could be drained.
The two golf companies in August filed for a provisional disposition with the Tokyo District Court, demanding TEPCO decontaminate the golf course and pay about 87 million yen ($1.13 million) for the upkeep costs over six months.
TEPCO's argument over ownership of the radioactive substances drew a sharp response from lawyers representing the Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club and owner Sunfield.
“It is common sense that worthless substances such as radioactive fallout would not belong to landowners,” one of the lawyers said. “We are flabbergasted at TEPCO’s argument.”
The golf course has been out of operation since March 12, the day after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami set off the nuclear crisis.
The companies wanted to reopen the course in July, but radiation levels, checked by the Nihonmatsu municipal government in June, were above the national safety limits.
On Aug. 10, a level of 2.91 microsieverts per hour was recorded 10 centimeters above ground at the tee of the sixth hole. The level was 51.1 microsieverts per hour near a drainage ditch in a parking space for golf carts, a level comparable to the Ottozawa area of Okuma, 2.4 km from the plant.
But TEPCO questioned the reliability of these figures.
“There is room for doubt about the ability of the measuring equipment the city used and the accuracy of the records,” it said.
TEPCO even suggested that the levels of contamination at the golf course would not pose a problem: “There are sites overseas with an annual reading of 10 millisieverts of natural radiation."
The district court on Oct. 31 not only rejected TEPCO’s argument that radioactive fallout belongs to individual landowners, it also said the city’s radioactivity measurements were credible.
Moreover, the court ruled that companies have the right to demand decontamination work by TEPCO.
But the court went on to say that central or local governments should be responsible for the decontamination work, given the efficiency of their cleanup operations so far.
The district court also rejected the companies' demand for compensation, saying the golf course operations could have been resumed because the radiation levels were below 3.8 microsieverts per hour, the yardstick set by the science ministry in April for authorizing the use of schoolyards.
The golf course companies immediately appealed the district court's decision.
Lawyers said operations were suspended at the golf course because of potential health risks to employees and customers.
“It is only natural that an employer take into account the health of its employees,” one of the lawyers said.
Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club says that it doesn’t know when it can reopen.
The Fukushima prefectural golf association, citing “high radiation levels,” canceled a tournament at the golf course that was scheduled for early July. The fairways and greens have become overgrown with grass and weeds.
“We have asked 15 part-time workers, including caddies, to stay home since March 12,” said Tsutomu Yamane, representative director of the golf course. “We also asked all 17 employees working at the front desk and facility management, except for one employee, to voluntarily quit in September.”
The golf course company commissioned a radiation testing agency to check the course on Nov. 13. It detected 235,000 becquerels of cesium per kilogram of grass, a level that would put the area into a no-entry zone under safety standards enforced after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
On Nov. 17, radioactive strontium at 98 becquerels per kilogram was detected in the grass and ground.
Asked about TEPCO’s doubts concerning the city’s radiation measurements, Nihonmatsu Mayor Keiichi Miho said, “We made the utmost efforts when we conducted the checks.”
TEPCO: Radioactive substances belong to landowners, not us
November 24, 2011
By TOMOHIRO IWATA / Asahi Shimbun Weekly AERA
During court proceedings concerning a radioactive golf course, Tokyo Electric Power Co. stunned lawyers by saying the utility was not responsible for decontamination because it no longer "owned" the radioactive substances.
“Radioactive materials (such as cesium) that scattered and fell from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant belong to individual landowners there, not TEPCO,” the utility said.
That argument did not sit well with the companies that own and operate the Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club, just 45 kilometers west of the stricken TEPCO plant in Fukushima Prefecture.
The Tokyo District Court also rejected that idea.
But in a ruling described as inconsistent by lawyers, the court essentially freed TEPCO from responsibility for decontamination work, saying the cleanup efforts should be done by the central and local governments.
Although the legal battle has moved to a higher court, observers said that if the district court’s decision stands and becomes a precedent, local governments' coffers could be drained.
The two golf companies in August filed for a provisional disposition with the Tokyo District Court, demanding TEPCO decontaminate the golf course and pay about 87 million yen ($1.13 million) for the upkeep costs over six months.
TEPCO's argument over ownership of the radioactive substances drew a sharp response from lawyers representing the Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club and owner Sunfield.
“It is common sense that worthless substances such as radioactive fallout would not belong to landowners,” one of the lawyers said. “We are flabbergasted at TEPCO’s argument.”
The golf course has been out of operation since March 12, the day after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami set off the nuclear crisis.
The companies wanted to reopen the course in July, but radiation levels, checked by the Nihonmatsu municipal government in June, were above the national safety limits.
On Aug. 10, a level of 2.91 microsieverts per hour was recorded 10 centimeters above ground at the tee of the sixth hole. The level was 51.1 microsieverts per hour near a drainage ditch in a parking space for golf carts, a level comparable to the Ottozawa area of Okuma, 2.4 km from the plant.
But TEPCO questioned the reliability of these figures.
“There is room for doubt about the ability of the measuring equipment the city used and the accuracy of the records,” it said.
TEPCO even suggested that the levels of contamination at the golf course would not pose a problem: “There are sites overseas with an annual reading of 10 millisieverts of natural radiation."
The district court on Oct. 31 not only rejected TEPCO’s argument that radioactive fallout belongs to individual landowners, it also said the city’s radioactivity measurements were credible.
Moreover, the court ruled that companies have the right to demand decontamination work by TEPCO.
But the court went on to say that central or local governments should be responsible for the decontamination work, given the efficiency of their cleanup operations so far.
The district court also rejected the companies' demand for compensation, saying the golf course operations could have been resumed because the radiation levels were below 3.8 microsieverts per hour, the yardstick set by the science ministry in April for authorizing the use of schoolyards.
The golf course companies immediately appealed the district court's decision.
Lawyers said operations were suspended at the golf course because of potential health risks to employees and customers.
“It is only natural that an employer take into account the health of its employees,” one of the lawyers said.
Sunfield Nihonmatsu Golf Club says that it doesn’t know when it can reopen.
The Fukushima prefectural golf association, citing “high radiation levels,” canceled a tournament at the golf course that was scheduled for early July. The fairways and greens have become overgrown with grass and weeds.
“We have asked 15 part-time workers, including caddies, to stay home since March 12,” said Tsutomu Yamane, representative director of the golf course. “We also asked all 17 employees working at the front desk and facility management, except for one employee, to voluntarily quit in September.”
The golf course company commissioned a radiation testing agency to check the course on Nov. 13. It detected 235,000 becquerels of cesium per kilogram of grass, a level that would put the area into a no-entry zone under safety standards enforced after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
On Nov. 17, radioactive strontium at 98 becquerels per kilogram was detected in the grass and ground.
Asked about TEPCO’s doubts concerning the city’s radiation measurements, Nihonmatsu Mayor Keiichi Miho said, “We made the utmost efforts when we conducted the checks.”
Interesting. Radio-active fallout that enters onto one's property belongs to the property's owner. I wonder if a similar legal argument could be made about the electricity that comes onto one's property? That makes as much sense as saying, "the bullet now belongs to the shooting victim." Well, as predicted it looks like TEPCO is trying to stick the government (tax-payers) with clean-up costs.
[This message has been edited by carnut122 (edited 11-24-2011).]
Interesting. Radio-active fallout that enters onto one's property belongs to the property's owner. I wonder if a similar legal argument could be made about the electricity that comes onto one's property? That makes as much sense as saying, "the bullet now belongs to the shooting victim." Well, as predicted it looks like TEPCO is trying to stick the government (tax-payers) with clean-up costs.
TEPCO doesn't have even a fraction of the resources to fully remediate their mess. Hell, the entire nuclear industry in Japan doesn't. Of course they'll foist as much as much as they can on taxpayers.
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08:25 PM
PFF
System Bot
Nov 25th, 2011
dennis_6 Member
Posts: 7196 From: between here and there Registered: Aug 2001
By the end of August, Tepco received 20,000 claim for damage, but they compensated only 1,000 cases of them, which was 2 billion yen.
Now it has become clear that Tepco is very reluctant to provide compensation.
Even though they make the claiming process extremely tricky so they can reduce the claiming cases, it is estimated that over 60,000 cases will go to Tepco for the term of September, October and November.
----- So we have a hot spot 33 times higher than Chernobyl's immediate mandatory evacuation level, we have TEPCO claiming fallout belongs to homeowners, and we have them claiming to compensate victims, but in reality only compensating a few. The truth is being exposed slowly. Still waiting on phonedawgz to call me a wacko idiot again, even though time is proving him wrong.
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08:16 PM
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
As Japan continues to recover from the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, it's still unclear how much radiation people in the area were actually exposed to over time.
One report following the aftermath of the quake suggests that human exposure to nuclear radiation was relatively low. Until now, researchers and health officials lacked data on exposures during the days and weeks immediately following the event.
Following the explosion in March until June, 13 research teams from Hirosaki University in Japan collected data from more than 5,000 people by using Geiger counters. They found that the vast majority had external contamination levels (radioactive particles on their clothes and body) below the "no contamination" level. On average, people registered at levels lower than 13 kilo counts per minute, which isn't known to be harmful.
Ten individuals, however, showed higher levels of radioactivity, but they were still too low to warrant decontamination. Researchers also found a trend among the safety shelters, with locations closer to the plant showing higher exposures in the air. As expected, outdoor air was linked to higher radiation levels than indoors. All levels declined with time.
Though the report is preliminary, it puts forth estimates that may be representative of the area. It's also worth mentioning that scientists measured radiation exposure indirectly -- through detectable particles on a person's body rather than internally, or measuring how much material a person has accidentally inhaled or consumed. Even so, radioactive particles on a person's clothes likely serve as a good indicator of how much radiation was present in dust particles in the air.
Overall, the team thinks long-term studies will be needed to establish whether these low-exposures add up over time, especially in newborns and fetuses, which are more sensitive to the negative effects of radiation.
To most journalists, a good story is defined in large measure by how much attention it will get. A story that makes page one, or leads the newscast, is better than one buried inside the newspaper or that runs after the third commercial. A story that people talk about for days, or ‘goes viral’, is even better.
All of which helps explain why the dramatic and alarming aspects of stories about risk often get played up, and the ameliorating or neutral or balancing aspects that might help do justice to the truth but which could ‘weaken’ the story, get played down, or left out altogether. A recent story by the Associated Press regarding radiation from the Fukushima nuclear disaster illustrates what this looks like, and offers an instructive lesson about how the news media contribute to fears that don’t match the facts, excessive worry that contributes to unhealthy choices for us as individuals, and as a society.
The story ran under various headlines. Most said something like this one from Boston. com; “Future cancers from Fukushima plant may be hidden” on Boston.com Essentially, the story is that a broad public health study of the population affected by Fukushima probably won’t detect any cancers, because there will be too few to show up compared with the much higher general cancer rate. In other words, the number of cancer cases from Fukushima will probably be pretty low.
Of course, “Nuke disaster might cause few cancers” doesn’t sound all that bad, and might not attract as many readers as something more alarming. But the AP reporters, working on a story about the health study of Fukushima’s effects, stumbled into an answer that doesn’t make for page one play; the relatively low radiation doses most people got (except for the workers who brought the melting reactors under control) probably won’t cause that many cancers at all. Possibly none! Consider the evidence reporters Malcolm Ritter and Mari Yamaguchi include in their story;
Paragraph 4; “Several experts inside and outside Japan told The Associated Press that cancers caused by the radiation may be too few to show up in large population studies.” Paragraph 6; “ ‘The cancer risk may be absent, or just too small to detect,’ said Dr. Fred Mettler, a radiologist who led an international study of health effects from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.” Paragraph 8; “2 million residents of Fukushima Prefecture, targeted in the new, 30-year survey, probably got too little radiation to have a noticeable effect on cancer rates, said Seiji Yasumura”, the head of the study. Paragraph 27; “Michiaki Kai, professor of environmental health at Oita University of Nursing and Health Sciences, said that based on tests he's seen on people and their exposure levels, nobody in Fukushima except for some plant workers has been exposed to harmful levels of radiation.” But low cancer risk is not scary, not as good a story. So, despite the fact that the experts said that few people, if any, will get cancer, the lede dishonestly instead suggests the possibility of a high rate, “Even if the worst nuclear accident in 25 years leads to many people (my emphasis) developing cancer, we may never find out.” The lede fails to report the basic overall truth the reporters themselves learned about the low radiation risk, and instead emphasizes the far more alarming fact that the cases will be ‘hidden’. Which is interesting, because the study of the psychology of risk perception…the emotional/instinctive way we judge how scary things are…has found that the greater the uncertainty the greater the fear. Reporters haven’t studied the psychology of risk perception, but they surely sense what makes things more scary just like we all do. So the scarier uncertainty aspect, the part more likely to ring our alarm bells and get us to pay attention, gets played up, and the less scary/more reassuring part…that even if we can’t detect them the number of cases will be low…gets played down.
To be fair, Ritter and Yamaguchi do report, repeatedly, that experts say the risk will be low. They even acknowledge that Fukushima might not cause any cancers at all, because scientists are not sure whether low doses of radiation are even carcinogenic in the first place. But it’s instructive to note that they don’t acknowledge the debate over the carcinogenicity of low doses of radiation until after several alarming paragraphs about contaminated water and forests and rice and fish and milk, radioactive soil that had to be removed near schools, mistrust in government, people carrying their own Geiger counters, kids being told to wear masks even though they are more than a hundred miles away from the contaminated area. The scary facts play higher.
It’s also interesting to note that, buried down in graph 25, the story cites Japanese officials as saying “mental health problems caused by excessive fear of radiation are prevalent and posing a bigger problem than actual risk of cancer caused by radiation.” Excessive fear of radiation?! Hmmmm. I wonder where that might have come from?
That’s the point of this little critique. Risk reporting that overplays the scary and underplays the neutral or ameliorating can actually hurt people. Fear fueled by alarmist coverage that goes beyond the evidence of the actual danger can lead to unhealthy choices by individuals, and by society (fear of nukes has contributed to an energy policy that relies more on coal burning for electricity, the particulate emissions from which kills tens of thousands of people per year). Fear certainly adds to stress, which is bad for our health in all sorts of ways.
Setting aside the health harms, alarmist coverage that distorts the facts also damages the public’s already shaky trust in the news media. I understand the realities of motivations of a daily journalist. I was one for 22 years and, mea culpa, I did this a lot during my reporting days. Alarming stories get people’s attention, which is after all what reporters want and how news organizations make their living. But journalism that goes too far and inaccurately overplays fear to attract attention is contributing to a big risk to the news industry itself, the risk of losing readers and listeners and viewers by abusing the trust they put in us to do a fair job with the truth.
Following the explosion in March until June, 13 research teams from Hirosaki University in Japan collected data from more than 5,000 people by using Geiger counters. They found that the vast majority had external contamination levels (radioactive particles on their clothes and body) below the "no contamination" level. On average, people registered at levels lower than 13 kilo counts per minute, which isn't known to be harmful.
Ten individuals, however, showed higher levels of radioactivity, but they were still too low to warrant decontamination. Researchers also found a trend among the safety shelters, with locations closer to the plant showing higher exposures in the air. As expected, outdoor air was linked to higher radiation levels than indoors. All levels declined with time.
Though the report is preliminary, it puts forth estimates that may be representative of the area. It's also worth mentioning that scientists measured radiation exposure indirectly -- through detectable particles on a person's body rather than internally, or measuring how much material a person has accidentally inhaled or consumed. Even so, radioactive particles on a person's clothes likely serve as a good indicator of how much radiation was present in dust particles in the air.
Overall, the team thinks long-term studies will be needed to establish whether these low-exposures add up over time, especially in newborns and fetuses, which are more sensitive to the negative effects of radiation.
So, taking measurements from clothing (assuming the clothes were "clean") and bodies (assuming they were recently bathed) is conclusive evidence of radiation exposure? The Fukushima workers are decontaminated daily by showering and changing out of the radiated clothing. I'm not faulting you for posting this. I just don't understand reaching any kind of conclusion (except for radiation measured in hours) from such a study.
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09:31 AM
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
Residents of the town closest to the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan have re-elected a mayor who wants to rebuild the community, rejecting a candidate who advocated permanent relocation. Mayoral and prefectural elections in the Fukushima prefecture were rescheduled from April in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated the region in March. Two candidates stood for election as mayor in Okuma, which was at the beginning of the nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant: Toshitsuna Watanabe, the existing mayor who is keen to rebuild the town, and Jin Kowata, who advocated the relocation of the entire population of 11,500. Watanabe was re-elected by 3451 votes to 2343 in a poll with a turnout of just over 68%. According to the town's website, nearly 8000 evacuees from Okuma are still in the Fukushima prefecture. All evacuees were eligible to vote in the election
Say, phonedawgz, you must have missed my recent question to you, or perhaps you didn't realize that I was asking a question of you. Would you be so kind as to go back to read it, and provide an answer? I'd appreciate hearing your answer and thoughts. Thanks!
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10:48 AM
dennis_6 Member
Posts: 7196 From: between here and there Registered: Aug 2001
A joint study by Kyoto University and the University of Tsukuba, among other entities, estimated that water at the mouth of the Abukumagawa river running through the prefecture was contaminated with cesium levels over 50 billion becquerels a day.
Radioactive substances from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant have now been confirmed in all prefectures, including Uruma, Okinawa Prefecture, about 1,700 kilometers from the plant, according to the science ministry.
The ministry said it concluded the radioactive substances came from the stricken nuclear plant because, in all cases, they contained cesium-134, which has short half-life of two years.
Before the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, radioactive substance were barely detectable in most areas.
But the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology's survey results released on Nov. 25 showed that fallout from the Fukushima plant has spread across Japan. The survey covered the cumulative densities of radioactive substances in dust that fell into receptacles during the four months from March through June.
Figures were not available for Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, where the measurement equipment was rendered inoperable by the March 11 disaster.
One measurement station was used for each of the other 45 prefectures.
The highest combined cumulative density of radioactive cesium-134 and cesium-137 was found in Hitachinaka, Ibaraki Prefecture, at 40,801 becquerels per square meter. That was followed by 22,570 becquerels per square meter in Yamagata, the capital of Yamagata Prefecture, and 17,354 becquerels per square meter in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward.
The current air radiation level in Ibaraki Prefecture is about 0.14 microsievert per hour, equivalent to an annual dose of about 1 millisievert, the safety limit for exposure under normal time international standards.
Large amounts of radioactive dust fell in Tokyo, but a separate survey has detected relatively low accumulations of cesium in the soil.
"Tokyo has smaller soil surfaces than other prefectures, but road and concrete surfaces are less prone to fixate cesium deposits, which were probably diffused by the wind and rain," a ministry official explained.
The fallout densities were considerably lower in the Chugoku and Kyushu regions in western Japan. The smallest figure of 0.378 becquerel per square meter came from Uto, Kumamoto Prefecture. The density in Osaka was 18.9 becquerels per square meter.
The peak value in Ibaraki Prefecture was 970,000 times larger than the cumulative fallout density of 0.042 becquerel per square meter in fiscal 2009, found in an earlier nationwide survey before the Fukushima crisis started.
Before the accident, cesium-137, which has a longer half-life of 30 years, had been detected from time to time from atmospheric nuclear tests. But those densities mostly stayed below 1 becquerel per square meter, while cesium-134, with a shorter half-life, was rarely detected, the ministry officials said.
Also on Nov. 25, the science ministry released maps of aerially measured radioactive cesium from the Fukushima plant that accumulated in Aomori, Ishikawa, Fukui and Aichi prefectures.
This was the final batch of the 22 prefectures in eastern Japan where mapping was to be completed by the end of this year.
Nowhere in the four prefectures did the accumulations exceed 10,000 becquerels per square meter, the threshold for defining an area as being affected by the nuclear accident. This reconfirmed the science ministry's view that radioactive plumes wafted only as far west as the border of Gunma and Nagano prefectures and as far north as the border of Miyagi and Iwate prefectures, ministry officials said.
The ministry also confirmed that radioactive plumes tended to drift just short of mountain ranges where they formed belts of high cesium concentrations due to rainfall and other factors. The mountain ranges included the Ou and Iide mountains along the border of Yamagata and Fukushima prefectures, the Echigo mountains along the border of Fukushima and Niigata prefectures, the Shimotsuke mountains along the border of Fukushima and Tochigi prefectures, and the Kanto mountains along the border of Gunma and Nagano prefectures.
These patterns are shown in three-dimensional plots in an online Japanese-language document released by the science ministry (http://bit.ly/unIfH0).
The ministry also said Nov. 25 that it will conduct aerial measurements of cesium accumulations in soil in regions outside the 22 prefectures starting next year. That is because small amounts of cesium have been detected in dust deposits in Hokkaido and western Japan. By HIROSHI ISHIZUKA / Staff Writer http://ajw.asahi.com/articl...shima/AJ201111260001
------------------ Wow, time proving me right again. Not bad for a alarmist, wacko, idiot, that should stick to copy and paste before I hurt myself. This brings back memories of where I stated the fallout maps were incomplete, because the fallout stopped at prefecture lines, man made lines. I stated something along the lines of I believe that was because the other areas were not surveyed.
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03:38 PM
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
Say, phonedawgz, you must have missed my recent question to you, or perhaps you didn't realize that I was asking a question of you. Would you be so kind as to go back to read it, and provide an answer? I'd appreciate hearing your answer and thoughts. Thanks!
Originally posted by JazzMan: Let's try this another way: do you think the negative consequences in Japan and worldwide of this nuclear engineering disaster are enough to warrant a reconsideration of using uranium fission for civilian power generation?
quote
Originally posted by phonedawgz:
No
Thanks for an honest answer.
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11:13 PM
Nov 27th, 2011
dratts Member
Posts: 8373 From: Coeur d' alene Idaho USA Registered: Apr 2001
I sure would hope you can find a source a little more intelligent than one that reports on a bottle of spilled paint in Tokyo as 'evidence' that Fukushima has gone critical.
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03:41 PM
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
The no was an answer to your question of if I would look back and find your question.
quote
Originally posted by JazzMan:
Thanks for an honest answer.
To answer your other question - We should ALWAYS be considering what it the best thing to do for both energy production and the environment. Should changes be made in the light of what we learned from Fukushima? Without a doubt. It has already been started.
Should we cut off all uranium based nuclear power because of what happened at Fukushima? Since we don't have anything to replace it with that is inherently superior the answer is no. You guys can masturbate on the idea of Thorium reactors replacing everything but until they are proven, it is nothing more than mental masturbation.
Solar and wind are still impractical to be any major power production method. I am not a fan of burning additional megatons of coal and oil to replace nuclear.
Yes we need to improve back up systems. Placing back up generators in locations that would be taken out by a tsunami in a tsunami area wasn't too smart. btw, if you haven't seen the pictures - it would have been simple to have them located up the hill that the plant was located on. A small gas turbine located there would have totally eliminated this situation.
----
Regarding the refugee situation - How does the number of refugees from the nuclear plan compare to the number of refugees from the tsunami? Are the tsunami refugees being allowed to move back into the areas where the 15,839 deaths, 5,950 injured, and 3,642 people missing were?
[This message has been edited by phonedawgz (edited 11-27-2011).]
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03:42 PM
dratts Member
Posts: 8373 From: Coeur d' alene Idaho USA Registered: Apr 2001
I sure would hope you can find a source a little more intelligent than one that reports on a bottle of spilled paint in Tokyo as 'evidence' that Fukushima has gone critical.
I think that this is the best source so far. I rarely read your posts, especially if they are long. I already know what you think. You're anti nuke right?
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05:05 PM
Formula88 Member
Posts: 53788 From: Raleigh NC Registered: Jan 2001
Yes we need to improve back up systems. Placing back up generators in locations that would be taken out by a tsunami in a tsunami area wasn't too smart. btw, if you haven't seen the pictures - it would have been simple to have them located up the hill that the plant was located on. A small gas turbine located there would have totally eliminated this situation.
It would have traded one problem for another. The further away backup generators are, the longer the transmission lines have to be. If the transmission lines at the plant are destroyed by disaster, both utility power and backup is taken out by the same event. Then you have to try to restore both backup and utility power to get anywhere. At least having the generators on site means you have off site power provided by the utility and on site power by generators. It splits up your power generation.
Something as catastrophic as a magnitude 9 quake, followed tsunami less than an hour later is pretty difficult to plan for. The plant had 20ft high seawalls to protect from tsunami, but it was nowhere near high enough to stop the 50ft wave that hit. Historically, the highest ever was about 33ft, so even if they had designed to that, it still wouldn't have been enough.
I think onsite power in a hardened facility would be the best answer to both issues, but there are always tradeoffs in any design.
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06:08 PM
PFF
System Bot
phonedawgz Member
Posts: 17091 From: Green Bay, WI USA Registered: Dec 2009
I sure would hope you can find a source a little more intelligent than one that reports on a bottle of spilled paint in Tokyo as 'evidence' that Fukushima has gone critical.
This statement is dishonest as they come. it seems to infer that the media claimed the paint bottle was proof of Fukushima fallout in Tokyo, and also the only proof. Exactly the same as lying. Its not sarcasm, because the intent is to mislead.
Radioactive substances from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant have now been confirmed in all prefectures, including Uruma, Okinawa Prefecture, about 1,700 kilometers from the plant, according to the science ministry. http://ajw.asahi.com/articl...shima/AJ201111260001
Nothing about a paint bottle in that article.
[This message has been edited by dennis_6 (edited 11-27-2011).]
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07:53 PM
dennis_6 Member
Posts: 7196 From: between here and there Registered: Aug 2001
JP Gov officially admitted that Japanese food is harmful Posted by Mochizuki on November 8th, 2011 · 47 Comments
Since 311, every time it turned out a kind of food is contaminated, they made “safety” limit, such as 500 Bq/Kg for vegetables, and allowed them to distribute.
However, at today’s meeting of the Lower House Budget Committee, Edano former chief cabinet secretary, current minister of Economy, Trade and Industry admitted that it is harmful for your health if you keep having it for one year.
Edano former chief cabinet secretary is famous for his trade mark phrase, “In short term,it is not harmful”. He was even called “Short term fraud” by some people.
It is not a small number of people who trusted his word and didn’t evacuate or kept eating food under the “safety limit”.
At today’s meeting of the Lower House Budget Committee, he “explained”.
He held 39 press conferences in the first 2 weeks after 311.
BUT he said “In short term, it is not harmful” ONLY 7 times.
OF those, 5 “In short term, it is not harmful”s were for food and drink.
By this he “meant”, you will be sick if you keep having it for one year, but if you have it once or twice, it doesn’t hurt your body.
2 “In short term, it is not harmful”s were for the north west area of Fukushima plant, which was severely contaminated right after the explosions.
It therefore means, those people who stayed there for long time shall be damaged by radiation.
In conclusion, as Japanese government admitted, if you keep having food from Japan for one year, probably you will be sick.
If it’s only once or twice, you may be ok.
People who abandoned their own sense of judgement, and trusted the government blindly, great job. Good bye.
Bonus:
Otsuka Norikazu, a TV news caster was a good Japanese. He devoted himself for the national campaign of “Let’s support north Japan by eating their food.” Your Ad Here
He was sent to the hospital for acute lymphatic leukemia on 11/7/2011.
In the morning, he touched his neck and felt something strange. He went to the doctor.
The doctor diagnosed him to be acute lymphatic leukemia.
It is not clear the connection between his patriotic challenge and acute lymphatic leukemia.It will never be clear.
