NEWS ADVISORY: Repair work halted at reactor No. 2 after 500 millisieverts detected — Temp rising at No. 1 From Energy News. Short, and to the point.
What They're Covering Up at Fukushima From Counterpunch. Doom. Doom. Excerpts:
Hirose Takashi has written a whole shelf full of books, mostly on the nuclear power industry and the military-industrial complex. Probably his best known book is Nuclear Power Plants for Tokyo in which he took the logic of the nuke promoters to its logical conclusion: if you are so sure that they're safe, why not build them in the center of the city, instead of hundreds of miles away where you lose half the electricity in the wires?
..while it made sense to oppose nuclear power back then, now that the disaster has begun he would just as soon remain silent, but the lies they are telling on the radio and TV are so gross that he cannot remain silent.
After reading his account, you will wonder, why do they keep on sprinkling water on the reactors, rather than accept the sarcophagus solution [ie., entombing the reactors in concrete. Editors.] I think there are a couple of answers. One, those reactors were expensive, and they just can't bear the idea of that huge a financial loss. But more importantly, accepting the sarcophagus solution means admitting that they were wrong, and that they couldn't fix the things.
Excerpts from television interview:
Yo: Today many people saw water being sprayed on the reactors from the air and from the ground, but is this effective?
Hirose: . . . If you want to cool a reactor down with water, you have to circulate the water inside and carry the heat away, otherwise it has no meaning. So the only solution is to reconnect the electricity. Otherwise it’s like pouring water on lava.
Yo: It will take 1300 tons of water to fill the pools that contain the spent fuel rods in reactors 3 and 4. This morning 30 tons. Then the Self Defense Forces are to hose in another 30 tons from five trucks. That’s nowhere near enough, they have to keep it up. Is this squirting of water from hoses going to change the situation?
Hirose: In principle, it can’t. Because even when a reactor is in good shape, it requires constant control to keep the temperature down to where it is barely safe. Now it’s a complete mess inside, and when I think of the 50 remaining operators, it brings tears to my eyes. I assume they have been exposed to very large amounts of radiation, and that they have accepted that they face death by staying there.
..
If I were Prime Minister Kan, I would order them to do what the Soviet Union did when the Chernobyl reactor blew up, the sarcophagus solution, bury the whole thing under cement, put every cement company in Japan to work, and dump cement over it from the sky. Because you have to assume the worst case. Why? Because in Fukushima there is the Daiichi Plant with six reactors and the Daini Plant with four for a total of ten reactors. If even one of them develops the worst case, then the workers there must either evacuate the site or stay on and collapse. So if, for example, one of the reactors at Daiichi goes down, the other five are only a matter of time. We can’t know in what order they will go, but certainly all of them will go. And if that happens, Daini isn’t so far away, so probably the reactors there will also go down. Because I assume that workers will not be able to stay there.
I’m speaking of the worst case, but the probability is not low..
Tokyo says radiation in tap water above limit From Chron.com/found it on Godlike Productions.. Excerpts:
Tokyo Water Bureau officials say levels of radioactive iodine in some city tap water is two times the recommended limit for infants.
The officials told reporters Wednesday that a water treatment center in downtown Tokyo that supplies much of the city's tap water found that some water contained 210 becquerels per liter of iodine 131.
They said the limit for consumption of iodine 131 for infants is 100 becquerels per liter. They recommended that babies not be given tap water, although they said the water is not an immediate health risk for adults.
US bars some Japan foods over radiation fears From Raw Story. Excerpts:
The United States has announced it was barring some food imports from Japan due to fears of radiation and nuclear contamination in the wake of an earthquake and tsunami disaster.
The US Food and Drug Administration said it had placed an import alert on all milk, milk products, fresh vegetables and fruits from certain regions.
This means that no products of these types from the prefectures of Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi and Gunma can enter the United States without first being shown to be safe.
Asian Stocks Retreat on Iodine in Tokyo Tap Water, Reactor Woes From Bloomberg/Found it on Rense.com
Asian stocks fell, with the regional benchmark index set for its first loss in four days, after levels of iodine unsafe for infants were reported in Tokyo tap water as worked struggled to reconnect power to a damaged nuclear reactor.
..
“Investor focus has moved to the medium-term consequences of the natural disaster to the Japanese and global economies,” said Tim Schroeders, a money manager in Melbourne at Sydney- based Pengana Capital Ltd., which manages about $1 billion.
..
“There are still a lot of uncertainties surrounding the nuclear fallout, as well as aftershocks, and we won’t be seeing a stable market for a while,” said Yoshinori Nagano, a senior strategist in Tokyo at Daiwa Asset Management Co., which oversees about $104 billion. “No one thinks the nuclear crisis has ended completely.”
File Under: Logical, in a World Gone Mad.. Japan's mafia among the first to organise and deliver aid From Asia News Network/found it on Rense. Excerpts:
The worst of times sometimes brings out the best in people - even in Japan's mafia, the yakuza.
The Daily Beast news website said that hours after the first shock waves hit, two of the largest crime groups went into action, opening their offices to those stranded in Tokyo and shipping food, water and blankets to the devastated areas.
The website reported that the day after the earthquake, the Inagawa-kai (the third-largest organised crime group in Japan) sent 25 trucks filled with paper diapers, instant ramen, batteries, torches, drinks and other essentials to the Tohoku region.
The Daily Beast said an executive in Sumiyoshi-kai, the second-largest crime group, even offered refuge to members of the foreign community - something unheard-of in a still slightly xenophobic nation, especially among the right-wing yakuza, the website said.
The Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest crime group, has also opened its offices across the country to the public and has been sending truckloads of supplies, but very quietly and without any fanfare, the website said.
..
But this is not the first time the yakuza have displayed a humanitarian impulse. In 1995, after the Kobe earthquake, the Yamaguchi-gumi was one of the most responsive forces on the ground, quickly getting supplies to the affected areas and distributing them to the local people.
The Daily Beast said that, admittedly, much of those supplies were paid for with money from years of shaking down the people in the area, and that the yakuza are certainly not unaware of the public relations factor.
And yet, they're actually doing something.
Toyota and Honda extend auto shutdowns From The Detroit Free Press. Short answer: Saturday at the very earliest for Toyota, Sunday for Honda, but really, probably much later..
Japan quake: 9,300 dead, 13,786 missing From Sify news.com Excerpts:
The devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11 have left 9,301 people dead, while at least 13,786 were still unaccounted for till Wednesday morning, Xinhua reported citing the National Police Agency.
Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log
What They're Covering Up at Fukushima From Counterpunch. Doom. Doom. Excerpts:
Hirose Takashi has written a whole shelf full of books, mostly on the nuclear power industry and the military-industrial complex. Probably his best known book is Nuclear Power Plants for Tokyo in which he took the logic of the nuke promoters to its logical conclusion: if you are so sure that they're safe, why not build them in the center of the city, instead of hundreds of miles away where you lose half the electricity in the wires?
..while it made sense to oppose nuclear power back then, now that the disaster has begun he would just as soon remain silent, but the lies they are telling on the radio and TV are so gross that he cannot remain silent.
After reading his account, you will wonder, why do they keep on sprinkling water on the reactors, rather than accept the sarcophagus solution [ie., entombing the reactors in concrete. Editors.] I think there are a couple of answers. One, those reactors were expensive, and they just can't bear the idea of that huge a financial loss. But more importantly, accepting the sarcophagus solution means admitting that they were wrong, and that they couldn't fix the things.
Excerpts from television interview:
Yo: Today many people saw water being sprayed on the reactors from the air and from the ground, but is this effective?
Hirose: . . . If you want to cool a reactor down with water, you have to circulate the water inside and carry the heat away, otherwise it has no meaning. So the only solution is to reconnect the electricity. Otherwise it’s like pouring water on lava.
Yo: It will take 1300 tons of water to fill the pools that contain the spent fuel rods in reactors 3 and 4. This morning 30 tons. Then the Self Defense Forces are to hose in another 30 tons from five trucks. That’s nowhere near enough, they have to keep it up. Is this squirting of water from hoses going to change the situation?
Hirose: In principle, it can’t. Because even when a reactor is in good shape, it requires constant control to keep the temperature down to where it is barely safe. Now it’s a complete mess inside, and when I think of the 50 remaining operators, it brings tears to my eyes. I assume they have been exposed to very large amounts of radiation, and that they have accepted that they face death by staying there.
..
If I were Prime Minister Kan, I would order them to do what the Soviet Union did when the Chernobyl reactor blew up, the sarcophagus solution, bury the whole thing under cement, put every cement company in Japan to work, and dump cement over it from the sky. Because you have to assume the worst case. Why? Because in Fukushima there is the Daiichi Plant with six reactors and the Daini Plant with four for a total of ten reactors. If even one of them develops the worst case, then the workers there must either evacuate the site or stay on and collapse. So if, for example, one of the reactors at Daiichi goes down, the other five are only a matter of time. We can’t know in what order they will go, but certainly all of them will go. And if that happens, Daini isn’t so far away, so probably the reactors there will also go down. Because I assume that workers will not be able to stay there.
I’m speaking of the worst case, but the probability is not low..
Tokyo says radiation in tap water above limit From Chron.com/found it on Godlike Productions.. Excerpts:
Tokyo Water Bureau officials say levels of radioactive iodine in some city tap water is two times the recommended limit for infants.
The officials told reporters Wednesday that a water treatment center in downtown Tokyo that supplies much of the city's tap water found that some water contained 210 becquerels per liter of iodine 131.
They said the limit for consumption of iodine 131 for infants is 100 becquerels per liter. They recommended that babies not be given tap water, although they said the water is not an immediate health risk for adults.
US bars some Japan foods over radiation fears From Raw Story. Excerpts:
The United States has announced it was barring some food imports from Japan due to fears of radiation and nuclear contamination in the wake of an earthquake and tsunami disaster.
The US Food and Drug Administration said it had placed an import alert on all milk, milk products, fresh vegetables and fruits from certain regions.
This means that no products of these types from the prefectures of Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi and Gunma can enter the United States without first being shown to be safe.
Asian Stocks Retreat on Iodine in Tokyo Tap Water, Reactor Woes From Bloomberg/Found it on Rense.com
Asian stocks fell, with the regional benchmark index set for its first loss in four days, after levels of iodine unsafe for infants were reported in Tokyo tap water as worked struggled to reconnect power to a damaged nuclear reactor.
..
“Investor focus has moved to the medium-term consequences of the natural disaster to the Japanese and global economies,” said Tim Schroeders, a money manager in Melbourne at Sydney- based Pengana Capital Ltd., which manages about $1 billion.
..
“There are still a lot of uncertainties surrounding the nuclear fallout, as well as aftershocks, and we won’t be seeing a stable market for a while,” said Yoshinori Nagano, a senior strategist in Tokyo at Daiwa Asset Management Co., which oversees about $104 billion. “No one thinks the nuclear crisis has ended completely.”
File Under: Logical, in a World Gone Mad.. Japan's mafia among the first to organise and deliver aid From Asia News Network/found it on Rense. Excerpts:
The worst of times sometimes brings out the best in people - even in Japan's mafia, the yakuza.
The Daily Beast news website said that hours after the first shock waves hit, two of the largest crime groups went into action, opening their offices to those stranded in Tokyo and shipping food, water and blankets to the devastated areas.
The website reported that the day after the earthquake, the Inagawa-kai (the third-largest organised crime group in Japan) sent 25 trucks filled with paper diapers, instant ramen, batteries, torches, drinks and other essentials to the Tohoku region.
The Daily Beast said an executive in Sumiyoshi-kai, the second-largest crime group, even offered refuge to members of the foreign community - something unheard-of in a still slightly xenophobic nation, especially among the right-wing yakuza, the website said.
The Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest crime group, has also opened its offices across the country to the public and has been sending truckloads of supplies, but very quietly and without any fanfare, the website said.
..
But this is not the first time the yakuza have displayed a humanitarian impulse. In 1995, after the Kobe earthquake, the Yamaguchi-gumi was one of the most responsive forces on the ground, quickly getting supplies to the affected areas and distributing them to the local people.
The Daily Beast said that, admittedly, much of those supplies were paid for with money from years of shaking down the people in the area, and that the yakuza are certainly not unaware of the public relations factor.
And yet, they're actually doing something.
Toyota and Honda extend auto shutdowns From The Detroit Free Press. Short answer: Saturday at the very earliest for Toyota, Sunday for Honda, but really, probably much later..
Japan quake: 9,300 dead, 13,786 missing From Sify news.com Excerpts:
The devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11 have left 9,301 people dead, while at least 13,786 were still unaccounted for till Wednesday morning, Xinhua reported citing the National Police Agency.
Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log
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