The story of Fukushima.....
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/19547-fukushima-a-global-threat-that-requires-a-global-response#startOfPageId19547Hosts!! This article was first published on Truthout and any reprint or reproduction on any other website must acknowledge Truthout as the original site of publication.
The story of Fukushima should be on the front pages of every newspaper. Instead, it is rarely mentioned. The problems at Fukushima are unprecedented in human experience and involve a high risk of radiation events larger than any that the global community has ever experienced. It is going to take the best engineering minds in the world to solve these problems and to diminish their global impact.
When we researched the realities of Fukushima in preparation for this article, words like apocalyptic, cataclysmic and Earth-threatening came to mind. But, when we say such things, people react as if we were the little red hen screaming "the sky is falling" and the reports are ignored. So, we’re going to present what is known in this article and you can decide whether we are facing a potentially cataclysmic event.
Also see:
http://truth-out.org/news/item/19584-radioactive-rainwater-overwhelms-fukishima-nuclear-plant"
Radioactive Rainwater Overwhelms Fukushima Nuclear Plant
Either way, it is clear that the problems at Fukushima demand that the world’s best nuclear engineers and other experts advise and assist in the efforts to solve them. Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen of
Fairewinds.org and an international team of scientists created a 15-point plan to address the crises at Fukushima.
A subcommittee of the Green Shadow Cabinet (of which we are members), which includes long-time nuclear activist Harvey Wasserman is circulating a sign-on letter and a petition calling on the United Nations and Japanese government to put in place the Gundersen et al plan and to provide 24-hour media access to information about the crises at Fukushima. There is also a call for international days of action on the weekend of November 9 and 10. The letter and petitions will be delivered to the UN on November 11 which is both Armistice Day and the 32nd month anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami that caused the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
The Problems of Fukushima
There are three major problems at Fukushima: (1) Three reactor cores are missing; (2) Radiated water has been leaking from the plant in mass quantities for 2.5 years; and (3) Eleven thousand spent nuclear fuel rods, perhaps the most dangerous things ever created by humans, are stored at the plant and need to be removed, 1,533 of those are in a very precarious and dangerous position. Each of these three could result in dramatic radiation events, unlike any radiation exposure humans have ever experienced. We’ll discuss them in order, saving the most dangerous for last.
Missing reactor cores: Since the accident at Fukushima on March 11, 2011, three reactor cores have gone missing. There was an unprecedented three reactor ‘melt-down.’ These melted cores, called corium lavas, are thought to have passed through the basements of reactor buildings 1, 2 and 3, and to be somewhere in the ground underneath.
Harvey Wasserman, who has been working on nuclear energy issues for over 40 years, tells us that during those four decades no one ever talked about the possibility of a multiple meltdown, but that is what occurred at Fukushima.
It is an unprecedented situation to not know where these cores are. TEPCO is pouring water where they think the cores are, but they are not sure. There are occasional steam eruptions coming from the grounds of the reactors, so the cores are thought to still be hot.
The concern is that the corium lavas will enter or may have already entered the aquifer below the plant. That would contaminate a much larger area with radioactive elements. Some suggest that it would require the area surrounding Tokyo, 40 million people, to be evacuated. Another concern is that if the corium lavas enter the aquifer, they could create a "super-heated pressurized steam reaction beneath a layer of caprock causing a major 'hydrovolcanic' explosion."
A further concern is that a large reserve of groundwater which is coming in contact with the corium lavas is migrating towards the ocean at the rate of four meters per month. This could release greater amounts of radiation than were released in the early days of the disaster.
Radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean: TEPCO did not admit that leaks of radioactive water were occurring until July of this year. Shunichi Tanaka the head of Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority finally told reporters this July that radioactive water has been leaking into the Pacific Ocean since the disaster hit over two years ago. This is the largest single contribution of radionuclides to the marine environment ever observed according to a report by the French Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety. The Japanese government finally admitted that the situation was urgent this September – an emergency they did not acknowledge until 2.5 years after the water problem began.
How much radioactive water is leaking into the ocean? An estimated 300 tons (71,895 gallons/272,152 liters) of contaminated water is flowing into the ocean every day. The first radioactive ocean plume released by the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster will take three years to reach the shores of the United States. This means, according to a new study from the University of New South Wales, the United States will experience the first radioactive water coming to its shores sometime in early 2014.
One month after Fukushima, the FDA announced it was going to stop testing fish in the Pacific Ocean for radiation. But, independent research is showing that every bluefin tuna tested in the waters off California has been contaminated with radiation that originated in Fukushima. Daniel Madigan, the marine ecologist who led the Stanford University study from May of 2012 was quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying, "The tuna packaged it up (the radiation) and brought it across the world’s largest ocean. We were definitely surprised to see it at all and even more surprised to see it in every one we measured." Marine biologist Nicholas Fisher of Stony Brook University in New York State, another member of the study group, said: "We found that absolutely every one of them had comparable concentrations of cesium 134 and cesium 137."
In addition, Science reports that fish near Fukushima are being found to have high levels of the radioactive isotope, cesium-134. The levels found in these fish are not decreasing, which indicates that radiation-polluted water continues to leak into the ocean. At least 42 fish species from the area around the plant are considered unsafe. South Korea has banned Japanese fish as a result of the ongoing leaks.
The half-life (time it takes for half of the element to decay) of cesium 134 is 2.0652 years. For cesium 137, the half-life is 30.17 years. Cesium does not sink to the ocean floor, so fish swim through it. What are the human impacts of cesium?
When contact with radioactive cesium occurs, which is highly unlikely, a person can experience cell damage due to radiation of the cesium particles. Due to this, effects such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and bleeding may occur. When the exposure lasts a long time, people may even lose consciousness. Coma or even death may then follow. How serious the effects are depends upon the resistance of individual persons and the duration of exposure and the concentration a person is exposed to, experts say.
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The Stranger
(11,297 posts)It makes it hard to read.
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)For some reason I left all those hyper links thinking they would convert. Should be better now?
JayhawkSD
(3,163 posts)This statement is untrue in its entirety. The cores melted through the bottoms of the reactor vessels, but are known to be on the floors of the reactor buildings, and it is known that they did not melt through those floors and into the ground underneath. That is why the appication of cooling water is still required. If the corium was "somewhere in the ground underneath" the buildings the application of cooling water would be completely useless and they would not be doing it.
The rest of the story is similarly hysterical and inaccurate.
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)I don't think so. But nice imagination you have.
TEPCO and the Japanese govt have both said they don't know the exact locations of the cores. They forgot to ask you, eh?
No, you are just dreaming, and so nothing you have said has any credibility.
What is it with you deniers? You pontificate and slam the messengers but give the nuke industry polluters a free ride. WTF is going on?
JayhawkSD
(3,163 posts)and no they have not said that; at least not in the sense that you try to impute to them. The corium is buried under a lot of wreckage and debris, so they do not know its precise location to the foot, but they do know that it did not penetrate into the ground. Again; due to the heat which it is still radiating it's approximate location is still very clear, and it is not deep underground. If it was there would be no need to keep applying cooling water to it.
I'm not going to prolong this. You hysterical anti-nuclear propagandists will believe any terrifying "fact" that suits your crusade and deny any report or logic which does not which does not.
Well, the fact is that the drainage trenches under the plants are floored with gravel. So using your theory that cores magically settled on the concrete, where the drainage trenches are located, means the corium is running off into that trench bypassing the concrete floor all together.
They have sent robots in to locate the coriums. The robots died due to the radiation. It will be years before they can even get close to the coriums.
Meanwhile the ocean is more radioactive than ever as the groundwater flows thru the coriums. You seem to be making the claim that the 3 coriums are somehow contained, when the evidence says just the opposite.
Your wild propaganda protecting the polluters is not useful to making sure our world does not become wholly nuked. Which, indeed, is my crusade. You should join.
JayhawkSD
(3,163 posts)The floor of the reactor building is not gravel. It is solid concrete, very thick with heavy steel reinforcement. It has drainage below and around it, but that is irrelevant to the settlement of the corium. The cor melted through the bottom of the reactor and then cooled sufficiently to become solid as it came to rest on the bottom of the reactor building. This is precisely what the building was designed to do.
The robots could not reach the reactor vessels, let alone the wreckage and debris beneath the reactor vessels, because the wreckage was impassable, and yes, the robots dies due to radiation. Where is the radiation coming from is the core "ran off through the drainage gravel and disappeared deep underground" as you claim? Residual radiation would not be that high.
They are pouring huge amounts of water onto the melted cores, which are stil into the buildings, in order to keep them cool and that water is running into the drainage ditches since the building is not waterproof. The floor is, but the water is running out the sides where the drainage is. That water is radioactive and is contaminating the groundwater and draining into the ocean.
I am not promoting nuclear power, and in fact oppose it because of the unavailability of waste disposal. But I am not a hysterical crusader who will rant nonsense to espouse my cause. I would add that I opposed the licensing of this type of reactor from the beginning. PWR reactors are far more robust and I felt that the BWR was a false economy and should not have been permitted.
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)That I am a hysterical crusader?
But then you misquote me? And you end up saying what I have said: water is flowing over the corium, becoming contaminated and flowing into the ocean. You are the one making the claim you know where the corium is, i claim we don't know.
So, there it is. With your errors, false claims and personal slam on me, all i can say is it would be wise to more carefully consider your comments. I am not the one to blame for Fukushima and the pollution. So climb down, and instead of going after me, go after the polluters, would be my advice.
