2011 Japanese Earthquake and Tsunami - News and Analysis

[chaanakya]

TEPCO confirms damage to part of No. 4 unit's spent nuke fuel
TOKYO, April 14, Kyodo

Some of the spent nuclear fuel rods stored in the No. 4 reactor building of the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi power plant were confirmed to be damaged, but most of them are believed to be in sound condition, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Wednesday.

The firm known as TEPCO said its analysis of a 400-milliliter water sample taken Tuesday from the No. 4 unit's spent nuclear fuel pool revealed the damage to some fuel rods in such a pool for the first time, as it detected higher-than-usual levels of radioactive iodine-131, cesium-134 and cesium-137.

The No. 4 reactor, halted for a regular inspection before last month's earthquake and tsunami disaster, had all of its 1,331 spent fuel rods and 204 unused fuel rods stored in the pool for the maintenance work and the fuel was feared to have sustained damage from overheating.

The cooling period for 548 of the 1,331 rods was shorter than that for others and the volume of decay heat emitted from the fuel in the No. 4 unit pool is larger compared with pools at other reactor buildings.

According to TEPCO, radioactive iodine-131 amounting to 220 becquerels per cubic centimeter, cesium-134 of 88 becquerels and cesium-137 of 93 becquerels were detected in the pool water. Those substances are generated by nuclear fission.

The government's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said the confirmed radioactive materials were up to 100,000 times higher than normal but that the higher readings may have also been caused by the pouring of rainwater containing much radioactivity or particles of radiation-emitting rubble in the pool.

The roof and the upper walls of the No. 4 reactor building have been blown away by a hydrogen explosion and damaged by fires since the disaster struck the plant. The water level in the spent fuel pool is believed to have temporarily dropped.

TEPCO said the fuel rods may have also been damaged by steel frames that fell into the pool in addition to overheating caused by the loss of cooling functions after the twin disasters.

The utility plans to examine the condition of the plant's reactor buildings by deploying a small unmanned helicopter to see whether it is possible to extract spent fuel from pools.

The nuclear agency said now that the condition of the No. 4 unit pool is partially known, workers can better prepare for recovery works there.

Earlier in the day, the government's nuclear regulatory agency ordered TEPCO to check the quake resistance of reactor buildings at the Fukushima plant, which have been rocked by strong aftershocks from the magnitude-9.0 earthquake that wrecked the site and triggered tsunami on March 11.

The agency told the utility to immediately examine the buildings and consider reinforcement work if they are judged as not sufficiently quakeproof.

In addition to the No. 4 unit, the Nos. 1 and 3 reactor buildings have also been severely damaged by hydrogen explosions in the early days of the crisis.

''As strong aftershocks occur almost daily, we have to consider what will happen to buildings already damaged by blasts,'' said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the nuclear agency.

He acknowledged the difficulties involved in the work to reinforce the quake resistance of the buildings, where radiation levels are high, but said, ''We must devise some ways.'' The agency urged TEPCO to report back to it on the matter as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Yoko Komiyama, senior vice minister of health, labor and welfare, said Wednesday at a Diet session that a total of 22 workers at the plant have been exposed to radiation exceeding 100 millisieverts as of early Wednesday and that the highest level of exposure among them is 198.24 millisieverts.

Exposure to 100 millisieverts is the permissible level for nuclear plant workers dealing with an emergency, but the limit has been raised to 250 millisieverts for the ongoing crisis.

Workers continued Wednesday to remove highly radioactive water in the plant as part of efforts to put an end to the emergency, which is now acknowledged as one of the world's worst nuclear disasters.

TEPCO had pumped out 700 tons of highly polluted water by Wednesday evening from an underground tunnel-like trench to a ''condenser,'' where in normal operations steam from the reactor is converted into water.

Eventually, the operator plans to remove a total of 60,000 tons of contaminated water, found in the basements of the Nos. 1 to 3 reactor turbine buildings as well as the trenches connected to them, and to store it in nearby tanks and other areas.

As a result of the operation, the level of highly radioactive water that had been filling up the trench connected to the No. 2 reactor's turbine building was lowered. Nishiyama said it will likely take several weeks before the tainted water removal operation ends.

The highly toxic water is believed to originate from the No. 2 reactor's core, where fuel rods have partially melted. The water, which has also affected other parts of the plant, is hampering efforts to restore the reactors' key cooling functions, lost in the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

The nuclear agency also said TEPCO has installed three steel sheets near a seawater intake for the No. 2 reactor and set up ''silt fence'' curtain barriers near intakes for the Nos. 3-4 reactors at the six-reactor plant to block the spread of radioactive substances in water.

Massive amounts of water have been poured into the reactors and their spent nuclear fuel pools as a stopgap measure to cool them down at the Fukushima plant.

But pools of contaminated water have been detected in various parts of the nuclear complex on the Pacific coast, with some water leaking into the sea, as an apparent side effect of the emergency measure. TEPCO successfully stopped the leak of highly radioactive water from a cracked pit on April 6.

==Kyodo

[Lalmohan]

ok, i was asleep during chemistry madrasah... is it possible to filter out or chemically precipitate the radio active materials in the tons of cooling water in the various trenches and store them as a slurry/sludge in a smaller space?

[ramana]

YEAH. its called zeolite process which exchanges ions and traps the bad stuff and evaporate the de-ionized water in ponds. The bad stuff gets quarantined.

[Lalmohan]

so i expect its a second order activity once the crisis is under control?

[Amber G.]

Unit 3 spent fuel pool in happier times... (about a year old photo)

[ramana]

AmberG, Why are they switching units for radiations? Early on it was Sievert(Milli etc) now its Bqs. Why?

In my days, it was rads and rems.

[Amber G.]

They measure different things..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ionizing_radiation_units
Activity: (old unit Curie, Now Bq) (Just how many particles are emitted)
(1 Ci = 37 billion Bq )

Exposure: (Only for X-rays or gamma rays)
Old unit roentgen (R) (Measures Ionization)
New : None (One can use coulomb/Kg, if one wants to)

Absorbed dose: (Energy absorbed / Kg)
Old unit Rad ... New unit: Gray (=100 rad) ( 1 Rad is about 1 Roentgen in air or about .9 or something like that - for practical purpose - this is, of course true only for gamma rays)

Biological effect: (Absorbed dose * factor of harm it will do)
Old Unit Rem .. New unit Sievert (=100 rem)

Total body dose (or equivalent dose etc): averaged over whole body taking proper weight to organs etc..
Sv. (This is used as a rough measure of chance that one will develop cancer in later part of the life)

(Of course, other derived units eg rate: as Sv/Hr etc etc...)

[abhishek_sharma]

A little knowledge: The Japanese authorities have done well in releasing copious amounts of crude data on the nuclear crisis. But it is imperative for the data to be provided in more meaningful and user-friendly ways.

Nature 472, 135 (14 April 2011)

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v4 ... 2135a.html

One month after the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan, there is still no clear picture of the further hazard posed by the wrecked nuclear reactors and spent fuel ponds at the Fukushima nuclear power plant (see page 146), and monitoring of fallout remains patchy. To improve the situation, better data, in more user-friendly forms, and more sophisticated analyses are essential. Compared with the 1979 Three Mile Island accident or the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, there is certainly much more information available about this latest nuclear accident — largely thanks to the Internet and online media. Japan's science ministry, and other bodies, have issued reams of data, including daily environmental radiation measurements — an admirable feat, given that the Japanese authorities are also having to deal with the huge aftermath of the quake and tsunami.

But as Peter Sandman, a risk consultant based in Princeton, New Jersey (http://www.psandman.com/whatsnew.htm), points out, the authorities have failed badly to forewarn the public of a series of events that they must have known were likely to happen. This has resulted in nasty surprises such as radioactive pollution of the sea (see page 145), foods and tap water — as well as this week's upgrading of the accident to level 7, the highest on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale and matched only by Chernobyl. As a result, many people now do not trust the authorities to tell them if the situation is likely to worsen, sapping public confidence.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), which runs the Fukushima plant, has also on at least four occasions had to retract as incorrect its findings on the amount and composition of radionuclides in areas in and around the plant, or on reactor parameters. This has created uncertainty and public mistrust in the company's monitoring abilities. In its defence, damaged plant instrumentation means that key data on events inside the reactors are sometimes missing or unreliable. Even so, the most complete and credible publicly available analyses of possible reactor-event scenarios have come not from Japan, but from outside scientists, nuclear-reactor makers and regulatory authorities.

Similarly, it is pertinent to ask why, so far, the only detailed publicly available forecasts of the direction and concentration of atmospheric radionuclide plumes have come from overseas agencies. The Japanese almost certainly have data that would allow much higher-resolution forecast maps of Fukushima and the surrounding areas. Although the Japanese authorities are releasing data daily on radiation levels in the air, soil and water, these are scattered across multiple, individual web pages. This uncoordinated approach was excusable in the early days, but data collection and presentation urgently need to improve. The authorities have also failed to provide vital context on how these exposure rates translate (or not) into what matters to people, such as health effects, and where they make farming impossible. The recurring narrative that this or that radiation dose is as much as would be given by an X-ray or a CT scan doesn't cut it, as health effects, for example, depend most on accumulated doses over long times.

Information on fallout distribution made public by the government and TEPCO also lacks basic metadata, such as the latitude and longitude of sampling points or the sampling protocols used, and results are presented as static PDFs from which researchers cannot easily extract the data. As a result, it is next to impossible for academic researchers and others to compile and map the daily reports and gain a better picture of the situation and of changes over time and space. The Japanese authorities, the International Atomic Energy Agency and other bodies with relevant information must present it as dynamic data and high-resolution maps that also show day-to-day variation, total net cumulative soil deposition and where hotspots are, and as models of what's happening overall rather than just spot counts.

Data analysis should also not be left to governments alone. Researchers are rightly calling for an independent group to process the data and publish evidence-based risk assessments. They also want data in machine-readable formats, such as spreadsheets, databases and spatial data formats. This would unleash the diverse creativity of academic researchers, journalists, software geeks and mappers, who are often better equipped, and more agile than governments and international agencies, to present data online in timely, informative and compelling ways. To convert raw data into high-quality, user-friendly forms is not a luxury, but essential for helping to build public trust.

Shake-up time for Japanese seismology

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/va ... 10105.html

Summary

The Japanese government should admit to the public that earthquakes cannot be reliably predicted.

Use of the misleading term 'Tokai earthquake' should cease.

The 1978 Large-Scale Earthquake Countermeasures Act should be repealed.

For the past 20 years or so, some seismologists in Japan have warned of the seismic and tsunami hazards to the safety of nuclear power plants, most notably Katsuhiko Ishibashi, now professor emeritus at Kobe University. Their warnings went unheeded. Yet in the immediate aftermath of the magnitude-9.1 earthquake that struck Tohoku on 11 March, pundits could be found on many Japanese TV stations saying that it was “unforeseeable”.

The 'foreseen' earthquakes were presumably the hypothetical future earthquakes used by the Japanese government to produce national seismic hazard maps for Japan1. The modellers assume that 'characteristic earthquakes' exist for various zones, choose the fault parameters for each zone as the input to their model, and then produce probabilistic hazard maps.


Online collection

Although such maps may seem authoritative, a model is just a model until the methods used to produce it have been verified. The regions assessed as most dangerous are the zones of three hypothetical 'scenario earthquakes' (Tokai, Tonankai and Nankai; see map). However, since 1979, earthquakes that caused 10 or more fatalities in Japan actually occurred in places assigned a relatively low probability. This discrepancy — the latest in a string of negative results for the characteristic earthquake model and its cousin, the seismic-gap model2, 3, 4 — strongly suggests that the hazard map and the methods used to produce it are flawed and should be discarded.

Globally, in the past 100 years, there have been five subduction-zone earthquakes of magnitude 9 or greater (Kamchatka 1952, Chile 1960, Alaska 1964, Sumatra 2004, Tohoku 2011), which suggests that the upper limit on the possible size of a subduction-zone earthquake may not much depend on the details of the subduction modality5. Large tsunamis have frequently struck the Pacific coast of the Tohoku district. The well-documented 1896 Sanriku tsunami had a maximum height of 38 metres and caused more than 22,000 deaths. The 869 Jogan tsunami is documented to have had a height roughly comparable to, or perhaps slightly less than, that of the 11 March tsunami.



If global seismicity and the historical record in Tohoku had been used as the basis for estimating seismic hazards, the 11 March Tohoku earthquake could easily have been 'foreseen' in a general way, although not of course its particular time, epicentre or magnitude. Countermeasures for dealing with such events could and should have been incorporated in the initial design of the Fukushima nuclear power plants.

The 'Tokai earthquake'

In the 1960s, plate tectonics became generally accepted as the fundamental paradigm of solid-Earth geoscience. Researchers in several countries made efforts to combine plate tectonics with seismicity data to make long-term forecasts of large earthquakes. The idea was very simple. It was hypothesized that zones where no large earthquakes had occurred for a while, dubbed 'seismic gaps', were ripe for imminent large events. However, the seismic-gap hypothesis failed the test of reality2. Over tens of thousands of years or longer, the net slip released by earthquakes and aseismic slip must match net inter-plate motion. But we now know that this catching-up process does not occur regularly or cyclically, as is further underscored by the 11 March earthquake.

In the mid-1970s, when enthusiasm for the seismic-gap model was still widespread in the global geoscience community, several researchers in Japan proposed that the plate boundary off the Tokai district was a seismic gap where a magnitude-8 earthquake could be expected6. The neighbouring Tonankai and Nankai districts were also labelled as being seismic gaps7. No large earthquake has occurred in any of these districts since 1975, but they are still classified as the most hazardous regions in the country by the Japanese government (see map).

Over the past 30 years or so, government spokesmen and university scientists associated with the government's Headquarters for Earthquake Research Promotion (or its various predecessors) have used the term 'Tokai earthquake' so often that the public and news media have come to view it as a 'real earthquake' rather than merely an arbitrary scenario (1.78 million hits in a Japanese-language Google search). This misleads the public into believing that the clock is ticking down inexorably on a magnitude-8 earthquake that is certain to strike the Tokai district in the near future. Use of the term 'Tokai earthquake' (and its companions 'Tonankai earthquake' and 'Nankai earthquake') should therefore cease.

Unpredictable earthquakes

Throughout most of seismological history, the prediction of earthquakes hours or days in advance has, for good reason, been regarded with great scepticism8 (see http://go.nature.com/ahc6nx). However, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, several studies, initially by researchers in the Soviet Union, and followed by similarly positive studies from major US institutions, led to a burst of optimism. The editors of Nature wrote in 1973 that the “situation is in some ways similar to that in 1939 when nuclear fission suddenly became a reality”9. Positive results were also published at roughly the same time in Science and some leading speciality journals.

The positive reports were based on claims to have observed 'precursors' of earthquakes. For example, some studies of the type discussed in Nature's 1973 article claimed to have observed decreases of 10–20% in crustal seismic velocities before earthquakes, with the return of the velocities to their normal values being the sign that an earthquake was imminent. But the 1976 earthquake in Tangshan, China, which caused a reported 240,000 fatalities, was not predicted, and by the late 1970s it had become clear to most researchers that the supposed precursors were artefacts. The prediction boom then largely died out, but like many similar examples (such as polywater and cold fusion), die-hard holdouts in several countries continue to make precursor claims.

Baseless prediction law

By the mid-1970s, public discussion of the supposedly imminent Tokai earthquake reached quasi-panic levels. This was exploited by the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) and university scientists, who persuaded the Japanese parliament to enact the Large-Scale Earthquake Countermeasures Act (LECA) in 1978. This law in effect requires the JMA to operate a 24/7 monitoring system to detect precursors indicating that the 'Tokai earthquake' (see map) will occur within up to three days. If and when signals thought to be precursors are ever observed, a panel of five geophysicists will review the data, the JMA director will inform the prime minister, and the cabinet will then declare a state of emergency, which will stop almost all activity in a wide area around the Tokai district.


This law, which has no precedent in any other country, presumes of course that reliable precursors exist. In particular, on the basis of one report of a geodetic precursor of an earthquake in Japan in 1944 (see Fig. 2 in ref. 6), geodetic slip is the main target of the JMA observations. The 1944 data, taken far from the epicentral region, were interpreted as possibly suggesting uplift of a few centimetres due to slow slip on a deep part of the fault shortly before the main shock. Unfortunately, the data were measured using antiquated surveying techniques, and are subject to considerable uncertainty. Nothing of this type has ever been observed using Global Positioning System devices or other modern measurement techniques. A famous report of a supposed geodetic precursor, the 'Palmdale Bulge', in the United States in the 1970s was later shown to be an artefact8.

Basing even a large-scale programme of observational research on the 1944 data would be uncalled for. It beggars belief, then, that the Japanese government operates a legally binding earthquake-prediction system on this basis. The JMA's official home page says (author's translation): “At present the only place a system for predicting earthquakes exists is for a magnitude-8 earthquake with an epicenter offshore Suruga Bay, i.e. the 'Tokai earthquake'. Science and technology have not progressed sufficiently to allow other earthquakes to be predicted.” But there are many more observatories now than in 1978. If it really were possible to predict the 'Tokai earthquake' then, surely it would be possible to predict all magnitude-8 earthquakes now.

Time for openness

How is it that the Tokai prediction system has been in place for more than 30 years, with barely a whimper from most mainstream Japanese seismologists? The reasons for this silence are complex. First, many researchers have been co-opted in various ways (such as with funding and committee memberships). Second, government decisions are nominally reviewed, but review panels are chosen by bureaucrats of the agency being reviewed. Third, cogent criticisms do get reported by print media, but are usually ignored by broadcasters, so critics don't get much traction. Fourth, through the 'press club' system, the government pipes its views directly into the media, often through reporters lacking in scientific knowledge. Finally, as long as the LECA stays on the books, the government can claim that it is obligated by law to try to predict the Tokai earthquake.

It is time to tell the public frankly that earthquakes cannot be predicted, to scrap the Tokai prediction system and to repeal the LECA. All of Japan is at risk from earthquakes, and the present state of seismological science does not allow us to reliably differentiate the risk level in particular geographic areas. We should instead tell the public and the government to 'prepare for the unexpected'10 and do our best to communicate both what we know and what we do not. And future basic research in seismology must be soundly based on physics, impartially reviewed, and be led by Japan's top scientists rather than by faceless bureaucrats.

[Amber G.]

I'm talking about airborne radiation not surface burns.

Also there is a huge difference between a surgeons scalpel and a random stab wound. Difference between killing healthy tissue and diseased tissue.

What exactly is "airborne radiation?" .... And, to put it mildly, no one was talking about 'surface burns' ... (we are not likely to see surface burns.. or even feel something.. if we get 10-20 Sv radiation on feet.)

It is a common misconception but radiation risks are not akin to 'random stab' wound or 'surgeons scalpel' .. the calculations which goes into risk calculation due to radiation treatment (additional cancer risk) is actually very similar. Hospitals can monitor and mitigate risk due to low blood count (or defective immune system)etc.. but long term effects are same. (This is why, so much effort goes into finding the effective minimum dose, delivered at the right place - smallest possible equivalent total body dose - is important...


To clear another apparent misconception: Small dose of radiation (say 1 mSv) does not damage a cell like higher radiation does, in the sense that one cannot measure the effect by direct means. Hence the difficulty in predicting the risks.. While it may be prudent to go on the side of caution and take worse case scenario (assume no threshold, and linear model) to set limits but it is quite different to put those values as scientific facts.

Hth

Follow up on those workers from IAEA site:

NISA reported on 12th April that the three workers who had previously been exposed to high dose rates while working in the turbine building of Unit 3 have undergone further medical checks. No negative outcomes were identified. In the case of the two workers who received doses of a few Sievert to their legs as a result of walking in contaminated water, medical tests showed no evidence of either skin burns or erythema.

This was exactly consistent with what I was saying.. few sV's on a limb is not going to cause radiation burn ... effective whole body radiation would be still be less than 250 mSV..

[Theo_Fidel]

YEAH. its called zeolite process which exchanges ions and traps the bad stuff and evaporate the de-ionized water in ponds. The bad stuff gets quarantined.

Really! There has go to be a better way that letting it evaporate in the open. If the water has no contaminants left why evaporate at all.

[chaanakya]

Govt may have other utilities share TEPCO's compensation burden
The Yomiuri Shimbun

The government is considering a plan to form a mutual aid system that would include Tokyo Electric Power Co. and all other power companies in the nation to pay compensation to people who suffered from the nuclear accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, it has been learned.

The mutual aid system is modeled after the compensation program established for damage caused by the 1979 nuclear accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear power station in the United States.

According to the government's draft plan, each power company might be assessed 30 billion yen to 50 billion yen for each of their nuclear reactors, though the actual amount could be negotiated later.

TEPCO, the operator of the crippled nuclear plant, would be required to pay as much as 2 trillion yen to 3.8 trillion yen in total, including its contribution to the system plus other obligations.

Compensation in excess of the total amount borne by the power companies would be fully covered by the government, according to the draft plan.

The government is considering the creation of a special law to establish the compensation program, sources said. The government and TEPCO will soon start talks over how to pay for the damages.

According to the draft plan, TEPCO would pay 100 billion yen to 200 billion yen every year from its annual profit for 15 years to pay for damages. In addition, it would pay 510 billion yen to 850 billion yen for the mutual aid program, representing the charge assessed for its 17 nuclear reactors.

The other power companies own a total of 37 nuclear reactors around Japan. Each company will pay a charge based on the number of nuclear reactors it owns. The total charges borne by the nation's nine power companies would be 1.1 trillion yen to 1.8 trillion yen.

The government will shoulder up to 240 billion yen based on the Law on Compensation for Nuclear Damages. In addition, if the total compensation required exceeds the amount shouldered by the utilities, the excess would be fully covered by the government, according to the draft plan.

However, power companies not related to the crippled Fukushima plant are likely to protest strongly if they are required to share the compensation burden with TEPCO.

(Apr. 14, 2011)

[chaanakya]

Disassembly of N-reactors a joint effort? / Toshiba seeks cooperation of rival Hitachi

Gone with the Wind, finally a ten year epic decommissioning plan seems to be taking shape.Fukushima may still be inhabited by some thousands of technicians etc involved in decommissioning while original residents who were evacuated would resettle elsewhere while becoming Nuclear IDP,

Of the six nuclear reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, the Nos. 1 to 4 reactors need to be decommissioned. It is the first time in the world for four reactors to face such severe trouble simultaneously.

The No. 1 reactor was manufactured by General Electric Co., the No. 2 by GE and Toshiba, the No. 3 by Toshiba and the No. 4 by Hitachi.

Toshiba has called for Hitachi to decommission the reactors jointly, as the difficult task may face rough going in the aftermath of hydrogen explosions that occurred at the Nos. 1 and 3 reactors.

Hitachi has reportedly shown a positive stance on a joint decommissioning project with Toshiba. Even if the plan is realized, the work will take at least 10 years.

On April 4, Toshiba made a proposal on decommissioning to TEPCO, jointly with four U.S. companies, including its subsidiary Westinghouse Electric Co. Under that plan, the decommissioning work would be completed in about 10 years at the earliest.

Specifically, the work of cooling the interior of the overheated reactors and removing debris would be done in the next six months, while the following five years would be spent on removing fuel rods from the reactor and spent fuel rods from a storage pool. In the final five years, the buildings housing the reactors and other equipment would be dismantled, along with the reactors themselves, while the contaminated ground would undergo soil improvement and the whole lot would be left vacant.

Development of German-style eco-town eyed after nuclear crisis

TOKYO, April 13, Kyodo

Prime Minister Naoto Kan is considering developing an environmentally friendly town with a population of about 50,000 to 100,000 in the event residents need to leave their homes near the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant for many years, a person close to the premier said Wednesday.

Kan is thinking of designing a downtown area ''modeled on a German garden city,'' Kenichi Matsumoto, a renowned writer who serves as a special adviser to the Cabinet, told reporters after a meeting with the premier.

While no luck for Fukushima Laconium, we could have Davis Besse Laconium though, pools are irreparably damaged.

http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201104130196.html

The buildings housing the Fukushima plant's No. 1, No. 3 and No. 4 reactors have all been damaged, leaving storage pools exposed, and equipment normally used in the removal process may also have been knocked out by the explosions.

High levels of radiation are also likely to prove a major obstacle to the removal effort, which sources said TEPCO has been formulating since March.

Water was collected from the No. 4 reactor storage pool on Tuesday to check on the condition of the spent fuel rods. The No. 4 reactor is of particular concern to TEPCO officials.
<snip>

A major difference between the two accidents, however, is that the reactor building at Three Mile Island was not damaged. The wrecked buildings at Fukushima have led to high radiation levels on the plant site.

A TEPCO executive said, "It will be impossible to conduct the work now because of the high radiation levels."

An official with the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said of the plan: "It cannot be carried out unless radiation levels fall to a point that ensures the safety of the workers."

Some TEPCO officials say the removal of the spent fuel rods could take several years.

[chaanakya]

WHO says there is no effect on public health since no public is left inside evacuation zone

GENEVA/VIENNA--An increase in the severity level of Japan's nuclear accident does not mean the public health risk is any worse or that the disaster resembles Chernobyl in 1986, global expert bodies said on Tuesday.

"Our public health assessment is the same today as it was yesterday," World Health Organization spokesman Gregory Hartl told Reuters, explaining that the higher rating was the result of combining the amounts of radiation leaking from three reactors and counting them as a single incident.

"At the moment there is very little public health risk outside the 30-km (evacuation) zone."

Hartl said the Japanese authorities now had much more information than in the immediate aftermath of the disastrous quake and tsunami that smashed the Fukushima plant in northeast Japan on March 11.

"They are looking at the cumulative dose, but again this is at the reactor itself," he said. "Remember there is no one left ... around the reactor, it has been evacuated."

While we need to keep watch over public health issues for next 20 years , WHO says

The World Health Organization says there is no need for new public health measures against the nuclear incident at the Fukushima nuclear plant at the moment. But it says studies may be needed to keep watch over public health for up to 20 years.

WHO Director of Public Health and the Environment Maria Neira held a news conference on Wednesday after the Japanese government raised the severity level of the nuclear accident to a maximum 7 on the international scale.

She said that public health measures taken by the Japanese government, including enforcing an evacuation zone and relocating nearby residents, are appropriate.

But she also said the organization will need to reassess the situation almost on an hourly basis, because the situation is not yet under control.

Neira said studies will have to be conducted over the next 10 to 20 years, to keep a watch over any public health issues.

[GuruPrabhu]

Govt may have other utilities share TEPCO's compensation burden

This is a brilliant plan! Congratulations to the Japanese for pulling off a sensible compromise.

[chaanakya]

Child-rearing benefits face ax / Handouts to be abolished to free up funds for quake reconstruction
The Yomiuri Shimbun

The government and the ruling Democratic Party of Japan are set to abolish the child-rearing allowance system in October, which could free up some of the huge funds needed for earthquake disaster reconstruction efforts, according to sources.

The current stopgap legislation maintains the payment of 13,000 yen per month for each child through September. The government and the DPJ have begun coordinating on legislative moves to abolish the system when the period expires, having judged it would be difficult to secure fiscal resources to finance the allowances after last month's Great East Japan Earthquake, the sources said.

Child benefits, however, would continue based on the previous system of dependent child allowances with income caps, introduced during the administration of the Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner New Komeito, with some modifications, according to the sources.

The DPJ-led administration, which came to power in 2009, introduced the child-rearing allowance system in 2010 under a law enacted as temporary legislation effective for fiscal 2010.

For this fiscal year, the government submitted a bill to the current Diet session to raise the amount of payments for households with children under 3 years old to 20,000 yen per month. But it gave up on efforts to enact the legislation due to resistance from the opposition camp.

With support from the opposition Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party, the government passed the stopgap legislation to keep the same level of payments from last fiscal year through September.

However, the government and the DPJ have decided to give priority to disaster reconstruction funding. Continuing the current payment system after September would cost about 1.1 trillion yen, the sources said.

If and when the current child allowance system is abolished or allowed to expire, the previous system of income-capped dependent child allowances, based on a permanent law, would automatically be reinstated.

Komeito, which wants the previous system revived, has proposed modifying the system, such as uniformly setting payments at 10,000 yen per month and imposing no income caps on residents in disaster-hit areas. Under the previous system, the payments were 5,000 yen or 10,000 yen per child depending on certain conditions regarding the age and number of children targeted. The Komeito proposal is expected to cost about 600 billion yen.

The government and the DPJ are considering using the Komeito proposal as a basis and allocating the other 500 billion yen in a second supplementary budget for this fiscal year, which is expected to be devoted exclusively to disaster reconstruction measures.

Some DPJ executive board members are even calling for a shift to the previous system before October, to curb the issuance of deficit-covering government bonds in the envisaged second extra budget.

[Sanku]

^^^ That should have a bad affect on the already severe demographic situation.

[GuruPrabhu]

This is a brilliant plan! Congratulations to the Japanese for pulling off a sensible compromise.

Not sure if you're being sarcastic, but that is akin to asking Indigo and Spicejet to bear the fuel bills of Air India.

No, it is like asking all the airlines to share the burden of Air Traffic Contollers.

[Sanku]

Not sure if you're being sarcastic, but that is akin to asking Indigo and Spicejet to bear the fuel bills of Air India.

No, it is like asking all the airlines to share the burden of Air Traffic Contollers.

No its like asking Air India to pay for buying routes at exorbitant amount without letting them buy aircraft to fly it and then selling it to Indigo cheap.

In short a well known scam.

[Sanku]

Some more statements of the obvious.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... month.html

Japan's Nuclear Plant Operators Admit No Blueprint to Solve Crisis after a Month

Operators of Japan's damaged nuclear power plant admitted yesterday (WED) that they had not come up with a blueprint to end the nuclear crisis more than a month after it began.

Radiation levels in the sea surrounding the nuclear power plant in northeast Japan were reported to have doubled to 23 times above the legal limit in the latest tests off nearby Minamisoma city.

[arnab]

^^^ Yeah I don' know why the media bothers anymore Apprently a reporter asked 'Do you have a masterplan to solve the nuke crisis yet'? To which an obvious answer is - No, we are doing it slowly, step by step. This of course gets screamed out as 'TEPCO has no blue print to solve problems' !!

Alternatively they could have declared it a scale 7 disaster on day 3 and basked in the laurels of 'transparency'

[Sanku]

^^^ Yeah I don' know why the media bothers anymore Apprently a reporter asked 'Do you have a masterplan to solve the nuke crisis yet'? To which an obvious answer is - No, we are doing it slowly, step by step. This of course gets screamed out as 'TEPCO has no blue print to solve problems' !!

Unfortunately, it took them a month to say the obvious, till now, "We have everything in control no worries was the line.

Alternatively they could have declared it a scale 7 disaster on day 3 and basked in the laurels of 'transparency'

That would not be a bad idea. They would have a iota of credibility left.

[arnab]

"We have everything in control no worries was the line.

Proof please?

That would not be a bad idea. They would have a iota of credibility left

How so? Now the Russians are saying it is not a scale 7 (but probably between 5 and 6. They should know!!). TEPCO is doing it to get out of insurance liability. How would calling it a scale 7 disaster without investigation make it more 'credible' and 'transparent'?

[Sanku]

"We have everything in control no worries was the line.

Proof please?

That would not be a bad idea. They would have a iota of credibility left

How so? Now the Russians are saying it is not a scale 7 (but probably between 5 and 6. They should know!!). TEPCO is doing it to get out of insurance liability. How would calling it a scale 7 disaster without investigation make it more 'credible' and 'transparent'?[/quote]

Why dont you actually read the reports posted on this thead?

Sorry, go back and read the first few pages of the post, when the entire "all izz well" drama followed by howls of protest started.

When did the French say it was 6?

They put their credibility on line too right (and came out tops, unlike "all izz well' folks) -- go ahead search for "sanku" on this this thread and this time read the reports posted starting a month back.

[amit]

go ahead search for "sanku" on this this thread and this time read the reports posted starting a month back.

Err Sanku, I don't think that would be a good idea!

[arnab]

Sorry, go back and read the first few pages of the post, when the entire "all izz well" drama followed by howls of protest started.

When did the French say it was 6?

They put their credibility on line too right (and came out tops, unlike "all izz well' folks) -- go ahead search for "sanku" on this this thread and this time read the reports posted starting a month back.

Please show me a reference to 'All is well, we have everything under control'

[Lalmohan]

catherine zeta jones is suffering from bipolar disorder
amazing how common this affliction is...

[Sanku]

Please show me a reference to 'All is well, we have everything under control'

With all due respect arnab, you should have done it yourself.

Hows this.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2 ... nformation

Note date line

Meltdowns and Misinformation
What do we actually know about Japan's nuclear crisis?
BY JOSEPH CIRINCIONE | MARCH 18, 2011

To state the obvious, the nuclear crisis in Japan is bad and will get worse. Despite the heroic efforts of the remaining workers at the nuclear complex, it seems likely that two reactor cores will melt down and two spent fuel ponds will ignite, spewing radioactivity into the ground, air, and water

It might be tempting to blame hysterical media coverage for this reaction, but in this case, most coverage I've seen has actually been fairly sober and cautious

The bigger problem has been the overly optimistic scenarios and conflicting information released by Japanese authorities. The public, not only in Japan but worldwide, simply no longer believes those in authority who tell them they are not in danger. This will make it difficult to manage the public response to the crisis going forward and may pose a grave risk for the future of the nuclear industry.

In an effort, perhaps, to keep the public calm, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) which owns the reactors, and the Japanese government which regulates them have limited the information released and constantly portrayed the situation as under control. The facts have spoken otherwise. The widening gap has now triggered a collapse of confidence on the part of the Japanese public and, it appears, the U.S. government. Brookings Institution scholar Daniel Kaufmann notes that TEPCO "infuriated Japan's prime minister, who learned of the first plant explosion at reactor 1 on Saturday from watching TV." In the early days of the crisis, TEPCO officials denied that water levels had fallen in reactors and fuel storage pools, but hours later announced extraordinary measures to pump new water in.

Please, please please, don't ask rhetorical questions.

[amit]

Talking about Foreign Policy Magazine, it also published a very interesting interview with Stewart Brand on March 22. In case you're wondering who Brand is, here's what FP says:

In 2005, Stewart Brand, then four decades into his career as a countercultural gadfly, environmental thinker, and futurist, published an attention-grabbing essay in MIT Technology Review called "Environmental Heresies". Brand argued that in order to achieve the aims of ecological sustainability that he had advocated in the Whole Earth Catalog, the hippie omnium gatherum and Boomer cultural touchstone Brand began publishing in 1968, environmentalists would have to rethink a number of their core beliefs -- including the movement's historic aversion to nuclear power.

Folks read it in full. And please note he's not a nooklear lobby expert but an environmentalist.

SB: What hasn't changed is climate vulnerability and growing economic needs, especially in the developing world for clean, base-load electricity. And we're learning some important new stuff on levels of safety under exceptional duress, which is what happened in Japan. I expect there will be a fair amount of review of safety procedures, equipment, training, and whatnot. And this will be an experience in the industry that everybody will be learning from, much as Three Mile Island was and to some extent Chernobyl was.

The main event, the century-size problem we're looking at, is climate change. {Sounds familiar?} But frankly, if climate were not an issue by now, I would still be saying we need to go nuclear because it is the alternative to coal -- and coal is all by itself such very large-scale, long-term bad news. Billions of people are getting out of poverty in the developing world. For that to go forward, one of the needs and demands they all have is for more electricity. So on those grounds alone I think there is a reason to proceed with nuclear.

FP: Why go nuclear? Why not go with wind farms, or solar, or hydropower?

SB: Hydropower is good. Hydropower is pretty maxed out, but obviously China is still building a lot more dams so those will go forward. Wind power is pretty good. It uses up a lot terrain and so far it is still an inconstant source. Solar, solar thermal, is looking good compared to photovoltaic, which is terrific on roofs and for very local usage like that. The major large-scale use of solar that looks promising right now is solar thermal in places like North Africa where you have a mineral desert where you really don't care if a lot of it is covered with mirrors.

But people have been expecting a Moore's Lawfor solar, and self-accelerating technologies do not apply so far in energy technology. {The expectation that it does is very high on BRF} Solar panels get better, but really, really slowly. Likewise, wind basically got better by getting bigger. Nuclear was unusual in that it was a real step-function change in energy efficiency, similar to moving from burning wood to run civilization to burning coal, and later oil. It took a lot of engineering nuance to get them to really work, but once you did that, you didn't look back. Nuclear is that category of jump. We keep looking for more of those jumps, but they're all incremental.

FP: The incident in Japan has been a crash course in all the things that we worry about with nuclear power. Are those things that you weigh in your calculus when you're looking at this? And, why don't those weigh heavier than some of these other factors?

SB: Well I think it's a crash course for everybody. It sort of reminds me of the energy crisis in '73 when basically civilization as a whole suddenly was forced to look at an X-ray of its own metabolism in terms of our energy uses: where it was coming from, where the vulnerabilities were, how effective cost changes were, things like that. This time I'm noticing in the public media, compared to Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, there's a lot more sophistication: taking technical details seriously, people paying attention to dosage of radiation and realizing that not all radiation is instantly lethal, which I think was the view that was held by many for a long time. {Thanks Amber for trying to hammer precisely this very same point here despite abuse and flak} Also, people are catching on that one of the advantages, I suppose, of radiation as a hazardous [substance] is that it's really easy to measure and really easy to measure accurately.

SB: I think so. I think we're further along. People are catching on that electricity is of the essence and they don't want the lights to go out. And nuclear has been a part of it long enough, with a good enough safety record in most cases, that it's not new and frightening. And climate has forced us to look at the whole portfolio of both dirty energy sources and clean energy sources, {OK, I think I can claim a small bit of credit for trying to say the same thing time and again} and environmentalists are catching on that wind is not free. It's not only a very intermittent, but a rather thin source of energy, so you use up a lot of landscape to get a gigawatt of electricity. The same goes for solar. And they're all more expensive than coal. So the idea of "Don't worry, nuclear can solve all our problems," went away, but it's still part of the portfolio solution.

I think also that [what] we're getting from Japan is some perspective. There was a dam that failed in the Fukushima area and 1,800 homes were apparently damaged or destroyed, washed away. But you don't hear much discussion like, "Well, should we not build any more dams?" Is hydroelectric power now in great danger as a potential source of electricity? {Ok this has been discussed on BRF also with the Tehri example, good to see we're not to far off the mark in our analysis} No. Likewise, there have been petrochemical refinery fires and explosions with horrendous footage and loss of life, as well as major industrial loss. And we're not talking about shutting down refineries because a really severe earthquake can harm them.

[Sanku]

http://enenews.com/japans-nuclear-commi ... byl-totals

Japan’s nuclear commission reveals Fukushima may have emitted more radioactive material than official Chernobyl totals

Important take away

1) This is still all modelling and to great extent -- guess work, the numbers SHOULD NOT be taken as cast in stone and absolute measurements. There is despite best efforts a lot of uncertainty. This should be kept in mind before saying "all iz well, onlee 10%"

2) There is acknowledgment that full information was not revealed before. This should be kept in mind while evaluating current information.

[Lalmohan]

Japan quake: Police search for bodies near plant

More than 300 police in protective gear are searching for bodies.

It is the first time an operation to find those killed by the earthquake and tsunami has been carried out in the 10km (six-mile) zone around the plant.

Police said falling radiation levels had made it possible.

"The search started around 1000 and will continue until sunset," a police spokesman said. "It's difficult to estimate how many people are still missing in the area. We have to go and find them as soon as possible.

[Sanku]

More discussion on ample evidence of large Tsunami's in the past as well as limits of seismological sciences in predicting a large one...

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/ ... IV20110413

Japan's northeast suffered many large past tsunamis

In a commentary in the journal Nature, geophysics professor Robert Geller singled out two tsunamis -- the 38-meter Sanriku tsunami of 1896 that killed 22,000, and the Jogan tsunami of 869 that was comparable in size to the March 11 disaster -- which pummeled the very same Tohoku region in the northeast.

"There were very many documented large tsunamis in that area but the point is ... even one would have been enough to warrant precaution in designing nuclear power plants," Geller, of the Graduate School of Science at the University of Tokyo, said in a telephone interview.

................

"It's known to have happened before and it's well documented and so when they built a nuclear power plant they should have provided for a tsunami of the same size," Geller said.

In his commentary, Geller said the equipment and the science that seismologists now have at their disposal were insufficient to make reliable short-term quake predictions.

"Theoretically we try to make a prediction ... that an earthquake is going to happen in a day or two. In my opinion that system is not scientifically sound and should be terminated," Geller said.

"It's a futile effort. Why should we be pretending to do something that we cannot do?"

"We should instead tell the public and the government to 'prepare for the unexpected' and do our best to communicate both what we know and what we do not know."

key take aways

1) NPPs on Japanese NE seaboard better be prepared to handle 15m+ Tsunami

2) They cant say when or how big the next one will be.

Personally I would say that they should stop playing Japanese roulette with Nuclear power plants at such high risk prone sites and instead manage with what else they can, including cutting down on power requirements through societal changes. Japan is not a country which should flirt with this tech.

[D Roy]

its a simple matter of energy density. uranium has a much much bigger **** than everybody else in terms of energy content. That is why nuclear does so much better in land use.

And one thing about hydropower - small hydro and run of the river is good - 30-50 percent PLF can be achieved.

But something that people just don't understand about pumped storage plants i.e reservoir based plants - they are peaking stations and do not add net energy to the grid on an annual basis. They use more power on a yearly basis to increase the reservoir level than they actually contribute to the grid.

They are used as peaking stations because of their ability to fire up quickly and wind down quickly.

[Lalmohan]

well exactly, pump storage only really works if you have surplus capacity at non-peak demand times
it is conservation in a sense, but far from efficient at a macro level

[D Roy]

Its potential energy that is turned into electrical energy at a time of your choosing. But getting that potential energy itself requires conversion of electrical energy from the grid. And on a net basis the reservoir (PSP) ends up consuming more energy than its generates.

Its purpose is to add installed capacity to the grid. Of course it can also serve as a back-up for intermittent sources as it does for wind in Norway.

But somebody at the macro level has to generate more on a net basis to make this PSP-renewable linkeage viable and that unfortunately is still coal.

On the other hand a new generation of load following nuclear plants can actually help increase the penetration of renewable power in the grid directly and exisiting nuke baseload stations can do that by backing up the grid itself.

You see, when you actually work as a grid manager you realize how difficult it is to operate wind based power. The grid has to be on constant stand by since we are dealing with an intermittent source and has to factor in back-up power for the capacity lost due to intermittency. This is something most of these green kooks don't understand- that grid managers cannot plan on a wishful basis , a certain capacity is planned and it has to be met and the grid frequency maintained or their will be a major trip.

Locally significant trips happen more regularly in Tamil Nadu than any other state in India. There is a reason for that. Just talk to any SLRDC guy and he'll tell you the tales of woe.

[D Roy]

Japan is not a country which should flirt with this tech.

They don't flirt with it. They have the most advanced nuclear engineering sector in the world with japan steel works supplying 80 percent of the reactor pressure vessel market.

Westinghouse is 77 percent owned by Toshiba.

GE-Hitachi has 50-50.

Areva has a major tie-up with Mitsubishi. They lead the world in FBRs and reprocessing technology.

30 per cent of their power comes from nuclear and is a major factor behind their industrial competitiveness. Most high end supply chains originate in Japan.

The BWRs at Fukushima would simply not be built in today's Japan with their active decay heat removing systems. And even those 40 year old plants took a 9.2 hit. It was the Tsunami that did them in as we all know.

[amit]

I suggest folks read the Energy News link kindly provided by Sanku. It provides good entertainment value.

It also shows the pitfalls of being absolutely transparent. All manner of wolves are ready to twist your comments and re-arrange facts. But I suppose there is a readership for this, as is evident from the fact that it is provided as evidence that Fukushima is bigger than Chernobyl on the same page where another report says Russians accuse the Japanese of over reacting by assigning the Level 7.

[Amber G.]

go ahead search for "sanku" on this this thread and this time read the reports posted starting a month back.

Err Sanku, I don't think that would be a good idea!

I did go ahead and did some search, not only in this thread but outside too, not only this month but many months...

Typical comments from outside:
"XXXXX is a baffoon" ( First word edited later, These are not my words, but were used by bloggers who are interested in Indian affairs)
"The whole thread is Sxxxxx-fied" (This is from an eminent Indian scientist, ex brfer, who sits on a nuclear-safety board)
If someone is interested, I can give dozens of reference. One example, just see Maverics blog.

In this thread, virtually all the gyan I see are posts like:
" 17 in serious condition in hospital " ( A demonstrably false statement)
and personal attacks like:

Madarassa math is your specialty; ignorance coupled with blatant foul mouthed hate to India and Indians which you proudly wear on your sleeve.

And of course, colorful phrases which makes the environment hostile like "Almost Virgin" to describe Fukushima core situation.

Never mind , IAEA summary has been consistent with statements like "situation is very serious" .. not many will equate it with "all-iz-well"
/sigh/

Edited later: Some proper names are redacted.

[Amber G.]

It also shows the pitfalls of being absolutely transparent. All manner of wolves are ready to twist your comments and re-arrange facts. But I suppose there is a readership for this, as is evident from the fact that it is provided as evidence that Fukushima is bigger than Chernobyl on the same page where another report says Russians accuse the Japanese of over reacting by assigning the Level 7.

Amit, the danger for aam janata, is that neem-hakims (not necessary in this thread but unfortunately many MSM) totally misunderstand, and then irresponsibly report misleading stories.

For example Daily Mail story (which I linked and commented) was "many (50) inevitably will die within weeks"

Source(s) of that screaming headline:
1) IENS level went up 5, some dork looked it up and noticed, guide-lines said "If there are a few deaths, the level has to be raised to 5" (See the lahori logic. (It does not imply that level 5 means few deaths)

2) One workers mother heard from his son, who told her that "he was ready to die for his country"

Sankuji's reaction (Please check out the thread, for the full context, I am going to be brief but do not want to misrepresent)

After it was already posted and commented by me, he posted the story again!! With screaming headlines!!! and when I politely pointed out the earlier discussion there were about 3 messages, basically accusing me to dishonoring those brave workers who are on the death-bed.

... One can't even make such things up.

[Lalmohan]

I suggest folks read the Energy News link kindly provided by Sanku. It provides good entertainment value.

i couldn't make it past the madrasah maths... but forced myself to get to the comments... i've cut and pasted them on the walls of my gotterdammerung fuhrer bunker where i will make my last stand against the governmint...

[Amber G.]

X-post, may be of interest as some were talking about Russian take on current Japan situation...
Russian-UAE partnership eyes Indian market

Russia's AtomEnergoMash (AEM) and UAE-based Dodsal Group could begin jointly producing nuclear power plant equipment in India following the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU).

The MoU - signed in Dubai following a two-day meeting between the companies – provides for cooperation in the production and supply of power equipment for nuclear power plants, thermal power plants and for the oil and gas industry. It also calls for cooperation in technology transfer and consultancy services. Discussions between the two companies began in May 2010.

AEM - the engineering division of the Russian state nuclear energy company Rosatom - and Dubai-based diversified multinational group of companies Dodsal Group have agreed to set up a manufacturing unit in India with an initial investment of some $150 million. They have targeted the start-up of commercial production at the unit by the first quarter of 2013.

Rajen Kilachand, chairman and CEO of Dodsal, commented: "The memorandum of understanding with AtomEnergoMash is another step for Dodsal Group in expanding its activities in the power sector." He added, "The collaboration between AtomEnergoMash and Dodsal Group will help India implement its ambitious, particularly in the area of projects in the nuclear industry."

Vladimir Kashchenko, director general of AEM, said, "Localisation projects to produce power plant equipment in the most promising regions of the world is part of our strategy to transform AtomEnergoMash into a global energy machine building company."

The MoU with AEM follows the acquisition last month by Dodsal of the former Austrian engineering company AE&E IDEA based in Chennai, India, which it said will be merged into the wider engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) business of the Dodsal Group.