Crippled Fukushima reactor fully exposed for first time since meltdown

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) used an industrial crane to lift the last of its 18 protective panels Thursday. Each of the panels weighs around 20 tons and measure 23 by 17 meters

Fukushima’s Nuclear Plant reactor No. 1 has been fully exposed for the first time since the March 2011 tragedy, after the utility company safely removed the last cover sheet of the temporary protective construction. 

   

Fukushima decommissioning costs soar to at least $24bn.

 

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) used an industrial crane to lift the last of its 18 protective panels Thursday. Each of the panels weighs around 20 tons and measure 23 by 17 meters.
The protective cover was erected in October 2011 as a temporary measure to halt a radiation leak following a meltdown caused by a powerful earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.
The dismantling of the panels started in July 2015 and was concluded on Thursday.





At Unit 1, rubble from the damaged building caused by the hydrogen explosion remains scattered and needs to be removed. The entire site is highly contaminated and will now be covered with tarpaulins to avoid the spread of radioactive waste. TEPCO is using anti-scattering agents to keep the dust down. Small pieces of rubble that can create dust are being vacuumed up while mist sprinklers are being used inside the building to keep radiation under control.

TEPCO next plans to remove 392 fuel assemblies from the spent pool and clean out the melted nuclear fuel from inside the building, NHK news reported. The utility company is assessing the level of radiation before continuing the cleanup process.





Scientists are also installing the necessary equipment to complete fuel extraction which will only start in four years. Fuel removal from Unit 1's depleted fuel pool is scheduled to begin around March 2021, according to TEPCO’s Mid- and Long-Term Roadmap that was revised in June 2015.

In March 2011, a tsunami destroyed emergency generators at the plant. They had been cooling the reactors. The tsunami led to three nuclear meltdowns and the release of radioactive material.
In Reactor 1, overheating caused the creation of hydrogen gas.
On March 12, an explosion in Unit 1 destroyed the upper part of the building.

TEPCO’s decommission plan for the Fukushima nuclear power plant implies at least a 30-40 year period before the consequences of the meltdown are fully eliminated.
So far the clean-up efforts have already cost Japan in excess of $21 billion.

According to the latest estimates from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, the decommissioning costs will top $105 billion. rt

rt

 

Fukushima Radiation Has Contaminated The Entire Pacific Ocean (And It’s Going To Get Worse)

Credit – NOAA
The nuclear disaster has contaminated the world’s largest ocean in only five years and it’s still leaking 300 tons of radioactive waste every day.

What was the most dangerous nuclear disaster in world history? Most people would say the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine, but they’d be wrong. In 2011, an earthquake, believed to be an aftershock of the 2010 earthquake in Chile, created a tsunami that caused a meltdown at the TEPCO nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan. Three nuclear reactors melted down and what happened next was the largest release of radiation into the water in the history of the world. Over the next three months, radioactive chemicals, some in even greater quantities than Chernobyl, leaked into the Pacific Ocean. However, the numbers may actually be much higher as Japanese official estimates have been proven by several scientists to be flawed in recent years.


Radioactive Debris from Fukushima approaching North
America’s western coast. Credit – RT

If that weren’t bad enough, Fukushima continues to leak an astounding 300 tons of radioactive waste into the Pacific Ocean every day. It will continue do so indefinitely as the source of the leak cannot be sealed as it is inaccessible to both humans and robots due to extremely high temperatures.
It should come as no surprise, then, that Fukushima has contaminated the entire Pacific Ocean in just five years. This could easily be the worst environmental disaster in human history and it is almost never talked about by politicians, establishment scientists, or the news. It is interesting to note that TEPCO is a subsidiary of General Electric (also known as GE), one of the largest companies in the world, which has considerable control over numerous news corporations and politicians alike. Could this possibly explain the lack of news coverage Fukushima has received in the last five years? There is also evidence that GE knew about the poor condition of the Fukushima reactors for decades and did nothing. This led 1,400 Japanese citizens to sue GE for their role in the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

Even if we can’t see the radiation itself, some parts of North America’s western coast have been feeling the effects for years. Not long after Fukushima, fish in Canada began bleeding from their gills, mouths, and eyeballs. This “disease” has been ignored by the government and has decimated native fish populations, including the North Pacific herring. Elsewhere in Western Canada, independent scientists have measured a 300% increase in the level of radiation. According to them, the amount of radiation in the Pacific Ocean is increasing every year. Why is this being ignored by the mainstream media? It might have something to do with the fact that the US and Canadian governments have banned their citizens from talking about Fukushima so “people don’t panic.”


Credit – AP

Further south in Oregon, USA, starfish began losing legs and then disintegrating entirely when Fukushima radiation arrived there in 2013. Now, they are dying in record amounts, putting the entire oceanic ecosystem in that area at risk. However, government officials say Fukushima is not to blame even though radiation in Oregon tuna tripled after Fukushima. In 2014, radiation on California beaches increased by 500 percent. In response, government officials said that the radiation was coming from a mysterious “unknown” source and was nothing to worry about.

However, Fukushima is having a bigger impact than just the West coast of North America. Scientists are now saying that the Pacific Ocean is already radioactive and is currently at least 5-10 times more radioactive than when the US government dropped numerous nuclear bombs in the Pacific during and after World War II. If we don’t start talking about Fukushima soon, we could all be in for a very unpleasant surprise.

Read-more:
 

• TrueActivist.com
• http://peakoil.com/enviroment/fukus...tire-pacific-ocean-and-its-going-to-get-worse 
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harvey-wasserman/us-sailors-sick-from-fuku_b_4759831.html
• http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/us-sailors-sue-radiation-poisoning-21307774
• http://www.naturalnews.com/050902_Fukushima_US_Navy_sailors_radiation.html 
• http://www.snopes.com/photos/technology/fukushima.asp
• http://www.nnvl.noaa.gov/MediaDetail.php?MediaID=680&MediaTypeID=1
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_and_radiation_accidents_and_incidents

 

Why I Left Tokyo

Doctor Shigeru Mita, who recently moved to Okayama-city, Okayama prefecture, to open a new clinic there, wrote a short essay in the newsletter published by Association of Doctors in Kodaira, metropolitan Tokyo.

Although the target readers for this essay were not the general public, it has been cited in a weekly e-mail magazine published by journalist Kota Kinoshita, who has been organizing actions to urge people to leave radiation affected areas (including Tokyo) since 3.11, 2011.

On many occasions, public talks and gatherings, both Dr. Mita and Mr. Kinoshita have acknowledged the danger of radiation and they have called out for immediate action for radiation protection.

In November 2013, WNSCR translated an essay that Dr. Mita wrote for parents concerned about radiation: (Please read the article here). Despite the interests of many parents in Japan, there are very few doctors who show serious concern on the issues of radiation, and commenting on the issue publicly is even rarer.

It is the opinion of WNSCR that Dr. Mita’s views have significant meaning for the general public, especially for those who are interested in the health impact of radiation on the general population. We have permission to translate a new essay of Dr. Mita, through Mr. Kinoshita

Why did I leave Tokyo?
Shigeru Mita ( Mita clinic)
To my fellow doctors,


Map Left by Toshiaki Mizuno & Hideya Kubo, April 29, 2013

I closed the clinic in March 2014, which had served the community of Kodaira for more than 50 years, since my father’s generation, and I have started a new Mita clinic in Okayama-city on April 21.

I had been a member of the board of directors in the Kodaira medical association since the 1990’s, the time I started practicing medicine at my father’s clinic. For the last 10 years, I had worked to establish a disaster emergency response in the city.

In Tokyo, the first mission of the disaster response concerns how to deal with earthquakes.

In the event of a South Eastern Earthquake, which is highly expected, it is reasonable to assume a scenario of meltdown in the Hamaoka nuclear power plant in Shizuoka prefecture, followed by radiation contamination in Tokyo.

I have been worried about the possibility of radiation contamination in Tokyo, so I had repeatedly requested the medical association, the municipal government and the local public health department to stock medical iodine. However, every time my request was turned down; the reason given was that Tokyo did not expect such an event. Hence there was no plan for preparing for the event.

In the afternoon of March 11, 2011, Tokyo experienced slow but great motions in the earthquake. I thought, “now this is what’s called long-period seismic motions. The South Eastern Sea earthquake, with the following Hamaoka NPP accident, are finally coming”. Instead, the source of the earthquake was in Tohoku. The temperature of the reactors in Fukushima Daiichi NPP rose and it caused massive explosions, followed by meltdowns and melt-through.

It is clear that Eastern Japan and Metropolitan Tokyo have been contaminated with radiation.

Contamination of the soil can be shown by measuring Bq/kg. Within the 23 districts of Metropolitan Tokyo, contamination in the east part is 1000-4000 Bq/kg and the west part is 300-1000 Bq/kg. The contamination of Kiev, the capital city of Ukraine, is 500 Bq/kg (Ce137 only). West Germany after the Chernobyl accident has 90 Bq/kg, Italy has 100 and France has 30 Bq/kg on average. Many cases of health problems have been reported in Germany and Italy. Shinjuku, the location of the Tokyo municipal government, was measured at 0.5-1.5 Bq/kg before 2011. Kodaira currently has 200-300 Bq/kg contamination.

I recommend all of you to watch the NHK program, “ETV special: Chernobyl nuclear accident: Report from a contaminated land”, which is available on the Internet. I think it is important to acknowledge what people who visited Belarus and Ukraine, and heard the stories of the locals, have seen and felt there, and listen to those who served in rescue operations in Chernobyl in the past more than 20 years.

Their experience tells them that Tokyo should no longer be inhabited, and that those who insist on living in Tokyo must take regular breaks in safer areas.

Issues such as depopulation and state decline continue to burden the lives of second and third generation Ukrainians and Belarusians today, and I fear that this may be the future of Eastern Japan.

Since December 2011, I have conducted thyroid ultrasound examinations, thyroid function tests, general blood tests and biochemical tests on about 2000 people, mostly families in the Tokyo metropolitan area expressing concerns on the effects of radiation. I have observed that white blood cells, especially neutrophils, are decreasing among children under the age of 10. There are cases of significant decline in the number of neutrophils in 0-1 year-olds born after the earthquake (<1000). In both cases, conditions tend to improve by moving to Western Japan (Neutrophils 0–>4500). Patients report nosebleed, hair loss, lack of energy, subcutaneous bleeding, visible urinary hemorrhage, skin inflammations, coughs and various other non-specific symptoms.

Kodaira, in western Tokyo, is one of the least-contaminated areas in Kanto; however, we began to notice changes in children’s blood test results around mid-2013 even in this area. Contamination in Tokyo is progressing, and further worsened by urban radiation concentration, or the effect by which urban sanitation systems such as the sewage system, garbage collection and incineration condense radiation, because contaminated waste is gathered and compressed. Data measured by citizens’ groups showed that radiation levels on the riverbeds of Kawabori River in Higashiyamato and Higashimurayama in Tokyo have increased drastically in the last 1-2 years.

Other concerns I have include symptoms reported by general patients, such as persistent asthma and sinusitis. The patients show notable improvement once they move away.

I also observe high occurrences of rheumatic polymyalgia characterized by complaints such as “difficulty turning over,” “inability to dress and undress,” and “inability to stand up” among my middle-aged and older patients. Could these be the same symptoms of muscle rheumatism that were recorded in Chernobyl?

Changes are also noticeable in the manifestation of contagious diseases such as influenza, hand-foot-and-mouth disease and shingles.

Many patients report experiencing unfamiliar symptoms or sensing unusual changes in their bodies. Perhaps they feel comfortable speaking to me, knowing that my clinic posted signs informing of possible radiation-related symptoms immediately after the nuclear accident. Many young couples with small children and women worried about their grandchildren visit my clinic and earnestly engage in the discussion, and there is not a single patient who resists my critical views on the impacts of radiation.

Ever since 3.11, everybody living in Eastern Japan including Tokyo is a victim, and everybody is involved.

We discovered that our knowledge from the discipline of radiology was completely useless in the face of a nuclear disaster. The keyword here is “long-term low-level internal irradiation.” This differs greatly from medical irradiation or simple external exposure to radiation. I do not want to get involved in political issues; nonetheless, I must state that the policies of the WHO, the IAEA or the Japanese government cannot be trusted. They are simply far too distanced from the harsh realities that people in Chernobyl still face today.

The patients from Eastern Japan that I see here in Okayama have confirmed the feelings that I have had for a long time, since I was based in Tokyo. People are truly suffering from this utter lack of support. Since 3.11, mothers have researched frantically on radiation to protect their children. They studied in the midst of their hostile surroundings in Tokyo, where they could no longer trust either government offices or their children’s schools. Family doctors were willing to listen about other symptoms, but their faces turned red at the slightest mention of radiation and ignored the mothers’ questions. Mothers could not even talk openly to friends anymore as the atmosphere in Tokyo became more and more stifled.

I believe that it is our duty as medical doctors to instruct and increase awareness among the Japanese public. This is our role as experts, having knowledge of health that the general public does not possess. Three years have quickly passed since the disaster. No medical schools or books elaborate on radiation sickness. Nevertheless, if the power to save our citizens and future generations exists somewhere, it does not lie within the government or any academic association, but in the hands of individual clinical doctors ourselves.

Residents of Tokyo are unfortunately not in the position to pity the affected regions of Tohoku because they are victims themselves. Time is running short. I took an earlier step forward and evacuated to the west. My fellow doctors of medicine, I am waiting for you here. And to the people in Eastern Japan still hesitating, all my support goes to facilitating and enabling your evacuation, relocation, or a temporary relief in Western Japan.

Japanese Godzilla. 

Radiation affected mutant monster