Fukushima plant groundwater likely contaminated despite data error
TOKYO, April 1, Kyodo
 
Groundwater at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is highly likely to be contaminated with radioactive materials, even though its operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. is reviewing its analysis released late Thursday due to erroneous calculations, the government's nuclear safety agency said Friday.
 
The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said some of the analysis data on the groundwater presented by the utility known as TEPCO cannot be trusted due to the errors, casting doubts on the finding that the concentration of radioactive iodine in the water was 10,000 times the legal limit.
 
Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the governmental nuclear regulatory body, said it was ''extremely regrettable'' that TEPCO had given incorrect radiation data at the plant for the second time. The agency has strongly warned the operator over the matter and urged it to take steps not to do so again, he added.
 
''TEPCO faces a grave situation as it is failing to live up to the expectations of people who are very worried by the company. Its data should be trustworthy,'' Nishiyama said.
 
Earlier in the week, the utility corrected its analysis of radiation levels in water accumulating in the basement of the No. 2 reactor's turbine building.
 
The agency said the density readings of radioactive substances in groundwater samples taken on Tuesday and Wednesday from around the No. 1 reactor's turbine building may be revised downward, as TEPCO's evaluation programs for materials such as tellurium, molybdenum and zirconium were found to have errors.
 
But it said the firm's analysis programs for radioactive iodine were confirmed to be correct.
 
On Friday, workers continued operations to secure enough space at tanks to store radiation-contaminated water that has been soaking the basements of the reactors' buildings and filling up tunnel-like underground trenches connected to them.
 
TEPCO has been pouring massive amounts of water into the reactors and spent nuclear fuel pools at the plant as a stopgap measure to cool them down, because serious damage to fuel rods from overheating could lead to the release of enormous amounts of radioactive materials into the environment.
 
However, the measure is believed to be linked to the possible leak of radiation-contaminated water from the reactors, where fuel rods have partially melted.
 
Removal of the water at the turbine buildings is believed to be essential to restoring the vital functions to stably cool down the reactors and the spent nuclear fuel pools.
 
In an effort to prevent radioactive dust from being dispersed by wind and rain from the plant, TEPCO will begin a test spraying of a water-soluble resin, which has coating effects, later in the day.
 
As a result of hydrogen explosions, masses of debris have been strewn around the site, which was ravaged by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. A total of 60,000 liters of resin will be sprayed over a period of two weeks.
 
The engineers will also start moving fresh water carried by a U.S. Navy barge to tanks at the plant, which will be injected into the reactors to cool them down.
 
The barge containing 300,000 gallons of fresh water is now moored at the Daiichi power station, while another ship carrying an additional 200,000 gallons is expected to arrive later Friday, according to the U.S. Navy.
 
==Kyodo

Tokyo (CNN) -- Tens of thousands evacuated from around the stricken Fukushima Daiichi power plant may not be allowed home for months, a Japanese minister said Friday, with no end in sight for the nuclear crisis as fresh concerns mount about alarming radiation levels in beef, seawater and groundwater.
 
While he didn't set a firm timetable, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said people who'd lived within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the nuclear facility would not return home permanently in "a matter of days or weeks. It will be longer than that."
 
"The evacuation period is going to be longer than we wanted it to be," Edano said. "We first need to regain control of the nuclear power plant."
 
The plight of the evacuees and those within a 20-to-30 kilometer radius of the facility, who have been told to stay indoors and encouraged to leave, is one of many storylines still playing out in relation to the crisis. Many are rooted at the northeast Japan power plant where dozens of workers, soldiers and others are rushing to prevent the disaster from worsening, while further afoot farmers, citizens and officials are dealing with the effects of already released radiation.
 
That includes news Friday, from Edano, that more tests would be conducted on radiation levels in beef, as well as chicken and pork that came from the most affected areas.
 
Japan's health ministry reported the previous day thatradiation higher than the regulatory limit has been found in beef from Fukushima prefecture, the same province as the embattled nuclear plant. Radiation likely would enter a cow -- or, similarly, a pig or chicken -- indirectly, after it eats grass and other feed that itself has been contaminated.
 
The radiation levels, detected in a single cow, were slightly above the guidelines set by Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission -- 510 becquerels (a measurement of radioactivity by weight), compared to the official limit of 500 becquerels.  
 
The meat will not be sold and will be retested, the ministry said.
 
This radiation finding is the first one involving beef, although authorities have banned the sale and transport of numerous vegetables grown in the area after tests detected radiation.
 
Cesium 134 loses half its radiation every 2.1 years, notes the Argonne National Laboratory in Argonne, Illinois. Cesium 137, experts have said, has a half life of 30 years.
 
Cesium 137 levels have also spiked in ocean waters off the nuclear plant, according to the nation's nuclear and industrial safety agency. A Wednesday afternoon sample showed levels of 527 times the standard.  
 
Because of its long half life, experts have said its presence is worrisome.  
 
"That's the one I am worried about," said Michael Friedlander, a U.S.-based nuclear engineer, explaining cesium might linger much longer in the ecosystem. "Plankton absorbs the cesium, the fish eat the plankton, the bigger fish eat smaller fish -- so every step you go up the food chain, the concentration of cesium gets higher."
 
Questions remain about how the cesium reached the sea, as did radioactive iodine-131 isotope samples taken Wednesday 330 meters (361 yards) into the Pacific Ocean that showed levels 4,385 times above the regulatory limit. This exceeded the previous day's reading of 3,355 times over the standard -- and was an exponential spike over the 104-times increase seen just last Friday.
 
Officials have downplayed the potential perils posed by this isotope, since it loses half of its radiation every eight days. All fishing is banned within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the plant, and Hidehiko Nishiyama of Japan's nuclear safety agency adds that such waterborne radiation should dilute over time.
 
As efforts continued Friday to cool nuclear fuel in reactors and spent fuel pools -- using concrete pumping trucks and a new supply of fresh water from a U.S. Navy barge that docked in waters outside the plant Thursday -- concerns remained about other water sources that have shown high levels of radiation.  
 
This includes water in exposed maintenance tunnels leading in and out of the Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4 reactor buildings, one of which earlier had radiation levels 100,000 above the norm.
 
Authorities have been working in recent days to drain these tunnels, to prevent them from spilling over and sending tainted water into the ground. By Friday, an official with the Tokyo Electric Power Company -- which operates the plant and heads the recovery effort -- said water levels had dropped one or more meters, and that the issue was no longer urgent.
 
What has become more of a priority is testing, and finding the source of, an apparent spike in radiation in groundwater near the plant.  
 
Just after midnight Friday, a Tokyo Electric official said that iodine-131 levels in ground water from a pipe near the No. 1 reactor had 10,000 times the standard limit. But the utility later backtracked, promising to get more clarity later.
 
Edano addressed this confusion in a press conference later Friday, noting that a "constant amount of radiation" appeared to be getting into the groundwater while noting that further tests are forthcoming.
 
"The numbers released ... looked strange, and that led to the recalculation," he said. "In either case, underground water seems to contain some level of radioactive substances, and this leads to an understanding that the ... soil in the vicinity needs to be monitored closely."
 
All this contamination -- both into the ground and, eventually, the sea -- is the result of a leak or some other sort of ground seepage from one of the nuclear plant's four most embattled reactors, a Tokyo Electric official said Thursday. The official noted that the high levels suggest the release of radiation into the atmosphere alone couldn't be the lone source.
 

Tokyo Electric warned for not securing enough dosimeters for workers
TOKYO, April 1, Kyodo
 
The government's nuclear regulatory agency said Friday it had issued another warning to Tokyo Electric Power Co. over the management of workers' radiation exposure at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, after it was found that there were not enough dosimeters to cover all of the workers.
 
Some workers were sharing dosimeters while doing the same job because many of the devices were destroyed in the March 11 quake and tsunami, a situation that was not ''desirable from the viewpoint of ensuring workers' safety,'' said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the agency.
 
But the plant operator, known as TEPCO, had been able to secure a total of 420 dosimeters by Thursday, sufficient for each of the workers to wear a device when working at the radiation-leaking site.
 
TEPCO officials said the number of dosimeters available had declined from an initial 5,000 to 320 after the tsunami damaged devices. It had been managing the workers' radiation exposure by ordering the leader of each work team to wear a dosimeter, but some workers had expressed concern about the situation.
 
Following the warning issued to the company on Thursday, Nishiyama said, ''From today, all of the workers will wear dosimeters. And if each individual cannot get one, the work should not take place.''
 
Nishiyama added that the measure is not expected to result in any work being skipped.
 
TEPCO was already warned over its lax management of radiation exposure in relation to a recent incident in which three workers were exposed to high-level radiation and taken to hospital.
 
Regarding the incident on March 24, it was found that a worker who should have been checking on-site radiation levels was absent and three workers had been engaging in work to lay cables without measuring the radiation dose.
 
According to the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, a total of 21 workers have been exposed to radiation exceeding 100 millisieverts so far during the ongoing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
 
Workers are usually permitted to be exposed to up to 100 millisieverts in an emergency situation. The limit, however, has been raised to 250 millisieverts specifically for the work at the plant.
 
TEPCO has also decided to beef up security at the Fukushima Daiichi and Daini nuclear power plants after a man in a vehicle tried to enter the Daiichi plant and then broke through the gate of the nearby Daini plant on Thursday, according to the agency.
 
The agency said that it has ordered all nuclear-related facilities to enhance security following the incident.
 
==Kyodo

Mayor of Fukushima city in restricted area appeals to world over plight
TOKYO, April 1, Kyodo
 
The mayor of Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture, a city subject to a government directive for its residents to stay indoors to avoid radioactive fallout from a nuclear plant crippled by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, has begun appealing to the world over the ''injustice'' of such an instruction.
 
Speaking in a roughly 11-minute English-subtitled video posted on the video-sharing site Youtube on March 24, Katsunobu Sakurai said the government's directive has made life extremely difficult for local residents.
 
''Even volunteers and those delivering relief supplies have no choice but to enter (the city) at their own risk,'' said a grim-looking Sakurai, wearing the same sort of protective clothing worn by workers in charge of disaster relief and other emergencies. ''Residents are being forced into starvation.''
 
The city of Minamisoma is located within a 20-30-kilometer radius of the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which is leaking amounts of radioactive material into the air, soil and sea.
 
While the government has issued a directive for people who live within a 20-km radius of the plant to evacuate, those inside the ring have largely been left to themselves, many of them leaving on their own due to severe disruptions to their daily lives.
 
Kenichiro Nakata, a Minamisoma resident who made the video, said he wants the world to know that inhumane conditions exist in Japan. ''Residents affected by the disaster don't even know whether they should stay or evacuate,'' he said.
 
In the video, Sakurai notes that his people have suffered extensive damage from both the tsunami triggered by the earthquake and the subsequent nuclear disaster.
 
Besides lacking information from the government and plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., as well as manpower and supplies, he said, ''Many residents can't secure any means of transportation'' in the 20-30 km ring.
 
Sakurai called for more assistance and cooperation, noting that few journalists have ventured into his city and that telephone interviews -- the most common way of contacting residents -- are inadequate for reporting on their plight.
 
An evacuation directive has been imposed since the magnitude 9.0 quake and tsunami knocked out power supplies to the nuclear plant's cooling systems and led to massive leaks of radioactive materials, with a directive issued for those living in the ring to stay indoors.
 
With criticism mounting over the directive for those living in the ring, the government began urging them on March 25 to evacuate voluntarily.
 
==Kyodo
 

(3) Des niveaux maximaux ont été fixés par le règlement (Euratom) no 3954/87 du Conseil du 22 décembre 1987 fixant les niveaux maximaux admissibles de contamination radioactive pour les denrées alimentaires et les aliments pour bétail après un accident nucléaire ou dans toute autre situation d'urgence radiologique [2], le règlement (Euratom) no 944/89 de la Commission du 12 avril 1989 fixant les niveaux maximaux admissibles de contamination radioactive pour les denrées alimentaires de moindre importance après un accident nucléaire ou dans toute autre situation d'urgence radiologique [3] et le règlement (Euratom) no 770/90 de la Commission, du 29 mars 1990, fixant les niveaux maximaux admissibles de contamination radioactive pour les aliments pour bétail après un accident nucléaire ou dans toute autre situation d'urgence radiologique [4].
 
(4) Ces niveaux maximaux peuvent être rendus applicables dès que la Commission a reçu des informations sur la survenue d'un accident nucléaire, lesquelles indiquent que les niveaux maximaux admissibles de contamination radioactive pour les denrées alimentaires et les aliments pour animaux sont susceptibles d'être atteints ou ont été atteints, conformément à la décision 87/600/Euratom du Conseil, du 14 décembre 1987, concernant des modalités communautaires en vue de l'échange rapide d'informations dans le cas d'une situation d'urgence radiologique [5] ou en vertu de la convention de l'Agence internationale de l'énergie atomique du 26 septembre 1986 sur la notification rapide d'un accident nucléaire. Dans l'intervalle, il convient d'utiliser ces niveaux maximaux préétablis comme valeurs de référence pour apprécier l'opportunité de mettre ou non des denrées alimentaires et des aliments pour animaux sur le marché.

IAEA warns of further leaks
Fukushima workers face risk of uncontrolled reactions: watchdog
Bloomberg
The U.N. nuclear watchdog agency warned that a potential uncontrolled chain reaction at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant could cause further radiation leaks and increase the risk to workers
 
 
 
 
A partial meltdown of fuel in the No. 1 reactor building may be causing the isolated reactions, Denis Flory, nuclear safety director for the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency, told a news conference in Vienna.
 
Nuclear experts call these reactions "localized criticality." They consist of a burst of heat, radiation and sometimes an "ethereal blue flash," according to the U.S. Energy Department's Los Alamos National Laboratory website. Twenty-one workers worldwide have been killed by "criticality accidents" since 1945, the site says.
 
"We share the view with the IAEA that various phenomena are possible," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said at a news conference Thursday. "At the same time, the organization said they don't have clear signs that show such a phenomenon is happening."
 
The IAEA "emphasized that the nuclear reactors won't explode," Edano said.
 
Radioactive chlorine found March 25 in the reactor No. 1 turbine building suggests chain reactions continued after the reactor shut down, physicist Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, Calif., wrote in a paper released Monday. Radioactive chlorine has a half-life of 37 minutes, according to the report.
 
The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said there is no possibility of uncontrolled chain reactions.
 
Boron, an element that absorbs neutrons and hinders nuclear fission, has been mixed with cooling water to prevent accidental chain reactions, Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the agency, said Thursday.
 
Pressure vessels as well as external containment of reactors 1 through 3 may be damaged, the Nuclear Safety Commission said Wednesday.
 
Edano on Wednesday ruled out the possibility that the two undamaged reactors, units 5 and 6, will be salvaged.
 
Reactors 1 through 4 suffered explosions, presumed meltdowns and corrosion from seawater sprayed on radioactive fuel rods after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami cut power to cooling systems.
 
Workers have averted the threat of a total meltdown of fuel rods by injecting water into the damaged reactors for the past two weeks. The complex's six units are connected with the power grid and two are using temporary motor-driven pumps. Work to repair the plant's monitoring and cooling systems has been hampered by discoveries of hazardous radioactive water.
 
Dismantling the plant and decontaminating the site may take 30 years and cost Tokyo Electric Power Co. more than ¥1 trillion, according to engineers and analysts. The government hasn't ruled out pouring concrete over the entire facility as one way to shut it down, Edano said.
 
Dumping concrete on the plant would serve a second purpose: it would trap contaminated water, said Tony Roulstone, an atomic engineer who directs the University of Cambridge's master's program in nuclear energy.
 
"They need to immobilize this water and they need something to soak it up," he said. "You don't want to create another hazard, but you need to get it away from the reactors."
 
The process will take longer than the 12 years needed to decommission the Three Mile Island reactor in Pennsylvania following a partial meltdown in 1979, said Hironobu Unesaki, a nuclear engineering professor at Kyoto University.
 
Tepco shareholders may be wiped out by cleanup costs and liabilities stemming from the nuclear accident, the worst since Chernobyl. The company faces claims of as much as ¥11 trillion if the crisis lasts two years and potential takeover by the government, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch report Tuesday.
 
 
 
The Japan Times  
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c'est un cauchemar eveillé... Je plains de tout coeur les japonais qui n'ont pas fini d'en voir des vertes et des pas mures.    
 
   
 

Le gouvernement japonais injecterait des fonds publics dans Tepco
 
Le gouvernement japonais pourrait injecter des fonds publics dans la société exploitante de la centrale accidentée de Fukushima, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), afin de l'aider à rester à flot en pleine crise nucléaire, selon un porte-parole du gouvernement. Yukio Edano a expliqué vendredi que l'Etat pourrait financer la compagnie pour l'aider à affronter les problèmes de la centrale Fukushima Dai-Ichi et assurer un approvisionnement d'électricité suffisant à Tokyo qu'elle dessert. "Il s'agit d'une option que nous n'excluons pas", a-t-il déclaré.
 
Le quotidien Mainichi a cité un responsable gouvernemental non identifié affirmant que le gouvernement "allait mettre de l'argent de façon à être impliqué" dans la gestion de Tepco, une compagnie privée. Il ne s'agit pas cependant pour le moment de la nationaliser. Le ministre de l'industrie, Banri Kaieda, avait indiqué plus tôt que le gouvernement allait créer un comité spécial pour étudier le type d'aide financière que l'Etat pourrait apporter.