BBC News - Managing water is Fukushima priority

The map on this page has just been released by the scientists working on the European Space Agency's Goce satellite.

The spacecraft measures gravity variations across the surface of the Earth and this information, allied to sea-surface height data, can then be used to work out current directions and speed.

U.S. Sees Array of New Threats at Japan’s Nuclear Plant - NYTimes.com

United States government engineers sent to help with the crisis in Japan are warning that the troubled nuclear plant there is facing a wide array of fresh threats that could persist indefinitely, and that in some cases are expected to increase as a result of the very measures being taken to keep the plant stable, according to a confidential assessment prepared by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Among the new threats that were cited in the assessment, dated March 26, are the mounting stresses placed on the containment structures as they fill with radioactive cooling water, making them more vulnerable to rupture in one of the aftershocks rattling the site after the earthquake and tsunami of March 11. The document also cites the possibility of explosions inside the containment structures due to the release of hydrogen and oxygen from seawater pumped into the reactors, and offers new details on how semimolten fuel rods and salt buildup are impeding the flow of fresh water meant to cool the nuclear cores.

While the assessment does not speculate on the likelihood of new explosions or damage from an aftershock, either could lead to a breach of the containment structures in one or more of the crippled reactors, the last barriers that prevent a much more serious release of radiation from the nuclear core. If the fuel continues to heat and melt because of ineffective cooling, some nuclear experts say, that could also leave a radioactive mass that could stay molten for an extended period.

Among other problems, the document raises new questions about whether pouring water on nuclear fuel in the absence of functioning cooling systems can be sustained indefinitely. Experts have said the Japanese need to continue to keep the fuel cool for many months until the plant can be stabilized, but there is growing awareness that the risks of pumping water on the fuel present a whole new category of challenges that the nuclear industry is only beginning to comprehend.

The document also suggests that fragments or particles of nuclear fuel from spent fuel pools above the reactors were blown “up to one mile from the units,” and that pieces of highly radioactive material fell between two units and had to be “bulldozed over,” presumably to protect workers at the site. The ejection of nuclear material, which may have occurred during one of the earlier hydrogen explosions, may indicate more extensive damage to the extremely radioactive pools than previously disclosed.

The steps recommended by the nuclear commission include injecting nitrogen, an inert gas, into the containment structures in an attempt to purge them of hydrogen and oxygen, which could combine to produce explosions. On Wednesday, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, which owns the plant, said it was preparing to take such a step and to inject nitrogen into one of the reactor containment vessels.

Hydrogen explosions in the first few days of the disaster heavily damaged several reactor buildings and in one case may have damaged a containment structure. That hydrogen was produced by a mechanism involving the metal cladding of the nuclear fuel. The document urged that Japanese operators restore the ability to purge the structures of these gases and fill them with stable nitrogen gas, a capability lost after the quake and tsunami.

The N.R.C. report suggests that the fuel pool of the No. 4 reactor suffered a hydrogen explosion early in the Japanese crisis and could have shed much radioactive material into the environment, what it calls “a major source term release.”

Source: nytimes

Red Ice Radio - Richard C. Hoagland - The Secret Space Program & The Fukushima Nuclear Reactor Disaster

Richard C. Hoagland - The Secret Space Program & The Fukushima Nuclear Reactor Disaster
March 20, 2011

In this program, we discuss the "Secret Space Program" and the concept of a breakaway civilization. Someone with a more sophisticated and advanced technology, from Earth, has created for themselves a completely different capability to go into space, to utilize resources and maybe even to settle on other planets. Is this a plausible theory? Could this really be happening? Richard C. Hoagland from enterprisemission.com and author of “The Monuments of Mars” and ”Dark Mission", returns to Red Ice Radio to discuss some of these ideas. Richard tries to shed light on the possibility that most of humanity has been kept in the dark about. Topics Discussed: the other space program, advanced technology, Timothy Good, Peter Levenda, Richard Dolan, Joseph Farrell, the Secret Space Program, breakaway civilization, anti-gravity, free energy, Star Trek, the Nazis, the Hebrews, the Bible, natural cycle of cataclysm, the yuga cycles, the superwealthy elite, banksters, uranium and plotunium, Japanese earthquake, tsunami, nuclear meltdown at Fukushima, war in Libya, philosophical roots of the idology and more.



Source: redicecreations.com

In Japanese Village, Outrage and Fear Rise With Radiation - NYTimes.com

In Japanese Village, Outrage and Fear Rise With Radiation - NYTimes.com

Japan earthquake, tsunami: Seawater radiation measured at 7.5 million times legal limit

Reporting from Tokyo— The operator of Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear plant said Tuesday that it had found radioactive iodine at 7.5 million times the legal limit in a seawater sample taken near the facility, and government officials imposed a new health limit for radioactivity in fish.

The reading of iodine-131 was recorded Saturday, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said. Another sample taken Monday found the level to be 5 million times the legal limit. The Monday samples also were found to contain radioactive cesium at 1.1 million times the legal limit.

Although the government authorized the release of the 11,500 tons and has said that any radiation would be quickly diluted and dispersed in the ocean, fish with high readings of iodine are being found.

On Monday, officials detected more than 4,000 bequerels of iodine-131 per kilogram in a type of fish called a sand lance caught less than three miles offshore of the town of Kita-Ibaraki. The young fish also contained 447 bequerels of cesium-137, which is considered more problematic than iodine-131 because it has a much longer half-life.

On Tuesday chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano said the government was imposing a standard of 2,000 bequerels of iodine per kilogram of fish, the same level it allows in vegetables. Previously, the government did not have a specific level for fish. Another haul of sand lance with 526 bequerels of cesium was detected Tuesday, in excess of the standard of 500 bequerels per kilogram.

Radioactivity Found in Fish - Japan

Eating radioactive fish every day for a year doesn't even expose you as much radiation as you would get from the U.S Capitol.

Risk Low

The risk to people from the deliberate discharge at the Fukushima plant is low, according to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency.

The potential additional radiation dose to a person eating seaweed or seafood caught near the Fukushima plant every day for a year would be 0.6 millisievert, the agency said in a statement. That compares to 0.85 millisievert from a year of exposure to granite that comprises the U.S. Capitol, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

With a radioactive half-life of 30 years, cesium can build up in the meat of marine predators as they eat smaller animals, said Karen Gaines, chairwoman of the biology department at the University of Eastern Illinois in Charleston.

“If they’re going to restart fisheries and make people feel comfortable, they’ll need real-time monitoring of the catch,” said Gaines, who studies radioactive cesium in animals at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, which made plutonium for U.S. nuclear weapons.


Source: BusinessWeek

The Blog @ Homeland Security: DHS Supports Exercise of Securing the Cities Program Designed to Detect Radiological and Nuclear Threats

DHS Supports Exercise of Securing the Cities Program Designed to Detect Radiological and Nuclear Threats

Beginning today, thousands of first responders and law enforcement officers from 150 agencies in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut will participate in a five-day, full-scale exercise to evaluate the Securing the Cities (STC) program, a DHS-funded effort to protect New York City and other major metropolitan areas against the threat of illicit radiological and nuclear weapons and materials. The exercise is not related to a specific threat.

“The Securing the Cities program is a key component of the Department’s efforts to protect the nation from terrorist threats,” said Secretary Napolitano. “The STC pilot program has helped build a capability among first responders to help detect illicit radiological and nuclear weapons or materials in a major metropolitan area that simply did not exist four years ago.”

Securing the Cities began in 2006 as a pilot project for the New York City region, providing equipment, tools and training through cooperative agreements to the New York Police Department (NYPD), the lead agency for the STC program, which in turn distributes grant money to other participating agencies. In all, STC has provided more than 5,800 pieces of detection equipment, trained nearly 11,000 personnel, and conducted more than a hundred drills.

“Through Securing the Cities, the New York City region is providing thousands of first responders with the tools they need to detect radiological and nuclear threats,” said Warren Stern, Director of DHS’ Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO). “This full-scale exercise will help us to determine how we can continue to improve our ability to identify, prevent and respond to potential nuclear or radiological threats.”

Following an evaluation of the initial pilot, President Obama’s FY 2012 budget request outlines a transition from a pilot program to a more permanent capability that could be continued in the New York City region and replicated in other major metropolitan cities.

Source: dhs.gov