Intro: "At least 45 tons of highly radioactive water have leaked from a purification facility at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, and some of it may have reached the Pacific Ocean, the plant's operator said Sunday. Nearly nine months after Fukushima Daiichi was ravaged by an earthquake and tsunami, the plant continues to pose a major environmental threat."
In this Nov. 12, 2011 file photo, workers in protective suits and masks wait to enter the emergency operation center at the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station in Okuma, Japan. (photo: David Guttenfelder, AP)
More Radioactive Water Leaks at Japanese Plant
05 December 11
t least 45 tons of highly radioactive water have leaked from a purification facility at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, and some of it may have reached the Pacific Ocean, the plant's operator said Sunday.
Nearly nine months after Fukushima Daiichi was ravaged by an earthquake and tsunami, the plant continues to pose a major environmental threat. Before the latest leak, the Fukushima accident had been responsible for the largest single release of radioactivity into the ocean, threatening wildlife and fisheries in the region, experts have said.
The new radioactive water leak called into question the progress that the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, appeared to have made in bringing its reactors under control. The company, known as Tepco, has said that it hopes to bring the plant to a stable state known as a cold shutdown by the end of the year.
The trouble on Sunday came in two stages, a Tepco statement said. In the morning, utility workers found that radioactive water was pooling in a catchment next to a purification device; the system was switched off, and the leak appeared to stop. But the company said it later discovered that leaked water was escaping, possibly through cracks in the catchment's concrete wall, and was reaching an external gutter.
In all, as much as 220 tons of water may now have leaked from the facility, according to a report in the newspaper Asahi Shimbun that cited Tepco officials.
The company said that the water had about one million times as much radioactive strontium as the maximum safe level set by the government, but appeared to have already been cleaned of radioactive cesium before leaking out. Both elements are readily absorbed by living tissue and can greatly increase the risk of developing cancer.
Tepco said a check on Saturday had found no sign of the leak, suggesting that it began Saturday night or early Sunday morning. The company said it was exploring ways to stop any more water from escaping.
Since the disaster in March, workers have been struggling to cool the stricken plant's reactors by flooding them with water, which is contaminated with radioactivity in the process and becomes a problem of its own.
Tepco installed a new circulatory cooling system in September with filters that decontaminate and recycle the cooling water. But the company acknowledges that some water has already leaked into the ocean, and thousands of tons of water remain in the flooded basements of the plant's reactor buildings.
The Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety in France estimates that between March and mid-July, the amount of radioactive cesium 137 that had leaked into the Pacific from the Fukushima Daiichi plant amounted to 27.1 petabecquerels, the greatest amount known to have been released from a single episode. (A becquerel is a frequently used measure of radiation, and a petabecquerel is a million billion becquerels.)
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Is it sound environmental practice to pour concrete gutters on a nuke site that lead directly to the ocean? Criminal corporate greed exposed by their own press release.
What are WE going to do about it?
No more, never again. It IS up to us, and our habits and lifestyles. Drive on & shop........
As a physicist with 40 years of radiation safety responsibilitie s I find it apalling that the govt (Japan Inc.) has raised the "annual limit" for the radiation workers pictured above to a staggeringly high number. These unskilled laborers are sacrificing themselves to put the corks in these leaking power plants. It scares me to see them permit such high doses because it implies a desperation and urgency, that time is short to prevent an even bigger disaster.
Nuclear energy is:
A) Safe
B) Eco-friendly
C) Inexpensive
D)None of the above
In a chauffeur driven car
A Rolls-Royce I think it was
He sported a cigar …
Wow … A big impression!
A rock-star could he be?
No, just a salesman -
For Nuclear energy.
An’ there within the boardroom
A ’fore his spiel began
He flexed his corporate muscles
Revealing avarice in his plan:
His presentation: awesome
His dress: impeccable
But the content of his words
Were not so laudable
Embraced were words of safety
Extolled was energy
But n’er did he speak “meltdown”
Nor “nuclear misery”
He hung his head in shame
When questions then began:
Earthquake?; Tsunami?;
Destruction in Japan?
Our citizens sent him packing
Japan and we both know:
Nuclear energy …
A deadly way to go.
this article is little more than a press release - when will the officials or the press give us understandable and believable facts about this shameful disaster?
compare the press handling of the BP blowout and this much more serious one - in the BP incident, the press did not allow themselves to be excluded from the scene - in the beginning we were spoon fed information from various "officials" in dribs and drabs
finally because of the importance of the operation to restore normal conditions, BP was forced to provide the public with live access to the monitoring cameras until the well was shut in after releasing 200 m gal of crude oil into the gulf - it was in the news until the releases stopped
in fukushima, the operator is still running the show in this continuing disaster - the level of water and the temperature of the six reactor cores and the levels and temperatures of the six spent fuel containment pools is anyone's guess except for the operator - the public is not getting current information - and how much help is knowing that a french institute estimates the release of cesium at 27.1 petabecquerels?
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