Fukushima Lies

[Analis]

Surprisingly, there wasn't a thread dedicated to it. While the mainstream media turn a blind eye on what is happening at Fukushima, what was suspected from day one is now confirmed. TEPCO, with the help of the Japanese state, has been constantly lying on what happened, and is still lying.

http://www.infiniteunknown.net/2011/05/ ... ma-crisis/

TEPCO Lied And Will Continue To Lie To The Public And The Entire World About Fukushima Crisis
Posted On May 18

Tokyo Electric Power Co. has made misleading statements about when it will stabilize its nuclear reactors crippled by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, said Tetsuo Ito, head of the Atomic Energy Research Institute at Kinki University in western Japan.

The company, known as Tepco, yesterday reiterated the schedule on its so-called road map announced a month ago to achieve cold shutdown of the three radiation-leaking reactors as early as October. Setting a timetable without knowing the condition of the reactor cores doesn’t make sense, Ito said in a phone interview from Osaka.

“Only after understanding what’s going on inside the buildings and reactors, will it be clear what parts of the timetable are achievable,” Ito said. “Devising a road map without that will give the public a false sense of security.”

On May 15, or more than two months after the disaster at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant, Tepco said conditions were worse than expected in reactor No. 1 when it found all uranium fuel rods had melted. Today it sent four workers into reactor No. 2 for the first time since March 14 to measure radiation levels and assess whether work can be done to fix gauges that will show the condition of the core.

“It’s highly likely No. 2 and No. 3 reactors are worse than thought,” Ito said. “Tepco devised the first (road map) before fully grasping the situation inside the reactor buildings; a scientist wouldn’t do such a thing.”

Ito has headed the institute, which started running Japan’s first university-based nuclear reactor in 1961, for more than five years. He has spent 35 years in nuclear engineering research.
Targets Achievable

Tepco officials believe the targets remain achievable, spokeswoman Ryoko Sakai said by phone today. She declined to comment on Ito’s other remarks.

When asked whether Tepco has sought the advice of nuclear engineering academics, Vice President Sakae Muto said yesterday the company has talked to experts, nuclear companies and government bodies around the world.

Tepco has also been criticized by government officials for responding too slowly to the crisis that unfolded at Fukushima after the tsunami washed ashore.

The utility plans to build self-circulating cooling systems in reactor buildings damaged by explosions after the earthquake and tsunami knocked out power and pumping equipment to cool fuel rods and spent pools.

This is to achieve a cold shutdown, where the core temperature in the three damaged reactors falls to below 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit).
Forced Evacuations

Beside radiation leaks into the atmosphere forcing about 50,000 families near the plant to evacuate, more than 10 million liters (2.6 million gallons) of contaminated water have leaked or been released into the sea.

Millions of liters of radiated water have also filled basements and trenches at the station from leaking reactor vessels and piping.

Since the accident, Tepco shares have lost 82 percent of their value. They traded at 392 yen at 2:32 p.m. in Tokyo today compared with 2,153 yen on March 10.

Japan’s government in April raised the severity rating of the Fukushima crisis to the highest on an international scale, the same level as the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. The station, which has withstood hundreds of aftershocks, may release more contamination than Chernobyl before the crisis is contained, Tepco officials have said.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEFtfkJc4kM

The Japanese Government widened the evacuation zone surrounding the melted down Fukushima nuclear plant. More than 5,000 people left their homes on Sunday after being exposed to high levels of radiation. It is now known that a nuclear meltdown did occur inside 3 reactors at the plant. There are currently over 3,000 tons of highly radioactive wastewater underneath reactor one that shouldn't be there - and Japanese officials are scrambling to figure out a way to get it out of there. So what do these new developments mean for Japanese officials who were hoping to have the disaster contained in the coming months? Joining Thom Hartmann is Paul Gunter, Reactor Oversight Project. Original link here. (The last clips are from NHK World News in Japan.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwBuRNmxOlI
SORRY, DUE TO TIME LIMITS, I COULDN'T ADD THE USUAL SARCASM.

Nuclear plant cooling system manually shut down

The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant says workers may have manually shut down the No.1 reactor's emergency cooling system in order to prevent damage to the reactor. It says pressure inside the reactor had dropped sharply after the earthquake struck the plant on March 11th.

Tokyo Electric Power Company on Monday disclosed records of its operations at the plant.

They show that the reactor automatically halted operations after the earthquake.

The emergency cooling system was automatically activated but stopped about 10 minutes later and remained off for about 3 hours until after the tsunami arrived.

TEPCO says plant workers may have manually shut down the cooling system because pressure inside the reactor had dropped sharply from 70 to 45 atmospheres.

The system is designed to cool the reactor even if all external sources of power are lost, but the move to shut it down temporarily means that it did not fully function.

TEPCO says the decision may have been made based on a manual to prevent damage to the reactor.

It says if the system had worked, it may have had more time until the meltdown, so it will investigate developments leading up to the decision to turn it off and whether the move was correct.


Note: Single radiation dose of 2,000 millisieverts (200,000 millirems) and above causes serious illness. See also exposure list below.
Half-life of some radioactive elements

 

[Analis]

http://theintelhub.com/2011/05/12/tepco ... ctor-no-1/

TEPCO Now Confirms Nuclear Meltdown In Fukushima Reactor No. 1
Intel Hub Note: This is more proof that the alternative media was correct in our assessments of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

NaturalNews
By Mike Adams
May 12th, 2011

TEPCO has now publicly admitted it wasn’t telling the truth about the severity of the damage to Fukushima reactor No. 1.

We’re now being told what we’ve suspected all along — that nuclear fuel rods in that reactor are totally exposed and have suffered a nuclear meltdown, releasing vast amounts of radiation comparable to Chernobyl. As Bloomberg now reports, the water level in reactor No. 4 is one meter below the fuel assembly itself.

This means, of course, that the water isn’t high enough to cover the fuel rods, which is why those fuel rods have suffered a nuclear meltdown. (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-…)

The Associated Press is also reporting that “other fuel has slumped to the bottom of the pressure vessel and is thought to be covered in water.” This statement is astonishing all by itself because it means the fuel rods were in a total meltdown hot enough to cause their metal containment cylinders to “slump” and melt their way down to the lower levels of the coolant pools.

Notably, AP carefully avoids using the term “melt” and instead says the fuel rods “slumped.” This is all part of the AP’s determined downplaying of the Fukushima catastrophe (see below).

Not surprisingly, as AP now reports, “The findings also indicate a greater-than-expected leak in that vessel.” But the laws of nuclear physics don’t care what you “expect,” you see. They don’t care about media spin or power company B.S. The laws of physics simply follow their natural course, regardless of what you hope they do.

And in the case of Fukushima, the laws of physics led directly to a core fuel meltdown that now even the mainstream media cannot deny (although they still aren’t calling it a “nuclear meltdown”). As AP reports:

Nuclear Industrial and Safety Agency officials said the new data indicates that it is likely that partially melted fuel had fallen to the bottom of the pressurized vessel that holds the reactor core together and possibly leached down into the drywell soon after the March 11 quake and tsunami that struck Japan’s northeastern coast.

Undeniable meltdown

What AP is describing, of course, is a nuclear meltdown. It doesn’t get any more obvious than this: The fuel reached melting temperature and melted down. Along with this, there would have had to be a massive release of radiation into the containment vessel, which just happens to have numerous holes in it that allow highly radioactive water to leak directly into the environment.

No wonder TEPCO discovered its radiation detectors had all maxed out there and become non-functional. No wonder TEPCO had to selectively stop reporting radiation releases — it was in the middle of a Chernobyl-like core fuel meltdown!

The Telegraph in the UK is refreshingly printing the truth on this story: “One of the reactors at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power plant did suffer a nuclear meltdown, Japanese officials admitted for the first time today, describing a pool of molten fuel at the bottom of the reactor’s containment vessel.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor…)

But the mainstream media in the U.S. has obviously been instructed by the White House to avoid using the term “nuclear meltdown” in describing what happened at Fukushima. There is a rather blatant downplaying of the facts going on behind the scenes at the media giants.

Some of this spin can only be called blatant lies, by the way. In the same story linked above, AP claims “Unit 4 contained no fuel rods at the time of the earthquake…”

Huh? No fuel rods in reactor No. 4? This what on Earth is this video showing? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKHW…

I love how the media admits it has been misreporting the truth of the situation all along, and then it comes up with new fairytale spin stories in practically the same sentence. They might as well just report, “There was no nuclear fuel in Fukushima at the time of the tsunami, and that’s why governments have stopped monitoring radiation levels.”

TEPCO once again meets Murphy’s Law

In any case, this sudden revelation that reactor No. 4 has already experienced a nuclear fuel meltdown is, not surprisingly, causing considerable setbacks to TEPCO’s plan to have the whole facility deactivated by Christmas. Just as NaturalNews publicly predicted, the Christmas shutdown plan was little more than a combination of fantasyland thinking and industry spin.

“What this means is this is probably going to be a much more difficult cleanup than they originally planned for,” said particle physicist Paul Padley in a Bloomberg story (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-…). The government and Tepco “have consistently appeared to be underestimating the severity of the situation.”

And that’s the story of modern science: Arrogant in its confidence over the laws of nature, yet utterly dishonest in reporting the truth when its Tower of Babel crumbles to the ground. No wonder the reputation of the conventional scientific community continues to plummet as people realize just how dangerous these people really are.

Read my related story on this to learn the truth of how modern conventional science is based on a mindless, soulless, false belief that human beings have no free will or consciousness. And therefore, human beings are all expendable in science’s big experiments: Nuclear power, GMOs, vaccines and much more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032372_s…

So, from day one, reactors 1, 2, 3 were melting, 1 was in a full, and not partial meltdown, and the container was breached. The major accident TEPCO was trying to "prevent" had already happened on 14th march. Additionally, the reactors had already been damaged by the earthquake, before the tsunami.
Add to that he revelation that the water level is too low, that the situation has gone ashtray in reactor 4, that the contamination is spreading at full rate, taht pockets of contamination by plutonium have been detected at 50 kms, that hundreds of tons of contaminated water is continually poured into the sea ; it is clear now that they can't control the situation. Japan is slowly turning into a radioactive area ; that is, if a major explosion doesn't happen and poison the whole country.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

I'm more concerned about how "modern conventional science is based on a mindless, soulless, false belief that human beings have no free will or consciousness. And therefore, human beings are all expendable in science’s big experiments: Nuclear power, GMOs, vaccines and much more". If only the guy writing that could point me in the direction of some consumable products which would help me avoid the pitfalls of modern conventional science.

Anyhoo, contrary to the claims of some alternative reality websites the story seems to have been fairly well covered.

 

[OneWingedBird]

it doesn't surprise me at all, but between the japanese downplaying it and the media uplaying it then getting bored, it's probably been harder to establish the level of bullshit in the story than it was measuring the level of reactor water.

 

[shruggy63]

Quoted from Ted
'I'm more concerned about how "modern conventional science is based on a mindless, soulless, false belief that human beings have no free will or consciousness. And therefore, human beings are all expendable in science’s big experiments: Nuclear power, GMOs, vaccines and much more". If only the guy writing that could point me in the direction of some consumable products which would help me avoid the pitfalls of modern conventional science.'
Drink lots of milk, that'll help in avoiding thyroid cancer from the fallout.

 

[Novena]

More about this in the Graun today:

Japan nuclear plant confirms meltdown of two more reactors
Fukushima Daiichi operator accused of delaying announcement of meltdowns in reactors 2 and 3 as IAEA inspectors arrive

Justin McCurry in Tokyo
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 May 2011 09.54 BST

The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant said fuel rods in two more reactors were likely to have suffered a meltdown soon after they were crippled by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami in north-east Japan.

Confirmation by Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) that fuel in the cores of reactors 2 and 3 had melted came days after new data confirmed a similar meltdown in reactor 1 about 16 hours after the disaster.

The utility, which last week suffered the biggest annual loss by any Japanese firm outside the financial sector, said most of the melted fuel in all three reactors was covered in water and did not threaten to compound the world's worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl.

The temperature of the fuel rods, which are believed to have melted and settled at the bottom of flooded reactor pressure vessels, remained well below dangerous levels, the company said.

"It is unlikely that the meltdowns will worsen the crisis because the melted fuel is covered in water," said a Tepco spokesman, Takeo Iwamoto.

It said the fuel rods in the reactors 2 and 3 had started melting two to three days after the earthquake and tsunami, which knocked out vital cooling systems.

Tepco officials repeated their insistence that the reactors had been crippled by the waves, but speculation has mounted in recent days that the quake itself had been responsible, casting doubt on Tepco's claims that the plant was able to withstand even the most violent seismic shifts.

Tepco said it had been unable to confirm the meltdowns until it had finished analysing data, but Koichi Nakano, a political science professor at Sophia University, suggested the revelation was timed to minimise its impact on the public.

"In the early stages of the crisis Tepco may have wanted to avoid panic," he told Reuters. "Now people are used to the situation … nothing is resolved, but normal business has resumed in places like Tokyo."

Tepco's handling of the crisis will come under closer scrutiny with the arrival in Tokyo of a delegation from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The UN nuclear inspectors will visit the Fukushima plant and present their findings at a meeting of ministers from IAEA member-states on 20 June.

Tepco has suffered recent setbacks that may derail attempts to bring the plant under control in the next six to nine months, which is the deadline the firm announced just over a month ago.

On Monday, it said makeshift containers being used to store tens of thousands of tonnes of contaminated water were almost full.

The company has yet to complete a system to reprocess the water for reuse in the reactors, raising fears that contaminated liquid could leak into the sea.

A Tepco spokesman said dealing with contaminated water that has gathered in reactor buildings and trenches could take until the end of the year, adding that the volume of water being used to cool the damaged reactors could rise to about 200,000 tonnes.

Tepco is working with the French nuclear engineering firm Areva to reprocess the water.

Japan's shift towards renewable energy, meanwhile, is expected to gather momentum later this week.

The prime minister, Naoto Kan, will unveil plans at the G8 summit in Deauville, France, to require all new buildings to be fitted with solar panels by 2030, the Nikkei business newspaper said.

Kan has already announced a comprehensive review of Japan's nuclear energy policy and ordered the temporary closure of an atomic plant in central Japan that is considered particularly vulnerable to earthquake damage.

But he is also expected to tell G8 leaders that Japan will continue to use nuclear energy after making safety improvements.

Some have criticised Kan and Tepco for failing to quickly release information about the extent of the damage at Fukushima Daiichi. "I am very sorry that the public doesn't trust the various disclosures the government has made about the accident," Kan told parliament.

Separately Italy's government voted by 313 votes to 291 to shelve plans for new nuclear power plants. Earthquake-prone Italy currently has no reactors, but pro-nuclear prime minister Silvio Berlusconi had planned to build new nuclear plants. He decided to scrap the plans following rising public concern after the disaster at Fukushima.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/24/japan-nuclear-plant-more-meltdowns

 

[Analis]

Anyhoo, contrary to the claims of some alternative reality websites the story seems to have been fairly well covered.

Depends. The feeling remains that they are downplaying the thing. It was usually covered in a low key fashion, especially if you consider the seriousness of the situation. And more often incompletely. I asked some of my friends and relatives what they knew. Some of them had read that the situation had been revealed as worse than expected. But none of them knew that it was so from the first days, or that the reactors had already halted before the tsunami.
And a number of newspapers simply reiterated that TEPCO hoped to control the situation in a few months. A surreal statement. Although some expressed doubts, quite cautiously. Such caution is out of place, as it should be clear now that they have no control.

I'm more concerned about how "modern conventional science is based on a mindless, soulless, false belief that human beings have no free will or consciousness. And therefore, human beings are all expendable in science’s big experiments: Nuclear power, GMOs, vaccines and much more". If only the guy writing that could point me in the direction of some consumable products which would help me avoid the pitfalls of modern conventional science.

The writer wanted to point that we are facing a clear example of a noxious scientific-political lobby, that eats through institutions more surely than the corium through the floor of the plant. This situation is not restricted to Japan. There is little doubt things are not dissimilar in other countries, afflicted by the same opacity and connections between the nuclear lobby and agencies in charge of nuclear security. There have already been cases of nuclear plants revealed to have poor security, despite reassuring official claims to the contrary.

 

[Jerry_B]

Quoting conspiratorial websites only tells us about the conspiratorial take on events - this may differ from actuality. So are we really talking about the events or conspiracy theories about the events?

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

Quoting conspiratorial websites only tells us about the conspiratorial take on events - this may differ from actuality. So are we really talking about the events or conspiracy theories about the events?

So it can be dismissed as a conspiracy theory? It has been obvious that there has been some sort of cover up of the real nature of the catastrophe, since it began two months ago, with a series of explosions, fires and thick black clouds of debris. In this case, what little that could be observed of, 'actuality', differed very widely from the official version and that propagated by the mainstream media. When little actual trustworthy information is forthcoming from official sources, people will look for information elsewhere. The real questions are along the lines of, why haven't people been given accurate information so that they might have a better chance of protecting themselves from the worst effects of the fallout and why haven't the mainstream media been doing their job?

 

[Jerry_B]

Until we have solid reliable information about events, yes, it is still a conspiracy theory. The theories may be interesting but it would be a mistake to assume that they're telling the truth when (some might say) the media is not.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

Japanese Government increases safe radiation exposure limit for Japanese school children to 20x previous limit, so that they can continue to go to school in Fukushima district.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/05/24/3225435.htm

Outrage as Japan lifts radiation limit for kids

ABC News Australia. By Tokyo correspondent Mark Willacy. May 24, 2011

Outraged parents have held a rowdy demonstration outside Japan's education ministry in Tokyo to protest against the government's decision to weaken nuclear safety standards in schools.

Under new guidelines, Japanese children are allowed to be exposed to 20 times more radiation than was previously permissible.

The new regulation means children can now be exposed to as much radiation as a German nuclear worker.

The government argues the change is essential to keeping schools open in the Fukushima region.

According to Nobel Prize-winning group Physicians for Social Responsibility, the new limits mean exposed children now have a one-in-200 risk of getting cancer, compared with a one-in-500 risk for adults.

The decision provoked outrage from within Japan's government, with the prime minister's chief scientific adviser resigning in protest.

The government says it had no choice but to raise the legal exposure limit, saying about three-quarters of the schools in Fukushima have radiation levels above the old safety level of one millisievert.

The vast majority of schools would have closed, putting the education of hundreds of thousands of children on hold.

Hundreds of parents travelled from the radiation zones of Fukushima to the doors of the education ministry in Tokyo, furious at the government's decision.

...

Human guinea pigs.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Depends. The feeling remains that they are downplaying the thing.

Feelings are persistent things but not always the most considered or reliable.

It was usually covered in a low key fashion, especially if you consider the seriousness of the situation. And more often incompletely. I asked some of my friends and relatives what they knew. Some of them had read that the situation had been revealed as worse than expected. But none of them knew that it was so from the first days, or that the reactors had already halted before the tsunami.

And in the phrase 'worse than expected' you give lie to the claim that the Japanese authorities have, well, lied. Is it really so unreasonable to imagine that they would know the exact extent of the damage before they were actually able to inspect it?

If your friends and relatives hadn't heard the latest news on the subject then it's probably because they've not sought - not a Herculean task in the age of the internet. The information's there, the mainstream media choose not to cover it because the initial shock has dissipated and barring major developments people in the west are not as interested as they were 10 weeks ago. That's news values for you - as sinister as the pursuit of consumers.

And a number of newspapers simply reiterated that TEPCO hoped to control the situation in a few months. A surreal statement. Although some expressed doubts, quite cautiously. Such caution is out of place, as it should be clear now that they have no control.

Is it really that clear?

The writer wanted to point that we are facing a clear example of a noxious scientific-political lobby, that eats through institutions more surely than the corium through the floor of the plant. This situation is not restricted to Japan. There is little doubt things are not dissimilar in other countries, afflicted by the same opacity and connections between the nuclear lobby and agencies in charge of nuclear security. There have already been cases of nuclear plants revealed to have poor security, despite reassuring official claims to the contrary.

Yeah, that and the evil of vaccinations.

Sorry but the author's a crank and a charlatan, twenty times worse than the mainstream media.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Japanese Government increases safe radiation exposure limit for Japanese school children to 20x previous limit, so that they can continue to go to school in Fukushima district.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/05/24/3225435.htm

Outrage as Japan lifts radiation limit for kids

ABC News Australia. By Tokyo correspondent Mark Willacy. May 24, 2011

Outraged parents have held a rowdy demonstration outside Japan's education ministry in Tokyo to protest against the government's decision to weaken nuclear safety standards in schools.

Under new guidelines, Japanese children are allowed to be exposed to 20 times more radiation than was previously permissible.

The new regulation means children can now be exposed to as much radiation as a German nuclear worker.

The government argues the change is essential to keeping schools open in the Fukushima region.

According to Nobel Prize-winning group Physicians for Social Responsibility, the new limits mean exposed children now have a one-in-200 risk of getting cancer, compared with a one-in-500 risk for adults.

The decision provoked outrage from within Japan's government, with the prime minister's chief scientific adviser resigning in protest.

The government says it had no choice but to raise the legal exposure limit, saying about three-quarters of the schools in Fukushima have radiation levels above the old safety level of one millisievert.

The vast majority of schools would have closed, putting the education of hundreds of thousands of children on hold.

Hundreds of parents travelled from the radiation zones of Fukushima to the doors of the education ministry in Tokyo, furious at the government's decision.

...

Human guinea pigs.

Does seem a bit strange. Presumably the kids are immune to radiation when not in schools near Fukushima.

I guess they must build the walls of those houses pretty thick out there in Japan.

 

[Mythopoeika]

I guess they must build the walls of those houses pretty thick out there in Japan.

Paper walls. Very thick paper.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

I guess they must build the walls of those houses pretty thick out there in Japan.

Paper walls. Very thick paper.

It keeps the dust off.

 

[Analis]

The information's there, the mainstream media choose not to cover it because the initial shock has dissipated and barring major developments people in the west are not as interested as they were 10 weeks ago. That's news values for you - as sinister as the pursuit of consumers.

So, the media chose not to cover it just because it didn't interest people anymore ? Meaning they're just commercial entities trying to sell the best stuff (the best meaning that sells best) ? Not a great discovery, indeed. But that does not make it less sinister.

And in the phrase 'worse than expected' you give lie to the claim that the Japanese authorities have, well, lied. Is it really so unreasonable to imagine that they would know the exact extent of the damage before they were actually able to inspect it?

I meant worse than expected from the public viewpoint. Not from the authorities' viewpoint. It was obvious from the start that to classify the incident at 4 on the international scale, while Three Miles Island was at 5, was a bad joke.

Quoting conspiratorial websites only tells us about the conspiratorial take on events - this may differ from actuality. So are we really talking about the events or conspiracy theories about the events?

The writer wanted to point that we are facing a clear example of a noxious scientific-political lobby, that eats through institutions more surely than the corium through the floor of the plant. This situation is not restricted to Japan. There is little doubt things are not dissimilar in other countries, afflicted by the same opacity and connections between the nuclear lobby and agencies in charge of nuclear security. There have already been cases of nuclear plants revealed to have poor security, despite reassuring official claims to the contrary.

Yeah, that and the evil of vaccinations.
Sorry but the author's a crank and a charlatan, twenty times worse than the mainstream media.

The nuclear lobby is alive and well. It was demonstrated not only by the opacity of the coverage of the disaster at Fukushima. But also by the revelation that nuclear facilities lacked efficient protections agaisnt natural risks.

An alert was reported at the Onagawa nuclear power plant in the immediate aftermath of the 11 March quake. The high radioactivity measured was later explained as coming from Fukushima.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/1 ... 35059.html

But the plant was indisputably damaged by an aftershock tremor estimated at around 7.2 Richter early April. It was not a "historical' earthquake, but TEPCO had not even been able to protect their plants against such predictible hazard.

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/132203/ ... -power.htm

Japan Earthquake: More Nuclear Plants Lose Power
By Jesse Emspak | April 8, 2011 9:53 AM EDT

The aftershocks of the Tohoku earthquake that rocked Japan Thursday night have caused spills of radioactive water and power losses at no less than three different nuclear facilities.

An aerial view shows Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant is seen at Miyagi Prefecture in this photo taken by Yomiuri Shimbun on April 8. Water leaked out of spent fuel pools at the Onagawa nuclear plant in northeast Japan after a strong aftershock rocked the region late on Thursday, but there was no change in the radiation levels outside the plant, operator Tohoku Electric Power said on Friday.

Japan's Nuclear Industrial Safety Agency said there was no change in radiation levels outside the plants.

The problems were reported at two nuclear plants run by Tohoku Electric Power Co. One is in Onagawa and the other is in Higashidori, some distance north of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station. Loss of power was reported at a nuclear fuel reprocessing facility in Rokkasho.

In Onagawa, radioactive water from the spent fuel pools spilled in the wake of the magnitude 7.1 temblor. Kyodo News reports that the aftershocks caused the plant to also lose the ability to cool the spent fuel rods for anywhere from 20 to 80 minutes.

That is not enough time to cause the kinds of problems that resulted from loss of cooling at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, but it does raise further concerns about the safety of spent fuel facilities during earthquakes.

The spill at Onagawa was small, though contaminated water was seen on the floors of all three reactor buildings, according to Tohoku Electric power Co., the operator of the plant. One spilled up to 3.8 liters of water with high levels of radioactive contamination.

Meanwhile, the Higashidori nuclear power station in Aomori prefecture, lost power completely, according to NISA. The plant switched to emergency diesel power for some hours before some power was restored.

The nuclear reprocessing facility in Rokkasho, Aomori prefecture, as of Friday afternoon was still running on emergency power. The reprocessing plant is operated by Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd. JNFL said that as the pools where spent fuel is kept are located at ground level it is possible to keep pumping water into them even when all external power is lost. A tsunami would not affect the plant, JNFL says, because it is five kilometers from the shoreline and 55 meters above sea level. The reprocessing plant stores some 3,258 tons of spent fuel.

http://greenworldinvestor.com/2011/04/0 ... brownouts/

Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant Spills Radioactive Water after 7.4 March 11 Aftershock Sendai Earthquake- 4 Killed,Massive Brownouts
8 Apr, 2011 || by Abhishek Shah Japan, Nuclear Energy

TEPCO the owner and operator of the Damaged Fukushima Nuclear Plant reported that its Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant in the Miyage Prefeture also leaked very small amounts of radioactive water.About 3.8 kgs of radiated water from one of the spent fuel rod pools spilled as three out of four external power supply units in Onagawa shut down leaving only one power source to cool the spent fuel. at the Nuclear Plant failed after the 7.4 Richter Scale Earthquake off the seas near Fukushima.The cooling systems have been restored and there is no more damage at the Nuclear Plant like Fukushima.Note the workers at the Damaged Dai-ichi were evacuated due to the Tsunami Warning issued in the aftermath of the Earthquake.These workers have again returned in their radiation fighting work at the Plant.USA said that it seems that the worst scenario of serious contamination from the Fukushima Nuclear Accident has probably passed.

Radioactive water leaks found at Onagawa nuke plant after Thursday’s quake
Radioactive water leaks were found Friday at Onagawa nuclear power plant in Miyagi prefecture after the 7.4-magnitude aftershock shook northeastern Japan Thursday night, Kyodo News Agency reported.Radioactive water spilled from pools holding spent nuclear fuel rods at the power plant. It was observed inside the buildings at all three reactors at the Onagawa plant, which has suspended operations since the mega earthquake and tsunami on March 11, according to the nuclear safety agency.As much as 3.8 liters of water leaked at one of them, with the highest level of a radioactive isotope — 5,410 bequerels per kilogram — found in the spilled water on the floor beside a spent fuel pool in the building housing the No. 1 reactor, Kyodo said.

The new earthquake though much lower in magnitude than the bigger one has resulted in the deaths of 4 and caused massive brownouts as most of the power plants in northern Japan were shut down.Electricity was cut across a huge area of northern Japan and plunging more than 3.3 million households into darkness late Thursday night.

When we are facing such irresponsibility, the right question to ask is why the Japanese nuclear security authority did not take action to prevent this from happening.

Have no doubt that it would be not different in many other countries. In France, for example, we have already had such farcical situations as the roof of the turbines building of the neutron reactor Superphénix (located approximatively at 100 km east of Lyon) collapsing under the weight of snow on 8 december 1990 - although it would not have been seen as farcical had the reactor not been stopped this day.
I could also mention the little-known fact that a Fukushima-like situation was narrowly avoided at the Blayais nuclear plant (near Bordeaux) during the hurricanes of late December 1999. That such a disaster would happen was just a matter of time.

And it would be interesting to ask if foreign governments were involved in the cover-up of what was happening at Fukushima.

 

[Jerry_B]

And it would be interesting to ask if foreign governments were involved in the cover-up of what was happening at Fukushima.

That's if there actually was a cover-up - thus far, that is merely an assumption.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

http://articles.timesofindia.indiat...d/29577398_1_radioactivity-nuclear-plant-dose

70,000 more should evacuate after Fukushima: Watchdog

Times of India online. May 24, 2011

PARIS: Seventy thousand people living beyond the 20-kilometre no-go zone around Fukushima should be evacuated because of radioactivity deposited by the crippled nuclear plant, a watchdog said.

Updating its assessment of the March 11 disaster, France's Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) highlighted an area northwest of the plant that lies beyond the 20-km (12 mile) zone whose inhabitants have already been evacuated.

Radioactivity levels in this area range from several hundred becquerels per square metre to thousands or even several million bequerels per square metre, the IRSN report, issued late Monday, said.

Around 70,000 people, including 9,500 children aged up to 14, live in the area, "the most contaminated territory outside the evacuation zone," the agency said.

"These are people who are still to be evacuated, in addition to those who were evacuated during the emergency phase in March," Didier Champion, its environmnent director, told AFP.

Staying in this area means the inhabitants would be exposed to radiation of more than 10 millisieverts (mSv)in the year following the disaster, according to the IRSN.

This level is used in French safety guidelines for protecting civilian populations after a nuclear accident. In France, 10 mSv is three times the normal background radiation from natural sources.

"Ten mSV is not a dangerous dose in and of itself, it's more a precautionary dose," said Champion, noting however that this figure that does not include any additional doses from contaminated food or water.

The 10 mSV derives from a calculation of exposure to at least 600,000 becquerels per square metre, emitted by caesium 137 and 134, which are long-lasting radioactive elements.

Of the 70,000 people in the zone identified in the IRSN report, more than 26,000 could be exposed to doses of more than 16mSv in the first year after the disaster.

On May 15, Japan began to evacuate 4,000 residents of the village of Iidate-mura and 1,100 people in the town of Kawamata-cho, 30 kms from the plant. The two locations had consistently received high amounts of radioactive dust due to wind patterns.

The IRSN report is based on data for radioactivity reported by the Japanese authorities and from US overflights of the zone.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

So, the media chose not to cover it just because it didn't interest people anymore ?

No. The media did cover it, just not as prominently as before (that aside it's simply wrong to talk about 'the media', mainstream or otherwise - such a thing doesn't really exist).

Meaning they're just commercial entities trying to sell the best stuff (the best meaning that sells best) ? Not a great discovery, indeed. But that does not make it less sinister.

I'm afraid it does. Ignoring the truth as part of a concerted effort to mislead the public, distoriting reality for the benefit of corporations or governments, is far more sinister than not telling people something because they don't think they'll pay attention and cost you ratings into the bargain. If you want to see the potential of a sinister nexus between information and its providers look no further than the site which provoked this thread in the first place - truly disgusting.

I meant worse than expected from the public viewpoint. Not from the authorities' viewpoint. It was obvious from the start that to classify the incident at 4 on the international scale, while Three Miles Island was at 5, was a bad joke.

Obvious to whom? The suddenly-expert nuclear commentators? Upon what evidence would you claim that they were aware of the full extent from the start? And is it not reasonable to suggest that information may have been downplayed in order to avoid the possibility of mass panic rather than for some sinister and selfish purpose?

The nuclear lobby is alive and well. It was demonstrated not only by the opacity of the coverage of the disaster at Fukushima. But also by the revelation that nuclear facilities lacked efficient protections agaisnt natural risks.

Yes, the nuclear lobby is alive and well. Nobody's denying it. However, that doesn't mean that any claim made about it happens to be true. Citing a notoriously deceitful and agenda driven news source is not the best way to convince anyone not already predisposed towards doom-laden conspiracy theories.

An alert was reported at the Onagawa nuclear power plant in the immediate aftermath of the 11 March quake. The high radioactivity measured was later explained as coming from Fukushima.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/1 ... 35059.html



But the plant was indisputably damaged by an aftershock tremor estimated at around 7.2 Richter early April. It was not a "historical' earthquake, but TEPCO had not even been able to protect their plants against such predictible hazard.

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/132203/ ... -power.htm

It was not a historical emergency. The systems worked and no damage was done to public health so TEPCO did protect their plant. What is your point?

When we are facing such irresponsibility, the right question to ask is why the Japanese nuclear security authority did not take action to prevent this from happening.

That would be one of the right questions. Galloping ahead with conspiracy theories at the prompting of agenda-driven websites who offer non-expert, partial glimpses of a story would be a poor way to seek the answer.

Have no doubt that it would be not different in many other countries. In France, for example, we have already had such farcical situations as the roof of the turbines building of the neutron reactor Superphénix (located approximatively at 100 km east of Lyon) collapsing under the weight of snow on 8 december 1990 - although it would not have been seen as farcical had the reactor not been stopped this day.
I could also mention the little-known fact that a Fukushima-like situation was narrowly avoided at the Blayais nuclear plant (near Bordeaux) during the hurricanes of late December 1999. That such a disaster would happen was just a matter of time.

And yet it's not been nearly as disastrous as the doomy chorus would have had us believe.

And it would be interesting to ask if foreign governments were involved in the cover-up of what was happening at Fukushima.

It would be interesting if we could establish that there was a cover-up at Fukushima.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

...

Have no doubt that it would be not different in many other countries. In France, for example, we have already had such farcical situations as the roof of the turbines building of the neutron reactor Superphénix (located approximatively at 100 km east of Lyon) collapsing under the weight of snow on 8 december 1990 - although it would not have been seen as farcical had the reactor not been stopped this day.
I could also mention the little-known fact that a Fukushima-like situation was narrowly avoided at the Blayais nuclear plant (near Bordeaux) during the hurricanes of late December 1999. That such a disaster would happen was just a matter of time.

And yet it's not been nearly as disastrous as the doomy chorus would have had us believe.

...

How can you possibly justify that statement?

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

How can you possibly justify that statement?

The direst scenarios of nuclear meltdowns envisaged before the earthquake have not been realised. Given the extraordinary circumstances the impact on public health has been unremarkable. So far there has been little to compare with Chernobyl, say. Of course, in time there may be fatalities but salivating in expectation of them shows that there may as well be a nuclear button in a lot of people's heads, one which when pushed suspends reason.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

... Of course, in time there may be fatalities but salivating in expectation of them shows that there may as well be a nuclear button in a lot of people's heads, one which when pushed suspends reason.

Contemptible.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Contemptible.

 

[ramonmercado]

Contemptible.

The long term effects of this incident are unlikely to be a laughing matter. Agreed that a breach does not lead to The End of The Universe but more people will die of cancers.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

The long term effects of this incident are unlikely to be a laughing matter. Agreed that a breach does not lead to The End of The Universe but more people will die of cancers.

Sorry, Ramon, not laughing at the long term effects, just the idea of being held in contempt by the above and the irony of the remark. To claim, for example, that the Japanese authorities (mostly composed of real people albeit ones that by dint of wielding some degree of power are a bit demonic, probably) are using children as guinea pigs, regardless of how illogical and ill-researched the claim, would seem just a little contemptible to a few I'm quite sure. The later response does nothing to dissuade any notion of atavistic and reactive hysteria.


Undoubtedly there will be long-term effects, not the least of which will be a rise in cancers. However, no energy source is risk free though some seem to behave as though there is an alternative which is. It's fairly obvious that there's an instinctive tendency to view nuclear technology as unsafe (not unreasonably, in some respects).

However, the real winner out of this episode is most likely to be the fossil fuel industry, an energy source which will claim many times more lives than the spillage at the Fukushima power plant, in climate change, poverty and resource wars. It just seems to me that for some it's easier to criticise and get indignant than to face the facts.

I'd also suggest that one of the reasons why the Mainstream Media have chosen not to cover the story as thoroughly in recent weeks is precisely because of the gap between the worst of the scare stories (pre and post tsunami) and the reality of the situation, even as they appear worse than initially suspected. If the plant went in to complete meltdown tonight there would be little else on the news for days. There was something rather ghoulish about the way the 24 hour news channels in this country at least camped outside Fukushima impatient for more bad news. If they could give us that bad news story they would.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

...

Sorry, Ramon, not laughing at the long term effects, just the idea of being held in contempt by the above and the irony of the remark. To claim, for example, that the Japanese authorities (mostly composed of real people albeit ones that by dint of wielding some degree of power are a bit demonic, probably) are using children as guinea pigs, regardless of how illogical and ill-researched the claim, would seem just a little contemptible to a few I'm quite sure. The later response does nothing to dissuade any notion of atavistic and reactive hysteria.

...

Increasing the allowed safe limit for school children to 20x the previous limit, certainly seems like entering into entirely new and previously almost unexplored territory, to me: "The new regulation means children can now be exposed to as much radiation as a German nuclear worker. ... According to Nobel Prize-winning group Physicians for Social Responsibility, the new limits mean exposed children now have a one-in-200 risk of getting cancer, compared with a one-in-500 risk for adults."

However, I wasn't the first person to use the term 'guinea pigs'. Physicist, Dr Michio Kaku, the Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics in the City College of New York of City University of New York and the co-founder of string field theory, used the term in a recent interview (April 13th), with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/4/13/expert_despite_japanese_govt_claims_of

...

AMY GOODMAN: What about the evacuation zone? Is it big enough?

DR. MICHIO KAKU: It’s pathetic. The United States government has already stated 50 miles for evacuating U.S. personnel. The French government has stated that all French people should consider leaving the entire islands. And here we are with a government talking about six miles, 10 miles, 12 miles. And the people there are wondering, "What’s going on with the government? I mean, why aren’t they telling us the truth?" Radiation levels are now rising 25 miles from the site, far beyond the evacuation zone. And remember that we could see an increase in leukemia. We could see an increase in thyroid cancers. That’s the inevitable consequence of releasing enormous quantities of iodine into the environment.

...

DR. MICHIO KAKU: They’re literally making it up as they go along. We’re in totally uncharted territories. You get any nuclear engineering book, look at the last chapter, and this scenario is not contained in the last chapter of any nuclear engineering textbook on the planet earth. So they’re making it up as they go along. And we are the guinea pigs for this science experiment that’s taking place. Then it could take up to 10 years, up to 10 years to finally dismantle the reactor. The last stage is entombment. This is now the official recommendation of Toshiba, that they entomb the reactor over a period of many years, similar to what happened in Chernobyl.

...

"... we are the guinea pigs ..."

People who aren't deeply worried about true situation at Fukushima dai ichi, really don't understand the situation.

 

[Jerry_B]

People who aren't deeply worried about true situation at Fukushima dai ichi, really don't understand the situation.

But if none of us really know what's going on, it would perhaps be premature to assume too much. After all, Kaku is only really expressing his opinion. AFAIK, he hasn't been to the site and may not be qualified to assess what's going on if he had. The reaction is to panic and worry, but one wonders if that is wise in a time where information is scanty.

What seems to be happening is the same sort of thing that happened after OBL was killed: various 'facts' thrown out very very quickly, various claims and counter-claims (also circulating very very quickly) being made, etc.. Add into this the way information like this propogated by different media systems (including the internet) and it's a heady mix that's very hard to seperate out into distinct information.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Increasing the allowed safe limit for school children to 20x the previous limit, certainly seems like entering into entirely new and previously almost unexplored territory, to me: "The new regulation means children can now be exposed to as much radiation as a German nuclear worker. ... According to Nobel Prize-winning group Physicians for Social Responsibility, the new limits mean exposed children now have a one-in-200 risk of getting cancer, compared with a one-in-500 risk for adults."

You obviously didn't get the point the first time around. They will be exposed to no more radiation in a school in Fukushima than they will be in their homes. If you actually look for a less selective version of this story you'll find this:


"The PSR statement directly challenges Tokyo's stance that it is safe for schoolchildren to use school playgrounds in the prefecture as long as the dose they are exposed to does not exceed 20 millisieverts over a year."

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ ... 503a1.html

In any case, PSR itself is hardly a disinterested party (did somebody say "lobby"?):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physicians ... onsibility

However, I wasn't the first person to use the term 'guinea pigs'. Physicist, Dr Michio Kaku, the Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics in the City College of New York of City University of New York and the co-founder of string field theory, used the term in a recent interview (April 13th), with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!

If you want to dispute the points of posters (in an insulting fashion or otherwise) and hide behind the words of other rathers than explain your own, then fine. I couldn't really care less what Michio Kaku has to say on it - we are the guinea pigs is practically his catchphrase. Perhaps you might want to tell us more about the accuracy of his earliest use of the statement?

Regardless, the point still remains that you believe the Japanese authorities are completely disinterested in the welfare of the children under their charge save for the data their precarious lives will yield. It's a fairly dim view of humanity or maybe just the Japanese, I don't know which.

People who aren't deeply worried about true situation at Fukushima dai ichi, really don't understand the situation.

People who believe anything about the true situation at Fukushima dai ichi really don't understand the situation.

 

[Analis]

I'm afraid it does. Ignoring the truth as part of a concerted effort to mislead the public, distoriting reality for the benefit of corporations or governments, is far more sinister than not telling people something because they don't think they'll pay attention and cost you ratings into the bargain. If you want to see the potential of a sinister nexus between information and its providers look no further than the site which provoked this thread in the first place - truly disgusting.

I don't see really any difference. They don't tell people because if they did, it would cost them money ? In other words, because it benefits them not to tell what's happening ? No matter how important it is ?
That's where the shoe pinches : the media were never led by a will to inform the public for its own benefit, but by greed. They don't report what is disturbing, or only in low key fashion, because they would lose customers. And they are supposed to be our main reliable source of information ?

Obvious to whom? The suddenly-expert nuclear commentators?

I don't know if you are serious. The plant was affected by explosions soon. No such thing had happened at Three Miles Island. Explosions meant serious breaches, which meant important radioactive leaks.

Upon what evidence would you claim that they were aware of the full extent from the start?

It's certainly possible that they didn't know everything. But they certainly had access to readings that gave them a good idea of the gravity of the situation.
By the way, inspecting the facilities was all they could do after they had supposedly restored power supply. They had also lied about that.
What is for certain is that the situation could only worsen if they couldn't intervene. All evidence converges to demonstrate that this was the case.
http://www.politis.fr/Fukushima-Tepco-c ... 14247.html

Fukushima : Tepco is beginning to admit

......
This admission did not come without reasons : on 24 May, a team of twenty experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency will begin an inspection of the damage and of the plants, which last about ten days. Even taking into account the IAEA's well known leniency, it could only state, and then report that Tepco has been lying since the accident about whappened in the plant. What the japanese newspapers have already begun to relate, despite that they are more or less tied with the industrial and business world. So, the Yomiuri Shimbun, 11 millions copies and rather rightist, and its rival the Asahi Shimbun, 12 millions copiesa nd slightly more leftist, are publishing a few critics and infos which are not only more meant to reassure the public at the behalf of the government.
......
Reactors 2 and 3 are almost in the same state [than reactor 1] : just because the hundred mobile generators on trucks could never come close to the reactors, because of the very high radioactivity near the facilities. Tepco had yet asserted they had succeeded to restore the power supply... In fact, by putting their life in jeopardy, engineers could only introduce into the control rooms a small electric cable : it allowed them to inspect damage with more than torchlights.
......

And is it not reasonable to suggest that information may have been downplayed in order to avoid the possibility of mass panic rather than for some sinister and selfish purpose?

So they could have misled the public after all ?
Mass panic ? Probably, it was one of their concerns. But the situation that led to the possibility of mass panic is the consequence of their careless policy. A policy whose consequences they couldn't face.

Yes, the nuclear lobby is alive and well. Nobody's denying it. However, that doesn't mean that any claim made about it happens to be true.

Not any claim, but a good deal of them do.

It was not a historical emergency. The systems worked and no damage was done to public health so TEPCO did protect their plant. What is your point?

The systems worked ? Not well, as there was damage that should never have been in the case of an earthquake of this magnitude. Despite previous reassurances that the plants were 100 % fullproof. Another illustration of their thoughtlessness.

That would be one of the right questions. Galloping ahead with conspiracy theories at the prompting of agenda-driven websites who offer non-expert, partial glimpses of a story would be a poor way to seek the answer.

Don't put the wrong blame on the wrong people.
They have agendas, like almost any website or media. But they are not those who are involved in the fact that those questions are usually ignored. With the consequences we are now facing.
As for the reasons, yes, the most likely are the links between the nuclear industries and the political world.
In France, I can provide evidence of a similar situation : a study of the ASN (Nuclear Security Authority) showed that EDF deliberately underestimated seismic risks, ignoring the studies of the IRSN (Institute for Radiological protection and Nuclear Security). The other revelation is that the IRSN knew that, chose to remain silent and took no action. In fact, the ASN took no more action (although it could change, after Fukushima).

And yet it's not been nearly as disastrous as the doomy chorus would have had us believe.

?!?
Probably the reason why the intervention in situ couldn't be conducted properly, despite that the staff wore heavy protective clothes. In fact, an intervention in a severely damaged nuclear facility is impossible to conduct properly, without sacrificing the workers - what the Soviets had done at Chernobyl.

And when you say that :

The direst scenarios of nuclear meltdowns envisaged before the earthquake have not been realised. Given the extraordinary circumstances the impact on public health has been unremarkable. So far there has been little to compare with Chernobyl, say.

The IAEA has reclassified the incident at the level 7, the same than Chernobyl. And relating to impact on public health, it had been unremarkable at Chernobyl in the aftermath of the accident too - except fot he workers who had been sent in situ.

Of course, in time there may be fatalities but salivating in expectation of them shows that there may as well be a nuclear button in a lot of people's heads, one which when pushed suspends reason.

This one, in my opinion, is best left ignored.

However, the real winner out of this episode is most likely to be the fossil fuel industry, an energy source which will claim many times more lives than the spillage at the Fukushima power plant, in climate change, poverty and resource wars. It just seems to me that for some it's easier to criticise and get indignant than to face the facts.

Be careful : a suspicious mind might conclude that you have an agenda... See how it is easy to ascribe nefarious motives to anybody.

 

[Analis]

Groundwater is contaminated, and the Japanese government is asked to enlarge the evacution area.

http://www.lematin.ch/actu/monde/japon- ... mer-399666

A 10.000 times above normal levels radioactive contamination was detected in groundwater under the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, in the north-east of Japan, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) executives asserted thursday.

Tepco doesn't think that this contamination affected any drinking water supply system, spokesperson Naoyuki Matsumo added.
According to Mr Matsumo, levels of iodine 131 that were 10.000 times above normal levels were found in grounwater at 15 m under one of the six reactors of the plants.

Contaminated water accumulated in the plant since it was damaged by the quake and the tsunami on 11 March. Leaks into Pacific ocean have already happened.

Pressure

Japan is facing growing pressure to enlarge the evacuation area around the damaged Fukushima plant. Tokyo has declined this option until now. Readings are yet suggesting that radioactive substance is pouring into the sea.

The IAEA and the Japanese nuclear security agency advised Naoto Kan, head of the Japanese government, to enlarge the 2 km security perimeter around the nuclear facilities to 40 km.

The two agencies are stating that radioactivity levels above those that would require an evacuation were registered at a distance of 40 km, notably in the village of Iitate.

In addition, contaminated water was found in the ground close to the reactor 1, reported on thursday the owner of the plant, according to the Kyodo news agency. The radioactivity found in an underground trench near reactor 2 is more than ten thousands times superior to normal levels, Tepco added.