America’s Pentagon has announced that American military personnel in Japan at the time of the Fukushima Accident were safe. They have posted a website mapping radiation exposures for military Americans in Japan during the accident and said none of the doses posed health risks. The website shows exposures between March 12 and May 11 at 13 locations in Japan where most of the nearly 70,000 U.S. military and affiliated populations lived. It revealed the highest adult exposure was at Sendai, just north of Fukushima, with whole body radiation of 1.2 millisieverts and 12 mSv for the thyroid. By comparison, a full-body CAT scan yields a whole body exposure of 50 mSv. There were no children at Sendai, but children between one and two-years-old at the Hyakuri Airbase south of Fukushima had an estimated whole body exposure of 1.6 mSv and 27 mSv thyroid. “Since the estimated radiation doses and health risks associated with this event are so low, no one is being placed in a medical surveillance program to monitor their long-term health outcomes,” the website said. (Japan Today)
- Tepco will invite former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Dale Klein to oversee restarts of the company’s nukes. He will be part of an expert panel to review Tepco’s nuclear safety measures, which will be formed due to the company’s harsh criticism contained in the government’s accident investigations. The panel will also include lawyer and Diet-appointed investigative panel member Masafumi Sakurai, and management consultant Kenichi Omae. They will supervise the utility’s effort to improve nuclear safety measures and transparency in management. The firm’s turnaround plan includes the future restart of reactors at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in Niigata Prefecture, which was undamaged by the 3/11/11 quake/tsunami. (NHK World)
- Tokyo has decided to delay setting the new energy policy decision. It was planned to announce the decision on Monday, but lack of a consensus in the Diet and last minute opposition by business groups forced the postponement. The majority Democratic Party of Japan had stated a goal of abolishing nuclear energy by 2030, which many businesses didn’t like. Many Diet members also had reservations about the DPJ position. A minority of DPJ members said they felt the delay would keep the issue from being a focal point in the election scheduled for Sept.21. (Kyodo News)
