Aug 31, 2013 | Fukushima Commentary
August 31, 2013 Ever since the Fukushima groundwater contamination issue emerged more than a month ago, the Press has incessantly labeled the waters “toxic”. This blog has previously covered the hazards of radioactive Cesium-137 (“How Hazardous is Cs-137?” – two parts...
Aug 29, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
The Nuclear Regulatory Authority formally raised the crisis level at F. Daiichi to INES level-3. Level-3 is a “serious incident”. The watchdog said the upgrade it is entirely due to the wastewater tank leak announced by Tepco on August 21st. The NRA added that their...
Aug 28, 2013 | Fukushima Commentary
August 28, 2013 It is now official…this morning Japan’s Nuclear Regulatory Authority raised the crisis level at Fukushima Daiichi to “level-3” on the INES scale. Level-3 means the situation can be called a serious incident. Included with the announcement, the NRA...
Aug 26, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
On Friday, Masao Yoshida, former Fukushima station manager, was laid to rest. He died on July 9 of esophageal cancer. Yoshida was the person in charge of the plant staff fighting the accident, beginning on March 11, 2013. He has been praised by all officials in Japan...
Aug 24, 2013 | Fukushima Commentary
August 24, 2013 On July 26, Tepco’s president Naomi Hirose vowed to improve Tepco’s public disclosure policy, saying “even if the evaluations do not show enough evidence, we will swiftly and honestly mention risks and worst-case scenarios without fearing the impact.”...
Aug 22, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
One of the Cesium-stripped water storage tanks at F. Daiichi has lost 300 tons of water. The tank lost the water into a coffer dam surrounding 26 tanks grouped together, each holding 1,000 tons. The leaking tank has been drained and the water pumped into another...
Aug 19, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
Prophets of nuclear energy doom have again descended on Japan’s willing, nuclear-averse Press. Tepco is preparing to remove more than 1,300 spent fuel bundles from the storage pool on the fifth floor of F. Daiichi’s unit #4 reactor building. The bundles will be placed...
Aug 17, 2013 | Fukushima Commentary
August 17, 2013 The build-up of stored wastewater at Fukushima Daiichi is a serious problem, at least as far as the Japanese press is concerned. Currently, there is almost 360,000 tons of Cesium-stripped water being stored in above-ground tanks. The rate of build-up...
Aug 15, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
Tepco is accelerating “pumping up” groundwater inside the soil-solidified walls at F. Daiichi. One pumping operation was started last Friday at less than 20 tons per day. After the complete installation of about thirty pipes driven 5 meters into the ground later this...
Aug 12, 2013 | Fukushima Accident Updates
Japan’s Industry Ministry admits their statement of highly-contaminated groundwater flow to the sea is an assumption. The Ministry official who made the announcement qualified the Ministry’s position when he said, “But, we’re not certain if the water is highly...