4/3/2012 Nuclear Waste Has New Best Friends

Source: NEW ENERGY AND FUEL
Date: 4/3/2012

Make that consumers and power companies as well, because these MIT PhD candidates have engineered a way to eliminate waste uranium based fuel by making electricity.

Leslie Dewan and Mark Massie who are nuclear engineering PhD students at MIT, started working their idea called “Transatomic Power” back in 2010, and formed a corporation with the same name last year.  Their business model is to license the design of reactors rather than build plants, a huge capital-intensive endeavor.

Dewan Massie and Lester of Transatomic Power. Click image for the largest view.

Here’s the lure – Transatomic Power’s Waste-Annihilating Molten Salt Reactor (WAMSR) can convert the high-level nuclear waste produced by conventional nuclear reactors each year into $7.1 trillion of electricity.  Here’s the payoff – At full deployment, WAMSR reactors could use the existing stockpiles of nuclear waste to equal satisfying the world’s electricity needs through 2083.
 ...
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[Editor's Note:  Although corrosive molten salts are still toxic to humans and there is still nuclear waste produced (albeit less because of greater efficiency at using up the nuclear fuel), the Generation IV molten salt reactor design is much safer than current operating solid fuel reactor designs, which are water cooled.  Molten salt reactors run at a higher temperature but lower pressure than water cooled fission reactors, reducing wear and tear on equipment and increasing safety.  Because the molten salt bath is the coolant rather than water, there is no danger of hydrogen explosions.  If there is a power failure the frozen salt plug melts and the molten salt drains out of the reactor by gravity in to an underground catch basin.  No more nuclear meltdowns when there is a sustained power outage emergency.]

4/3/2012 Fukushima Radiation Moving Across Pacific Ocean

Source: Huffington Post
Date: 04/ 3/2012 1:06 pm
by:  By Jesse Emspak, LiveScience Contributor:

An aerial view of damage to Sukuiso, Japan, a week after the earthquake and subsequent tsunami devastated the area in March, 2011. 

Radioactive material from the Fukushima nuclear disaster has been found in tiny sea creatures and ocean water some 186 miles (300 kilometers) off the coast of Japan, revealing the extent of the release and the direction pollutants might take in a future environmental disaster.

In some places, the researchers from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) discovered cesium radiation hundreds to thousands of times higher than would be expected naturally, with ocean eddies and larger currents both guiding the "radioactive debris" and concentrating it.
...
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3/4/2012 San Onofre Power Plant To Get A Visit From Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman

Source: Huffington Post
Date: 04/ 4/12 03:49 PM ET
By: MICHAEL R. BLOOD

 Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko (Associated Press) 

LOS ANGELES — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced Wednesday that its chairman will visit the ailing San Onofre nuclear power plant on the California coast, where twin reactors have been sidelined because of excessive wear in tubing that carries radioactive water.
...
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[Editor's Note: Map of San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station
View Live Ustream Radiation Detectors in a larger map ]

3/30/2012 (Video) Fukushima...radiation so high - even robots not safe

Source: RT: The Big Picture
Date: 3/30/2012 upload date
by: Thom Hartmann


Description
Kevin Kamps, Beyond Nuclear joins Thom Hartmann. More than a year into the nuclear crisis at Fukushima - radiation levels have now reached their highest point yet. What does all this mean - and what should nuclear supporters in America be taking away from the continuing crisis?

3/30/2012 California Slammed With Fukushima Radiation

Source: Washington's Blog
Date: 3/30/2012

Fukushima Radiation Plume Hit Southern and Central California

The Journal Environmental Science and Technology reports in a new study that the Fukushima radiation plume contacted North America at California “with greatest exposure in central and southern California”, and that Southern California’s seaweed tested over 500% higher for radioactive  iodine-131 than anywhere else in the U.S. and Canada:

Projected paths of the radioactive atmospheric plume emanating from the Fukushima reactors, best described as airborne particles or aerosols for 131I, 137Cs, and 35S, and subsequent atmospheric monitoring showed it coming in contact with the North American continent at California, with greatest exposure in central and southern California. Government monitoring sites in Anaheim (southern California) recorded peak airborne concentrations of 131I at 1.9 pCi m−3

Anaheim is where Disneyland is located.

EneNews summarizes the data:

Corona Del Mar (Highest in Southern California)

• 2.5 Bq/gdwt (gram dry weight)= 2,500 Bq/kg of dry seaweed
  

Santa Cruz (Highest in Central California)

• 2.0 Bq/gdwt = 2,000 Bq/kg of dry seaweed

Simon Fraser University in Canada also tested North American seaweed after Fukushima:

• “In samples of dehydrated seaweed taken on March 15 near the North Vancouver SeaBus terminal, the count was zero; on March 22 it was 310 Bq per kilogram; and by March 28 it was 380 Bq/kg.” -Vancouver Sun
• Seaweed in Seattle also tested positive for iodine-131; levels were not reported -KIRO
• No results after March 28 were reported

In addition, radioactive debris is starting to wash up on the Pacific Coast. And because the Japanese areburning radioactive materials instead of disposing of them, radioactive rain-outs will continue for some time … even on the Pacific Coast.

Of course, the government is doing everything it can to help citizens cover up what’s occurring. Wepointed out in January:

Instead of doing much to try to protect their citizens from Fukushima, Japan, the U.S.and the EU all just raised the radiation levels they deem “safe”.

Nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen says that high-level friends in the State Department told him that Hillary Clinton signed a pact with her counterpart in Japan agreeing that the U.S. will continue buying seafood from Japan, despite that food not being tested for radioactive materials [see this].

And the Department of Energy is trying to replace the scientifically accepted model of the dangers of low dose radiation based on voodoo science. Specifically, DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley Labs used a mutant line of human cells in a petri dish which was able to repair damage from low doses of radiation, and extrapolated to the unsupported conclusion that everyone is immune to low doses of radiation….

Indeed:

American and Canadian authorities have virtually stopped monitoring airborne radiation, and are not testing fish for radiation. (Indeed, the EPA reacted to Fukushima by raising“acceptable” radiation levels.)

So – as in Japan – radiation is usually discovered by citizens and the handful of research scientists with funding to check, and not the government. See this, this, this, this, this andthis.

The Japanese government’s entire strategy from day one has been to cover up the severity of the Fukushima accident. This has likely led to unnecessary, additional deaths.

Indeed, the core problem is that all of the world’s nuclear agencies are wholly captured by the nuclear industry … as are virtually all of the supposedly independent health agencies.

So the failure of the American, Canadian and other governments to test for and share results is making it difficult to hold an open scientific debate about what is happening.

And it’s not just radiation from Japan.  An effort by the Southern California Edison power company to secretly ramp up production to avoid public disclosure may have led to a leak at the San Onofre nuclear power plant.

And see these articles on California radiation exposure courtesy of EneNews:

• Anaheim, CA has highest amount of radioactive fallout of any EPA air monitoring station in Continental U.S. for iodine-131
• Over EPA limit: Cesium levels in San Francisco area milk now higher than 6 months ago
• USGS: Los Angeles area had highest cesium deposition in US after Fukushima
• “Tends to concentrate in the testicles”: 360+ atoms of radioactive sulfur per day may have been inhaled by Californians after Fukushima
• Unprecedented Spike: 1501 atoms of radioactive sulfur per meter³ was detected in California air
• Radioactive sulfur in California spiked to highest levels ever detected: University researchers
• Controversy after US gov’t estimate showed 40,000 microsievert thyroid dose for California infants from Fukushima — Data not released to public — “Very high doses to children”
• Spike in radiation levels for West Coast? “Abnormal” readings on 8 of 18 EPA monitors for California, Oregon, Washington — Devices now “undergoing quality review”
• Nuclear policy expert: “Striking” that radioactive iodine-131 in California rainwater is so far above level permitted in drinking water
• Uranium-234 detected in Hawaii, Southern California, and Seattle

3/28/2012 High Radiation, Little Water in Japan Reactor

Source: Associated Press
Date: 3/28/2012

Description
Recent investigation found one damaged reactor at Japan's crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant has extremely high levels of radiation and very little water. Authorities haven't been able to probe two others that had meltdowns. (March 28)

Read here for more about the recent probe of the reactor 2 core at Fukushima Daiichi from the Associated Press.

Source: RedButtonStudios, NHK World
Date: Wednesday, March 28, 2012 11:13 +0900 (JST)

Description
Great remix of NHK World by RedButtonStudios

3/26/2012 Tokyo Soil – Blanketed With Fukushima Radiation – Would Be Considered “Radioactive Waste” In the United States

Source: Washington's Blog
Date: 3/26/2012

Tokyo Slammed with Radiation

We noted in August that some parts of Tokyo have more radiation than existed in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zones. And see this and this.

There are indications that radiation levels are increasing in Tokyo.

Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen took 5 random soil samples in Tokyo recently, and found that all 5 were so radioactive that they would be considered radioactive waste in the United States, which would have to be specially disposed of at a facility in Texas:

Tokyo Soil Samples Would Be Considered Nuclear Waste In The US from Fairewinds Energy Education on Vimeo.
Video Description

While traveling in Japan several weeks ago, Fairewinds’ Arnie Gundersen took soil samples in Tokyo public parks, playgrounds, and rooftop gardens.

All the samples would be considered nuclear waste if found here in the US. This level of contamination is currently being discovered throughout Japan.

At the US NRC Regulatory Information Conference in Washington, DC March 13 to March 15, the NRC's Chairman, Dr. Gregory Jaczko emphasized his concern that the NRC and the nuclear industry presently do not consider the costs of mass evacuations and radioactive contamination in their cost benefit analysis used to license nuclear power plants.

Furthermore, Fairewinds believes that evacuation costs near a US nuclear plant could easily exceed one trillion dollars and contaminated land would be uninhabitable for generations.

Indeed, shortly after the earthquake, U.S. government officials noted widespread contamination throughout northern Japan, including Tokyo, and said:

Entire region would be required to be posted as radiological area.

No wonder the potential evacuation of Tokyo has been quietly discussed by Japanese officials ever since the earthquake hit.

3/27/2012 UPDATE 1-U.S. agency to keep SCE's Calif nuclear units shut

Source: Reuters
Date: Tue Mar 27, 2012 5:28pm EDT

(Reuters) - The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission o n T uesday said it will not allow Southern California Edison's San Onofre nuclear generator in California to restart until the agency is sure that the company has addressed premature degradation of tubes in the unit's steam generators.
...
Read full article here

[Editor's Note: Map of San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station
View Live Ustream Radiation Detectors in a larger map ]

Plutonium to make nuclear bombs is extracted from reprocessing nuclear waste from commerical Uranium fission reactors

Source: RT: The Big Picture: Conversations with Great Minds
by: Thom Hartman


This interview with Stephanie Cooke, author of In Mortal Hands: A Cautionary History of the Nuclear Age and editor of Nuclear Intelligence Weekly is especially informative.  One reason for the push for commercial nuclear power is that Plutonium is the by-product of the nuclear fuel cycle.  Waste from Uranium fission reactors is reprocessed to chemically extract Plutonium, which is used to make nuclear bombs.

3/19/2012 Radioactive cesium levels rise sharply in Fukushima, according to citizen watchdog

Source: Straight.com
Date: 3/19/2012
by: Charlie Smith

A Japanese citizen watchdog has reported that cesium-137 levels rose more than five times in Fukushima over a 24-hour period between March 15 and 16.
...
Read full article here

3/19/2012 U.N. nuclear watchdog says it received North Korea invitation

Source: Reuters
Date: Mon Mar 19, 2012 4:01pm EDT
by: Fredrik Dahl

(Reuters) - The United Nations nuclear watchdog said on Monday it had received an invitation from North Korea to visit, three years after its inspectors were expelled from the reclusive Asian state for the second time.
...
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3/16/2012 U.S. nuclear expert recounts Fukushima disaster

Source: CBS
Date: March 16, 2012 7:01 PM
by: Scott Pelley

(CBS News) One year ago Friday, rising radiation forced evacuation of most emergency workers from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. The tsunami that struck Japan five days earlier set off an emergency unlike any before: the meltdown of three reactors at the same time.

One of the experts sent into the emergency is Charles Casto. He's a former nuclear plant operator working for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He was America's top expert at the scene and an eyewitness to history. CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley caught up with him to talk about the Fukushima disaster. 
...
Read the rest here and for transcript