The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    cmaukonen's picture

    Japanese Gov. suggests cover up for nuclear disaster.

    By cmaukonen on Tue, 03/29/2011 - 11:54pm |

    I could not believe this when I first read it.

    TOKYO, March 30, Kyodo

    The government is considering applying new measures to prevent the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant from further spreading radioactive particles, its top spokesman said Wednesday.

    Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told a news conference that the government and nuclear experts are discussing ''every possibility'' to bring the plant under control and that some measures that have been reported by the media are included in their options.

    Media reports said that the government and the experts have been studying the feasibility of new steps such as covering reactors of the plant with special cloth to reduce the amount of radioactive particles flying away from the facility and using a big tanker to collect the contaminated water.

    Since the March 11 earthquake and ensuing tsunami damaged the nuclear plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co. and the government have been battling to cool its overheating reactors.

    ==Kyodo

    There ya go. Throw a tarp over it and maybe people won't notice.

    Comments

    Throw a tarp over it

     

    That's what I always do with a mess I don't feel like dealing with...


    by jollyroger on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 1:59am

    On my commute I was able to listen to Democracy Now! this morning. Amy Goodman hosted a debate between grande dame anti-Nuclear activist Helen Caldicott and long-time climate change activist George Monbiot. Monbiot feels that coal is much more harmful than nuclear, charging that anti-Nuke folk have been "cherry-picking" data to support their contentions. Caldicott agrees that coal is bad, but feels that nuclear will be much more harmful for much longer, and that the data that hasn't been cleansed by the IAEA, and similar organizations, clearly supports the concern over the long-term, indeed generational, health risks of nuclear contamination. A podcast of today's show is here.

    Monbiot relied heavily on some UN report, while Caldicott was mostly reacting to IAEA reports that she felt were slanted by the atomic energy industry. At one point he cited a figure of only 43 people killed by Chernobyl. Caldicott was outraged by that number and could only stammer, "That's a lie!"


    by Donal on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 9:11am

    According to this story on the BBC, they have decided to scrap 4 of the reactors. (I don't belive they were actually considering trying to use them again...OY)

    Japan is to decommission four stricken reactors at the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear plant, the operator says.

    Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) made the announcement three weeks after failing to bring reactors 1 - 4 under control. Locals would be consulted on reactors 5 and 6, which were shut down safely.

    Harmful levels of radioactivity have been detected in the area.

    More than 11,000 people are known to have been killed by the devastating 11 March earthquake and tsunami.

    Emperor Akihito visited a centre for earthquake and tsunami victims in the Tokyo area on Wednesday.

    Not only that, it sounds like the president of TEPCO is having some heart problems as well.  At leat they don't perform Hara-kiri anymore. Just have a heart attack instead.


    by cmaukonen on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 9:33am

    http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/03/82090.html

    Efforts to remove radiation-contaminated water filling up at a troubled reactor building and an underground trench connected to it at the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have hit a snag, casting a shadow on restoration of the vital cooling functions at the site, the government's nuclear safety agency said Wednesday.

    The evolving nuclear crisis also showed no signs of abating, as the agency said the same day the highest concentration of radioactive iodine-131 was detected Tuesday in a seawater sample taken near the plant's drainage outlets in the Pacific Ocean. The density was 3,355 times the maximum level permitted under law.

    Workers rushed to pump out radiation-polluted water that has been filling up the basement of the No. 1 reactor's turbine building and the tunnel-like trench connected to it, but they found out Tuesday a tank accommodating the water from the building had become full, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said.

    The engineers also newly spotted water polluted with low-level radiation at a building designed for radioactive waste disposal at the plant, where the trench water is meant to be transferred. They nonetheless finished laying hoses to discharge the trench water, according to the agency.

    Despite the halt of water-pumping operations at the No. 1 turbine building, the depth of stagnant water was confirmed to have been halved to 20 centimeters, the agency said.

    On Wednesday evening, smoke was temporarily seen rising from a power distribution panel at the No. 1 reactor of the Fukushima Daini nuclear plant, some 10 kilometers south of the Daiichi power station, but it soon disappeared.

    No radiation leak was confirmed from the site and nobody was injured in the incident, the plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

    At the Daiichi plant, radioactive water has also been soaking the basements of the Nos. 2-3 reactor buildings and filling the underground tunnels linked to them. The operator known as TEPCO continued work to secure enough space to accommodate the polluted water at the plant's tanks.

    Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the governmental nuclear regulatory body, told a press conference that the stagnant water obstructs attempts by TEPCO to revive the key cooling functions at the plant, which were paralyzed after the March 11 magnitude 9.0 quake and ensuing tsunami.

    TEPCO has been pouring massive amounts of water into the reactors and spent nuclear fuel pools at the plant as a stopgap measure to cool them down, because serious damage to fuel rods from overheating could lead to the release of enormous amounts of radioactive materials into the environment.


    by cmaukonen on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 12:06pm

    We do not even know how to handle our own nuclear waste.

    Six months ago everybody was saying: hell look at Europe and Japan they get ___% of their energy from nuclear....blah blah blah


    by Richard Day on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 4:29pm