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NRC's Jaczko: "right now I intend to continue to serve out my term"
05/23/2012 - 17:34
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

??? Didn't he just announce his resignation?

From The Hill (5/23/2012):

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko acknowledged Wednesday that it could be a while before he steps down as head of the agency, despite announcing plans to resign this week.

And he declined to outright dismiss the possibility that he could be re-nominated to a second term as chairman if his successor is not confirmed by next year.

“Right now my focus is on nuclear safety and I have been privileged and honored to serve in this position, and right now I intend to continue to serve out my term,” Jaczko said at a press conference in Charlotte, N.C., the chairman’s first public appearance since announcing his plan to step down.

“If by that time, a successor has not been found, then I’ll deal with those issues at that time.”

The comments came a day after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) suggested that Jaczko could be re-nominated if his successor is not confirmed by June 30, 2013, when the chairman’s first term ends.

“We hope to have a replacement before that. But if we don’t, Greg will be there for the duration,” Reid told reporters in the Capitol Tuesday. “And if something doesn't work out, he can always be re-nominated.”

Pressed by reporters Wednesday for clarification of his remarks, Jaczko added: “I announced my resignation contingent on a successor being nominated and confirmed. And until that time I intend to continue to serve as chairman.”

Asked if he intends to serve out his term, Jaczko said, “It depends on the process whether a successor is nominated and confirmed. So if that happens before the end of my term, then I would leave at that time.”

The White House has said President Obama hopes to nominate Jaczko’s replacement “soon.” But Reid’s comments Tuesday cast doubt on how quickly the nomination will move through the Senate.

The Senate is also grappling with the re-nomination of Republican NRC Commissioner Kristine Svinicki, who faces opposition from Reid and other top Democrats.

Reid has been a vocal defender of Jaczko, his former aide, amid allegations that he bullied NRC staff.

Republicans have added the allegations to the long list of reasons they dislike Jaczko’s leadership on the commission. Other reasons include Jaczko’s decision to close out a review of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository and the chairman’s opposition to recent approvals of new nuclear reactors.

Jaczko again defended his tenure at the NRC Wednesday and denied that his resignation had anything to do with a pending inspector general report examining his leadership on the panel.

“Any inspector general report had nothing to do with this decision,” he said.

The chairman repeated the assertion that he made his decision in order to give the president and the Senate time to name a successor.

“The timing I thought was appropriate for the president and the Senate to find a replacement for me,” he said.

Jaczko declined to offer suggestions for his replacement.

“I’m not involved in the process of identifying a replacement,” he said.


Kitakyushu City Hall on May 23: Mothers vs City Officials
05/23/2012 - 06:43
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

First, young mothers with small children (photo from @mama_jp):


The sign says, "Adults should protect the future of children. We're against disaster debris burning. Protect Kyushu for Japan."

Professor Yukio Hayakawa's tweet was: "Mothers in Kitakyushu, have they all gone nuts?"

On his May 23 blog, he proclaimed, "This day will be long recorded as the day when the discrimination against Tohoku has started."

He probably has not seen this picture of Kitakyushu City officials blocking the passage (photo from @Saikeman):


If he did, he may highly approve of the high-handed way the Kitakyushu City officials have treated the whole issue - from not bothering to tell anyone (residents, neighboring cities) to laughing at the protesters to calling the police to disperse the protesters yesterday. The professor is recommending that Kitakyushu City declare independence from the rest of Japan if the residents want to keep out the disaster debris.

The city is test-burning the debris from Ishinomaki City, Miyagi Prefecture right now at an incineration plant for regular household garbage. In the test burn, 1 part of disaster debris is supposed to be mixed with 9 parts of household garbage and burned. Protests apparently have no impact to the city officials or the mayor, and the residents of Kitakyushu City are indifferent for the most part, I hear.

NHK reports that about 70 people are protesting near the incineration plant, but there are more than 150 policemen blocking the road to protect the debris-carrying trucks.

Kyushu have been mostly spared from the fallout from the Fukushima accident, so the residents' sensitivity to radiation contamination is probably not the same as that in Kanto or Tohoku. Professor Hayakawa's later tweet says "176 becquerels per kilo? That's just normal."

Measurement of soil for cesium-137 in the nearby Fukuoka City in 2010 was 2.3 becquerels/kg. The highest I could find was 155 becquerels/kg in 1964. (Data from Japan Chemical Analysis Center)

Radioactivity of disaster debris from Ishinomaki City, Miyagi, from the Ministry of the Environment:

Report from Australia: "Japan farmer harvests hope in our soil"
05/23/2012 - 02:55
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)
The Australian has the following report of Mr. Takemi Shirado, Iwaki-City rice farmer who went to Australia after the Fukushima I Nuclear Plant Accident to start again from scratch.

Farmer Shirado just harvested 10 kilograms of rice from 100 grams of seed rice. Now he will plant 10 kilograms of seed rice to harvest 1 tonne of rice by summer.


From The Australian (5/23/2012):

JAPANESE farmer Takemi Shirado still sounds grief-stricken and shell-shocked when talking about last year's Fukushima nuclear disaster that so devastated his rural community.

Catastrophic radiation contamination of the soil means his family won't be able to sow rice on their Iwaki rice paddies, about 60km from the crippled defunct power plant, for at least 300 years.

Other local farmers are starting to grow leafy vegetables on less-contaminated fields, but are finding consumers too scared to buy their risky produce.

But Mr Shirado is clearly not a man to moan and mope.

Instead he has come to Australia as head of a consortium of Fukushima farmers to see if north Queensland's fertile Burdekin valley might hold the solution to his prefecture's long-term fallout-affected food problems.

Mr Shirado's dream now is to turn the sugarcane fields around Ayr into fertile flooded rice paddies growing Japanese rice varieties in traditional organic ways, to supply the people of his ruined home prefecture once again with their staple food.

Yesterday Mr Shirado, official representative of the Fukushima farmers co-operative, was celebrating.

More than 15 months after the tsunami and nuclear explosion destroyed his community's quiet way of life, the proud Japanese rice grower could be found standing knee deep in green rice stalks, small Japanese sickle in hand, harvesting his first Kochi rice trial in tropical north Queensland.

"It is looking good; even though it is still early days," said a satisfied Mr Shirado.

"So far this looks like being a very good area for growing rice; I think we can grow four crops a year here and the water is very pure too."

With strict quarantine restrictions on importing Japanese varieties of rice into Australia, Mr Shirado's Burdekin rice scheme has had to start from scratch.

Three months ago he had just a handful of the required kochi rice seeds -- only 100g -- to plant in three small test plots at the Ayr agricultural research station.

After yesterday's hand harvest, he now has 10kg of rice grain to grow his next Ayr crop on more irrigated land. By August, Mr Shirado hopes to have turned that 10kg of rice into one tonne of seed, before expanding exponentially.

Local Queensland agricultural regional development manager Gareth Jones admits the plans of the Fukushima Farmers co-operative are ambitious; particularly their certainty of harvesting a rapid four crops of rice a year, each taking just three months to grow.

But he says the Burdekin needs diversity, and that new varieties of sushi or short-grain rice grown using flood irrigation, might fit well into fallow rotations of local canegrowers.

"It's no exaggeration to say that when this project started, the Japanese delegation felt they were planting seeds of hope for the future," Mr Jones says.


Mr. Shirado has the same smile of a farmer who loves farming, growing what he wants without worries of radiation contamination, like Mr. Tanno, who gave up farming in Fukushima and moved to Nagano to grow his organic carrots.

(H/T John Noah)

#Radioactive Japan: 107.2 Bq/kg of Cesium from Pork from Koriyama City, First Pork to Exceed Safety Limit
05/22/2012 - 18:58
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)
Radioactive cesium exceeding the safety limit of 100 becquerels/kg was detected from one of 6 pigs shipped from a pig farm in Koriyama City, Fukushima Prefecture. The other 5 were also found with radioactive cesium, ranging from 11 Bq/kg to 78 Bq/kg.

First, from Yomiuri Shinbun (5/22/2012):

福島・郡山産の豚肉からセシウム…出荷自粛

Radioactive cesium from pork produced in Koriyama City, Fukushima, voluntary shipment halt

福島県郡山市は２２日、市内の養豚農家が出荷した豚１頭の肉から、国の規制値（１キロ・グラム当たり１００ベクレル）を超える１０７・２ベクレルの放射性セシウムが検出されたと発表した。

Koriyama City in Fukushima Prefecture announced on May 22 that the meat from one of the pigs shipped by a pig farmer in the city was found with 107.2 Bq/kg of radioactive cesium, exceeding the national safety limit (100 Bq/kg).

農水省によると、４月に導入された新規制値を超えるセシウムが豚から検出されるのは初めて。

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, it is the first case of cesium detection from pork that exceeded the new safety limit introduced in April.

同市によると、２１日に出荷された６頭を簡易検査したところ、そのうち１頭から５０ベクレル超を検出。再検査した結果、新規制値超の放射性セシウムを検出した。市は簡易検査で問題のなかった５頭の出荷自粛を農家に求め、すべて市場に出回っていない。

According to the city, the meat from 6 pigs that was shipped on May 21 was tested using the simplified method [NaI scintillation, most likely]. From the meat from one of the pigs, more than 50 Bq/kg of cesium was detected. After more detailed inspection [likely using germanium semiconductor detector], radioactive cesium exceeding the new safety limit was detected. The city has requested the voluntary halt of shipment of the meat from 5 pigs that passed the simplified test, so none of the meat is being sold in the market.

市は２２日に職員を派遣して農家にヒアリングを行ったが、原因究明には至っていない。今後、豚の餌である配合飼料などを検査して解明を急ぐ。

The city send an official to the pig farm on May 22 and interviewed, but the cause [for radioactive cesium in the meat] is not known yet. The city will test the formula feed and other feed for the pigs to try to identify the cause.


Koriyama City's press release on May 22, 2012 says the pork that was found with 107.2 Bq/kg of cesium will be destroyed, but the rest of the pork that tested lower than the safety limit (100 Bq/kg) is "supposed to be destroyed by the producer". That doesn't engender much confidence these days.

試料の種類
検査結果
セシウム134
セシウム137
合計
豚肉1
19.1
21.7
40.8
豚肉2
21.0
27.7
48.7
豚肉3
検出せず（＜1.38）
11.2
11.2
豚肉4
41.8
65.4
107.2
豚肉5
20.2
37.3
57.5
豚肉6
26.9
50.6
77.5

One Day After the Disaster Debris Standoff in Kitakyushu: 2 Protesters Arrested
05/22/2012 - 17:58
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

for ostensibly "attacking the police", according to Yomiuri Shinbun (5/22/2012). If the past incidents are any indication, that would mean these two men got in physical contact with policemen, and that's called "attacking".

Yomiuri also reports 20 of the 22 trucks carrying 80 tonnes of disaster debris got inside, after 8-hour delays. The debris will be burned on May 23.

There were about 40 policemen against 30 or so protesters, according to Yomiuri.

By the way, Yasumi Iwakami's IWJ did the live netcast from early morning of May 22 for about 15 hours.

Portirland blog has the screen shots of the survey meter, with the highest radiation level at 0.612 microsievert/hour. The embedded video shows the measurement was done after the truck left the site. The survey meter went from 0.06 microsievert/hour or so to 0.612 microsievert/hour in about 2 and a half minutes.

(UPDATED) Disaster Debris Standoff in Kitakyushu: City Officials Threatening Police Action
05/22/2012 - 06:59
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

so that the trucks can enter the depot. The police are trying to remove the protesters including a pregnant woman.

Someone's under the truck, trying to prevent it from entering the gate.

City official was heard laughing as he said protesters were pulled from under the truck. (Photo from @asat8)


Policemen were seen locking arms to protect the huge, brand-new truck that carries disaster debris.

Two people have been arrested, according to the tweets by people who have been watching the scene.

You can see it live:



Live streaming by Ustream

#Fukushima I Nuke Plant Reactor 1 Containment Vessel May Have Only 40 Centimeters of Water, Government Researchers at JNES Say
05/22/2012 - 03:37
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

Move over, Reactor 2 (which has 60 centimeters of water)...

Tokyo Shinbun reports that the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization under the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry analyzed the parameters of Reactor 1 at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant, and concluded that there may be only 40 centimeters of water retained inside the Containment Vessel.

Tokyo Shinbun's graphics shows the cooling water leaking from a downcomer.

The fuel debris (corium) is estimated to have eaten into the concrete floor of the Containment Vessel in Reactor 1, as announced in November last year. TEPCO's estimate is about 65 centimeters, and the estimate by the Institute of Applied Energy is as much as 2 meters.

From Tokyo Shinbun (5/22/2012):

東京電力福島第一原発１号機には毎時六トン前後の冷却水が注入されているのに、格納容器内の水位はわずか四十センチほどしかない可能性が、原子力安全基盤機構（ＪＮＥＳ）の解析で分かった。２号機の水位は約六十センチしかないことが実測で判明しており、格納容器損傷の深刻さをあらためてうかがわせた。　

Analysis by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization (JNES) has revealed the possibility that the water inside the Containment Vessel of Reactor 1 may be only 40-centimeter deep, despite 6 tonnes/hour water being injected [into the Reactor Pressure Vessel]. The water level inside the Reactor 2 Containment Vessel has been measured by an actual survey to be about 60-centimeter deep. It shows how severe the damages to the Containment Vessels have really been.

解析は、注水量や格納容器への窒素の注入量と、格納容器内の圧力変化の関係を調べ、どこにどれくらいの損傷があれば、変化をうまく説明できるか探る手法を使った。

In the analysis, JNES studied the relationship between the amount of water injected, the amount of nitrogen gas injected into the Containment Vessel and change in pressure levels inside the Containment Vessel to come up with the locations and the extent of damage that would explain the change in pressure levels well.

その結果、格納容器本体と下部の圧力抑制室をつなぐ配管周辺に直径数センチの穴が開いている▽穴の場所は、格納容器のコンクリート床面から約四十センチの高さで、穴から大量に水が漏れ、水はそれより上にはない－との結論になった。

JNES has concluded that:

  • There is a hole several centimeters in diameter on the pipe that connects the Containment Vessel and the Suppression Chamber;

  • The location of the hole is about 40 centimeters from the concrete floor of the Containment Vessel.

  • The injected water is leaking from the hole in great quantities.

  • There is no water [in the Containment Vessel] above the hole.

漏れた水は、原子炉建屋地下に流れた後、配管やケーブルなどを通す穴を通じ、隣接するタービン建屋地下に流れ込んでいるとみられている。東電は１号機の格納容器の水位は約一・八メートルあると推定しているが、それより大幅に低い。

The leaked water is considered to be flowing down to the basement of the Reactor building, and then into the adjacent turbine building through the pipes and cable ducts. TEPCO has estimated the water level of the Reactor 1 Containment Vessel to be about 1.8 meters, but the JNES analysis shows it is far less.

格納容器の厚みは三センチほどあるが、穴があるとみられる配管（直径一・七五メートル）の厚みは七・五ミリと四分の一程度しかない。専門家からは、配管は構造的に弱いとの指摘が出ていた。

The Containment Vessel is about 3 centimeters thick. However, the thickness of the 1.75-meter diameter pipe that may have a hole is only 7.5 millimeters thick, or only a quarter of the thickness of the Containment Vessel. Experts have pointed out that the pipe is structurally weak.

溶け落ちた核燃料が完全に水に漬かっていないことも懸念されるが、ＪＮＥＳの担当者は「格納容器内の温度は三〇度程度と高くはない。水に漬かって冷やされているとみられる」と指摘する。

There is also a fear that the fuel debris [corium] may not be completely submerged in water. But the JNES researchers say, "The temperature inside the Containment Vessel is not that high, at 30 degrees Celsius. The fuel debris is considered to be submerged and cooled."

廃炉を実現するためには、格納容器の損傷部を補修し、圧力容器ごと水没させる水棺にすることが必要。担当者は「解析結果は損傷部の特定に役立つ。今後はカメラによる実測も検討しなければならない」と話した。

In order to decommission the reactors, it is necessary to repair the damage(s) on the Containment Vessels so that the Reactor Pressure Vessel can be entombed with water. The researchers say, "The result of the analysis is useful in identifying the damage. We should also consider the actual survey using a camera."


As I reported here in December last year, Professor Takashi Tsuruda of Akita Prefectural University, a combustion expert, thinks the Reactor 1 Suppression Chamber was damaged in the explosion.

ECB Has Been Secretly Propping Up Greek Banks
05/22/2012 - 06:20
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)
From Financial Times, via CNBC (5/21/2012):

There has been no official announcement. No terms or conditions have been disclosed. But Greece’s banking system is being propped up by an estimated €100 billion or so of emergency liquidity provided by the country’s central bank — approved secretly by the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. If Greece were to leave the eurozone, the immediate cause might be an ECB decision to pull the plug.

Extensive use of “emergency liquidity assistance” (ELA) to help banks in the weakest economies has been one of the less-noticed features of the eurozone crisis. Separate from normal supplies of liquidity and meant originally as a temporary facility for national authorities to use when banks hit problems, ELA proved a lifesaver for the financial system Ireland and is now even more so in Greece. As such, it has given the ECB — which has ultimate control over the facility — considerable power to determine countries’ fates.

Whether that power would ever be exercised is unclear. ELA is a subject on which the ECB is deeply reluctant to provide information — even on where or when it is provided.

“You don’t say when you are in an emergency situation, because then you make the situation worse. So I really don’t see the usefulness of being more transparent,” Luc Coene, Belgium’s central bank governor, explained in a Financial Times interview this month.

The ECB’s guard slipped a little late last month. Its weekly financial statement published on April 24, showed an unexpected €121 billion increase in the innocently titled heading “other claims on euro area credit institutions,” the result of putting all ELA under the same item. By definition, €121 billion was the minimum amount of ELA being provided by the “eurosystem” — the network of eurozone central banks.

By scouring ECB and national central bank statements analysts, have since pieced together more details. Analysts at Barclays, for instance, reckon Greece is now using €96 billion in ELA, with Ireland accounting for another €41 billion and Cyprus €4 billion. If correct, total ELA in use has exceeded €140 billion — more than 10 per cent of the amount lent to eurozone banks in standard monetary policy operations.

Because of the risks of extra liquidity creating inflation, ELA in excess of €500 million requires approval by the ECB’s 23-strong governing council: its use can be stopped if two-thirds of the council oppose an application.

(Full article at the link)


On this reassuring news, the stock futures for the major European bourses are up right now. Stock markets in Asia are all up, with Korea's KOSPI up more than 1.7%.

In an separate, related article at CNBC, Mr. Alexis Tsipras is quoted:

In Greece itself, the head of the county’s radical left party traveled to Paris on Monday to try to consolidate support from political allies for rejecting the terms of the country's bailout package, ahead of general elections that could decide the destiny of Greece in the euro zone.

"I don't know if we have scared Europe, but judging by your presence here today, we have surprised it," Alexis Tsipras, the 37-year-old leader of Syriza, told journalists at the French National Assembly.


Just In: Kitakyushu Residents Physically Block the Delivery of Disaster Debris to the Waste Collection Depot
05/22/2012 - 02:43
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)
Headline only in Oita Press (5/22/2012):

北九州市の廃棄物集積地に宮城県石巻市のがれきを積んだトラックが入るのを、反対する市民が阻止。

Residents who oppose the acceptance of disaster debris to Kitakyushu City blocked the trucks that carry the debris from Ishinomaki City in Miyagi Prefecture to the Waste Collection Depot in the city.

#Radioactive Japan: Cherries from Fukushima City with 61.66 Bq/Kg of Radioactive Cesium
05/21/2012 - 20:21
From Fukushima Disaster Blog (English)

That's not much reduction from last year, particularly when the extensive "decontamination" of fruit trees in Fukushima was carried out last year and earlier this year.

Supermarket chain Ichii, based in Fukushima City, measures radiation in food items that the chain sells to customers. In the result for May 21, 2012, the supermarket chain reports that 61.66 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium was detected from cherries grown in Fukushima City.

According to Ichii, the cherries were not for sale but they were from a fruit farmer who wanted them tested prior to the shipment.

Last year, cherries from Fukushima City tested 70 to 96 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium, according to the Fukushima prefectural government webpage for Fukushima produce.

Fukushima Prefecture encouraged fruit farmers in Fukushima to "decontaminate" their fruit trees so that this year's crop would have low cesium (if not no cesium). The methods of decontaminating the fruit trees were:

  • Blasting the trees with high-pressure washers

  • Scraping off the tree barks with a sickle


In Fukushima City, the latter was the strongly preferred method forced upon the fruit farmers by the local JA, according to Mr. Shuji Akagi, who has been tweeting the scenes from his city with photographs.

Well clearly that didn't prevent cesium from entering the fruit this year. Surprise, surprise.

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