Japanese Earthquake and Tsunami II

Here's an article that seeks to reassure.

http://post.theenergycollective.com/?q=barrybrook/53461/fukushima-nuclea...

Does Canada have statistics on the long term health of nuclear power workers? And I'm sure that is complicated by turnover. The reason I ask that is I knew someone in the late 80s or early 90s that worked at Pickering who told me when there was a problem at the plant they were ordered into areas which resulted in exceeding the safe limits of their monitors by their supervisors. I remember telling the person to refuse to do it. 

Canada regulator reports water leak at nuclear plant

http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFN1610498020110316

Are We in Danger of Radioactive Exposure from the Japan Nuclear Leaks?

http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2011/03/are-we-in-danger-of-radioa...

"If we could rely on the Japanese and American governments to inform us of any danger, we wouldn't have to be so vigilant.."

This thread is about nuclear energy, not tsunamis or earthquakes. The title should be changed.

I suggest "Japanese Nuclear Catastrophe Is a Lesson to Us All"

NY Times coverage appears to be good

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U.S. Calls Radiation 'Extremely High' and Urges Deeper Caution in Japan

Mr. Jaczko's testimony came as the American Embassy in Tokyo, on advice from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, told Americans to evacuate a radius of "approximately 50 miles" from the Fukushima plant.

The advice represents a graver assessment of the risk in the immediate vicinity of Daiichi than the warnings made by the Japanese themselves, who have told everyone within 20 kilometers, about 12 miles, to evacuate, and those between 20 and 30 kilometers to take shelter.

Mr. Jaczko's testimony, the most extended comments by a senior American official on Japan's nuclear disaster, described what amounts to an agonizing choice for Japanese authorities: Send a small number of workers into an increasingly radioactive area in a last-ditch effort to cover the spent fuel, and the fuel in other reactors, - with water, or do more to protect the workers but risk letting the pools of water protecting the fuel boil away - and thus risk a broader meltdown.

The Japanese authorities have never been as specific as Mr. Jascko was in his testimony about the situation at reactor No. 4, where they have been battling fires for more than 24 hours. It is possible the authorities there disagree with Mr. Jascko's conclusion about the exposure of the spent fuel, or that they have chosen not to discuss the matter for fear of panicking people.

Experts say workers at the plant probably could not approach a fuel pool that was dry, because radiation levels would be so high. In a normally operating pool, the water provides not only cooling but also shields workers from gamma radiation. A plan to dump water into the pool, and others like it, from helicopters was suspended because the crews would be flying right into a radioactive plume.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/world/asia/17nuclear.html?partner=rss&...

So who do you believe?

I think I prefer to err on the side of caution.

Japan denies meltdown threat assessment by U.S.

U.S. urges 80 km evacuation zone for its citizens around nuclear plant

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/story/2011/03/16/japan-radiation-c...

[url=http://socialistworker.org/2011/03/15/risks-of-nuclear-roulette]The risks of nuclear roulette[/url]

Chris Williams, author of Ecology and Socialism: Solutions to Capitalist Ecological Crisis, explains how nuclear industry practices and government policies set the stage for a nuclear disaster in Japan that is on the verge of becoming the worst in history.

Finally perhaps a little dose of reality

U.S. Concerned Japan Facing Situation That Could Be 'Deadly For Decades': ABC News

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/16/japan-nuclear-crisis-us-officia...

Britain advises citizens to consider leaving Tokyo

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jmpSIEi0rMCKIj5-CBF4h...

I'm sure that when your neighbourhood nuclear reactor goes critical we'll all be able to identify the "pretty glaring flaws" in its design.  

I followed A_J's link to the stats on deadly windmills and found this disclaimer:
 

These accident statistics are copyright Caithness Windfarm Information Forum 2010. The data may be used or referred to by groups or

Far as I can see, these are just boxes with numbers in them.
http://www.caithnesswindfarms.co.uk/accidents.pdf
Great BBQ anecdotes for petro ghouls?
To be fair, the best people may not be harvesting wind power either.

Hurtin Albertan wrote:

Currently I am enjoying the benefits of natural gas and probably coal fired electricity.  Both of those have their own advantages and disadvantages, just like wind power and nuclear power and any other form of energy production.

I love the way you casually suggest that there is some kind of equivalency between all forms of energy production, as if it doesn't really matter which technology we use, because they all have their "advantages and disadvantages". The big difference is that fossil fuels are not renewable and their carbon emissions are forcing climate change. That's a big enough "disadvantage" to rule them out as energy sources to be encouraged and expanded.

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But I am willing to accept some disadvantages for the big bonus of heat and light and internet and refridgeration and what have you.

How big of you to be so willing to accept destruction of the environment and global climate change to ensure the continuation of your own convenience and comfort level. How do you think the rest of the world feels about your choice?

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Not so far away from me, about as far away as the site of this proposed nuclear reactor, is the fabulous Athabasca tar sands around Ft. McMurray.  While not as scary as a burning and exploding nuclear reactor, all the industrial development up there and it's associated hazards likely pose a far greater threat to me than the current situation in Japan.  In some ways I am willing to accept such industrial development up there in my old home town because again, not to belabour the point, but it's a price I pay to keep the lights on so to speak.

Again, you fail to acknowledge that the "fabulous" tar sands pose a threat to the entire world, including Japan, because of their contribution to global climate change and their perpetuation of reliance on fossil fuel as a major energy source. You're not paying anywhere near the price that the First Nations are paying for the environmental destruction and toxicity, or the price that the global south is paying for the effects of climate change.

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People fear the unknown.

Nuclear power is hardly "the unknown". We have good reason to fear what such a destructive and potentially deadly technology will do in the hands of those who place private profit before the welfare of humanity. 

Caldicott: Japan May Spell End of Nuclear Industry Worldwide

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=23744

"Independent Australia spoke exclusively to Dr. Caldicott yesterday as she was in transit to Canada to speak at a hearing into a proposal to build four new power plants in Darlington, Ontario.

'The situation is very grim and not just for the Japanese people,' said Dr. Caldicott. 'If both reactors blow then the whole of the Northern Hemisphere may be affected,' she said. 'This could be a diabolical catastrophe - we'll just have to wait and see. But I think the nuclear industry is finished worldwide...'"

Hurtin Albertan wrote:

I love the way you (M. Spector) read way, way too much into my posts. 

That and people freaking out possibly unnecessarily over the mention of "nuclear" and "anything else" in the same sentance, let alone "nuclear" and "emergency" or "crisis" or "apocalypse" or what the hey ever.

I thought he captured the essence of it quite well.  When it comes to nuclear as we understand it today, to my mind no amount freaking out is unnecessary.  We're talking about hundreds of containers spread around the world housing radioactive mini-suns and their byproducts, whose safe operation are overseen, supposedly to our benefit, by governmental bodies or private sector conglomerates that on their very best days for the most part, cannot manage to provide a single reason as to why we should trust them with anything.

Man, I really have to figure out how to quote stuff like that.

Fidel, no arguing with you over the corporate aspects of it all.  Anyways we (collective we) should have had nuclear power long ago in Alberta in my opinion.  We (collectively) burn an insane amount of natural gas to make steam to get oil out of the tar sands.  Nuclear power could easily have been used from the start to make that steam.  Do we need to build reactors now?  I really don't know.  I doubt we will anyways with the current state of things.  Given the current impact of the tar sands operations I don't think it's too far of a reach to claim that having a nuclear power plant up there wouldn't significantly degrade the situation much further, regardless of if this hypothetical reactor or reactors was built in 1975 or 2025. 

Should we have never built any nuclear power plants in Canada?  That's a whole other topic.  Probably not too hard to guess where I'd sit on that issue. 

How many nuclear power plants are out there across the globe right now, quietly and peaceably splitting atoms or whatever it is they do?  How many storage facilities are currently in use?  I don't have an exact number but I'd say Slumberjack is a little low in calling them "hundreds of containers", add them all up and there's probably thousands and thousands if you count in military stuff. 

And I'd say that speculating how "both reactors could blow and affect the whole northern hemisphere" is unnecessary freaking out.  Far as I know they cannot and will not "blow up" in a big old mushroom cloud.  Continue to leak dangerous levels of radiation yes, "blow up" no but hey, I'm just some guy on the internet.

Good site I found, seems to be pretty objective and non-biased and in no way connected to the industry or other lobby groups that I can see:

http://library.thinkquest.org/17940/texts/nuclear_disasters/nuclear_disasters.html

So there may still be explosions and maybe it still could blow up, just not like an atomic bomb if that is any consolation.

Anyways I continue in my hopes that this will all get "sorted out" before it gets to that catastrophic stage.

They need to entomb this entire reactor complex in concrete - sounds like a job for organized labour construction workers.

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Anyways we (collective we) should have had nuclear power long ago in Alberta in my opinion.  

People who advocate for nuclear energy really don't understand the concept of permanent. They have a limited grasp of the concept of risk, and they are certainly clueless about the hazards of technology. They also cannot think outside their own timeline, or conceive of a world existing beyond their lifetimes. What happens at the end of a plant's lifecycle? What happens to the irrradiated fuel? What happens when the "impossible" does happen? 

Like I said, anyone advocating for nuclear energy should be on a plane to Japan right now, ready to put out the fires. If they are unwilling to risk their lives for that, then they should STFU.

Worse Than Chernobyl?  -  by Russell D Hoffman

http://www.counterpunch.org/hoffman03172011.html

"Of course you can always listen to the pro-nukers tell you not to worry because it can't happen 'here', wherever 'here' is for you. It is clear now that this is worse than Chernobyl. Nuclear power will do this to us again and again, unless there is a global effort to close the plants. No reactor is safe..."

This is also beginning to have serious political ramifications what with China now demanding Japan tell everybody what is actually going on with radiation levels, etc.

Statement to US Senate

Union of Concerned Scientists wrote:

STATEMENT OF DR. EDWIN LYMAN,
SENIOR SCIENTIST, GLOBAL SECURITY PROGRAM

TO THE SENATE ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE

UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS

MARCH 16, 2011

On behalf of the Union of Concerned Scientists, I would like to thank Chairman Boxer, Ranking Member Inhofe, and the other members of the Environment and Public Works Committee for the opportunity to provide our views on the unfolding accident at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant and its implications for nuclear power in this country.

The Union of Concerned Scientists would like to extend its deepest sympathies to the people of Japan during this crisis.

While the ongoing situation in Japan should be a main focus of U.S attention, we should not hesitate to ask ourselves whether we are doing all that we can do to prevent a Fukushima-like nuclear disaster from happening here.

Before proceeding, I would like to say that the Union of Concerned Scientists is neither pro nor anti-nuclear power, but has served as a nuclear power safety and security watchdog for over 40 years.

In the aftermath of the 1979 Three Mile Island accident, the NRC undertook a major overhaul of its rules to correct many of the regulatory weaknesses that the accident revealed. In contrast, seven years later, the Commission and the industry avoided learning any lessons from the far more severe Chernobyl accident because of the misleading claim that such an extreme release of radioactivity could never happen at a plant of Western design.

However, the NRC and the industry cannot hide this time behind the "it can't happen here" excuse. We have 23 plants of the same design. We have plants that are just as old. We have had station blackouts.

We have a regulatory system that is not clearly superior to that of the Japanese. We have had extreme weather events that exceeded our expectations and defeated our emergency planning measures (Katrina).

We have had close calls (e.g. Davis-Besse) that were only one additional failure away from becoming disasters. We have had full-blown disasters in other industries (e.g. BP). We have suffered a devastating terrorist air attack against our infrastructure for which we were completely unprepared.

I would ask the Committee to imagine for a moment that the crisis unfolding at Fukushima is taking place in their home states, and to consider whether this is something that Americans should ever have to endure under any circumstances.

If the answer is no-the right answer, in our opinion-then it is incumbent on you to thoroughly investigate whether the risk of an American Fukushima is really as low as the NRC and the industry claim.

But even though it will be a long time before we learn all the lessons from the still-evolving disaster in Japan, it is not premature to immediately take steps to reduce vulnerabilities that have long been known by regulators but have not been addressed. I will offer a few examples.

1. At least two spent fuel pools at the Fukushima plant have caught fire and are releasing radiation into the atmosphere. These pools are on the upper floor of these Mark I boiling-water reactors and are now open to the air following explosions that breached the buildings around them. The U.S. has 31 boiling-water reactors with similarly situated spent fuel pools that are far more densely packed than those at Fukushima and hence could pose far higher risks if damaged. The U.S. should act quickly to remove spent fuel from these pools and place them in dry storage casks to reduce the heat load and radioactive inventories of the pools.

2. The Fukushima accident was precipitated by an earthquake and tsunami, but the direct cause appears to have been a loss of both off-site and on-site power supplies, a situation known as a station blackout. There are many other types of initiating events that could cause such a situation, including terrorist attacks. The NRC requires U.S. plants to have the capability to cope with a station blackout for no more than four to eight hours. We need to re-evaluate the adequacy of these requirements and the effectiveness of their implementation.

3. Although the Japanese are engaged in truly heroic efforts to mitigate the worst effects of this accident and reduce radioactive releases that could harm the public, these efforts have only been partially effective, are already resulting in life-threatening conditions for the workers on site, and are likely to ultimately fail. U.S. nuclear plants have severe accident management plans, but these plans are not required by regulations and do not have to be evaluated by the NRC and tested for their effectiveness. In the case of aircraft attack on a nuclear plant, the NRC does require plants to have plans to cope with the loss of large areas of the plant due to explosion and fire. These plans will have to be re-evaluated in light of Fukushima to judge whether they can be realistically carried out. In the meantime, the NRC should place a far greater emphasis on preventing accidents and terrorist attacks rather than trying to control them afterward.

4. Elevated levels of radiation have already been detected more than one hundred miles from the release site. While these levels remain low, if the accident continues to worsen then they could increase dramatically. If there was a reactor accident in the United States, the emergency preparedness measures that would directly protect the public, including evacuation planning and potassium iodide distribution, are limited to a 10-mile radius. Whether this distance should be increased will need to be reevaluated, as will the workability of emergency plans in the context of natural disasters or terrorist attacks.

There are many other areas where we believe the NRC has allowed safety margins to decrease too far. Now, not after an accident, is the time to reconsider whether the NRC's position on "how safe is safe" is truly adequate to protect public health and safety.

Thank you for your attention, and I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Nuclear power debate amid Japan crisis ruled by superstition

http://www.straight.com/article-382241/vancouver/gwynne-dyer-nuclear-pow...

Learning From Disaster: After Sendai?  -  by Richard Falk

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/03/201131691422585897....

"There is no doubt that the huge earthquake/tsunami constellation of forces was responsible for great damage and societal distress, but its overall impact has been geometrically increased by this buying into the Faustian baragain of nuclear energy, whose risks, if objectively assessed, were widely known for many years..

It is the greedy profit-seekers who minimise these risks. These predatory forces are made more formidable because they have cajoled most politicians into complicity and have many corporatist allies in the media that overwhelm the publics of the world with steady doses of misinformation..."

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Just think 3 years ago Linda Keen, head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, would not approve the reopening of the nuclear reactor at Chalk River unless emergency backup power was installed for pumps cooling the reactor core, PM Stephen Harper fired her.
And this genius is the guy running the country.

Emergency backup power for pumps cooling the reactors was the failure that led to the current disaster. The earthquake knocked out the power grid connecting to the nuclear power stations, and the the tsunami knocked out the diesel generators/power supply that was to be used in case the power grid was knocked out. With both out, it's called a station blackout.

What Canada needs is a station blackout on the Conservative regime in Ottawa. And the sooner the better with these losers.