Garden As If Your Life Depended On It, Because It Does

In some American towns, and not just impoverished backwaters, as many as 30 percent of residents can’t afford to feed themselves and their families sufficiently, let alone nutritiously. Here in the Piedmont Triad of North Carolina where I live it’s 25 percent.

Across the country one out of six of the elderly suffers from malnutrition and hunger. And the number of children served one or two of their heartiest, healthiest meals by their schools grows annually as the number of them living at poverty levels tops 20 percent. Thirty-seven million Americans rely on food banks that now routinely sport half-empty shelves and report near-empty bank accounts. And this is a prosperous nation!

In some cases this round of price hikes on everything from cereal and steak to fresh veggies and bread — and even the flour that can usually be bought cheaply to make it — will be temporary. But over the long term the systems that have provided most Americans with a diversity, quantity and quality of foods envied by the rest of the world are not going to be as reliable as they were.

What’s for Supper Down the Road?

• As they move through the next few decades Americans can expect:
• The price of conventionally produced food to rise and not come down again;
• Prices to rollercoaster so that budgeting is unpredictable;
• Some foods to become very expensive compared to what we’re used to;
• And other foods, beginning with some of the multiple versions of the same thing made by the same company to garner a bigger market share and more shelf space, to gradually become unavailable.

via Garden As If Your Life Depended On It, Because It Does | Food | AlterNet.

worst-case scenario realized – reactor meltdown in fukushima

The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say, raising fears of a major release of radiation at the site.

The warning follows an analysis by a leading US expert of radiation levels at the plant. Readings from reactor two at the site have been made public by the Japanese authorities and Tepco, the utility that operates it.

Richard Lahey, who was head of safety research for boiling-water reactors at General Electric when the company installed the units at Fukushima, told the Guardian workers at the site appeared to have “lost the race” to save the reactor, but said there was no danger of a Chernobyl-style catastrophe.

Workers have been pumping water into three reactors at the stricken plant in a desperate bid to keep the fuel rods from melting down, but the fuel is at least partially exposed in all the reactors. At least part of the molten core, which includes melted fuel rods and zirconium alloy cladding, seemed to have sunk through the steel “lower head” of the pressure vessel around reactor two, Lahey said.

“The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell,” Lahey said. “I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards.”

via Japan may have lost race to save nuclear reactor | World news | The Guardian.

 

uncovering the seriousness of japan’s nuclear catastrophe

japanese government officials have been busy recovering from a severe natural disaster, and there are areas in their country that still have not been visited by search and relief groups.

they’ve also been busy denying that japan is experiencing the greatest environmental disaster human beings have ever created.

several nuclear reactors have gone offline, and an entire facility – fukushima – has suffered explosions in three of its six reactors, and partial meltdowns in at least three, one of which hasn’t yet blown up.

so far, this incident is listed as a category 6 nuclear incident by the international atomic energy agency. to put that into perspective, the three mile island incident in the u.s. was a category 5 incident, while the worst incident in the past – the explosion of a facility in the former soviet union, at chernobyl in the ukraine – was a category 6 incident.

however, as the joke goes – this one (the fukushima incident) goes to 11!

When the Fukushima Meltdown Hits Groundwater – by dr. tom burnett, Ph.D. Earth Sciences and Physics.

Fukushima is going to dwarf Chenobyl. The Japanese government has had a level 7 nuclear disaster going for almost a week but won’t admit it.

The disaster is occurring the opposite way than Chernobyl, which exploded and stopped the reaction. At Fukushima, the reactions are getting worse. I suspect three nuclear piles are in meltdown and we will probably get some of it. (he means radioactive fallout from the damaged reactors…ed.)

If reactor 3 is in meltdown, the concrete under the containment looks like lava. But Fukushima is not far off the water table. When that molten mass of self-sustaining nuclear material gets to the water table it won’t simply cool down. It will explode – not a nuclear explosion, but probably enough to involve the rest of the reactors and fuel rods at the facility.

Pouring concrete on a critical reactor makes no sense – it will simply explode and release more radioactive particulate matter. The concrete will melt and the problem will get worse. Chernobyl was different – a critical reactor exploded and stopped the reaction. At Fukushima, the reactor cores are still melting down. The ONLY way to stop that is to detonate a 10 kiloton fission device inside each reactor containment vessel and hope to vaporize the cores. That’s probably a bad solution.

A nuclear meltdown is a self-sustaining reaction. Nothing can stop it except stopping the reaction. And that would require a nuclear weapon. In fact, it would require one in each containment vessel to merely stop what is going on now. But it will be messy.

Anyway, here is the information that the US doesn’t seem to want released:

Potential dispersion of the radioactive cloud over The Northern Hemisphere

This animation displays a potential dispersion of the radioactive cloud (Caesium 137 Isotope) after a nuclear accident in reactor Fukushima I. The continuous release rate is very uncertain, thus the calculations have to be interpreted qualitatively. Dispersion in the near surface level (Level 1), in appr. 2500 m height (Level 12) and in appr. 5000 m height (Level 16). (click on the link above to see how much radiation will fall where you live.)

And here is a chart that might help with perspective:

radiation dose chart -

a chart that explains the system used to measure radiation and exposure to radioactivity.

Making matters worse is the MOX in reactor 3. MOX is the street name for ‘mixed oxide fuel‘ which uses ~9% plutonium along with a uranium compound to fuel reactors. Here’s why it is used:

Mixed Oxide Nuclear Fuel Raises Safety Questions

Ordinary low-enriched uranium fuel contains primarily uranium 238, the most common natural isotope of the element, along with about 5 percent uranium 235, a rarer isotope that splits, or fissions, more readily. MOX fuel, on the other hand, substitutes plutonium 239 as the fissionable component, reducing the need for uranium 235.

But Robert Alvarez, a senior scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank, says that MOX is not the best way to irreversibly render plutonium unsuitable for weapons use. “If you really want to pursue the path of irreversibility, there are probably cheaper, easier ways to do it,” he says. One way would be to blend the plutonium down to a low concentration and put it in the DoE’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in the New Mexico desert. With the price tag attached to the MFFF, “it’s certainly not something you’d think you could make money off,” Alvarez says. “I kind of see it as a nuclear equivalent to a bridge to nowhere.”

And Edwin Lyman, senior scientist for global security at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington, D.C., argues that MOX is more likely to cause nuclear accidents than ordinary uranium fuel and is liable to release more harmful material in the event of an accident. “Plutonium has different properties than uranium 235 that generally tend to degrade some of the safety systems in nuclear plants,” Lyman says. For instance, because weapons-grade plutonium fissions more readily than uranium 235, reactors may need more robust control rods—neutron absorbers that shut down the nuclear chain reaction when inserted into a reactor’s core. “You never get quite as much margin even after doing all that as you do with uranium,” Lyman says.

Lyman authored a study in 2001 in Science & Global Security showing that radioactive leakage from a meltdown with MOX fuel, which in addition to plutonium has higher levels of radioactive isotopes such as americium 241 and curium 242, would be deadlier than a low-enriched uranium meltdown. “Because plutonium is so much more radiotoxic than many of the other radionuclides, even if it’s released in relatively small concentrations it can have an impact on the effects,” Lyman says. He adds that it is not possible at the moment to identify how much the MOX fuel in Fukushima reactor No. 3 has contributed to the radioactive plumes emanating from the plant.

The problem is that you don’t want to play with this stuff. A nuclear reactor means bring fissile material to a point at which it is hot enough to boil water (in a light-water reactor) and not enough to melt and go supercritical (China syndrome or a Chernobyl incident). You simply cannot let it get away from you because if it does, you can’t stop it.

The Japanese are still talking about days or weeks to clean this up. That’s not true. They cannot clean it up. And no one will live in that area again for dozens or maybe hundreds of years.

IAEA Data Appear to Show Increased Ground Contamination. Why Doesn’t the IAEA Just Say So?

It’s difficult to make any sense of the data being reported from various quarters regarding dose rates and contamination levels at varying distances from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) could do a public service by establishing a consistent reporting framework so the public can assess whether radionuclide release rates are changing, and in what direction. However, its daily updates are only adding to the confusion.

It would also be helpful if the IAEA provided some insight to the relationship between measured beta-gamma levels and the much lower reported I-131 and Cs-137 deposition rates. Many short-lived isotopes have already decayed away. However, the reported beta-gamma rates were significantly lower than 3.1 MBq/sq. m even on March 21. This indicates continued high levels of deposition that cannot be explained by the reported deposition rates of I-131 and Cs-137.

The IAEA data would be much more useful if it also provided enough detail to allow apples-to-apples comparisons from one day to the next.

UPDATE: March 27, 8 PM

On March 24, the IAEA reported beta-gamma measurements of 3.8 to 4.9 MBq/sq m. in a northwesterly direction from the Fukushima site, which is in the direction of the highly contaminated plume that DOE identified a few days earlier. The much lower readings of 0.4 MBq/sq. m or below reported on March 26 were taken in a southerly or southwesterly direction. So it is likely that the high reading of 3.1 MBq/sq m. reported on March 27 was taken from the northwesterly direction again, although IAEA did not say so.

Where Did the Water in the Spent Fuel Pools Go?

One cause of low water levels may have been that water splashed from the pools during the earthquake. I haven’t seen reports suggesting significant water loss by splashing or that the water levels in the pools were low shortly after the earthquake. Also, as noted above, the reported rate of heating of the pools at Units 4, 5, and 6 suggests that the water level was not significantly reduced early on.

Moreover, except in the case of the Unit 4 pool, even if the water levels in the pools had dropped by several meters during the earthquake—corresponding to hundreds of tons of water being spilled—the heating and boiling times to expose the fuel would still be too long to account for very low water levels in the pools.

A second possible cause of the low water levels is that the pools at Units 2, 3, and 4 all developed significant leaks. Some reports said that a leak was suspected in the pool of Unit 4 and possibly in Unit 3. This analysis suggests that all three pools may be developed leaks.

also of interest:

Fukushima nuclear power plant update: get all the data

Japan is racing to gain control of the crisis at the Fukushima nuclear power plan. Where does the most detailed data come from? Updated daily.

Mass. officials: radiation from Japan in rainwater

BOSTON—Radiation from the crippled nuclear plant in Japan is showing up in rain in the United States.

 

 

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health said Sunday that very low concentrations of radioiodine-131 that were likely from the Japanese power plant severely damaged by the earthquake and tsunami earlier this month have been detected in a sample of rainwater. Officials did not say where the sample was taken.The agency said the sample was taken in the past week and is one of more than 100 around the country. It is part of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency network that monitors for radioactivity.State officials say similar testing was done in other states, including California, Pennsylvania and Washington, and showed comparable levels of I-131 in rain.

via Mass. officials: radiation from Japan in rainwater – Boston.com.

Alberta’s Oil Sands: Hard Evidence, Missing Data, New Promises

this article is heavily footnoted and i have tried to eliminate all the footnotehis article is heavily footnoted s. if i missed a few, i am sorry, because there are numerous numerical citations throughout. also, it is from a canadian source, so the system of connotation is different than what we use in the u.s.

the original, much longer and heavily footnoted article is from the environmental health perspectrives website.

Digging and Drilling

Sprawling across much of northern Alberta’s boreal forest under an area a little smaller than the U.S. state of Illinois lies a valuable blend of bitumen, sand, minerals, and other materials. For centuries, native peoples valued the tarry blend for repairing canoes. Today, improving technology has made it possible to extract the bitumen and process it into products similar to those produced from crude oil. With today’s technology, about 27 billion m3—or around 10%—of the estimated bitumen deposits can be economically extracted.

That puts Canada’s oil reserves second only to Saudi Arabia’s 42 billion m3 and a little ahead of Iran’s 23 billion. By 2025, bitumen extraction is expected to rise 2.3 times over 2010 activity. No one is willing to hazard a guess about peak activity timing or magnitude because investments are driven by unpredictable factors such as world oil prices, future technological advances, government regulation, development of alternative energy sources, and world events such as terrorism and climate change.

Extracting oil from the sands is expensive, but the 40 or so companies working the fields are finding it lucrative, with net profits of $22.8 billion in 2008. Preprofit expenses include payments to the Government of Alberta: $3.8 billion in 2008 alone compared with $11.9 billion over the preceding 10 years. Alberta has had a financial stake in the oil sands for about 80 years, since the Canadian federal government transferred ownership of most natural resources to their respective provinces.

Surface mining is the only feasible process for extracting bitumen deposits down to a depth of 75 m. These are spread under about 4,800 km2 of the Athabasca oil sands region, or 3.3% of the 142,000-km2 bitumen-bearing zone, and account for about 20% of the estimated reserves and about 55% of current bitumen extraction. When deposits are deeper than 150 m, companies drill down and use steam heat to liberate the bitumen, a process known as in situ extraction. By 2015, in situ extraction is expected to dominate bitumen production, according to Davies.

Each process has its environmental tradeoffs. As of March 2009, surface mining had already disturbed more than 602 km2 of land and led to the creation of about 130 km2 of tailings ponds that contain dozens of toxic substances. Surface mining also requires 4–6 times more fresh water withdrawal than in situ extraction. In situ extraction, on the other hand, has a carbon footprint about one-third greater than that of surface mining. Both processes involve “enormous land disturbance and reclamation issues that encompass . . . the scarred landscape left by surface mines and the forest clearing that is characteristic of in situ production.” All these effects are particularly relevant to the First Nations peoples whose reserves (traditional hunting grounds) are located on or near the oil sands deposits.

Although the RSC panel found no evidence that people are currently being harmed by oil sands activity, that conclusion is based on testing for only a limited number of substances and reliance on some standards that may not be fully protective, says Kevin Timoney, an ecologist and principal investigator with Alberta-based Treeline Ecological Research. Moreover, chronic effects cannot yet be ruled out, and any health impacts later attributed to oil sands development could potentially affect tens of thousands of people living and working in and near the deposits.

Uncertain Impacts

There are more than 1,400 known pollutants emitted by oil sands operations. Among the few that are monitored are sulfur oxides (SOX), nitrogen oxides (NOX), hydrocarbons, and fine particulate matter (PM2.5). Emissions of SOX and other sulfur compounds, NOX, and total hydrocarbons have been rising during the past decade, but the RSC panel concluded that “current ambient air quality monitoring data for the region show minimal air quality impacts from oil sands development . . . except for noxious odour emission problems over the past two years.”

Indeed, hydrogen sulfide at three monitored industrial sites has exceeded the 1-hour guideline more than 2,400 times across three locations during the past decade and exceeded the 24-hour standard more than 400 times in the same period. Data on exceedances of the hydrogen sulfide guideline were not available for Fort McKay, a small village 54 km north of the boom town of Fort McMurray, but the RSC authors conclude that there are serious odor problems in this and possibly other locations: “Resolution of the odour problems being caused by oil sands development is clearly necessary.”

Alberta Environment spokeswoman Jessica Potter says her agency expects industry to solve the problem. “We put in effect an environmental protection order [EPO] to ensure this happens,” she says. “EPOs are enforceable by law, and disregarding an EPO can result in criminal charges.” Meanwhile, Davies says his members are working on the issue. “It’s a learn-as-you-go scenario,” he says. “We’re trying to find different ways to fix it.”

Annual average concentrations of SOX, NOX, PM2.5, and carbon monoxide (CO) from 2001 to 2008 in Fort McMurray were about one-third to three-fourths the concentrations in Alberta’s major urban areas of Edmonton and Calgary, although Fort McMurray exceeded provincial 24-hour average PM2.5 allowances 12 times compared with Edmonton’s 9. PM2.5 exceedances at Fort McKay have been more than double those at the village of Anzac, located in the middle of traditional oil and gas operations, although the exceedances cannot be directly attributed to oil sands operations since other activities are occurring in each area. As anecdotal evidence of potential particulate matter concerns, a panel commissioned by Environment Canada to evaluate the impacts of oil sands operations referred to the “ubiquitous dust” that was present during their site visits. Findings in two small air pollutant personal exposure studies involving participants wearing portable monitors in four regional communities demonstrated indoor air provided higher contaminant exposures than ambient air.

Total industry-estimated volumes of SOX, NOX, PM2.5, CO, volatile organic compounds, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), lead, mercury, and cadmium put the oil sands industry in anywhere from third to twelfth place—depending on the pollutant—among all Canadian industrial sources.

Downwind from oil sands operations, elevated NOX concentrations that can contribute to aquatic acidification have been detected at least 150 km east of the Alberta–Saskatchewan border, but elevated SOX from oil sands was not detected at any location in Saskatchewan. One study found elevated concentrations of polycyclic aromatic compounds (PACs) in snowmelt within 50 km of oil sands operations. Despite reductions in emissions per barrel of bitumen produced, Hrudey says greenhouse gas emissions from oil sands production are about 5% of Canada’s total and are expected to continue rising because of production increases that outstrip efficiency gains.

In its December 2010 report, an expert panel commissioned by Environment Canada to assess oil sands monitoring research wrote, “[O]ur site visits had an indelible impact. It is hard to forget the sheer extent of landscape disruption, the coke piles and the ubiquitous dust.”

Water pollution can potentially occur via many pathways. Massive tailings ponds associated with surface mining contain numerous toxic contaminants, including naphthenic acids, polar and saturated hydrocarbons, asphaltenes, benzene, phenols, cresols, phthalates, toluene, lead, mercury, arsenic, nickel, vanadium, chromium, and selenium. These can leach at low concentrations through dams and dikes, and although seepage rates must be quantified, the RSC panel notes that “very few published data are available on the dynamics of groundwater flow and the fate of process water contaminants in the impoundment structure.” Volatile contaminants can be transported by air, and if a tailings impoundment were to rupture, local wetlands and waterways would face a catastrophic influx of contaminants.

In situ extraction processes, which use steam heated to more than 250ºC, can alter subsurface dynamics such as leaching of arsenic into groundwater. Deep-well injection of wastes can increase the potential for groundwater and surface water contamination. Groundwater withdrawals have lowered the water table at least 40 m in some locations, altering the flows between surface water and groundwater. Overall, the RSC panel concludes, the complex interactions between surface and subsurface waters are poorly understood.

The Athabasca River is the largest single source for water for the oil sands industry, and maximum allowable water use that could occur would consume 16% of the historical 7-day low river flow. Under the current water management framework for the Athabasca River, oil sands facilities are allocated 3.5% of the average annual river flow and use less than 1%. River flow has fallen about 25–30% since the mid-1970s as precipitation declined and industrial uses increased. There are few financial incentives to reduce water use, but Hrudey says the RSC deemed the regulatory mechanisms in place capable of managing this issue.

Studies have found that many toxics, such as PACs, antimony, arsenic, cadmium, chromium, copper, lead, mercury, selenium, and zinc, can occur at higher concentrations downstream of oil sands operations than upstream (in some cases all the way to Lake Athabasca), and some of these are elevated enough to kill fish. But it remains to be determined if oil sands operations are the primary cause of these higher levels. Concentrations of toxic metals measured in the Athabasca River downstream of oil sands plants were much lower than Canadian requirements for drinking water.

Preparing for the Worst

Toxicity threats could become a major concern if there is a technological or natural disaster. A wide range of process accidents have already occurred, including numerous spills from processing plants and pipelines,23 fires and explosions at facilities, fires on wastewater ponds, and the deaths of more than 2,000 waterfowl that landed on various tailings ponds in multiple incidents.

Companies are required by law to submit environmental impact assessments (EIAs) that include plans for dealing with disasters, Davies says. But those paper plans don’t always reflect a comprehensive analysis of what could go wrong, considering actual past events, according to the RSC authors: “There have been large gaps in information submitted in EIAs that have not been required by the government nor provided by the companies, specifically dealing with consequences of technological disasters.” They also note that EIAs rarely address how a company will deal with extreme weather such as floods, torrential rains, high winds, bitter cold, and droughts and related forest fires.

Annual performance reports (assessments of the performance of oil sands tailings dams during operations and construction), independent dam safety reviews (which are required every five years), and emergency preparedness plans (descriptions of actions to be taken in the event a dam fails) are all available to the public through Alberta’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy (FOIP) Act. Potter says emergency response plans (i.e., call-down lists or telephone trees) are the only documents that are not publicly available.

Workers evacuated as radiation levels climb

via Workers evacuated as radiation levels climb – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).

 

Workers at Japan’s quake-ravaged Fukushima nuclear plant have been evacuated after extremely high radiation levels were detected.

A spokesman for the operators of the plant says radiation detected in a puddle of water was 10 million times higher than usual.

The workers had been struggling to pump radioactive water out of the plant.

The extremely high level of radiation discovered at reactor No. 2 is by far the most radioactive water to be found at the Fukushima plant so far.

The water, near the second reactor, triggered an evacuation order.

With ten million times the normal level of radiation for water in a working reactor the country’s nuclear safety agency says there’s a high possibility it’s coming directly from the reactor itself.

Extreme levels of radioactive caesium levels suggest there is major damage to the reactor’s fuel rods.

Last week three workers with inadequate protection suffered burns to their feet when they stepped in radioactive water at reactor three.

The announcement comes as the radiation levels in the sea off the Fukushima plant have also increased.

The offshore radiation levels have now risen to 1,850 times normal from 1,250 on Saturday, Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said.

Japan’s prime minister says the situation at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant remains grave and he cannot be optimistic.

A new shadow has been cast over efforts to control the radiation leak at the plant and the government says it is worried highly radioactive water is leaking from reactor No. 3.

A second pool of contaminated water has also been found in the basement of the No. 1 reactor.

The No. 3 reactor is a particular concern because it is the only one of six at the plant to use a potentially volatile mix of uranium and plutonium.

A hydrogen explosion badly damaged the unit’s outer building on March 14 and a partial meltdown is also suspected.

Two workers from the plant were rushed to hospital on Thursday after receiving radiation burns from standing in the puddle near the No. 3 reactor with a radiation level 10,000 times higher than normal.

High levels of radioactive iodine have also been found in seawater near the nuclear plant.

The seawater sample was taken around 300 metres from the nuclear plant near its drain outlets.

Japan’s Nuclear Safety Agency says the level of radioactive iodine was more than 1,200 times the legal limit.

Government officials insist there is no immediate threat to human health and they expect the radiation will be significantly diluted before it affects fish.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), which operates the stricken plant, said it may take another month to achieve a cold shutdown – when reactor temperatures fall below boiling point and cooling systems are back at atmospheric pressure.

“It is possible that the pressure vessel containing the fuel rods in the reactor is damaged,” a TEPCO spokesman said of reactor No. 3.

Hirose Takashi: What They’re Covering Up at Fukushima

Yoh: Every day the local government is measuring the radioactivity.  All the television stations are saying that while radiation is rising, it is still not high enough to be a danger to health. They compare it to a stomach x-ray, or if it goes up, to a CT scan.  What is the truth of the matter?

Hirose: For example, yesterday.  Around Fukushima Daiichi Station they measured 400 millisieverts – that’s per hour.  With this measurement (Chief Cabinet Secretary) Edano admitted for the first time that there was a danger to health, but he didn’t explain what this means.

All of the information media are at fault here I think.  They are saying stupid things like, why, we are exposed to radiation all the time in our daily life, we get radiation from outer space.  But that’s one millisievert per year.  A year has 365 days, a day has 24 hours; multiply 365 by 24, you get 8760.  Multiply the 400 millisieverts by that, you get 3,500,000 the normal dose.  You call that safe?

And what media have reported this?  None.  They compare it to a CT scan, which is over in an instant; that has nothing to do with it.

The reason radioactivity can be measured is that radioactive material is escaping.  What is dangerous is when that material enters your body and irradiates it from inside.  These industry-mouthpiece scholars come on TV and what to they say?  They say as you move away the radiation is reduced in inverse ratio to the square of the distance.  I want to say the reverse.

Internal irradiation happens when radioactive material is ingested into the body.  What happens?  Say there is a nuclear particle one meter away from you. You breathe it in, it sticks inside your body; the distance between you and it is now at the micron level. One meter is 1000 millimeters, one micron is one thousandth of a millimeter.  That’s a thousand times a thousand: a thousand squared.  That’s the real meaning of “inverse ratio of the square of the distance.”  Radiation exposure is increased by a factor of a trillion.  Inhaling even the tiniest particle, that’s the danger.

via Hirose Takashi: What They’re Covering Up at Fukushima.

arabic world in turmoil updated 3/26

The world’s attention has been focused on a handful of countries – Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and Libya – since the first popular protests broke out in Tunisia in December. But nearly a dozen countries in the region have seen political unrest, and the protest movement shows no signs of stopping.

Below is a summary of the demonstrations so far, and links to our coverage. The map above is interactive on the Al Jazeera website.

Countries covered in this article include:

Tunisia
Libya
Bahrain
Egypt
Jordan
Islamic Republic of Iran
Yemen
Algeria
Morocco
Saudi Arabia
Iraq

via Region in turmoil – Spotlight – Al Jazeera English.

Russian Chernobyl Expert Warns of Dire Consequences in Japan

“At Fukushima, our concern is not just the immediate exposures, but exposures that occur over the long term, from radioactive particles that are inhaled or ingested,” said Folkers. “These particles can fall on soil and in water and end up in the food supply for many years. We are worried that officials are measuring only the radiation that is the easiest to detect – gamma rays. Testing people for radiation on their skin or clothing is necessary, but it tells us little or nothing about what they could have breathed in or eaten—which results in internal exposure and long-term risk.”

Dr. Yablokov cautioned against the downplaying of the seriousness of the radiation releases at Fukushima. “When you hear ‘no immediate danger’ then you should run away as far and as fast as you can,” he said. He pointed out that the area around Chernobyl is as contaminated today as it was almost 25 years ago when the accident occurred.  Cesium, americium, strontium and plutonium that deposited in soil have reached the roots of plants which then propel the radioactivity back to the surface.  “The contamination there last year is the same as 20 years ago,” he said.

Coverage of the press conference can be viewed on C-Span.

via Russian Chernobyl Expert Warns of Dire Consequences for Health Around Fukushima | Common Dreams.

FDA Suddenly Bans Drugs That Have Been On The Market For Decades | Techdirt

the FDA banned 500 prescription drugs that had been on the market and working for years. To be fair, it was really 50-100 drugs (pdf), made by different companies, but that just highlights how there was actual competition in the marketplace for these drugs, which has now been removed. For all of the drugs, there is either a high-priced prescription version, or all the small manufacturers have been removed, leaving a virtual monopoly for one or more larger companies. This process began in 2006 when the FDA decided to remove marketed unapproved drugs (pdf).

The reasoning is that these drugs weren’t ever technically “approved” by the FDA. While the FDA has been around for about a century, the business of having the FDA first approve drugs before they could go on the market came about closer to fifty years ago, and a bunch of “unapproved drugs” that were in common usage before that never got approved. The FDA is targeting many of those, even if they have a long history in the marketplace. Conveniently, of course, there always seems to be a pharma company with a monopolized substitute ready.

In 2006 the first “new” monopoly that was created by this FDA process was for the malaria drug quinine sulfate. This left only Mutual Pharmaceutical Company to manufacture quinine in the US (pdf). While malaria is not a disease that affects many people in the US, it is big business worldwide. Malaria causes 300 to 500 million infections and over 1 million deaths each year. Treating this disease with quinine used to cost pennies a day. In fact, the British turned this treatment into a cocktail, the gin and tonic (quinine water).

Another drug removed was the antihistamine carbinoxamine, which was created prior to needing FDA approval, in the early 1950s. It was approved by the FDA in a slightly modified form in 2006. It is now sold exclusively by Mikart, Inc and Pamlab, LLC with no future competition because the FDA has banned all 120 other versions of carbinoxamine. You can imagine just how much that must increase the profits for Mikart and Pamlab on carbinoxamine, though that seems to come at the expense of consumers.

via FDA Suddenly Bans Drugs That Have Been On The Market For Decades | Techdirt.

catholic church pays out $166 million for raping children

The Pacific Northwest chapter of the Roman Catholic Church’s Jesuit order has agreed to pay $166 million to settle more than 500 child sexual abuse claims against priests in five states, attorneys have said.The decision on Friday compels a payout by the Society of Jesus in the Oregon Province, and is part of an agreement to resolve its two-year-old bankruptcy case. Lawyers for the victims said it is also the largest ever payout by a Catholic religious order such as the Jesuits.The Oregon Province is the Northwest chapter of the Rome-based Jesuit order and covers Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Idaho and Montana.

The victims, most of them Native Americans from remote Alaska Native villages or Indian reservations in the Pacific Northwest, were sexually or psychologically abused as children by Jesuit missionaries in those states in the 1940s through the 1990s, the plaintiffs’ attorneys said.

‘Lost childhood’

“No amount of money can bring back a lost childhood, a destroyed culture or a shattered faith,” Blaine Tamaki, a lawyer, who represents about 90 victims in the settlement, said in a statement.

“This settlement recognizes that the Jesuits betrayed the trust of hundreds of young children in their care,” Tamaki said. “These religious figures should have been responsible for protecting children, but instead raped and molested them.”

The Jesuits’ Oregon Province said the $166.1 million would be paid into a trust to “resolve approximately 524 abuse claims in a five-state area.”

via Huge payout over US priests sex-scandals – Americas – Al Jazeera English.

Following Radioactive Rain, Radiation In Tokyo Jumps 10 Fold

japanese authorities continue to hide behind a wall of lies

As radiation counts elevate in Japan, news of nuclear contamination spreading across a widening spectrum of life and its necessities, official pronouncements continue to play down events’ gravity. While some have questioned whether this is being pursued to promote calm, or perhaps the nuclear industry, the result has left many either skeptical of official claims or simply reassured by them. It seems time for some difficult facts.

Reports of false ‘nuclear rain’ warnings have made it to the news; but, just recently, so did valid rain warnings from local Japanese officials. And during the Chernobyl accident radioactive rain did occur, particularly striking some areas in Sweden.

It’s been estimated that “five percent of the released caesium-137 from the Chernobyl accident was deposited in Sweden due to heavy rainfall on 28-29 April 1986”.

Since Chernobyl, assorted scientific studies have demonstrated what one such effort termed the “serious impact of the Chernobyl accident on the environmental conditions in Sweden.” To this day, in some areas of the country Chernobyl’s legacy does remain a concern. And Sweden is a long way from Chernobyl.

While numerous proponents of nuclear power pursue what seems an exercise in surrealism, continuing to yet extoll ‘the benefits’ of ‘clean and safe’ nuclear energy, perhaps we should consider why so many trust that ‘the unthinkable’ can never occur…at least until it does.

It was 27 April 1986 when radiation alarms sounded at Sweden’s Försmark nuclear power plant, radiation upon workers’ clothing being the cause, though it would soon be discovered that the source of this radiation was not a local one. Hours after the alarm, the then USSR began revealing Chernobyl’s nuclear accident, an accident across the Baltic Sea and many hundreds of miles to the southeast. Meanwhile, not far up Sweden’s Baltic Coast from Försmark sat the city of Gävle, a city almost a thousand miles from Chernobyl, but soon a place to be lastingly impacted by it.

It was twenty-one years after the Chernobyl fire, in May 2007, when one Swedish paper headlined “Swedes still dying from Chernobyl radiation”, Gävle and what is occurring there figuring prominently in the english-language article. A heavy rainstorm had struck the small city in 1986, doing so as a cloud of Chernobyl’s fallout was overhead.

Prevailing winds at that time had driven radioactive clouds from Chernobyl over parts of Scandinavia, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) providing a report upon the early amounts of radiation registered in Chernobyl’s aftermath, a report where Gävle is again significantly featured. A recent article on Time.com, “Fukushima: Chernobyl Redux?”, describes the immediate effect Chernobyl had upon Gävle.

Radioactive iodine 146.9 times higher in seawater near nuke plant

Abnormally high levels of radioactive materials were again detected in the sea near the crisis-hit nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture, its operator said Thursday, warning the radiation levels in seawater may keep rising.

According to Tokyo Electric Power Co., radioactive iodine-131 146.9 times higher than the legal concentration limit was detected Wednesday morning in a seawater sample taken around 330 meters south of the plant, near the drain outlets of its troubled four reactors.

The level briefly fell to 29.8 times the limit on Tuesday morning from 126.7 times on Monday, but rose to its highest so far in the survey begun this week apparently due to rain and water sprayed at spent fuel pools from outside that caused radioactive materials to seep into the sea, it said.

The firm also said it found both iodine-131 and cesium-137 in a sample taken from near the drain outlets of the plant’s No. 5 and No. 6 reactors that stabilized Sunday in so-called ”cold shutdown.”

Iodine-131 19.1 times higher than the limit was also detected Wednesday afternoon in a sample taken some 16 kilometers south of the nuclear power station, up from 16.7 times on Tuesday.

The current radiation levels in seawater do not pose an immediate risk to human health, an official of TEPCO told reporters, but added, ”We have to continue to monitor whether (radioactive materials in seawater) will keep rising.”

Japan Soil Measurements Surprisingly High – ScienceInsider

on Wednesday the Japanese science ministry began to report measurements of cesium-137 in upland soil around the plant. The levels are highest from two points northeast of the plant, ranging from 8690

becquerels/kilogram to a high of 163,000 Bq/kg measured on 20 March from a point in Iitate about 40 kilometers northwest of the Fukushima plant.

The soil measurements are more significant for evacuation purposes than radioactivity in the air, says nuclear engineer Shih-Yew Chen of Argonne

National Laboratory in Illinois, because cesium dust stays underfoot while air is transient. Levels of cesium-137 are also more important than soil

readings of iodine-131, which is short-lived and more of a concern in milk and vegetables. “It’s the cesium that would prompt an evacuation,” says

Chen.

Based on a rough estimate, a person standing on soil with 163,000 Bq/kg of cesium-137 would receive about 150 millisieverts per year of radiation, says

Chen. This is well above the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standard of 50 millisieverts per year for an evacuation. (Per day, it’s 0.41

millisieverts, which is equivalent to four chest x-rays.) But Chen adds, “one point [of data] doesn’t mean that much.”

The hot spot is similar to levels found in some areas affected by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident in the former Soviet Union. Assuming the

radiation is no more than 2 centimeters deep, Chen calculates that 163,000 Bq/kg is roughly equivalent to 8 million Bq/m2. The highest

cesium-137 levels in some villages near Chernobyl were 5 million Bq/m2.

via Japan Soil Measurements Surprisingly High – ScienceInsider.

Loss of Plant Diversity Threatens Earth’s Life-Support Systems

ScienceDaily (Mar. 7, 2011) — An international team of researchers including professor Emmett Duffy of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science has published a comprehensive new analysis showing that loss of plant biodiversity disrupts the fundamental services that ecosystems provide to humanity.

Plant communities — threatened by development, invasive species, climate change, and other factors — provide humans with food, help purify water supplies, generate oxygen, and supply raw materials for building, clothing, paper, and other products.

The 9-member research team, led by professor Brad Cardinale of the University of Michigan, analyzed the results of 574 field and laboratory studies — conducted across 5 continents during the last 2 decades — that measured the changes in productivity resulting from loss of plants species. This type of “meta-analysis” allows researchers to move beyond their own individual or collaborative studies to get a much more reliable global picture. Their study appears in the March special biodiversity issue of the American Journal of Botany.

“The idea that declining diversity compromises the functioning of ecosystems was controversial for many years,” says Duffy, a marine ecologist who has studied the effects of biodiversity loss in seagrass beds. “This paper should be the final nail in the coffin of that controversy. It’s the most rigorous and comprehensive analysis yet, and it clearly shows that extinction of plant species compromises the productivity that supports Earth’s ecosystems.”

The team’s analysis shows that plant communities with many different species are nearly 1.5 times more productive than those with only one species (such as a cornfield or carefully tended lawn), and ongoing research finds even stronger benefits of diversity when the various other important natural services of ecosystems are considered. Diverse communities are also more efficient at capturing nutrients, light, and other limiting resources.

The analysis also suggests, based on laboratory studies of algae, that diverse plant communities generate oxygen — and take-up carbon dioxide — more than twice as fast as plant monocultures.

The team’s findings are consistent for plant communities both on land and in fresh- and saltwater, suggesting that plant biodiversity is of general and fundamental importance to the functioning of Earth’s entire biosphere.

Duffy, Loretta and Lewis Glucksman Professor of Marine Science at VIMS, says the team’s findings are important locally because estuaries like Chesapeake Bay are naturally low in plant diversity, making them especially vulnerable to ecological surprises resulting from loss of species.

“Salt marshes and seagrass beds depend largely on one or a few species of plants that create the habitat structure,” says Duffy. “When such species are lost, low diversity means there is often no one else to take their place…”

the rest of the article can be found at sciencedaily

radioactive fallout from japan “less than Chernobyl”

i’ve often wondered if people killed by “less-than-lethal” weapons are “less dead” than those killed by bullets…ed.

Trace amounts of radiation found on West Coast

A San Francisco-based monitor has identified trace amounts of radioactive iodine, cesium and tellurium isotopes in the air, consistent with the Japanese nuclear incident. But they are at levels far too small to pose a risk to human health, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“The radiation levels are hundreds of thousands to millions of times below levels of concern,” according to an EPA statement released Tuesday.

In a typical day, Americans receive doses of radiation from natural sources like rocks, bricks and the sun that are about 100,000 times higher than what is arriving in California from Japan, according to its analysis. The levels from Japan are 100,000 times lower than the radiation received from taking a round-trip international flight, the agency said.

The San Francisco monitor is one of four West Coast RadNet air-monitor filters; the others are in Anaheim, Riverside and Seattle. The samples were captured Friday and sent to EPA scientists for detailed lab analysis, which was completed Monday night.

A fifth monitor, based in Hawaii, also detected minuscule levels of a radioactive isotope. The identification and analysis is not yet complete.

Specifically, the San Francisco monitor found these levels of radiation, measured in Picocuries per meter, cubed: Cesium-137: 0.0013; Tellurium-132: 0.0075; Iodine-132: 0.0066; and Iodine-131: 0.068.

(what these reassurances fail to mention is that the rocks and bricks cool off when the sun sets, and the flight will eventually end…the radioactive fallout from japan will eventually end, too…someday…also, radioactive materials tend to accumulate in the body…ed.)

Work resumes to stabilise Japan nuclear plant

Work to stabilise Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear plant has resumed after work was suspended due to a plume of black smoke seen coming from a reactor.

Japan’s nuclear safety authority said two employees were taken to hospital after being exposed to radiation.

Uncovered Nuclear Fuel Rods In Japan Could Ignite A Chernobyl-Like Disaster

The optimism of Japanese officials surveying efforts to halt a nuclear crisis in Japan on Thursday contrasted with dire warnings from U.S. experts about the possibility of dangerous levels of radiation spreading across a large area.

The Fukushima nuclear power plant’s reactors have sat idle for the past five days, but not without tremendous action around them. Japanese officials said they are close to returning a power supply to the reactors, which would allow them to restart the regular cooling process. When an earthquake and tsunami leveled much of the nearby seaboard last week, other measures had to be taken to keep the fuel roads cooled.

But as that problem approached a resolution, a new problem confronted the plant. Old nuclear fuel roads resting in pools of sixty feet of water may be sitting in empty baths. Exposure to air would cause the fuel rods to heat up, burn and send a steady, sustained amount of radiation into the atmosphere.

“We believe that around the reactor site there are high levels of radiation,” Gregory Jaczko, head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, told a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing. “It would be very difficult for emergency workers to get near the reactors. The doses they could experience would potentially be lethal doses in a very short period of time.”

Reported by the New York Times:

On Thursday morning a spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power, the Daiichi plant operator, and a spokesman for Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency, denied Mr. Jaczko’s account, saying the situation at reactor No. 4 had not changed and that water remained in the spent fuel storage pool. But both officials said the situation was changing and that the reactor had not been inspected in recent hours.

“We can’t get inside to check, but we’ve been carefully watching the building’s environs, and there has not been any particular problem,” said Hajime Motojuku, the spokesman for Tokyo Electric.

Japan’s regulators also said early Thursday that radiation levels had decreased steadily overnight. Meanwhile, they continued to evacuate residents within 12 miles of the reactors and provide them with potassium iodide pills to counteract any negative effects of radiation. U.S. military personnel around Japan were among those taking pills after they were recorded with higher than normal radiation levels.

After high radiation levels prevented plant workers from air-dropping water into reactor three on Wednesday, officials hoped the military could make an attempt later Thursday. Reactor four, where a fire broke out earlier in the week, also remained a top priority. The drying pools with spent fuel roads from the two reactors appeared to be the greatest concern, however, because they are not encased as deeply as the active fuel roads in the reactors. Spent fuel at reactors five and six have raised concerns, but the danger doesn’t appear as imminent because the reactors are more intact.

Reactors one and two are both seriously damaged, and it’s unclear what kind of undertaking will be needed to rehabilitate them or completely seal them off.

The 9.0-earthquake that hit last week has caused at least $200 billion in damge, scared off stock investors across the world and left more than 1,400 people dead and tens of thousands more missing. More than two millions lacked either running water or electricity. From India to France, dozens of countries have told their citizens to flee Japan.

Even China, a ferocious builder of infrastructure, said it would suspend its approvals of nuclear power plants until they can be deemed absolutely safe.

Experts from the U.S. Energy Department and the International Atomic Energy Agency were expected to arrive in Japan later Thursday to provide help in assessing the situation at the power plant. Working with the power plant operators, the agencies must decide whether to continue stopgap cooling measures, let the fuel burn and contain the radiation or work to restore broader cooling measures.

Radiation Extends Past Evacuation Zone

TOKYO—Levels of radioactivity from Japan’s damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex may be above government limits for infants in some areas outside the plant’s 20-kilometer evacuation zone, according to the latest estimate to fuel an international debate over how close civilians should be allowed to the plant.

The new estimate, by a state-funded monitoring body, came as fears over Tokyo’s tap water eased. Tests Thursday also showed radioactive material in a major plant supplying water to the capital has fallen to below the level the government says could pose long-term health risks to infants. Elevated levels in samples from the plant Tuesday and Wednesday sparked official warnings and bottled-water sales.

Japan’s Nuclear Safety Technology Center, a government monitoring group, released the estimate late Wednesday of the cumulative exposure to radiation in zones surrounding the Fukushima Daiichi complex. The estimate covered the 12 days since Japan’s March 11 earthquake and tsunami spurred fires, explosions and spikes in radioactivity levels at the complex.

The estimate—which the center produced by modeling radiation readings collected at various points around the plant—suggested that most areas with radiation that exceeded government thresholds fell within the 20-kilometer evacuation zone.

But the model showed that areas where cumulative exposure over 12 days reached 100 millisieverts—the government’s maximum for infants—extended beyond the evacuation zone. A map based on data from the center showed areas that received a cumulative 100 millisieverts extended as far as about 40 kilometers northeast and south from the plant.

Radiation Levels in Japan

The Japanese government monitors radiation levels around the country. Track these measurements over time.

Government officials said the center’s estimate doesn’t require a larger evacuation, under even the most conservative standards. They said a person would have to have been in the area, and outdoors for the entire time since the March 11 earthquake, to receive that full dose.

Still, the test results demonstrate the uncertainty surrounding the measuring of radioactive emissions from the power plant.

Elevated levels of radioactive elements have been found as far away as Tokyo in its tap water, prompting worries over the nation’s food and water supplies. The U.S. last week recommended citizens come no closer than 50 miles, about 80 kilometers, to the plant, based on its own radiation readings in the area, putting pressure on Japanese authorities to justify their decision to evacuate the area within 20 kilometer of the plant and order those within 30 kilometers to remain indoors.

Neutron beam observed 13 times at crippled Fukushima nuke plant

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Wednesday it has observed a neutron beam, a kind of radioactive ray, 13 times on the premises of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant after it was crippled by the massive March 11 quake-tsunami disaster.

TEPCO, the operator of the nuclear plant, said the neutron beam measured about 1.5 kilometers southwest of the plant’s No. 1 and 2 reactors over three days from March 13 and is equivalent to 0.01 to 0.02 microsieverts per hour and that this is not a dangerous level.

The utility firm said it will measure uranium and plutonium, which could emit a neutron beam, as well.

In the 1999 criticality accident at a nuclear fuel processing plant run by JCO Co. in Tokaimura, Ibaraki Prefecture, uranium broke apart continually in nuclear fission, causing a massive amount of neutron beams.

In the latest case at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, such a criticality accident has yet to happen.

But the measured neutron beam may be evidence that uranium and plutonium leaked from the plant’s nuclear reactors and spent nuclear fuels have discharged a small amount of neutron beams through nuclear fission.

==Kyodo

via Neutron beam observed 13 times at crippled Fukushima nuke plant | Kyodo News.