FUKUSHIMA earthquake and tsunami thread and aftermath

[Bloo Loo]

Look, soon you'll be talking about realistic metrics such as risks vs. utility, deaths per kWh, and things like that. And we don't want that, we want to run around with our hands in the air because of TEH RADIATIONZ IZ COMIN.

risk calculations are of course a nonsense...we only need to look at banks to see what happens when you pile risk upon risk upon risk.

1 10,000 year event piled on another and another becomes very quickly a 10 year event.

[the gardener]

risk calculations are of course a nonsense...we only need to look at banks to see what happens when you pile risk upon risk upon risk.

1 10,000 year event piled on another and another becomes very quickly a 10 year event.

Don't bother. The Comical Ali brigade on here will be denying there's a problem with nuclear even when we've all got three heads and glow in the dark. They'll point out how glowing in the dark reduces traffic deaths or something.

[Riedquat]

If we're worrying about pollution and cancer, it might be worth taking a look out of the window: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/jul/10/air-pollution-lung-cancer-heart-failure

Personally, I'm a lot more worried about that than I am about Fukushima.

But it doesn't have RADIATION! RADIATION! is scary and dangerous and always secret, it's everywhere being covered up, lurking there to kill you.

[Guest_FaFa!_*]

SRSLY?

Yes, seriously. If it was related to the accident they'd be dropping like flies. He wasn't running things single handedly like Captain Kirk's dad.

[JPJPJP]

I am surprised at how little Fukushima has been in the news in the last year or so

All that radioactive material - including the cores from the reactors - hasn't gone away.

As is now becoming clear, the fact is that no one really has a practical solution to deal with an incident like this.

I wonder where those cores are now?

This article is a pretty reasonable view I think

http://prn.fm/2013/03/04/nuclear-expert-the-melted-core-cracked-the-containment-vessel-there-really-is-no-containment-at-fukushima-reactors/#axzz2YpG1fXsC

[Guest_FaFa!_*]

I am surprised at how little Fukushima has been in the news in the last year or so

Probably because you live on the other side of the planet and it won't affect you much. His death was the lead story the other day.

Edited July 12, 2013 by FaFa!

[fluffy666]

risk calculations are of course a nonsense...we only need to look at banks to see what happens when you pile risk upon risk upon risk.

1 10,000 year event piled on another and another becomes very quickly a 10 year event.

Nuclear power means a certain rate of nuclear accidents with associated contamination and deaths.

Coal power means releases of a wide spectrum of pollution, with direct air pollution deaths, mining deaths and longer term global warming.

Natural gas is more expensive, and still causes global warming. If you make energy more expensive, then you increase deaths from energy poverty.

Renewables are still expensive, and as a full solution the problems of intermittency are not addressed. A loss of power in a heatwave or cold snap would, again, cause deaths (excess winter deaths are already in the 10,000+ region per year).

There is no 'cheap, reliable energy with no risks or pollution' option (apart from Magic Energy Faeries, obviously)

[jimmythefinger]

Simple answer....

[Bloo Loo]

Nuclear power means a certain rate of nuclear accidents with associated contamination and deaths.

Coal power means releases of a wide spectrum of pollution, with direct air pollution deaths, mining deaths and longer term global warming.

Natural gas is more expensive, and still causes global warming. If you make energy more expensive, then you increase deaths from energy poverty.

Renewables are still expensive, and as a full solution the problems of intermittency are not addressed. A loss of power in a heatwave or cold snap would, again, cause deaths (excess winter deaths are already in the 10,000+ region per year).

There is no 'cheap, reliable energy with no risks or pollution' option (apart from Magic Energy Faeries, obviously)

Of course, energy, by its nature is dangerous...people die in cars, electrocutions and other things every day. You cant produce energy without side effects...its just impossible.

But, Nuclear remains in the environment for way beyond 50 generations....and Fukushima is going to be pumping this poison out for ever as far as I and my family are concerned.

[Goat]

Probably worth mentioning that 18,500 people died in the earthquake and tsunami, total deaths from the nuclear accident: maybe 1 so far.

[snowflux]

Of course, energy, by its nature is dangerous...people die in cars, electrocutions and other things every day. You cant produce energy without side effects...its just impossible.

But, Nuclear remains in the environment for way beyond 50 generations....and Fukushima is going to be pumping this poison out for ever as far as I and my family are concerned.

Worst case scenario for nuclear: occasional catastrophic meltdown with large-scale release of radiation, causing 1000s of deaths and rendering certain areas uninhabitable for centuries.

Worst case scenario for fossil fuels: CO2 emissions trigger runaway global warming leading to total annihilation of all life on Earth.

[Bloo Loo]

Worst case scenario for nuclear: occasional catastrophic meltdown with large-scale release of radiation, causing 1000s of deaths and rendering certain areas uninhabitable for centuries.

Worst case scenario for fossil fuels: CO2 emissions trigger runaway global warming leading to total annihilation of all life on Earth.

or global cooling freezes the World.

Man made climate change is a guess.

Death by radio active ingestion is a fact.

[Bloo Loo]

Probably worth mentioning that 18,500 people died in the earthquake and tsunami, total deaths from the nuclear accident: maybe 1 so far.

you cant eat sheep from certain parts of the UK following Chernobyl...

I guess that was a different kind of radiation....

[snowflux]

or global cooling freezes the World.

Man made climate change is a guess.

Death by radio active ingestion is a fact.

Very selective with your prejudices, aren't you? You are aware, of course, that you ingest a certain amount of naturally radioactive material every time you eat?

[zugzwang]

I am surprised at how little Fukushima has been in the news in the last year or so

All that radioactive material - including the cores from the reactors - hasn't gone away.

As is now becoming clear, the fact is that no one really has a practical solution to deal with an incident like this.

I wonder where those cores are now?

This article is a pretty reasonable view I think

http://prn.fm/2013/0.../#axzz2YpG1fXsC

The disaster at Fukushima is no longer in the news for the same reason Edward Snowden largely isn't. The One Percenters would prefer you not to read about such things.

[Riedquat]

Probably worth mentioning that 18,500 people died in the earthquake and tsunami, total deaths from the nuclear accident: maybe 1 so far.

IIRC there were some lives lost due to the earthquake causing a dam to fail. Wonder if it was for hydroelectric power.

Large scale energy with current technology is either burn stuff or nuclear and the former is more likely to have more negative consequences overall (but presumably because they're not as immediate and obvious they don't count).

[Scunnered]

you cant eat sheep from certain parts of the UK following Chernobyl...

I guess that was a different kind of radiation....

It's OK now: Post-Chernobyl disaster sheep controls lifted on last UK farms. That was in June 2012, a mere 26 years after the event.

Edit: in fact, what was stopped there was the requirement to have sheep tested for raioactivity before being sold. It doesn't say how long it was since any were last found at unsafe levels.

More here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/dec/29/sheep-farmers-chernobyl-meat-restricted

Edited July 12, 2013 by Scunnered

[Bloo Loo]

Very selective with your prejudices, aren't you? You are aware, of course, that you ingest a certain amount of naturally radioactive material every time you eat?

indeed, the World is radioactive.

just wonder why we need to spend so much on shielding Nuclear plants, if we follow your logic.

global warming is a guess, as scientific as economics.

[weaker]

Apparently the BBC weren't taking about it. Then it's squirrelled away....yet I found all of these stories in less than a minute.

The tone is the same as any other mainstream news report on the subject.

A direct link to the Tuna study is there if you want to take issue with it with the authors.

The plant chief apparently had cancer at the time of the accident - if you dispute the claim that cancer takes a number of years to develop, then I guess you'll have done your research and have research that backs up your view? Personally I have no idea and would be interested to find out what you have found.

Edit to add - please post a link to your 'real news media' source (including the graphic in your post), then we can do a fair comparison with the BBC. Sound fair?

The tone IS the same as any other MSM report - completely agree. Let's not frighten the public.

Let's not even give them the information so that they can decide for themselves if it's safe to eat tuna or swim in the Pacific.

It isn't just me..

Here's a more scientific approach (I actually got the image I posted from a google image search for "tuna fukushima", so I don't know where it came from:

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2012/05/nuclear-cheerleaders-use-voodoo-science-to-pretend-low-levels-of-radiation-are-safe-or-even-good-for-you.html

Here it is about as official as it gets:

http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/10/6377/2013/bgd-10-6377-2013.pdf

Conclusions

The contribution of 137Cs, 129I and 3H released from the damaged Fukushima NPP to the sea has been remarkable, as it has considerably influenced their concentrations in surface seawater as well as in the water column of the NW Pacific Ocean.

http://www.radiation.org/reading/pubs/HS42_1F.pdf

The total of 155,015 U.S. deaths in the

14-week period after Fukushima, 2,722 of which are infant deaths, represents a

large database that is meaningful in a preliminary analysis of potential Fukushima

effects. Not to use them would mean a two- or three-year absence of any health

status data, until final figures are made public.

The statistically significant difference in increased number of reported deaths

(total and infant) for the 14-week period after Fukushima has an added dimen-sion

because of similar findings for the four months immediately after the

Chernobyl meltdown in 1986, using a 10 percent sample of U.S. deaths. The

post-Chernobyl increases, based on preliminary death data, were roughly com-parable

to the increases calculated from final death data (see Appendix Table 2).

The preliminary versus final 1985–1986 change for the period May–August in

total deaths was within 3.7 percentage points (+6.0% vs. +2.3%), and the count

of infant deaths was within 3.0 percentage points (+3.1% vs. +0.1%). Thus, it is

unlikely that, for Fukushima, final death counts would show results markedly

different from the finding that more Americans, especially infants, died than

expected in the 14-week period following arrival of the Fukushima fallout.

The 14-week excess death projections after mid-March 2011 (13,983 total,

822 infant) are relatively similar to actual excesses in May–August 1986 (16,573

total, 306 infant).

Recent assessments have suggested that the amount of radioactivity released

from Fukushima equals or exceeds that released from Chernobyl. Given the

continuing emission of radioisotopes from the melted reactors, the high density

of population around the plant, and the close proximity to food sources, we can

expect that morbidity and mortality will be high in Japan.

and some background largely unreported:

http://fukushimaupdate.com/fukushima-subcontractor-fires-employees-for-whistle-blowing/

http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=28599

Just days after the meltdowns, I-131 concentrations in US precipitation was measured up to 211 times above normal. Highest levels of I-131 and airborne gross beta were documented in the five US States on the Pacific Ocean. The number of congenital hypothyroid cases in these five states from March 17-December 31, 2011 was 16% greater than for the same period in 2010, compared to a 3% decline in 36 other US States (p < 0.03). The greatest divergence in these two groups (+28%) occurred in the period March 17-June 30 (p < 0.04).

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23307-us-soldiers-sue-over-fukushima-radiation-exposure.html

The plaintiffs claim that the Fukushima radiation leak caused leukaemias, testicular cancer, vision problems and gynaecological bleeding, among other illnesses. "It seems like a pattern, a lot of cancers," says Garner

So please don't try to tell me the BBC are doing a good impartial job.

[snowflux]

indeed, the World is radioactive.

just wonder why we need to spend so much on shielding Nuclear plants, if we follow your logic.

global warming is a guess, as scientific as economics.

Just because you don't understand the reasoning behind a prediction does not make it a guess. I don't understand why you would dismiss the hazards of one form of energy generation out of hand, while expressing extreme concern about the hazards of another, even though both are subject to uncertainties.

[Ah-so]

you cant eat sheep from certain parts of the UK following Chernobyl...

I guess that was a different kind of radiation....

Which part can you not eat sheep from and can you provide a link from the FSA's website to back it up?

[Sour Mash]

Which part can you not eat sheep from and can you provide a link from the FSA's website to back it up?

This should enlighten you:

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=radiation+chernobyl+sheep+restrictions

[billybong]

Supermarket shelves seem to be groaning under the weight of unsold tins of tuna with lots of special offers along with lots of multiple tin vacuum packs.

Quite a few people are likely deciding why take the risk.

[DeepLurker]

But it doesn't have RADIATION! RADIATION! is scary and dangerous and always secret, it's everywhere being covered up, lurking there to kill you.

No, it's uncertainty that's dangerous.

At the moment, I have no way of knowing exactly the level of risk involved with the use of nuclear power[1]. Without that knowledge, I'm firmly in the "thanks, but no thanks" camp.

[1] By that, I mean that official declarations on the radiation levels after an accident seem to be always laughably underestimated (cf. Chernobyl, Fukushima). Which means I cannot trust the official scientists any more. And the only other people measuring the radiation levels are the tree huggers, which means that I have no trustworthy data at all...

[Bloo Loo]

Just because you don't understand the reasoning behind a prediction does not make it a guess. I don't understand why you would dismiss the hazards of one form of energy generation out of hand, while expressing extreme concern about the hazards of another, even though both are subject to uncertainties.

you are suggesting I have an extreme view. Thats why you cant understand it....because its not true.