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Thu, 2011-03-24 12:57 — mdmcdonald
The Environment and Public Health Working Group is focused on minimizing negative health impacts from the Tohoku earthquake and cascading effects.

The mission of the Environment and Public Health Working Group is to minimize negative health impacts from the Tohoku earthquake,tsunami, safety problems with Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant and cascading effects on Japanese society.

Working Group email address:  ***@***.***

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Members

Jason Jackson Kathy Gilbeaux Katie Rast mdmcdonald Patrick Young Yuki Karakawa
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Email address for group

environment-and-public-health@m.resiliencesystem.org

Japan Nuclear Crisis: IAEA Report Finds Country Underestimated Tsunami Risk For Nuclear Plants

Wed, 2011-06-01 11:49 — Kathy Gilbeaux

In this May 27, 2011 photo released by the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, members of the IAEA fact-finding team in Japan visit the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Okuma, Fukushima prefecture, northern Japan. (AP Photo/IAEA)

Reuters - June 1, 2011

TOKYO, June 1 (Reuters) - Japan underestimated the risk of tsunamis and needs to closely monitor public and workers' health after the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a team of international safety inspectors said in a preliminary review of the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.

The report, from an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) team led by Britain's top nuclear safety official Mike Weightman, highlighted some of the well-documented weaknesses that contributed to the crisis at Fukushima when the plant, 240 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo, was hit by a massive earthquake and then a tsunami in quick succession on March 11.

Those start with a failure to plan for a tsunami that would overrun the 5.7-metre (19 ft) break wall at Fukushima and knock out back-up electric generators to four reactors, despite multiple forecasts from a government agency and operator Tokyo Electric Power Co's own scientists that such a risk was looming.

Chernobyl Study Says Health Risks Linger

Sun, 2011-05-29 00:00 — Kathy Gilbeaux

The New York Times - March 17, 2011

Nearly 25 years after the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, children and teenagers who drank contaminated milk or ate affected cheese in the days and weeks after the explosion still suffer from an increased risk of thyroid cancer, according to a study released Thursday by the National Cancer Institute.

Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident: An Overview

Sat, 2011-05-28 23:29 — Kathy Gilbeaux

World Health Organization - Fact sheet N° 303 - April 2006

Background

On 26 April 1986, explosions at reactor number four of the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl in Ukraine, a Republic of the former Soviet Union at that time, led to huge releases of radioactive materials into the atmosphere. These materials were deposited mainly over countries in Europe, but especially over large areas of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine.

An estimated 350 000 clean-up workers or "liquidators" from the army, power plant staff, local police and fire services were initially involved in containing and cleaning up the radioactive debris during 1986-1987. About 240 000 liquidators received the highest radiation doses while conducting major mitigation activities within the 30 km zone around the reactor. Later, the number of registered liquidators rose to 600 000, although only a small fraction of these were exposed to high levels of radiation.

In the spring and summer of 1986, 116 000 people were evacuated from the area surrounding the Chernobyl reactor to non-contaminated areas. Another 230 000 people were relocated in subsequent years.

70,000 More Should Evacuate After Fukushima: Watchdog

Tue, 2011-05-24 14:35 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Canada.com - AFP - May 24, 2011

Paris - Seventy thousand people living beyond the 20-kilometre no-go zone around Fukushima should be evacuated because of radioactivity deposited by the crippled nuclear plant, a watchdog said.

Updating its assessment of the March 11 disaster, France's Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) highlighted an area northwest of the plant that lies beyond the 20-km (12 mile) zone whose inhabitants have already been evacuated.

Radioactivity levels in this area range from several hundred becquerels per square metre to thousands or even several million bequerels per square metre, the IRSN report, issued late Monday, said.

Around 70,000 people, including 9,500 children aged up to 14, live in the area, "the most contaminated territory outside the evacuation zone," the agency said.

"These are people who are still to be evacuated, in addition to those who were evacuated during the emergency phase in March," Didier Champion, its environmnent director, told AFP.

Staying in this area means the inhabitants would be exposed to radiation of more than 10 millisieverts (mSv)in the year following the disaster, according to the IRSN.

What Fukushima's Triple Meltdown Means

Sun, 2011-05-15 02:10 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Time - May 24, 2011

Two weeks after announcing the meltdown of fuel inside Fukushima's No. 1 reactor, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has said there have very likely been partial meltdowns at the other two reactors that were operating when the crisis began on March 11 as well. A spokesman for TEPCO, Japan's largest power company that has come under fire for its management of the crippled plant, said fuel rods at reactor No. 3 started melting March 13, two days after the 9.0 earthquake and ensuing tsunami struck the plant. Fuel rods at No. 2 probably started melting a day later, on March 14.

Fukushima Plant's Nos. 2, 3 Reactors Also Suffered Meltdown: TEPCO

Sun, 2011-05-15 01:10 — Kathy Gilbeaux

JapanToday.com - May 24, 2011

TOKYO —

The operator of the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power complex said Tuesday that meltdowns are assumed to have occurred in the cores of the Nos. 2 and 3 reactors in addition to the meltdown already confirmed at the No. 1 reactor, but stressed that it believes the melted fuel is being kept cool at the bottom of the pressure vessels.

Tokyo Electric Power Co also maintained its view that it was only after the giant tsunami hit after the devastating March 11 earthquake that the plant lost all its power sources, eventually leading to the loss of the reactors’ key cooling functions.

The announcement came as the utility is proceeding with work to assess data taken shortly after the nuclear accident occurred. Industry minister Banri Kaieda said the government agreed at a cabinet meeting Tuesday to set up a third-party panel to look into the causes of the country’s worst ever nuclear crisis.

The government has tapped Yotaro Hatamura, a 70-year-old professor emeritus at the University of Tokyo, as head of the special panel, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku said in a press conference.

The 2011 Off the Pacific Coast of Tohoku Pacific Earthquake and the Seismic Damage to the NPPs

Wed, 2011-04-27 23:14 — Kathy Gilbeaux

April 4, 2011 - Summary

Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA)

Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization (JNES)

(see attachment below - 76 page PDF report)

Japan Mulls Strictly Enforcing Evacuation Zone Near Plant

Wed, 2011-04-20 22:13 — Kathy Gilbeaux

AP - by Elaine Kurtenbach and Mari Yamaguchi - April 20, 2011

TOKYO -- Japanese authorities may for the first time strictly enforce their evacuation zone around a crippled nuclear plant, citing concerns Wednesday over radiation risks for residents returning to check on their homes.

About 70,000-80,000 people were living in the 10 towns and villages within 12 miles (20 kilometers) of the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant before the March 11 earthquake and tsunami wrecked its power and cooling systems, setting off the worst nuclear power crisis since the 1986 catastrophe at Chernobyl.

Virtually all of the residents left when the government ordered the area evacuated on March 12, but some occasionally have returned and police cannot legally block them. There currently is no penalty for violating the zone.

"We are considering setting up 'caution areas' as an option for effectively limiting entry" to the zone, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan will meet with local officials and evacuees to discuss the plans during a visit to the affected region Thursday, Edano said.

Robot in Japanese Reactors Detects High Radiation

Mon, 2011-04-18 23:33 — Kathy Gilbeaux

AP - AOL News - by Mari Yamaguchi - April 18, 2011

TOKYO -- Readings Monday from robots that entered two crippled buildings at Japan's tsunami-flooded nuclear plant for the first time in more than a month displayed a harsh environment still too radioactive for workers to enter.

Nuclear officials said the radiation data for Unit 1 and Unit 3 at the tsunami-flooded Fukushima Dai-ichi plant - collected by U.S.-made robots that look like drafting lamps on treads - do not alter plans for stabilizing the complex by year's end under a "road map" released by the plant operator Sunday.

With the public growing increasingly frustrated at the slow response to the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crises, parliament grilled Prime Minister Naoto Kan and officials from plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co.

"You should be bowing your head in apology. You clearly have no leadership at all," Masashi Waki, a lawmaker from the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, shouted at Kan.

"I am sincerely apologizing for what has happened," Kan said, stressing that the government was doing all it could to handle the unprecedented disasters.

TEPCO's president, Masataka Shimizu, looked visibly ill at ease as lawmakers heckled and taunted him.

Radioactivity Rises in Sea Off Japan Nuclear Plant

Sat, 2011-04-16 20:52 — Kathy Gilbeaux

AP - by Mari Yamaguchi - April 16, 2011

TOKYO -- Levels of radioactivity have risen sharply in seawater near a tsunami-crippled nuclear plant in northern Japan, signaling the possibility of new leaks at the facility, the government said Saturday.

The announcement came after a magnitude-5.9 earthquake jolted Japan on Saturday morning, hours after the country's nuclear safety agency ordered plant operators to beef up their quake preparedness systems to prevent a recurrence of the nuclear crisis.

There were no reports of damage from the earthquake, and there was no risk of a tsunami similar to the one that struck the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant March 11 after a magnitude-9.0 earthquake, causing Japan's worst-ever nuclear plant disaster.

Since the tsunami knocked out the plant's cooling systems, workers have been spraying massive amounts of water on the overheated reactors. Some of that water, contaminated with radiation, leaked into the Pacific. Plant officials said they plugged that leak on April 5 and radiation levels in the sea dropped.

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