Now that it’s become clear that most of Japan’s upcoming rice harvests are most likely to be contaminated with cesium, Japanese are holding onto last years rice like it was gold.
Japanese retailers are reporting that bags of last year’s rice are flying off the shelves, because consumers don’t think there will be any rice available from this year’s harvests.
The Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry says it’s working to ensure the safety of this year’s rice harvests. But so far the government has a real bad track record of proving their incompetence regarding nuclear contamination.
Lack of rice in Japan, yet another notch in the tightening belt of the global food crisis.
The recent announcement that three top government officials will lose their jobs, comes after weeks of blame games between the Japanese nuclear agencies and the nuclear power utility companies. The issue is that many weeks ago it was revealed that public hearings to determine if the Japanese people wanted nuclear power, were fixed to make it look like there was strong support of nuclear power.
Initially the utility companies were blamed, because it was their employees, and subcontractors that flooded the public hearings with support for nuclear energy. Now it turns out that the utility companies were ordered to do so by the very government agencies that were supposed to be regulating them.
05 August 2011, the Minister of the Economy, Trade, and Industry Ministry, Banri Kaieda, announced an investigation into the actions of the three top officials who were effectively fired the day before.
Specifically, a third party will investigate the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency. That agency was the one who set up the public hearings, and, according to several electric power companies, ordered the utilities to flood the hearings with supporters of nuclear power. The Japanese media is calling this a case of “influence peddling” on the part of the government.
Another example of the lack of preparedness of the Japanese government; promised increases in radiation monitoring have not materialized, because the government can’t handle it logistically.
02 August 2011, the Japanese government announced that in order to increase radiation monitoring they will now rely on non governmental groups, many of which have already been conducting their own radiation monitoring.
Many of Japan’s citizens have complained about the lack of response from the national government. Official government reports concerning radiation levels have been contradicted, and even proven wrong, by local governments, as well as the NGOs.
Many of the national government reports relied on data from Tokyo Electric Power Company, and it’s obvious TEPCo is totally unreliable.
Agencies of the Japanese government are now going to work with the NGOs, and local governments, to set up a large network of 250 radiation monitoring sites, which will include schools and libraries. They will check air, ground, water, plants and food for radiation contamination. The government hopes to have a web site set up by mid August, so that everyone in Japan can see the results.
The Japanese government established radiation contamination guidelines for determining whether fertilizers, and livestock feed, contaminated with radiation are safe to use, or not.
The new safe limit for contaminated fertilizer is 400 becquerels of cesium per kilogram. Farmers are asked to use humus and compost that contains less than that.
The new standard for fertilizer comes after it’s become clear that many crops around Honshu are contaminated, internally, with radiation. Many of those crops are fed to cows, which in turn become internally contaminated.
Also, the government established, for the first time, safe limits on cattle and fish feed. 300 becquerels of cesium per kilogram in cattle feed is the max, and 100 becquerels for fish feed.
Government officials say they will start explaining, by next week, how farmers can check for such levels.
In severalpostings (back in March) I warned that Japanese farmers should not plant their crops because of the radiation contamination…they planted their crops anyway, now it’s a mess.
Prefectural governments, and the national government of Japan, are now telling farmers not to ship their upcoming rice harvest, because of cesium contamination.
It’s not just rice that’s contaminated. For months now tea crops have been coming up with radiation, and what’s amazing is that the Japanese tea industry has spent money promoting their tea around the world, even holding tea drinking demonstrations. Many vegetables are contaminated, and even compost is proving to be contaminated. And, they’re still dealing with the massive beef cesium contamination.
The city of Pocatello is back to the drawing board after voting against buying $6.2 million worth of water rights. The deal would have been made with Portneuf Marsh Valley Canal Company. City officials backed out after credible threats of lawsuits from water users “downstream”.
Water is a big issue for Pocatello. Its main source of water is the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer, and it’s running dry. The Portneuf River flows through Pocatello, but it does not recharge the aquifer, and the city does not take any water from it.
To add to the problem, the city of Pocatello is not the only one using the Aquifer, the city of Chubbuck also gets its water from the same source.
For a long time it was thought that surface water runoff made its way to the ground water (Aquifer), but now its known that most surface water runoff just ends up in rivers heading out to the oceans (although some recharging comes from Mink Creek, and snow).
Geoscientists believe the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer was created 17,000 years ago when a natural dam broke, releasing a huge sea into the area (Bonneville Flood). Part of that sea was trapped in what is now known as Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer.
Another issue is that while many aquifers are held in small rock formations, even pebbles and sand, the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer is trapped by huge boulders, which were part of the natural dam holding back the ancient sea. You can see huge boulders around the area now. Every time a housing development goes in they end up spending a lot of time digging out the boulders in order to put in basements. It has also resulted in lucrative local rock mining businesses.
The water in the Aquifer is almost finite, it does not easily recharge as was once thought.
However, while most rain ends up in rivers, any water from slow melting snow, or used on farms or residential properties can get into the Aquifer. The problem is that large boulders do not filter the incoming surface water, like sand or pebble aquifers. This means the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer is very vulnerable to contamination.
To add to that, the soil is only about 2 to 8 feet thick, before you hit rock. I can attest to that since I’ve done a lot of landscaping here, and I grow vegetables and fruits. I can dig the depth of a shovel blade and hit rocks 4 inches in diameter or bigger. The thin soil means if you dump used motor oil on the ground, or use chemicals on your garden, it’s almost instantly heading for the Aquifer.
There is a three part (boring, basically a college lecture from 2010) video explanation of the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer issue, presented by Glenn Thackray of Idaho State University:
Thackray explains that the cities, residents, farmers and businesses take out more water from the Lower Portnuef Valley Aquifer, per year, than what flows into the Aquifer. This has been going on for a long time, and is why we’re running out of water. Add to that the fact that we’ve had some very dry winters, with less than normal snowfall (a big source of recharge, because it melts into the ground, unlike rain that runs off). The water level has been dropping since the 1990s.
Pocatello city officials say they are taking this issue seriously, and are being proactive about finding a solution.
Grocery chain operator Ito-Yokado says it sold over 2,600 kilograms (5,732 pounds) of beef contaminated with cesium. The beef was sold at 94 outlets in Tokyo and several surrounding prefectures, as well as on the northern island of Hokkaido, between April and July.
Ito-Yokado is not the only store that has admitted to selling the contaminated beef. Two other grocery/department store operators, Seiyu and Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings, have admitted to selling the meat.
Consumers are being asked to bring the meat back, but many analysts think that too much time has gone by and that most of the beef has been eaten.
Japan’s Education Minister Yoshiaki Takaki is demanding action after it was discovered that three elementary schools served children beef contaminated with cesium. The schools are located in Chiba, east of Tokyo.
Takaki has ordered local schools to check the source of the food they serve.
For months now, Japanese Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has been demanding that Tokyo Electric Power Company improve working conditions for their employees, including contractors. Officials have also been demanding to know why TEPCo is taking so long to get all the employees tested for radiation exposure (at least 1,500 are still awaiting tests). Now it turns out that 198 newly hired employees are missing!
The Japanese government has given TEPCo until 29 July 2011 to get all workers tested for radiation. The government is also demanding an explanation for the disappearance of 198 workers who were hired AFTER the 11 March disasters.
Earlier in the week TEPCo admitted that it could not find 132 employees, but after the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency investigated it turns out that 198 are missing.
Government officials are concerned that TEPCo’s lack of accounting for its employees is just par for the course; from day one of the nuclear disaster TEPCo officials have proven they have a lackadaisical attitude towards managing all aspects of running a nuclear plant. (or maybe they’re what are called ‘ghost workers’, they never existed, they were created on paper to ripoff taxpayers)
On June 17, Idaho Falls police officers tried to apprehend a man wanted for failing to pay fines, and probation violation. It ended after the man shot one cop, who lived thanks to his bullet proof vest, then the other police returned fire, shooting the suspect at least six times.
The official investigation said the police fired in self defense. The shots fired by police hit the man in the neck, shoulders and abdomen. The official investigation claims that the suspect shot himself in the head, after being shot multiple times by the police. Here’s the problem: The police officers’ own official statements say they do not recall seeing the suspect shoot himself! Mmmm
