How could a few shut down nuclear plants have such drastic affects on Japan’s industries? When it’s more than a few, try 60%.
Electrical power shortages will continue thru summer. Japan has 54 commercial nuke plants, right now 32 are shut down. Some, like Fukushima Daiichi, were shut down by the 11 March disasters. Others are down for scheduled maintenance, or government orders.
On top of that, six more plants are scheduled to shut down for maintenance this summer.
Tokyo Electric Power Company admits high levels of radiation contamination in Reactor 3 spent fuel pool, are coming from the reactor’s core!
TEPCo recently tested the water of the spent fuel pool, and found radiation that was not present prior to the 11 March disasters, which damaged the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
The readings are 140,000 becquerels of radioactive cesium-134, 150,000 becquerels of cesium-137 and 11,000 becquerels of iodine-131 per cubic centimeter. The clue that the radiation is coming from the reactor core is the iodine. Iodine is a short life radioactive isotope, and is created during nuclear fission. (don’t confuse iodine with iodide)
The closing of Hamaoka nuclear plant in Japan, because of the danger of a massive earthquake, is having direct affect on a British nuclear plant.
Sellafield MOX plant, in north west England, supplies Hamaoka with the nuclear fuel it needs to make electricity. Hamaoka uses MOX (mixed oxide) nuclear fuel, and Chubu Electric Power Company (operator of Hamaoka) has a contract with Sellafield as its only supplier.
On top of that the Hamaoka plant is the only user of MOX fuel from Sellafield.
Taxpayers in the United Kingdom shelled out 1.34 billion Pounds (U.S. $2.1 billion) for the Sellafield MOX plant, and the British government wants to build another one.
British officials are scrambling to work with CEPCo officials to figure out how to fulfill their contract. Maybe the Brits can start selling MOX to the Iranians?
The U.S. Department of Energy, and the Japanese Science Ministry, have put together a map of the fallout pattern of cesium. The damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has been spewing cesium.
The map shows the cesium fallout extends north west of the plant, in a large area. It is depicted with the colors yellow and red. NHK has a report.
Official say radiation levels from the Fukushima Daiichi plant have dropped enough that it is time to conduct more testing of soil for levels, and types, of radiation contamination.
The Bosnian Serb government is refusing to recognize the Bosnian national government. This over the country’s national court, which has been hearing cases of war crimes.
Austrian Valentin Inzko, is the supreme decision maker in Bosnia, and has ordered the Serbs to back off their plans to officially refuse to recognize the Bosnian national government. In retaliation, Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, sent a letter to the United Nations accusing Inzko of abusing his power.
Since the end of the Bosnian Civil War, the Idaho Air & Army National Guard has supported several peacekeeping missions to Bosnia.
It’s interesting how the main stream U.S. media reported the number of Drugs War protesters, over the weekend, as in the “hundreds”. It was tens of thousands!
Reports out of Mexico vary from 20,000 to 85,000. The latest protests took place from May 5-8, in several Mexican cities. The people were not only protesting drug gangs, but the police and military as well.
Most of the victims in the Drugs War have been innocent civilians, especially migrant workers from Central American countries. Which, when you think about it, doesn’t make sense. Why would drug dealers, police or military want to kill civilians and migrant workers? So far many local police have been arrested in connection with the mass killings of migrant workers. It makes you wounder if this is really a Drugs War.
Now the main stream U.S. media is running reports that Mexicans support their President’s Drugs War policy. In actuality the percent of supporters is slightly down from 2010. Makes you wonder why the U.S. media seems to be downplaying a war in Mexico that has killed more people than the wars in Afghanistan & Iraq combined, in the past few years.
Japan Atomic Power Company said its Tsuruga nuclear plant leaked a small amount of radiation on Sunday, 08 May 2011. But this is not the first time.
On 02 May radiation was detected outside the reactors. JAPCo officials think the radiation leak is coming from the cooling water for the fuel rods. They are shutting down the plant to inspect.
Tsuruga nuke plant is in Fukui Prefecture, directly west of Tokyo.
Radioactive strontium continues to be spewed from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Soil samples taken at the plant, on 18 April, tested positive for strontium 89 and strontium 90.
Strontium collects in your bones and can cause various bone cancers. You get contaminated by breathing it.
Tokyo Electric Power Company says April’s strontium 90 levels are 130 times higher than the levels detected in March! The levels of strontium 89 are 4,400 becquerels per kilogram of soil!
Because of the increase in strontium levels, officials in the Japanese government are advising that readings need to be taken in areas outside the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Once again, you’d think they’d already be doing that.
After first saying no, CEPCo now says OK they will shut down their Hamaoka plant.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan asked Chubu Electric Power Company to shut down their Hamaoka nuke plant, because the plant sits on top of a convergence of fault lines, that could produce an 8+ quake. The plant is not built to withstand such a quake, and the Japanese government wants the plant operators to reinforce the reactors.
The problem for CEPCo is that they have no way to replace the electric power that will be lost when they shut down the reactors. The Japanese auto industry, and other manufacturers, are worried because they are already dealing with supply problems due to lack of electricity. The shut down of Hamaoka nuclear plant will only make the supply situation worse.
CEPCo officials say that, so far, they can not come up with any practical alternative to replace the lost electrical power.
Toyota, Honda, Mitsubishi and Suzuki have factories in the prefectures that will be affected by the nuke plant shut down. Also, electronics makers Panasonic, Toshiba and Fujitsu have factories that will be affected by the shut down.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan had asked Chubu Electric Power Company to shut down their Hamaoka nuke plant, because it turns out that it is right over a convergence of fault lines, and scientists expect a magnitude 8+ quake.
Hamaoka is south west of Tokyo. Kan wants CEPCo to shut down the plant, and reinforce the reactors to withstand an 8+ quake.
CEPCo officials studied several options, including how to pay for the cost of reinforcing their nuclear plant. They decided they don’t have the money to reinforce the plant, and it would not be feasible to raise electric rates high enough to pay for it (because customers would refuse to pay the higher rates).
CEPCo also decided that shutting down the plant would make the already bad situation, for Japanese industries dealing with lack of power, even worse.
CEPCo is not ruling out shutting down the Hamaoka plant, if they can do it with out reducing electrical power, and find money to pay for the reinforcing.