Sarkozy arrives in Japan to discuss nuclear issues with Kan

JAPAN, March 31, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / KYODO NEWS) — French President Nicolas Sarkozy arrived Thursday in Japan to discuss the drawn-out crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant with Prime Minister Naoto Kan, as reported by KYODO NEWS AGENCY.

Sarkozy became the first foreign leader to visit Japan since the March 11 earthquake and ensuing tsunami that obliterated northeastern coastal towns and ravaged the nuclear facility.

He will express his solidarity with Japan, not only as the French leader but also as the chair of the Group of 20 leading industrialized and emerging economies.

He is also expected to say that France, which relies on nuclear power for nearly 80 percent of its electricity, is committed to offering more of its expertise to help Japan contain radiation spilling out of the crippled complex, located about 220 kilometers from Tokyo.

Kan and Sarkozy are scheduled to hold a joint news conference in the early evening shortly after their meeting at the premier’s office.

Sarkozy came to Tokyo for a brief visit after taking part in a G-20 seminar on reshaping the global monetary system in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing.

The president, visiting Japan for the second time since taking office in 2007, will head back to France soon after the news conference, according to Japanese officials.

France now holds the rotating presidency of the G-20 and Group of Eight major powers, both of which Japan is a member country.

France has the second most nuclear power stations of any country after the United States. Japan has the third most, deriving about 30 percent of its power from nuclear reactors.

Following the serious accident at the Fukushima plant, nuclear issues will top the agenda at the G-8 summit in late May, when leaders also from Britain, Canada, Germany, Italy, Russia and the United States gather in the northwestern French resort city of Deauville.

Kan and Sarkozy will almost certainly also discuss the situation in Libya, given that France has been taking a major role in demanding Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s immediate resignation, according to the Foreign Ministry officials.  (*)

 

No options but to close Fukushima nuke plant – Japanese Prime Minister

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan

JAPAN, March 31, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / RIA NOVOSTI / KYODO NEWS ) — Japan’s troubled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant will most likely be closed down, the Kyodo news agency reported on Thursday, quoting Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan.

“We cannot but close this nuclear power plant,” Kan said during a meeting with the leader of the Japanese Communist Party, Shii Kazuo, on Thursday.

On Wednesday, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano suggested that all six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant should be demolished. Tsunehisa Katsumata, the director of the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) which owns the plant, said earlier on Wednesday that it would be reasonable to close down the first four reactors.

All six reactors were badly damaged after a powerful earthquake and tsunami struck eastern Japan on March 11. Reactors No. 5 and 6 reactors have been less problematic than the other four and are already in a state of cold shutdown.

Japanese Trade and Industry Minister Banri Kaieda said on Wednesday that the country’s nuclear power stations would be closed if they did not meet tougher safety requirements being drawn up by the government. (*)

 

Japan orders immediate safety upgrade at nuclear plants

In this photo taken Sunday, March 27, 2011, Junpei Endo, 31, pauses on his bicycle after collecting mementos of his destroyed home where his father was killed during the March 11 massive tsunami waves that topped the neighborhood in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan. Endo grew up in the big green house down the street from 'Hiyori Yama' - Weather Hill. He left town three years ago, when he was 28, to work near Tokyo. After hearing about the tsunami, he drove back as fast as the roads would allow. (AP Photo/Wally Santana)

TOKYO, March 30, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / Reuters) – Japan ordered an immediate safety upgrade at its 55 nuclear power plants on Wednesday in its first acknowledgement that standards were inadequate when an earthquake and tsunami wrecked a facility nearly three weeks ago, sparking the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl in 1986.

As operators struggle to regain control of the damaged Daiichi nuclear reactors 240 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo, radiation leakage continued, with radioactive iodine in the sea off the damaged plant at record levels. The state nuclear safety agency said the amounts were 3,355 times the legal limit.

Smoke was reported coming from a second damaged nuclear plant site in Fukushima on Wednesday, with authorities citing an electric distribution board as the problem.

It is not known how serious the problem was at the Daini plant, which has been put into cold shutdown and is several miles from the stricken Daiichi power facility.

Anger at Japan’s nuclear crisis saw more than 100 people, chanting “stop nuclear power”, protest outside the Tokyo headquarters of nuclear plant operator Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) on Wednesday.

“We don’t want to use electric power that can kill people,” said Waseda University student Mina Umeda.

A Reuters investigation showed Japan and TEPCO repeatedly played down dangers at its nuclear plants and ignored warnings, including a 2007 tsunami study from the utility’s senior safety engineer.

The research paper concluded there was a roughly 10 percent chance that a tsunami could test or overrun the defenses of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant within a 50-year span based on the most conservative assumptions.

The new safety steps, to be completed by the end of April, include preparing back-up power in case of loss of power supply, and having fire trucks with hoses ready at all times to intervene and ensure cooling systems for both reactors and pools of used fuel are maintained, the Trade Ministry said.

Other measures such as building higher protective sea walls would be studied after a full assessment of the Fukushima disaster, officials said.

The immediate measures do not necessarily require nuclear plant operations to be halted, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Banri Kaieda told a news conference.

“These are the minimum steps we can think of right now that should be done immediately,” said Kaieda.

“We shouldn’t wait until a so-called overhaul or a comprehensive revision — something major that would take a long time — is prepared. We should do whatever we can if and when there is something (which safety authorities agree is) viable and necessary,” he said.

Before the disaster, Japan’s nuclear reactors had provided about 30 percent of the nation’s electric power. The percentage had been expected to rise to 50 percent by 2030, among the highest in the world.

NO END IN SIGHT

The government and TEPCO conceded there was no end in sight to Japan’s nuclear crisis.

“We are not in a situation where we can say we will have this under control by a certain period,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told a news briefing.

The discovery of highly toxic plutonium in soil at Daiichi had raised alarm over the disaster, which has overshadowed the humanitarian calamity triggered by the earthquake and tsunami, which left 27,500 people dead or missing.

TEPCO will test sprinkling synthetic resin in some areas of the Daiichi complex to prevent radioactive dust from flying into the air or being washed into the ocean by rain. The resin is water-soluble, but when the water evaporates, it becomes sticky and contains the dust.

Pollution of the ocean is a serious concern for a country where fish is central to the diet. Experts say the vastness of the ocean and a powerful current should dilute high levels of radiation, limiting the danger of marine contamination.

However, just how radiation is spilling into the ocean is unclear and controlling leakage from the plant could take weeks or months, making precise risk assessments difficult.

Tokyo Electric said it would take a “fairly long time” to stabilize overheating reactors, adding four of the six reactors would need to be decommissioned. Meanwhile, the head of the company was in hospital due to high blood pressure, adding to the disarray at Asia’s largest utility.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan, whose government faces mounting criticism for its handling of the crisis, won assurances of American support in a telephone conversation on Wednesday with President Barack Obama.

The United States has already agreed to send some radiation-detecting robots to Japan to help explore the reactor cores and spent fuel pools at the stricken nuclear plant.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who chairs the G20 and G8 blocs of nations, is due to visit Tokyo on Thursday. He will be the first foreign leader in Japan since the disaster.

In further support, France flew in two experts from its state-owned nuclear reactor maker Areva and its CEA nuclear research body to assist TEPCO.

DRAG ON ECONOMY

Hundreds of engineers have been toiling for nearly three weeks to cool the plant’s reactors and avert a catastrophic meltdown of fuel rods, although the situation appears to have moved back from that nightmare scenario.

Jesper Koll, director of equity research at JPMorgan Securities in Tokyo, said a drawn-out battle to bring the plant under control and manage the radioactivity being released would perpetuate the uncertainty and act as a drag on the economy.

“The worst-case scenario is that this drags on not one month or two months or six months, but for two years, or indefinitely,” he said. “Japan will be bypassed. That is the real nightmare scenario.”

Japan’s main stock index has fallen about 9 percent since the tsunami while TEPCO shares have fallen almost 80 percent. The government is considering a tax increase to pay for the damage it estimates at $300 billion in what could be the world’s costliest natural disaster.

Already criticized for weak leadership during Japan’s worst crisis since World War Two, Kan has been blasted by the opposition for his handling of the disaster and for not widening the exclusion zone beyond 20 km (12 miles) around Fukushima.

Kan said he was considering that step, which would force 130,000 people to move, in addition to 70,000 already displaced.

Hundreds of thousands whose homes and livelihoods were wiped away by the tsunami that obliterated cities on the northeast coast have heard next to nothing from the government about whether it will help them to rebuild.

About 175,000 were living in shelters on high ground above the vast plains of mud-covered debris with temporary housing for only a few hundred currently under construction. (*)

 

Japan on 'maximum alert' over nuclear plant

Engineers check facilities at the central control room of the Fukushima nuclear power plant at Okuma town. Japan said it was on "maximum alert" over a crippled nuclear plant where radioactive water has halted repair work and plutonium has been found in the soil. (AFP/Nuclear and Industrial Safety/ Jiji Press)

SENDAI, Japan, March 30, 2011  (KATAKAMI.COM / AFP) – Japan said it was on “maximum alert” over a crippled nuclear plant where radioactive water has halted repair work and plutonium has been found in the soil, AFP reported.

The level of radioactive iodine in the sea off Fukushima reached its highest reading yet at 3,355 times the legal limit, Jiji press said Wednesday.

The earthquake and tsunami that ravaged Japan’s northeast coast and left about 28,000 dead or missing also knocked out reactor cooling systems at the Fukushima plant, which has leaked radiation into the air and sea.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan conceded the situation at the coastal atomic power station remained “unpredictable” and pledged his government would “tackle the problem while in a state of maximum alert”.

In a stop-gap measure to contain the crisis at the plant, crews have poured thousands of tons of water onto reactors where fuel rods are thought to have partially melted, and topped up pools for spent fuel rods.

But the run-off of the operation has accumulated in the basements of turbine rooms connected to three reactors and filled up tunnels, making it too risky for workers to go near to repair cooling systems needed to stabilise the plant.

One tunnel alone holds 6,000 cubic metres (212,000 cubic feet) of contaminated water, more than two Olympic swimming pools. Still, the only choice for now is to keep pumping water, said government spokesman Yukio Edano.

“Continuing the cooling is unavoidable… We need to prioritise injecting water,” Edano told reporters.

If the rods are fully exposed to the air, they would rapidly heat up, melt down and spew out far greater plumes of radiation at the site, located about 250 kilometres (155 miles) northeast of Tokyo, nuclear experts fear.

Workers have piled sandbags and concrete blocks around the tunnel shafts to contain the water, the nuclear regulatory body said. They have now also restored light in the control rooms of reactors one to four.

The water out of reactor two has measured 1,000 millisieverts per hour — four times the recently-hiked total exposure limit for emergency staff, and a level that can cause radiation sickness with nausea and vomiting in an hour.

Adding to the nuclear fears, embattled operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said plutonium had been detected in soil samples that were taken a week ago at five spots in the plant.

Nuclear safety agency spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama said the plutonium data suggested “certain damage to fuel rods”, Kyodo News reported.

The US environmental protection agency says internal exposure to plutonium “is an extremely serious health hazard” as it stays in the body for decades, exposing organs and tissue to radiation and increasing the risk of cancer.

TEPCO shares plunged 18.67 percent on Tuesday, and have now lost nearly three quarters of their pre-crisis value. News reports said the government is considering taking a majority stake in the power company.

Fears have grown in Japan over food and water safety, and vegetable and dairy shipments from four prefectures have been halted.

Japan’s government has evacuated hundreds of thousands of people from within 20 kilometres of the plant, and more recently encouraged those remaining within 30 kilometres to also leave.

Environmental watchdog Greenpeace, which has taken its own measurements in the town of Iitate, 40 kilometres from the plant, urged the government to evacuate the town, especially children and pregnant women.

“Remaining in Iitate for just a few days could mean receiving the maximum permissible annual dose of radiation,” Greenpeace radiation expert Jan van der Putte said.

Jitters continued throughout Asia, with China, South Korea, the Philippines and Vietnam reporting that radiation had drifted over their territories, even though they emphasised the levels were so small there was no health risk.

Traces of radioactive iodine believed to be from Japan’s damaged nuclear plant have even been detected as far afield as Britain, officials said Tuesday.

“We would like to ask the public not to panic. These are very tiny amounts in the air,” Philippine Nuclear Research Institute spokeswoman Tina Cerbolis said, echoing officials in the other countries to have detected the radiation.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who currently heads the G8 and G20 blocs, will travel to Japan Thursday to meet Prime Minister Kan as a show of solidarity, according to his office.

The United States said it would send Japan radiation-resistant robots and trained staff to operate them, aiming to collect information about the reactors from areas too unsafe for humans to enter.  (*)

 

 

Japan on 'maximum alert' over N-crisis ; Japanese PM

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan

JAPAN, March 29, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM) — Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan says his government is in a “state of maximum alert” over the deepening radiation crisis at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, as reported by PRESS TV CHANNEL on Tuesday.

Addressing a lower house budget committee, Kan said that the situation “continues to be unpredictable” and that the government “will tackle the problem while in a state of maximum alert,” AFP reported.

Kan’s remarks come as traces of radioactivity from damaged nuclear facilities in Japan have been detected in rainwater in the northeast United States.

Ohio reported elevated radiation levels in rainwater on Monday, a day after monitors for the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found similar cases in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.

Experts at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio reported small amounts of Iodine 131 from Japan in precipitation on Monday.

“In theory, the Iodine 131 could have come from any radioactive waste processing facility. But we know it’s from Japan. The isotope is being seen worldwide,” said geology professor Gerald Matisoff, who monitors rainwater carried into Lake Erie for the EPA.

The EPA has been monitoring radiation from the Fukushima nuclear plant, which was battered in the massive March 11 earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan, and had previously detected “very low levels of radioactive material” in the United States.

The agency said that these levels “were expected as a result of the nuclear incident after the events in Japan since radiation is known to travel in the atmosphere,” and that “the levels detected are far below levels of public health concern.”

The US institute has, however, stepped up its monitoring of precipitation, drinking water, and other potential exposure routes for radiation as a precaution. (*)

 

Toxic plutonium seeping from Japan's nuclear plant

TOKYO, March 29, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM) – Highly toxic plutonium is seeping from the damaged nuclear power plant in Japan’s tsunami disaster zone into the soil outside, officials said Tuesday, further complicating the delicate operation to stabilize the overheated facility, AP reported on Tuesday.

Plutonium has been detected in small amounts at several spots outside the Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant for the first time, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

Safety officials said the amounts were not a risk to humans but support suspicions that dangerously radioactive water is leaking from damaged nuclear fuel rods — a worrying development in the race to bring the power plant under control.

“The situation is very grave,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters Tuesday. “We are doing our utmost efforts to contain the damage.”

A tsunami spawned by a magnitude-9.0 earthquake March 11 destroyed the power systems needed to cool the nuclear fuel rods in the complex, 140 miles (220 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo.

Since then, three of the complex’s six reactors are believed to have partially melted down, and emergency crews have grappled with everything from malfunctioning pumps to dangerous spikes in radiation that have sent workers fleeing.

Radiation seeping from the plant has made its way into produce, raw milk and even tap water as far away as Tokyo, prompting some nations to halt imports from the region. Residents within a 12-mile (20-kilometer) radius of the plant have been urged to leave or stay indoors.

The troubles have eclipsed Pennsylvania’s 1979 crisis at Three Mile Island, when a partial meltdown raised fears of widespread radiation release. But it is still well short of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, which killed at least 31 people with radiation sickness, raised long-term cancer rates and spewed radiation across much of the northern hemisphere.

A series of missteps and accidents, meanwhile, have raised questions about the handling of the disaster, with the government revealing growing frustration with TEPCO.

The Yomiuri daily newspaper reported that the government was considering temporarily nationalizing the troubled nuclear plant operator, but Edano and TEPCO officials denied holding any such discussions.

The nuclear crisis has complicated the government’s ability to address the humanitarian situation facing hundreds of thousands left homeless by the twin disasters. The official number of dead surpassed 11,000 on Tuesday, police said, and the final figure is expected to top 18,000.

The urgent mission to stabilize the Fukushima plant has been fraught with setbacks.

Workers succeeded last week in reconnecting some parts of the plant to the power grid. But as they pumped water into units to cool the reactors down, they discovered pools of contaminated water in numerous spots, including the basements of several buildings and in tunnels outside them.

The contaminated water has been emitting radiation exposures more than four times the amount the government considers safe for workers and must be pumped out before electricity can be restored to the cooling system.

That has left officials struggling with two crucial but sometimes-contradictory efforts: pumping in water to keep the fuel rods cool and pumping out — and then safely storing — contaminated water.

Nuclear safety official Hidehiko Nishiyama called it “delicate work.” He acknowledged that cooling the reactors took precedence over concerns about leakage.

“The removal of the contaminated water is the most urgent task now, and hopefully we can adjust the amount of cooling water going in,” he said, adding that workers were building makeshift dikes with sandbags to keep contaminated water from seeping into the soil outside.

The discovery of plutonium, released from fuel rods only when temperatures are extremely high, confirms the severity of the damage, Nishiyama said.

Of the five soil samples showing plutonium, two appeared to be coming from leaking reactors while the rest were likely the result of years of nuclear tests that left trace amounts of plutonium in many places around the world, TEPCO said.

Plutonium is a heavy element that doesn’t readily combine with other elements, so it is less likely to spread than some of the lighter, more volatile radioactive materials detected around the site, such as the radioactive forms of cesium and iodine.

“The relative toxicity of plutonium is much higher than that of iodine or cesium but the chance of people getting a dose of it is much lower,” says Robert Henkin, professor emeritus of radiology at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. “Plutonium just sits there and is a nasty actor.”

When plutonium decays, it emits what is known as an alpha particle, a relatively big particle that carries a lot of energy. When an alpha particle hits body tissue, it can damage the DNA of a cell and lead to a cancer-causing mutation.

Plutonium also breaks down very slowly, so it remains dangerously radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years.

“If you inhale it, it’s there and it stays there forever,” said Alan Lockwood, a professor of Neurology and Nuclear Medicine at the University at Buffalo and a member of the board of directors of Physicians for Social Responsibility, an advocacy group.  (*)

 

More radioactive water spills at Japan nuke plant

People work in the control room of reactor No. 2 with restored lighting at the earthquake and tsunami affected Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima in this March 26, 2011 photo

TOKYO, March 29. 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / AP ) – Workers have discovered new pools of radioactive water leaking from Japan’s crippled nuclear complex that officials believe are behind soaring levels of radiation spreading to soil and seawater, AP reported.

Crews also detected plutonium — a key ingredient in nuclear weapons — in the soil outside the complex, though officials insisted Monday the finding posed no threat to public health.

Plutonium is present in the fuel at the complex, which has been leaking radiation for more than two weeks, so experts had expected to find traces once crews began searching for evidence of it this week.

The Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant was crippled March 11 when a tsunami spawned by a powerful earthquake slammed into Japan’s northeastern coast. The huge wave destroyed the power systems needed to cool the nuclear fuel rods in the complex, 140 miles (220 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo.

Since then, three of the complex’s six reactors are believed to have partially melted down, and emergency crews have struggled with everything from malfunctioning pumps to dangerous spikes in radiation that have forced temporary evacuations.

Confusion at the plant has intensified fears that the nuclear crisis will continue for months or even years amid alarms over radiation making its way into produce, raw milk and even tap water as far away as Tokyo.

The troubles have eclipsed Pennsylvania’s 1979 crisis at Three Mile Island, when a partial meltdown raised fears of widespread radiation release. But it is still well short of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, which killed at least 31 people with radiation sickness, raised long-term cancer rates and spewed radiation across much of the northern hemisphere.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., which runs the complex, said plutonium was found in soil at five locations at the nuclear plant, but that only two samples appeared to be plutonium from the leaking reactors. The rest came from years of nuclear tests that left trace amounts of plutonium in many places around the world.

Plutonium is a heavy element that doesn’t readily combine with other elements, so it is less likely to spread than some of the lighter, more volatile radioactive materials detected around the site, such as the radioactive forms of cesium and iodine.

“The relative toxicity of plutonium is much higher than that of iodine or cesium but the chance of people getting a dose of it is much lower,” says Robert Henkin, professor emeritus of radiology at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. “Plutonium just sits there and is a nasty actor.”

The trouble comes if plutonium finds a way into the human body. The fear in Japan is that water containing plutonium at the station turns to steam and is breathed in, or that the contaminated water from the station migrates into drinking water.

When plutonium decays it emits what is known as an alpha particle, a relatively big particle that carries a lot of energy. When an alpha particle hits body tissue, it can damage the DNA of a cell and lead to a cancer-causing mutation.

Plutonium also breaks down very slowly, so it remains dangerously radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years.

“If you inhale it, it’s there and it stays there forever,” said Alan Lockwood, a professor of Neurology and Nuclear Medicine at the University at Buffalo and a member of the board of directors of Physicians for Social Responsibility, an advocacy group.

While parts of the Japanese plant have been reconnected to the power grid, the contaminated water — which has now been found in numerous places around the complex, including the basements of several buildings — must be pumped out before electricity can be restored to the cooling system.

That has left officials struggling with two sometimes-contradictory efforts: pumping in water to keep the fuel rods cool and pumping out — and then safely storing — contaminated water.

Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, called that balance “very delicate work.”

He also said workers were still looking for safe ways to store the radioactive water. “We are exploring all means,” he said.

Meanwhile, new readings showed ocean contamination had spread about a mile (1.6 kilometers) farther north of the nuclear site than before, but was still within the 12-mile (20-kilometer) radius of the evacuation zone. Radioactive iodine-131 was discovered offshore at a level 1,150 times higher than normal, Nishiyama told reporters.

Closer to the plant, radioactivity in seawater tested about 1,250 times higher than normal last week and climbed to 1,850 times normal over the weekend. Nishiyama said the increase was a concern, but also said the area is not a source of seafood and that the contamination posed no immediate threat to human health.

The buildup of radioactive water in the nuclear complex first became a problem last week, when it splashed over the boots of two workers, burning them and prompting a temporary suspension of work.

Then on Monday, Tokyo Electric Power Co. officials said workers had found more radioactive water in deep trenches used for pipes and electrical wiring outside three units.

The contaminated water has been emitting radiation exposures more than four times the amount the government considers safe for workers.

The five workers in the area at the time were not hurt, said TEPCO spokesman Takashi Kurita.

Exactly where the water is coming from remains unclear, though many suspect it is cooling water that has leaked from one of the disabled reactors.

It could take weeks to pump out the radioactive water, said Gary Was, a nuclear engineering professor at the University of Michigan.

“Battling the contamination so workers can work there is going to be an ongoing problem,” he said.

Amid reports that people had been sneaking back into the mandatory evacuation zone around the nuclear complex, the chief government spokesman again urged residents to stay out. Yukio Edano said contaminants posed a “big” health risk in that area.

Gregory Jaczko, head of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, arrived in Tokyo on Monday to meet with Japanese officials and discuss the situation.

“The unprecedented challenge before us remains serious, and our best experts remain fully engaged to help Japan,” Jaczko was quoted as saying in a U.S. Embassy statement.

Early Monday, a strong earthquake shook the northeastern coast and prompted a brief tsunami alert. The quake was measured at magnitude 6.5, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. No damage or injuries were reported.

Scores of earthquakes have rattled the country over the past two weeks, adding to the sense of unease across Japan, where the final death toll is expected to top 18,000 people, with hundreds of thousands still homeless.

TEPCO officials said Sunday that radiation in leaking water in Unit 2 was 10 million times above normal — a report that sent employees fleeing. But the day ended with officials saying that figure had been miscalculated and the level was actually 100,000 times above normal, still very high but far better than the earlier results.

“This sort of mistake is not something that can be forgiven,” Edano said sternly Monday.  (*)

 

Russian President meets with Emergency Situations Ministry rescuers who took part in the rescue operations in Japan

Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev (C) speaks during a meeting with Russian Emergencies Ministry members, who took part in the earthquake and tsunami earthquake rescue efforts in Japan, after their return to Moscow March 28, 2011. ( Photo : Kremlin.Ru )

Russia, 29 March 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / KREMLIN) — Acting on the President’s instructions, the rescuers worked in Sendai and Ishinomaki, the Japanese towns hardest hit by the earthquake and tsunami. The rescue operations took place on March 15-22, 2011.

Taking part in the meeting at the Kremlin were Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu, personnel from the Centre for High-Risk Rescue Operations Leader and the Emergency Situation Ministry’s Far East Regional Centre, and also rescuers from the Central Airborne Rescue Detachment and the Emergency Situations Ministry Department for Aviation and Air Rescue Technology.

 

Meeting with Emergency Situations Ministry rescuers who took part in rescue operations in Japan.

 

PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA DMITRY MEDVEDEV: Colleagues, friends,

I want to start by thanking you of course for the work that you did in Japan. This disaster that struck Japan is terrible, probably one of the greatest and most tragic disasters on our planet over this last decade. Tens of thousands of people have been killed or simply disappeared.

It was only natural that our country, like others, should respond to this terrible catastrophe, this ultimately global disaster, despite the fact that, as you know, not all is smooth sailing in our relations with our Japanese partners.

There are issues on which our countries share very similar views, and there are also issues on which we have our differences. But in this situation our duty was simply to help our neighbours and partners, and of course it is the Emergency Situations Ministry that provides the first line of assistance. You did a worthy job.

As far as I know, our detachment, with 161 people, was the biggest of all the rescue brigades other countries sent to Japan. This in itself is clear evidence of our desire to help our neighbours, and at the same time it also demonstrates our ability to provide this kind of support.

I spoke with the Japanese Prime Minister just a few days after the disaster struck. We had a lengthy and serious conversation. I could sense what a difficult time the Japanese authorities are going through, and at the same time I could also sense how important it was for them to receive this kind of help and support from Russia, a neighbour with whom they have a diverse range of relations, and yes, with whom there are differences too. But when the hand of friendship is extended in these kinds of circumstances it perhaps takes on even greater meaning.

I am sure that you have found friends and colleagues among the Japanese, grateful to you for the work that you performed in very difficult conditions. I also want to thank the Emergency Situations Ministry’s aviation department for arranging transport home for our citizens in Japan who wanted to return to Russia, seeing the way events were developing.

We were ready whatever the circumstances, and offered transport home to our citizens, and to citizens of our close neighbours, who have roots in the Russian Federation. This was important too, important for a large number of our people. Of course another vital part of the work you did was transporting cargoes of humanitarian aid to Japan.

I therefore want to thank you once again for all of this work. I think that our team carried out its mission in worthy fashion. Conditions there were far from easy. I hope you will share some of your experiences with us, because many of us, not just myself, will be interested to hear about it. I have been in regular contact with the minister, Mr Shoigu, who has kept me updated of course on your work, the tasks before you, and the difficulties or problems you have faced.

But your experiences are of interest too to the millions of people here who have been anxiously following developments in Japan. Tremors still continue in the earthquake zone, close to Japan’s islands and our territory too. And so of course people are following events very attentively.

Once more, I thank you for your work, and I ask you to perhaps say a few words about it now.  (*)

 

Workers trying to pump out radioactive water from Japan reactors

Aerial view shows the damaged roof of the No. 1 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Tomioka, Fukushima prefecture, northeastern Japan, in this still image taken from a March 23, 2011 Japan Defence Ministry video. Credit: Reuters/Japan Defence Ministry via Reuters TV

TOKYO, March 26, 2011 (Reuters) – Japanese engineers were frantically attempting on Saturday to pump out puddles of radioactive water at the earthquake-crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant after it injured three workers and delayed efforts to cool reactors to safe levels.

Underscoring growing international qualms about nuclear power raised by the killer earthquake and tsunami in northeast Japan two weeks ago, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said it was time to reassess the international atomic safety regime.

Radioactive water has been found in buildings of three of the six reactors at the power complex 240 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo. On Thursday, three workers sustained burns at reactor No. 3 after being exposed to radiation levels 10,000 times higher than usually found in a reactor.

“Bailing out accumulated water from the turbine housing units before radiation levels rise further is becoming very important,” said Japan Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency senior official Hidehiko Nishiyama.

The 9.0 magnitude quake and giant waves on March 11 left more than 10,000 people dead and 17,000 missing.

Despite such a shocking toll, much attention since the disaster has been on the possibility of a catastrophic meltdown at Fukushima.

With elevated radiation levels around the plant triggering fears across the nation, storage of the contaminated water has to be handled carefully.

“We are working out ways of safely bailing out the water so that it does not get out into the environment, and we are making preparations,” Nishiyama said.

He initially said the high radiation reading meant there could be damage to the reactor, but he later said it could be from venting operations to release pressure or water leakage from pipes or valves.

“There is no data suggesting a crack,” he said.

Nuclear watchdog the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Friday there had not been much change in the crisis over the previous 24 hours.

“Some positive trends are continuing but there remain areas of uncertainty that are of serious concern,” agency official Graham Andrew said in Vienna, adding the high radiation could be coming from steam.

On Friday, Nishiyama chided plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) for not following safety procedures inside the turbine building. Local media also criticised TEPCO, which has a poor safety record.

“The people on the spot have a strong sense of mission and may be trying to rush,” the Nikkei business paper said. “But if the work is done hastily, it puts lives at risk and in the end, will delay the repairs. This kind of accident ought to have been avoidable by proceeding with the work cautiously.”

SHIFTS

More than 700 engineers have been working in shifts to stabilise the plant and work has been advancing to restart water pumps to cool their fuel rods.

Two of the plant’s reactors are now seen as safe but the other four are volatile, occasionally emitting steam and smoke. However, the nuclear safety agency said on Saturday that temperature and pressure in all reactors had stabilised.

When TEPCO restored power to the plant late last week, some thought the crisis would soon be over. But two weeks after the earthquake, lingering high levels of radiation from the damaged reactors has kept hampering workers’ progress.

At Three Mile Island, the worst nuclear power accident in the United States, workers took just four days to stabilise the reactor, which suffered a partial meltdown. No one was injured and there was no radiation release above the legal limit.

At Chernobyl in the Ukraine, the worst nuclear accident in the world, it took weeks to “stabilize” what remained of the plant and months to clean up radioactive materials and cover the site with a concrete and steel sarcophagus.

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said on Friday the situation at Fukushima was “nowhere near” being resolved.

“We are making efforts to prevent it from getting worse, but I feel we cannot become complacent,” Kan told reporters. “We must continue to be on our guard.”

RADIATION IN TOKYO WITHIN GLOBAL AVERAGE RANGE

In Tokyo, a metropolis of 13 million people, a Reuters reading on Saturday morning showed ambient radiation of 0.22 microsieverts per hour, about six times normal for the city.

However, this was well within the global average of naturally occurring background radiation of 0.17-0.39 microsieverts per hour, a range given by the World Nuclear Association.

Meanwhile, the Japanese government has prodded tens of thousands of people living in a 20 km-30 km (12-18 mile) zone beyond the stricken complex to leave, but insisted it was not widening a 20 km evacuation zone.

Opposition lawmakers and local officials were severly critical of the move, especially since it came after the government advised residents there to stay indoors.

“So far they have only given the irresponsible instruction to stay inside; the decision-making is slow,” conservative Sankei newspaper quited Toshikazu Ide, the mayor of a village inside the 20-30 km area, as saying.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano has said the residents should move because it was difficult to get supplies to the area, and not because of elevated radiation.

An official at the Science Ministry however confirmed that daily radiation levels in an area 30 km (18 miles) northwest of the plant had exceeded the annual limit.

TAP WATER

Vegetable and milk shipments from near the stricken plant have been stopped, and Tokyo’s residents were told this week not to give tap water to babies after contamination from rain put radiation at twice the safety level.

It dropped back to safe levels the next day, and the city governor cheerily drank tap water in front of cameras.

Experts say radiation from the plant is still generally below levels of exposure from flights or medical X-rays.

Nevertheless, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Australia, the United States and Hong Kong are restricting food and milk imports from the zone. Other nations are screening Japanese food, and German shipping lines are simply avoiding the country.

In Japan’s north, more than a quarter of a million people are in shelters. Exhausted rescuers are still sifting through the wreckage of towns and villages, retrieving bodies.

Amid the suffering, though, there was a sense the corner was being turned. Aid is flowing and phone, electricity, postal and bank services have resumed, though they can still be patchy. (*)

 

Japanese Swap Fish for Burgers Due to Radiation Fears

Mothers receive bottles of water at a distribution office in the Adachi ward of Tokyo on March 24, 2011. Photographer: Haruyoshi Yamaguchi/Bloomberg

JAPAN, March 25, 2011 (KATAKAMI.COM / BLOOMBERG) — Tokyo resident Namiko Murata’s children are no longer getting their favorite salmon, saury and mackerel for dinner, Bloomberg reported on Thursday.

“I’m really paying attention to food because of the radiation problems,” said Murata, a mother of three. “We gave up eating fish even though my family likes it very much. Now, for protein, we drink three cups of soy milk a day.”

The detection of cobalt, iodine and cesium in the sea near the stricken Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant north of Tokyo this week hurt fish sales in the world’s second-biggest seafood market. Shoppers ignored government reassurances that their food and water supplies were safe even as countries from Australia to the U.S. restricted food imports from Japan on fears of radioactive contamination.

Ryoko Mizumoto, a 27-year-old mother of two, said she stopped buying dried Shirasu fish and horse mackerel. “I gave up buying maritime products and started buying cheap meat,” she said while lining up to buy bottled water at one of Seven & I Holdings Co.’s Ito-Yokado stores in Tokyo. “I make hamburger steak to replace the fish.”

Japan has restricted shipments of milk, spinach and other vegetables from Fukushima and neighboring prefectures as radiation from the plant, damaged on March 11 by the country’s strongest earthquake on record, contaminated agricultural products.

Bottled-Water Shortage

The country’s biggest beverage makers, with plants running at full capacity, face renewed pressure to raise bottled-water production as shoppers cleared store shelves following news that radiation contaminated Tokyo’s water supply. A Lawson Inc. (2651) convenience store in the capital last night had a sign saying customers could only buy one bottle of water each. Its shelves for water, juice and tea were empty.

The health ministry has tentatively set tolerable levels of radioactivity for each product. For fish, the level is set at 500 Becquerels per kilogram of radioactive cesium and 100 Becquerels per kilogram of uranium. Japan’s Food Safety Commission will assess the standards for possible revision as early as next week.

“We have not received any test results showing fish contaminated by more-than-acceptable levels of radioactivity,” Taiju Abe at the health ministry’s inspection and safety division said. “Prefectural governments are putting priority on testing vegetables as they are at the highest risk for contamination through the air and rain.”

Some Fishing Halted

Fishing in the northeastern prefectures of Fukushima, Miyagi and Iwate has been halted since the earthquake and the ensuing tsunami that engulfed towns in northeastern Japan, damaged the Fukushima nuclear facility and shook buildings in Tokyo.

The suspension lowered the risk that “tainted fish will be in the market,” said Yasuo Sasaki, senior press counselor at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. “We don’t see fish at a high risk of contamination because of radiation dilution,”

Kazuko Nishihara said she isn’t convinced. “We don’t trust the government,” said the 41-year-old mother of two who left Tokyo for Hiroshima on March 18, where she said food supplies are safe. “It hasn’t disclosed enough information. When we get back to Tokyo, I won’t eat vegetables produced in the Kanto region and will only eat fish from the western part of Japan.”

The Kanto region encompasses Tokyo and six prefectures, and contains about one-third of Japan’s 127 million people.

Sales Drop

Japan consumes about 9 million metric tons of seafood a year, second behind China’s more than 1.3 billion people, according to the website of the Sea Around Us Project, a collaboration between the University of British Columbia and the Pew Environment Group. It’s the world’s largest fish importer, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

“We are worrying about the marine radiation contamination problem,” said 35-year-old Takashi Inoue, who works at Shoei Suisan wholesaler at Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish market. “Unlike vegetables, the source of production is quite vague.”

Susumu Takana, a 68-year-old worker at nearby fish wholesaler Harahide, said business dropped by 40 percent since the earthquake. “Our main customers are restaurants who say they have few customers at night,” he said. “Some clients have started to say they don’t want fish from north of Choshi,” a city on near the northern border of Chiba, a prefecture neighboring Tokyo.

Switching to Meat

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said March 23 the government instructed regulators to implement maximum monitoring on Japan’s seafood. Fukushima and neighboring prefectures Miyagi and Iwate produce 707,500 tons of seafood, accounting for 13 percent of Japan’s 5.6 million tons of annual production, according to Statistics Japan.

Hiroyuki Metoki, a spokesman for Maruha Nichiro Holdings Inc. (1334) which sells prawns, crabs, octopus and shrimp from both Japan and overseas, said his company is getting more queries about where its produce is from. While it doesn’t buy from areas near the damaged nuclear plant because all supplies have stopped, “it’s possible customers will avoid products processed or caught in those areas in the future,” he said.

“We may have to depend on products from other parts of Japan and imports,” Metoki said. Because imported fish is expensive, people may “have to switch some portion of their fish consumption to something else, such as meat,” he said.

Getting enough fish hasn’t been a problem for Yoshiaki Saito, president of Saito Suisan, a fish wholesaler at Tsukiji. “Our sales have fallen to about one-fifth,” he said, declining to provide specific figures. “There is plenty of supply but there’s no demand.”

The decline in tourists is partly to blame, he said. “There are usually many customers from overseas. For example, tourists from China and Hong Kong come here to buy seafood. They buy crabs, tuna and scallops. There are no tourists now.”

Saito said he hasn’t heard of any impact of radiation on fish. “Even if there is, it’s only a small amount. We can’t worry about every little problem or there won’t be anything left for us to eat.”  (*)