Sharp Drop In Number Of Municipalities Who Accept Nuclear Waste

In an April survey, 572 cities and villages from 11 prefectures answered that they could accept nuclear waste. On November 2nd, that figure had dropped to 48 municipalities, i.e. 92% less, according an article from mainstream Sankei news (Japanese only).The Ministry of Environment chose not to reveal the names of these thoughtless cities and villages until they decide to actually transfer the nuclear waste. This lack of transparency does not improve trust ratings in M. Hosono and his ministry.

Pneumonia, Bronchitis: Code Names For Plutonium-Induced Lung Cancers?

Several officials reportedly had some severe health problems which turned out to be lung diseases. Fukushima fall-out regularly visits Tokyo where evermore hotspots appear and get difficult to cover up by the authorities with “non-Fukushima related” statements. Blogs and twits regularly point out to the logical existence of radionuclides which are not officially monitored until they eventually get into mainstream news, as in the case of strontium and probably “soon” uranium and plutonium oxides – how soon largely depends on when citizens will find and get a lab a positive sample that will force the authorities to admit it.

Effects on lungs are somewhat controversial as with any radioactive hazard studied and reported by governmental agencies and the nuclear industry and academia. For instance, uranium has supposedly “No adverse health effects reported” on humans whereas it causes “Severe nasal congestion and hemorrage (sic), lung lesions and fibrosis, edema and swelling, lung cancer” on animals, according to Wikipedia. As humans are ordinary animals, there is no particular reason for this discrepancy besides the political need to support their participation to the nuclear industry. Likewise, some Fukushima workers supposedly within the irradiation norms died suddenly from “non-Fukushima related” causes diagnosed by doctors working for TEPCO, under the seal of privacy and without any advanced nor official research. For instance, Fukushima Diary reported in their “Two sludge disposal facilities workers had sudden death within 2 weeks” post that, during an emergency citizen conference held on 10/24/2011 to discuss about how to deal with the radioactive debris and sewage sludge from Fukushima, the fact that two sludge disposal facilities workers died all of a sudden only in two weeks in October was leaked by a worker at a sewage farm in Chiba. This information did not appear at first in mainstream news according to blogger M. Mochizuki. Then a third worker suddenly died, supposedly from septic shock, as he reported in his subsequent post, “The third dead worker [septic shock]“. Although it is not clear whether the article refers to the same ″third″ worker (age and date differ), the Independent, a UK mainstream newspaper, reported that the worker died on his second day of work, while being exposed to “only” 170 uSv on the day he died (no mention about his first day). The Independent mentions also that: “The Japanese government’s maximum level of exposure for male workers at the plant is 250 millisieverts for the duration of the effort to bring it under control.”, which is largely over 20 millisieverts usually tolerated in other countries. Even this latter limit, which is equivalent to about 50 uSv per day, is arbitrary, as there is no reason why a nuclear plant worker should be more resistant to radiation than the general public, for which the international limit is 1 millisievert (raised to 20 in Japan after Fukushima). If we dismiss TEPCO’s explanation for the death of this worker, it seems that “fairly low” levels of radiation, contrarily to official, academic and industrial reports which serve the same community, could kill in a single day. After all, this third worker was irradiated to a daily level sixty times higher than the maximum for a member of the general public on the day he died, and no data was published for the previous day, which could be ten times more for what we know, considered the levels of radioactivity on site and other information leaked on Twitter by workers.

Although on the paper uranium and plutonium oxides are almost completely evacuated by the human body when ingested, and that when inhaled in “small” amounts, they have not been proved to be lethal, it may cast some reasonable doubts when some official people get pneumonia or bronchitis during an exceptional warm autumn, and their place of work or residence happen to be reported as some of the hottest spots in Tokyo, and that they have visited extensively Fukushima and contaminated prefectures such as Iwate and Miyagi.

Fukushima Diary reported on October 1st that some of the worse hotspots were in found in the “mud in Diet” (0.5 uSv/h) and in front of the Imperial Palace (0.7 uSv/h). Natural background radiation is ten times less. In the same post, M. Mochizuki mentioned that Upper House President Takeo Nishioka (who died of pneumonia early Saturday) nearly fainted at the Diet, that he said that he was suffering from severe canker sore and that he could not sleep recently. Besides, M. Mochizuki reported that M. Nishioka sometimes lost his words at the Diet. Of course, we may dismiss any information or connection with Fukushima as M. Nishioka was already 75 years old and some hotter spots have been found since without any casualty reported. However, when 9 year-old Princess Aiko was taken to the hospital for a cold, I suspected that it was in fact a symptom of low radiation exposure, especially since she is young and therefore more sensitive. These days, the official version from the Imperial Household Agency (IHA) is that she, like M. Nishioka, caught pneumonia. The Diet and Imperial Palace are geographically close in Tokyo. Although I hope that, now that she has left the hospital, she will live on healthily, I would not be surprised if the IHA announced some “unexpected” complications. The members of the Imperial Family must be exemplary and the Imperial couple visited Fukushima, Iwate and Miyagi two months after the nuclear disaster. Now, Emperor Akihito, who has “a fever due to a cold”, contracted bronchitis and had to go to the hospital. His immune system seems weakened, as “he appears to be fatigued and has lost some resistance to fight his illness” – which can be caused by a number of afflictions, including low-level radiation exposure, exacerbated by his old age (77). When he will die, it could be a signal for the Japanese Self-Defense Force to start a coup (Cf. Risk Of Coup In Japan? in SurvivalJapan). It would be quite a scandal if the Emperor was to become the victim of TEPCO and the government, the final straw that could very well serve as an excuse for the ultra-nationalist militaries to grab power.

These speculations will need to stand the test of time but I would not be surprised if the number of lung / respiratory diseases spiked, in of course a “non-Fukushima related” yet potentially lethal fashion in weeks to come, especially when officials or public figures are involved. After all, in the United States, “heart attack” is often a code name for drug overdose for this population, so pneumonia, bronchitis and, why not, severe asthma could become the same for radionuclide-induced cancers and acute poisoning (once in lungs, they move on into blood).

Update: Japan Times reported in April that pneumonia cases were on the rise in Tohoku, with a number of patients five to six times higher than the previous year at the same time.

Tokyo Imports 500,000,000 Kg Of Nuclear Waste

Tokyo will receive 500,000,000 kg trainloads of nuclear waste with residual radioactivity of 133 Becquerels/kg after incineration (cesium only, other radionucleides unknown) from Iwate and Miyagi prefectures, spread on 2.5 years starting from October 2011. Waste will be incinerated or buried in reprocessing centers in Tokyo port area. In other words, Tokyo global dose will increase by 2.2 billions Becquerels each month for 2.5 years by this policy alone (Cf. Japanese article below and Google translation).

Nuclear Spread Official Kick-Off in SurvivalJapan already reported that nuclear waste incineration had already informally started and led to radioactive sewage sludge accumulation at facilities in Tokyo, but also in Kanagawa, Saitama and other prefectures. We know that radioactive ash also turns up legally in cement and will go on in a country where the construction sector is historically controlled by the Japanese mafia, which is itself closely associated with politicians who grant public work projects in exchange for votes.

SurvivalJapan positively declared Greater Tokyo as part of the no man’s land last week (Cf. Japan Livability Map September 2011) after monitoring the build-up of radiation and the progress of the Japanese government policies. Since the purpose of this blog is to find ways to survive in Japan, I had stated that SurvivalJapan would focus solely on areas out of the no man’s land. I am making a slight internal policy breach here due to the seriousness of the matter, the number of expats still in Tokyo area and the fact that Tokyo is only a beginning: all prefectures will receive their share.

The Mainichi Shimbun article is reproduced hereafter :

Rubble from quake- and tsunami-hit areas to be disposed in Tokyo

Nuclear Spread Official Kick-Off

SurvivalJapan reported on multiple occasions that after the irradiated food spread, the most dangerous threat is the government’s decision to allow the spread of nuclear waste throughout Japan. This decision has now been taken as reported by Mainichi Shimbun mainstream newspaper. Nuclear dump sites will include dug trenches as used when building a swimming pool, some existing toxic heavy metal facilities and the rest will be burnt at your local industrial waste incineration plant. All precautionary measures will be taken against any tap water and agricultural soil contamination… In fact, this spread began before it was officially decided as can be read in two other news articles from Asahi Shimbun, the first dating as early as June 2011.

2700 Tons Radioactive Waste In Yokohama

SurvivalJapan reported last week that a 2.2 uSv/h hotspot had been measured in Yokohama by a citizen, in  リーベスト中山　ゴミ捨て場　前 on August 3, after an initial measure of 0.2 uSv/h on July 22. In this spot situated in Nakayama (near Yokohama hospital), the limit of 1 mSv is reached in about 3 weeks. The site is in front of a dumping ground and its radiation level had increased tenfold in ten days. We mentioned that it was a sign that wide dumpings of radioactive waste exist, although here the origin could have been medical, especially with the hospital nearby. Yokohama city confirmed since that mud in the drain system contained 2700 tons of radioactive waste and, as if it was not shocking enough, that they planned to bury it at sea. This illustrates the typical Japanese government handling of industrial waste: just dump it in the wild. Actually it is also a common practice of the population as can be seen by driving in the beautiful Japanese mountains. Wild dumps of television sets, motorbikes, etc. can be found anywhere down the steep slopes but you may need to ride a bicycle to actually notice it. Many construction companies sites with highly-fenced parking lots in the mountains where they keep their trucks and building materials are littered by their garbage all around, which eventually is washed down into the rivers. “What you can’t see can’t hurt you” seems the basic Japanese motto, from ordinary domestic trash to radioactive elements. Following the citizen groups’ outcry, the Yokohama mayor announced that the burial project was officially cancelled. It will therefore go underground. The level of radioactivity was up to 6468 Becquerels/kg. The press-release from Yokohama city (in Japanese) is available here in PDF version. It is reproduced at the bottom of this post. Mainichi Shimbun also reported about the “incident” in a Japanese-only version provided hereafter, according to which the mayor is consulting for other ways to dispose the sludge. Locations of detected waste where in the Southern Sludge Recycle Center in Kanazawa (南部汚泥 資源化 センター 金沢)  and in the Northern Sludge Recycle Center in Tsurumi (北部汚泥 資源化 センター 鶴見).

Yokohama is historically an international port city and several global companies still have subsidiaries there. Expats from this area may reconsider putting their families at risk. As reported in SurvivalJapan, Greater Tokyo, originally a frontier of the no man’s land, began falling in its northern and eastern suburbs of Saitama and Chiba. Yokohama, in Kanagawa prefecture, is located on the southeastern side of Tokyo, which means that the front has fallen and the whole city should now be evacuated. The Arakawa River brings radioactive waters into the Bay of Tokyo from Saitama and should be monitored much more closely.

You may wonder what was this radioactive sludge doing there since according to the same newspaper, it should not have left the no man’s land (Cf. Nuclear Troublemaker Hosono’s Policy Promoted by Mainichi Daily News in SurvivalJapan). This clearly shows that all sludge recycle centers across the country should be monitored by citizens. Smokes from these centers can add to air-borne contamination. Finally the “recycled” waters are dumped in rivers where you may want your kids to avoid having a foot bath in summer – and forget about fishing.

Nuclear Troublemaker Hosono’s Policy Promoted by Mainichi Daily News

The Mainichi Daily News promoted again today their friend’s, M. Hosono, plans about how to deal with the radioactive waste. It seems that M. Hosono upturned his original plan of spreading it to the whole of Japan since the technology is not available. In my opinion, there is not a remote chance that it will ever be, so we should be so lucky if M. Hosono sticks to his revised plan of not transferring radioactive waste by means of low technology. This cannot be a certainty, as in the Tokaimura plant, some workers have been fatal victims of handling nuclear power plant waste in mere buckets, thus achieving critical mass. Again, this kind of practice should come to no surprise to anyone who read Japan’s Nuclear Power Plant Workers, Exposed to Radiation, Hidden from Sight on SurvivalJapan. What is amazing is that such incidents are not more frequently reported. There is still a high possibility that M. Hosono’s reassuring speech hides an already on-going radioactive transportation by simple open-roof construction trucks.

Current official temporary storage involves digging a 3 meter deep pool in the soil, covering it with lining sheets as one would do in preparation of a plantation or a swimming pool, and then topping it with more soil – what is known as sweeping under the rug practice. The positive side of it is that it will not contaminate any new ground and the area should be declared a no man’s land anyway. M. Hosono seems to imply that any new nuclear power plant will not be built (at least in the short term) and his comments could be construed as a lenghtening of the lifespan of current ones. Nuclear plants in Japan are old and shoddily maintained so this is not a reassuring perspective: they should be stopped for good. New Prime Minister, M. Noda, is supposedly high in polls according to the state-controlled media, yet in my opinion, M. Goshi Hosono, state minister in charge of the nuclear crisis, managed to lose credibility from day one in office.

Wikipedia article about Tokaimura Nuclear Accident  (Tokai is located in the no man’s land).

The Mainichi article / friendly discussion with M. Hosono is reproduced hereafter :

Nuclear troubleshooter Hosono cites need for temporary storage facility at Fukushima

New Environment Minister Goshi Hosono, who was retained as nuclear disaster minister under a new Cabinet launched Sept. 2, said in a recent interview that major problems facing the Environment Ministry include decontamination efforts, radioactive waste and the creation of a nuclear power safety agency.

“On the other hand, there are wide-ranging issues such as environmental pollution, steps to address global warming and biodiversity,” he said on Sept. 4. “These issues are important for the international community and I want to tackle them in cooperation” with top deputies.

“What I want to do the most is to decontaminate” radiation-tainted areas around the crippled Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant, Hosono stressed. Such contaminated soil and debris have to be temporarily kept in cities, towns and villages involved, according to Hosono.

“But in reality, temporarily keeping the soil and debris there is very difficult, so we have no choice but to ask Fukushima Prefecture to set up a temporary storage facility within the prefecture to safely store the waste,” he said.

Hosono said the government of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda will not unilaterally make a decision on the issue but will reach a decision on what kind of facility and when and where such a temporary facility will be built in consultation with local governments concerned.

He also stressed the need to develop technology to reduce radioactive waste and to move it out of Fukushima Prefecture. There is a large amount of heavily contaminated rubble at the nuclear power plant and some of the rubble probably needs to be dealt with on site, he added.

The minister acknowledged that some evacuees cannot return home for extended periods of time due to the presence of high-level radioactive materials in their communities.

In the picture above : Workers spread lining sheets in a huge trench dug to bury radiation-contaminated topsoil collected from the ground of Yasawa Elementary School and Kindergarten in Minami-Soma, about 20 kilometers away from the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear facility, in Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan, Thursday, Aug. 18, 2011. (AP Photo/Hiro Komae)

“It is an extremely urgent task to decide how to manage houses and schools in cities, towns and villages,” he said, adding that the government wants to consult with these local governments individually and respond to their needs to the best of its ability.

Hosono, who has been dealing with the Fukushima nuclear crisis triggered by the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, said the new government will spend some time to discuss decommissioning the stricken plant.

“Setting an age limit on the life of a nuclear power plant is not necessary a scientific practice,” he said, adding it is desirable to draw a line somewhere in the course of stress tests or by other means. He said the government should not prolong the operational span of nuclear power plants simply by weighing the financial conditions of respective electric companies.

Hosono said Japan hopes to keep its pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent from 1990 levels by 2020. But specific measures to achieve the target have to be reconsidered, he said, adding building nine new nuclear reactors as part of the Japanese anti-global warming campaign is no longer realistic.

Click here for the original Japanese story

(Mainichi Japan) September 5, 2011

Hosono’s Spread of Radioactivity Decision Promoted by Mainichi Daily News

The quasi-state press organ “The Mainichi Daily News” has drawn out the straw to be today’s promoter of M. Hosono’s decision to spread the radioactive waste throughout Japan. Contrarily to the Mainichi’s title “Making Tohoku region final repository site for all nuclear waste simply not fair”, it is only fair because Tohoku received massive subventions through the years in exchange of hosting the nuclear power plants. Besides, fairness is a childish and irresponsible argument to the face of the extreme danger and urgency faced by Japan and the world at large. Transporting waste outside of Tohoku will only make the whole country unhabitable. Furthermore, if an accidental spill occurred in this natural disaster prone country, it would be another foreseeable environmental disaster come true. Unfortunately, M. Hosono will get his way and we can only prepare and avoid as much as possible the sludge destinations (cf. “Official Declaration of Irradiated Sludge Spread” on SurvivalJapan).

The Mainichi article / government propaganda is reproduced hereafter :

When candidates running for the post of Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) president were giving a joint press conference on Aug. 27 in Tokyo, then Prime Minister Naoto Kan was in Fukushima bowing apologetically to Fukushima Gov. Yuhei Sato.

“I have no choice but to ask that Fukushima Prefecture host an interim storage facility for nuclear waste and contaminated soil,” Kan said.

“What are you talking about? This has come out of nowhere,” Sato responded.

Toshio Seya, the head of the Fukushima Chamber of Commerce and adviser to Toho Bank, witnessed the melodramatic negotiations. Later, at a round-table meeting with reporters, Seya said, “Tokyo is the beneficiary of the nuclear power plant. Why not build (a radioactive waste storage facility) in Tokyo’s Odaiba district?” (The comment was published in the Asahi Shimbun’s Aug. 31 morning edition.)

Although shadowed by the drama of changing prime ministers, the above anecdote points to a serious problem that both anti-nuclear and pro-nuclear camps must face: where to store nuclear waste, at least for the time being.

Massive amounts of spent nuclear fuel are accumulating at nuclear power plants across Japan. On average, 64 percent of waste storage capacities at power plants are currently utilized. At old nuclear power stations, like those in Fukushima and Niigata prefectures, the figure is close to 90 percent, based on a survey conducted by Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center (CNIC) for 2009.

Nuclear waste was supposed to have been reprocessed to be used again as fuel, if things had gone according to the government’s 2005 Framework for Nuclear Energy Policy. But neither the prospects for recycling facilities nor fast-breeder nuclear reactors are good. And Japan has no final repositories. This is where the interim storage facilities come in, to buy time — several decades — until new technology is established to handle the problem on a more permanent basis.

Kan made the trip to Fukushima that day because he foresaw that leaving the task to the new prime minister would further delay the treatment and disposal of radiation-tainted soil and rubble. In appealing to the Fukushima governor for his cooperation in hosting a waste facility, Kan promised that it would only be used to store waste from within the prefecture, and also that it would not become a final repository for such waste.

There are two possible ways in which the new prime minister can go forward. The first option is to build up as many faits accomplis as possible, and eventually force the disaster-stricken Tohoku region to take on all nuclear waste. The alternative is to divide the responsibility of storing spent fuel among all prefectures.

A 23-page document titled “The Problem of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle’s Back End” argues that the recycling of spent fuel is impossible and that the burden of storing nuclear waste must be shared by each prefecture. It also suggests giving prefectures the capacity to buy or sell storage amounts with each other. The document reads like a sequel to another document that was released years earlier.

That document is “The 19 trillion yen Invoice,” a 25-page document critiquing the nuclear fuel cycle that caused a stir among government ministries in the spring of 2004. It had been written by a fringe group of Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) bureaucrats who charged that the funds earmarked for the pointless bank-end stages of the fuel cycle totaled 19 trillion yen.

The construction of temporary storage sites for radiation-contaminated waste in the disaster-stricken region is unavoidable. The spent fuel in Fukushima cannot be transported elsewhere. However, taking advantage of such circumstances to make the Tohoku region a final repository of nuclear waste created around the country is simply unfair.

There was a time when the economy was booming and the government could afford to spend extra. Back then, compensation payments were routinely given out to resolve conflicts and contradictions. A bit of that practice still lingers, but the government no longer has the means to dole out massive amounts of cash anymore.

Looking back on the negotiations and discussions between the central and Fukushima Prefectural governments, one anecdote from 2009 stands out. A member of the Fukushima Prefectural Assembly asked how spent nuclear fuel would be treated, and when. A representative from the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy (ANRE) responded, “That is something that is up to each operator (power company).”

This is apparently the sentiment of METI’s mainstream bureaucrats. Meanwhile, the new prime minister has not made any mention of the fuel cycle’s back end. Will he be able to rectify the mainstream’s irresponsibility, rigidity and decadence, and thereby alter the direction in which we are headed? Or will he retreat into the security of the status quo out of fear of turmoil? (By Takao Yamada, Expert Senior Writer)

Click here for the original Japanese story

(Mainichi Japan) September 5, 2011

Problematic Japanese Environment Radiation Readings

In the days and weeks following March 11, I followed closely the reading of environment radioactivity levels reported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (how can a single ministry properly handle so many fields?) of Japan – MEXT for short. I had good faith in their data, as there had not be any recent major scandal of cover-up by the government of industrial pollution and, besides, I could not see why should the government lie about it. Since then, the government continuously showed its dedication to brain-wash the population that there was no danger at all and the economic motivation is openly declared, as “Japan has to support the Tohoku region”. Paradoxically, although there supposedly is no danger to fear, the irradiated sludge from Fukushima must be dispatched to all regions to “share their pain”. If that waste is truly harmless, why don’t they keep it?

Recently it has transpired that Japanese green tea from Saitama and Chiba, the northern suburbs of Tokyo, are contaminated with radiation. These districts are also infamous for hosting radiation hot spots. The readings from MEXT show spikes in radiation level on March 15 there as well as in other places. MEXT readings for that day :

Saitama : 1.2 uSv/h

Chiba : 0.3 uSv/h

Tokyo : 0.5 uSv/h

Gunma : 0.6 uSv/h

Tochigi : 1.3 uSv/h

Ibaraki : 1.5 uSv/h

Official Declaration of Irradiated Sludge Spread

The Minister of Environment, M. Hosono, declared on September 4th, that “Japan must share the pain of Fukushima and waste and sludge from Fukushima must be accepted by other regions of Japan”.