8.8 earthquake hits Japan

I think it important enough to post the whole thing and not an excerpt on some of these alerts. If people don't like it, use the thumbs or the ignore button.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/15_21.html

Radiation exceeds limits at Ibaraki facility

A University of Tokyo facility in Ibaraki Prefecture, north of Tokyo, has reported radiation levels higher than legal standards.

The facility alerted the central government on Tuesday after it registered 5 microsieverts per hour before 8:00 AM and the radiation level continued to exceed the yardstick figure designated by a law for 10 straight minutes.

The facility is located in Tokai village, about 110 kilometers south of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant.

The facility says the radiation level later fell to 3 microsieverts per hour. It says normally the reading is at around 0.05 microsieverts per hour.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011 10:43 +0900 (JST)

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/15_17.html

TEPCO: 8,200 microsieverts recorded at plant

Tokyo Electric Power Company says radiation levels reached 8,217 microsieverts per hour near the front gate of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power station at 8:31 AM Tuesday.

Anyone in this kind of environment would be exposed to more than 3 years' worth of naturally occurring radiation within a single hour.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011 09:29 +0900 (JST)

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/15_06.html

TEPCO: Nuclear fuel may be melting

The Tokyo Electric Power Company says there is a possibility of fuel rods melting in the Number Two reactor at its Fukushima Number One plant.

A company official said at a news conference on Tuesday that the level of cooling water is now too low to measure.

He indicated that the fuel rods may have overheated and begun melting.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011 04:27 +0900 (JST)

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/15/us-japan-quake-idUSTRE72A0SS20110315

Japan warns radioactive levels high around plant after blast
Photo
10:53pm EDT

By Taiga Uranaka and Ki Joon Kwon

FUKUSHIMA, Japan (Reuters) - Japan's prime minister said on Tuesday that radioactive levels had become high around an earthquake-stricken nuclear power plant after an explosion there, and there was a risk of radiation leaking into the atmosphere.

Naoto Kan urged people within 30 km (18 miles) of the facility north of Tokyo to remain indoors and the French embassy in the capital warned in an advisory that a low level of radioactive wind could reach Tokyo within 10 hours.

Tuesday's explosion was the third at the plant since it was damaged in last Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami.

...

Jiji news agency said Tuesday's explosion had damaged the roof and steam was rising from the complex. It also reported some workers had been told to leave the plant, a development one expert had warned beforehand could signal a worsening stage for the crisis.

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/15/us-japan-quake-radiation-reading-idUSTRE72E02020110315

Radiation levels rise four-fold at stricken Japan reactor
8:13pm EDT

FUKUSHIMA, Japan (Reuters) - Radiation levels in the air surrounding Japan's quake-stricken nuclear power plant have risen four-fold after a fresh explosion at the site on Tuesday, the plant operator said.

The radiation reading at 08:31am local time (2331 GMT) climbed to 8,217 microsieverts an hour from 1,941 about 40 minutes earlier, Tokyo Electric Power Co said.

Authorities at the Fukushima Daiichi complex, damaged in Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami, are trying to prevent meltdowns in three of the plant's nuclear reactors.

Japanese authorities say levels would need to reach 1 million or so before causing large-scale radiation sickness.

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Good description and analysis of the situation here:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/14/us-japan-nuclear-analysis-idUSTRE72D8LM20110314

Excerpt:

Pumping seawater into the core and over the rods may not be as simple as it sounds. Water is pumped in from the ocean via a pipe into the cooling system, but operators must release an almost equal amount of radioactive gas into the next containment structure to equalize the pressure.

That gas will contain radioactive particles and hydrogen, which can explode when mixed with oxygen. Experts believe that caused the blasts at the outer shells of the reactors at Units 1 and 3 at the Daiichi plant.

Experts do not believe the situation will reach the catastrophic scale of the 1986 explosion at the Soviet Chernobyl plant in Ukraine. Chernobyl, the world's worst civilian nuclear disaster, was blamed for thousands of deaths due to radiation-linked illnesses.

Yet conditions are far from stable. On Tuesday morning, another explosion was heard at Unit 2. Officials said it too appeared to be caused by a build-up of hydrogen.

"The primary containment building, the steel vessel surrounding the reactor, can cope with a full core meltdown," said Professor Mark Prelas, Professor of Nuclear Engineering at the University of Missouri.

"That is what it's designed to do. There is no risk of a nuclear explosion here. This is nothing like a Chernobyl event when they had no containment structure around the core and a fire."

...

Concern over conditions at the No. 2 reactor were heightened on Monday after Japan's nuclear safety agency failed to give it a classification on the accepted international scale for nuclear events. Units 1 and 3 were rated at a 4 on the 7-step scale; Unit 2 was conspicuous by its absence.

France's nuclear safety authority said the accident could be classified as a level 5 or 6 on the scale, putting it on par with the 1979 U.S. Three Mile Island meltdown.

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TPM linked to this story just now, under the headline "Worst case scenario imminent."

Quote:

Japan Faces Potential Nuclear Disaster as Radiation Levels Rise
Yuriko Nakao/Reuters

TOKYO — Japan faced the likelihood of a catastrophic nuclear accident Tuesday morning, as an explosion at the most crippled of three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station damaged its crucial steel containment structure, emergency workers were withdrawn from the plant, and a fire at a fourth reactor spewed large amounts of radioactive material into the air, according to official statements and industry executives informed about the developments.

“No. 4 is currently burning and we assume radiation is being released. We are trying to put out the fire and cool down the reactor,” the chief government spokesman, Yukio Edano, told a televised press conference. “There were no fuel rods in the reactor, but spent fuel rods are inside.”

Government officials also said the containment structure of the No. 2 reactor had suffered damage during an explosion shortly after 6 a.m. on Tuesday.

They initially suggested that the damage was limited and that emergency operations aimed at cooling the nuclear fuel at three stricken reactors with seawater would continue. But industry executives said that in fact the situation had spiraled out of control and that all plant workers needed to leave the plant to avoid excessive exposure to radioactive leaks.

If all workers do in fact leave the plant, the nuclear fuel in all three reactors is likely to melt down, which would lead to wholesale releases of radioactive material — by far the largest accident of its kind since the Chernobyl disaster 25 years ago.

Reports of an imminent worsening of the problem came after a frantic day and night of rescue efforts focused largely on the No. 2 reactor. There, a malfunctioning valve prevented workers from manually venting the containment vessel to release pressure and allow fresh seawater to be injected into it. That meant that the extraordinary remedy emergency workers have been using to keep the nuclear fuel from overheating no longer worked.

As a result, the nuclear fuel in that reactor was exposed for many hours, increasing the risk of a breach of the container vessel and a more dangerous emissions of radioactive particles.

By Tuesday morning, the plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power, said it had fixed the valve and resumed seawater injections, but that they had detected possible leaks in the containment vessel that prevented water from fully covering the fuel rods.

Then the explosion hit the same reactor. The operator initially reported that the blast may have damaged the bottom part of the container vessel, but later said radiation levels had not risen high enough to suggest a major escalation of the problem. While they did not immediately provide a detailed account of what happened at the reactor, government and company officials initially ruled out a serious breach that could lead to massive radioactive leaks or a full meltdown of the nuclear fuel.

Even if a full meltdown is averted, Japanese officials have been facing unpalatable options. One was to continue flooding the reactors and venting the resulting steam, while hoping that the prevailing winds, which have headed across the Pacific, did not turn south toward Tokyo or west, across northern Japan to the Korean Peninsula. The other was to hope that the worst of the overheating was over, and that with the passage of a few more days the nuclear cores would cool enough to essentially entomb the radioactivity inside the plants, which clearly will never be used again. Both approaches carried huge risks.

While Japanese officials made no comparisons to past accidents, the release of an unknown quantity of radioactive gases and particles — all signs that the reactor cores were damaged from at least partial melting of fuel — added considerable tension to the effort to cool the reactors.

“It’s way past Three Mile Island already,” said Frank von Hippel, a physicist and professor at Princeton. “The biggest risk now is that the core really melts down and you have a steam explosion.”

Hiroko Tabuchi reported from Tokyo, Keith Bradsher from Hong Kong and Matthew L. Wald from Washington.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/world/asia/15nuclear.html?_r=1&hp

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/world/asia/15fuel.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rssThe

In Stricken Fuel-Cooling Pools, a Danger for the Longer Term
By WILLIAM J. BROAD and HIROKO TABUCHI
Published: March 14, 2011

Excerpts:

Even as workers race to prevent the radioactive cores of the damaged nuclear reactors in Japan from melting down, concerns are growing that nearby pools holding spent fuel rods could pose an even greater danger.

The pools, which sit on the top level of the reactor buildings and keep spent fuel submerged in water, have lost their cooling systems and the Japanese have been unable to take emergency steps because of the multiplying crises.

...

The good news is that the Japanese have a relatively long time to deal with the problem. Nuclear experts estimate the timeline for serious problems that could lead to a reactor meltdown as minutes to hours, and put the comparable time for cooling pools at days to weeks.

The bad news is that if efforts to deal with the emergency fail, the results could be worse.

The pools are a worry at the stricken reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant because at least two of the three have lost their roofs in explosions, exposing the spent fuel pools to the atmosphere. By contrast, reactors have strong containment vessels that stand a better chance of bottling up radiation from a meltdown of the fuel in the reactor core.

Were the spent fuel rods in the pools to catch fire, nuclear experts say, the high heat would loft the radiation in clouds that would spread the radioactivity.

...

A 1997 study by the Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island described a worst-case disaster from uncovered spent fuel in a reactor cooling pool. It estimated 100 quick deaths would occur within a range of 500 miles and 138,000 eventual deaths.

The study also found that land over 2,170 miles would be contaminated and damages would hit $546 billion.

That section of the Brookhaven study focused on boiling water reactors — the kind at the heart of the Japanese crisis.

The threat is considered so severe that at the start of the crisis Friday, immediately after the shattering earthquake, Fukushima plant officials focused their attention on a damaged storage pool for spent nuclear fuel at the No. 2 reactor at Daiichi, said a nuclear executive who requested anonymity because his company is not involved in the emergency response at the reactors and is wary of antagonizing other companies in the industry.

The damage prompted the plant’s management to divert much of the attention and pumping capacity to that pool, the executive added. The shutdown of the other reactors then proceeded badly, and problems began to cascade.

More at the link.

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Fire at reactor #4 is out: LINK

1 Reply

Some things I've been thinking about over the last few days:

1. With the abundant amount of lumber needing to be cleared and cleaned up in the many debris fields, is any of it salvageable so it can be recycled and used as rebuilding materials? Would it be worth the effort to sort the stuff out so that building temporary shelters with materials on hand can occur that much quicker and not have to wait for new materials to arrive?

2. If the lumber, metals and other debris can't be reused as immediate building materials, can they be quickly recycled and made into paper and other building products to lessen the burden of finding a place to dispose of it all?

3. Would it be plausible for many of the arriving ships with relief supplies to be loaded up with reclaimed debris to be taken elsewhere for re-manufacturing into usable products for the rebuilding effort? That would give them a place to start clearing enough space to be able to begin building the temporary shelters.

2 Replies

@Cycloptichorn,

Cycloptichorn wrote:

TPM linked to this story just now, under the headline "Worst case scenario imminent."

Quote:
Japan Faces Potential Nuclear Disaster as Radiation Levels Rise
Yuriko Nakao/Reuters

TOKYO — Japan faced the likelihood of a catastrophic nuclear accident Tuesday morning, as an explosion at the most crippled of three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station damaged its crucial steel containment structure, emergency workers were withdrawn from the plant, and a fire at a fourth reactor spewed large amounts of radioactive material into the air, according to official statements and industry executives informed about the developments.

The explosion damaged parts of the reactor outside the containment structure, not the containment structure itself:

http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20110315D15JF838.htm

The radiation is likely coming from that damage from the explosion, not from the fire.

Quote:

If all workers do in fact leave the plant, the nuclear fuel in all three reactors is likely to melt down, which would lead to wholesale releases of radioactive material — by far the largest accident of its kind since the Chernobyl disaster 25 years ago.

Things are already pretty well melted in all three reactors I'd think.

But a meltdown does not mean there has to be a breach of containment. There shouldn't be any wholesale release of radioactive material.

1 Reply

@oralloy,

oralloy wrote:

Fire at reactor #4 is out: LINK

They updated that article so it is more about the radiation than about the fire being out.

New article about the fire being out:

http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20110315D15EE883.htm

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Two survivors in Japan, reunited by a rescuer:

http://www.seattledogspot.com/2011/03/13/picture-from-japan-owner-and-dog-reunited

http://www.seattledogspot.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/japan1.jpg

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@oralloy,

oralloy wrote:

Cycloptichorn wrote:
TPM linked to this story just now, under the headline "Worst case scenario imminent."

Quote:
Japan Faces Potential Nuclear Disaster as Radiation Levels Rise
Yuriko Nakao/Reuters

TOKYO — Japan faced the likelihood of a catastrophic nuclear accident Tuesday morning, as an explosion at the most crippled of three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station damaged its crucial steel containment structure, emergency workers were withdrawn from the plant, and a fire at a fourth reactor spewed large amounts of radioactive material into the air, according to official statements and industry executives informed about the developments.

The explosion damaged parts of the reactor outside the containment structure, not the containment structure itself:

http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20110315D15JF838.htm

The radiation is likely coming from that damage from the explosion, not from the fire.

Looks like the fire was the source of the radiation.

This release is a bit dated (the fire is out now), but the government of Japan told the IAEA that the big spike in radiation was caused because a spent fuel storage pond was caught up in the fire:

http://www.iaea.org/press/?p=1248

Presumably if the fire melted some spent fuel rods to the degree that they released a large amount of radioactivity, those rods will remain quite a mess even now that the fire is out. Going to be an interesting cleanup job.

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Coolant water has begun to boil in the spent-fuel pool from last night's fire.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/15/japan-quake-fuel-boiling-idUSTFD00668620110315

2 Replies

As armageddon progresses at Fukushima Daiichi, here is a bit of good news from Fukushima Daini (that's the reactor complex that hasn't had any meltdowns, but they had lost control over the cooling system in three of their four reactors):

They have restored control over all their systems and all their reactors are now safely shut down.

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/11031503-e.html

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@oralloy,

oralloy wrote:

Coolant water has begun to boil in the spent-fuel pool from last night's fire.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/15/japan-quake-fuel-boiling-idUSTFD00668620110315

Radiation in reactor control room reaching extreme levels:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/15/japan-quake-controlroom-idUSTFD00669220110315

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No details yet but this just came across as "Breaking News"

30-km no-fly zone declared for stricken Japan nuke plant, atomic watchdog says

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NHK is saying that a new fire has broken out now at reactor No. 4.

TEPCO: Spraying water from air "difficult"

Tokyo Electric Power has found it difficult to spray water from a helicopter to cool down a storage pool for spent nuclear fuel inside the No.4 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The reactor was undergoing an inspection when the quake occurred. The firm says the temperature of the storage pool for spent nuclear fuel was 84 degrees Celsius on Monday morning, more than double the normal level. More recent temperatures are not available due to a technical failure.

On Tuesday morning, an explosion was heard and the roof of the building that houses the No.4 reactor was damaged. Tokyo Electric Power, the operator of the plant, says it appears a lack of coolant caused the fuel rods to be exposed, adding that a hydrogen explosion might have occurred.
If the reactor can't be cooled, the fuel rods may emit hydrogen or melt down. Tokyo Electric Power considering pouring water onto the storage pool in the containment vessel through a hole on the roof created by the blast.

However, the firm concluded that it would be extremely difficult to spray water from a helicopter as the hole is dozens of meters from the storage pool and a helicopter can only carry a limited amount of water on a single flight.

Workers are currently unable to approach the storage pool due to the high radiation levels. Tokyo Electric Company is studying the possibility of using fire engines and other options to inject water into the reactor.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 03:04 +0900 (JST)

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M6.4 quake in Shizuoka

A strong earthquake hit eastern Shizuoka Prefecture in central Japan on Tuesday night.

Japan's Meteorological Agency says the focus of the quake was in eastern Shizuoka Prefecture and it struck at 10:31 PM Tuesday, local time.
The quake had an estimated depth of 14 kilometers with a magnitude upgraded from 6 to 6.4.

The agency says there may be slight changes in sea levels but there's no need to worry about tidal damage.

Fujinomiya City in Shizuoka Prefecture was struck with an intensity of 6-plus on the Japanese scale of zero to 7. The quake was felt across the Tokyo and Tohoku areas.

The agency says there is a possibility that aftershocks with an intensity of 5-minus to 5-plus could occur within a week.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 02:28 +0900 (JST)

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Maps/10/140_35.gif

Magnitude 6.2 - EASTERN HONSHU, JAPAN
2011 March 15 13:31:46 UTC

Earthquake Details

* This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.

Magnitude 6.2
Date-Time

* Tuesday, March 15, 2011 at 13:31:46 UTC
* Tuesday, March 15, 2011 at 10:31:46 PM at epicenter
* Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones

Location 35.300°N, 138.700°E
Depth 10 km (6.2 miles) set by location program
Region EASTERN HONSHU, JAPAN
Distances 36 km (22 miles) S of Kofu, Honshu, Japan
37 km (22 miles) NW of Numazu, Honshu, Japan
42 km (26 miles) NNE of Shizuoka, Honshu, Japan
116 km (72 miles) WSW of TOKYO, Japan

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TOKYO | Tue Mar 15, 2011 4:47pm EDT

TOKYO (Reuters) - Two workers are missing after Tuesday's explosion at one of the reactors at a crippled Japanese nuclear plant, the country's nuclear safety agency said.

The agency did not identify the missing workers, but said they were in the turbine area of the No.4 reactor at the Fukushima nuclear plant, which was damaged by last Friday's earthquake and tsunami.

Agency official also told a news conference there was a crack in the roof of the reactor building.

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Quake deaths, missing exceed 10,000

The number of dead and missing from Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan has exceeded 10,000. This is the first time since World War Two that Japan has recorded so many victims in a natural disaster.

Police say 3,373 deaths have been confirmed so far, and 7,558 people remain unaccounted for.

In Miyagi Prefecture, 1,619 deaths have been confirmed, and 2,011 people remain missing. In Minami-sanriku Town, roughly 1,000 bodies have been discovered. Around 8,000 people, or nearly half the town's population, are missing.

Police have found several hundred bodies on the beaches of the Oshika Peninsula.

In Onagawa Town on the peninsula, about 5,000 people, or half the population, remain unaccounted for.

Iwate Prefecture has 1,193 confirmed deaths and 3,318 missing. A total of 373 deaths have been confirmed in the cities of Rikuzen-takata and Ofunato. Rikuzen-takata has 1,282 missing.

Fukushima Prefecture has confirmed 506 deaths and 2,220 missing. In Namie Town, the whereabouts of around 900 residents remain unknown.

Over 440,000 people are in 2,400 shelters in northeastern and central prefectures. Some shelters have yet to receive food and water and other essential supplies.

Relief efforts are being hampered by a shortage of fuel for trucks and ambulances.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 03:04 +0900 (JST)

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8.8 earthquake hits Japan

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