ABC Interview: ‘So If There Was A Problem With Reactor No. 4 SFP It Would Be The End Of Japan?’ – ‘Yes, There Is No One Who Denies That. We Cannot Sleep Peacefully’, Says Japan’s Former Ambassador To Switzerland (Video)


YouTube Added: 25.06.2012

Description:

In-depth update from ABC-Australia’s Mark Willacy, the ABC’s Japanese-speaking correspondent based in Tokyo.

Willacy interviews Japanese nuclear professor Hiroaki Koide, US energy policy adviser Robert Alvarez, TEPCO spokesman Yoshimi Hitosugi, undercover journalist Tomohiko Suzuki and most importantly retired diplomat to Switzerland, Misuhei Murata.

Murata states he has written to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon, urging international intervention to save the world from another bigger nuclear catastrophe of the spent fuel pool at Unit 4 failing and releasing huge extra amounts of deadly radiation.

Fukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 Is 200 Times Greater Than At Chernobyl Accident

Must-see:

Dr. Helen Caldicott (Co-Founder Of Physicians For Social Responsibility): What We Learned From Fukushima (Video – April 2, 2012):

Dr. Helen Caldicott: If Spent Fuel Pool No. 4 collapses I am evacuating my family from Boston.

Few people know that the Pacific Northwest got whacked hard by fallout from the Fukushima disaster with radiation rates hundreds of thousands of times higher than normal background radiation.

The damage from this is not something that the corporate media or the government is talking about.  It mysteriously disappeared from the radar almost immediately.

More info on reactor 4 SFP here:

MUST-SEE: Fukushima Totally Out Of Control – Radioactive Fallout In the US – Reactor 4 SFP Is the Highest Risk Now: If The Cooling Water Is Lost It’ll Be Just A Few Hours At Most Before That Waste Is On Fire (RT – The Big Picture – Video)

Independent And Government Experts Say Reactor 4 SFP Is A Grave Concern: 460 Tons Of Nuclear Fuel Could Overheat, Explode and Release Massive Amounts Of Radiation (((Finishing Off Japan)))


Fukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 is 200 times greater than at Chernobyl Accident (April 3, 2012):

Japan’s former Ambassador to Switzerland, Mr. Mitsuhei Murata, was invited to speak at the Public Hearing of the Budgetary Committee of the House of Councilors on March 22, 2012, on the Fukushima nuclear power plants accident. Before the Committee, Ambassador Murata strongly stated that if the crippled building of reactor unit 4—with 1,535 fuel rods in the spent fuel pool 100 feet (30 meters) above the ground—collapses, not only will it cause a shutdown of all six reactors but will also affect the common spent fuel pool containing 6,375 fuel rods, located some 50 meters from reactor 4. In both cases the radioactive rods are not protected by a containment vessel; dangerously, they are open to the air. This would certainly cause a global catastrophe like we have never before experienced. He stressed that the responsibility of Japan to the rest of the world is immeasurable. Such a catastrophe would affect us all for centuries. Ambassador Murata informed us that the total numbers of the spent fuel rods at the Fukushima Daiichi site excluding the rods in the pressure vessel is 11,421 (396+615+566+1,535+994+940+6375).

I asked top spent-fuel pools expert Mr. Robert Alvarez, former Senior Policy Advisor to the Secretary and Deputy Assistant Secretary for National Security and the Environment at the U.S. Department of Energy, for an explanation of the potential impact of the 11,421 rods.

I received an astounding response from Mr. Alvarez:

It is my understanding that of the 1,532 spent fuel assemblies in reactor No. 4, 304 assemblies are fresh and unirradiated. This then leaves 1,231 irradiated spent fuel rods in pool No. 4.  Based on U.S. Energy Department data, assuming a total of 11,138 spent fuel assemblies are being stored at the Dai-Ichi site spent they contain roughly 982 million curies of intermediate and long-lived radionuclides. I used a higher estimate that Chernobyl released about 2.5 million curies in my earlier estimate regarding pool No. 4.  It appears that there is roughly 393 million curies of Cesium-137 contained in the total spent fuel inventory at the Dai-Ichi site. This is more than 200 times the amount of Cs-137 released at the Chernobyl accident as estimated by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the U.S. National Council on Radiation Protection (NCRP). This is 145% more than the total NCRP estimate of Cs-137 released by all atmospheric nuclear weapons testing, Chernobyl, and world-wide reprocessing plants ( ~270 million curies or 1.0E+18 bequerels).

Many of our readers might find it difficult to appreciate the actual meaning of the figure, yet we can grasp what 200 times more Cesium-137 than the Chernobyl would mean. It would destroy the world environment and our civilization. This is not rocket science, nor does it connect to the pugilistic debate over nuclear power plants. This is an issue of human survival.

Read moreFukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 Is 200 Times Greater Than At Chernobyl Accident

Dr. Chris Busby: Fukushima Now 72,000 Times Hiroshima Radiation

About Dr. Busby (Source: Wikipedia):

Christopher Busby (born 1945) is a British scientist and activist known for his work on the health effects of ionising radiation. In addition to his academic appointments he is the director of Green Audit, an environmental consultancy agency, and scientific advisor to the Low Level Radiation Campaign which he set up in 1995. Busby was also the National Speaker on Science and Technology for the Green Party of England and Wales, and the Scientific Secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risks, based in Brussels.

From 1987 onwards Busby has worked in particular on the health effects of ionising radiation, developing the ‘Second Event Theory’ which distinguishes between hazards from external and internal irradiation. He has studied the effects of low-dose radiation on health. Recent (2008) work by Busby, focusing on the photoelectric effect as a mechanism for cells to be damaged by ingested uranium, was covered by the popular New Scientist magazine.

“As member of the International Society for Environment Epidemiology, he was invited to Iraq and Kosovo to investigate the health effects of depleted uranium. He has also given presentations on depleted uranium to the Royal Society and to the European Parliament. He was a member of the UK Ministry of Defence Oversight Board on Depleted Uranium.” He served on the UK Government’s Committee Examining Radiation Risks of Internal Emitters (CERRIE), which operated between 2001 and 2004, ultimately disagreeing with the committee’s conclusions and publishing a “minority report” with another committee member.

If you haven’t done so, please read at least these articles:

Japan Nuclear Meltdown: Multiple Times Worse than Chernobyl

Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant In Japan: A Dirty Bomb Waiting To Go Off

Japan Nuclear Meltdown: It’s Much, Much Worse Than It Looks (Thanks To The Stupidity of Nuclear Engineers!) (MUST-READ!)

And watch this:

Japan Government on Fukushima: ‘We Are Not Able To Measure The Amount Of Radiation Coming From The Power Plant’

Technology giant JAPAN cannot measure any amount of radiation? Oh, sure!

And if the following is true then ….

… I need a break.


The Japanese Government, IAEA & the Mainline Media all lied

It is clear that Nuclear Energy as a means of power generation is now dead in the water

Latest Newsflash:

Dr. Chris Busby verified today in an email that three spent fuel pools are totally blasted away and burned up. That puts the approximate radiation levels at 24,000 HIROSHIMAS x 3 = 72,000 times the radiation of Hiroshima now in the atmosphere. Remember, this is JUST from the spent fuel pools. Radiation escaping from the reactors is another story altogether.

We have now all had time to evaluate what we believe is the truth behind the Japanese Nuclear Incident (or should I say disaster) and it has become clear that we have all been deceived by the Japanese Authorities, their nuclear establishment, the IAEA, the international pro nuclear groups and more importantly the so called experts that are invited onto the mainstream media channels to blast us with nothing more than total spin. We have heard from nuclear experts from Chatham House (the NWO voice box) and such people as Prof. Gerry Thomas from Imperial College London.

They all keep playing down this disaster without themselves fully understanding the implications on human health and the antiquated testing methods used in the assessment of potential victims. It is only when one listens to such people as Dr. Chris Busby that you get to understand the true picture of the side effects of contamination by ingestion i.e. depleted uranium etc.

Before we go into what Dr Busby is saying about this disaster lets throw a few things around that will make you re think on how you yourself may have analyzed this event.

This was an excerpt from The Nation:

Read moreDr. Chris Busby: Fukushima Now 72,000 Times Hiroshima Radiation

Japan Nuclear Meltdown: It’s Much, Much Worse Than It Looks (Thanks To The Stupidity of Nuclear Engineers!)

Don’t miss:

Israeli Nuclear Expert Accuses Japan Of Downplaying Danger Nuclear Calamity: ‘If there is fallout of plutonium oxide, a most toxic substance that they use in the reactor that exploded, no one will be able to set foot on the site for thousands of years’

Flashback:

Japan’s Deadly Game of Nuclear Roulette (Must-Read!):

However, many of those reactors have been negligently sited on active faults, particularly in the subduction zone along the Pacific coast, where major earthquakes of magnitude 7-8 or more on the Richter scale occur frequently. The periodicity of major earthquakes in Japan is less than 10 years. There is almost no geologic setting in the world more dangerous for nuclear power than Japan — the third-ranked country in the world for nuclear reactors.

“I think the situation right now is very scary,” says Katsuhiko Ishibashi, a seismologist and professor at Kobe University. “It’s like a kamikaze terrorist wrapped in bombs just waiting to explode.”

When reading the following article keep this fact in mind …

Gamma radiation measurements – on which all those low health risk statements were based – do NOT take into account radiation from alpha-emitting radionuclides such as uranium and plutonium!!!

… and also remember that the fuel rods may have already burned:

Continuing problems raise fears of greater radiation threat (CNN):

High temperatures inside the building that houses the plant’s No. 4 reactor may have caused fuel rods sitting in a pool to ignite or explode, the plant’s owner said.

CNN has changed the article, but you can still see that this exact phrase has been used in the article here.


Here is why Japan’s nuclear disaster could get (much) worse than Chernobyl


Chernobyl

GE, the company that boasts that it “brings good things to life,” was the designer of the nuclear plants that are blowing up like hot popcorn kernels at the Fukushima Daiichi generating plant north of Tokyo that was hit by the double-whammy of an 9.1 earthquake and a hugh tsunami.

The company may escape tens or hundreds of billions of dollars in liability from this continuing disaster, which could still result in a catastrophic total meltdown of one or more of the reactors (as of this writing three of the reactors are reported to have suffered explosions and partial meltdowns, and all could potentially become more serious total meltdowns with a rupture of the reactor container), thanks to Japanese law, which makes the operator–in this case Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) liable. But if it were found that it was design flaws by GE that caused the problem, presumably TEPCO or the Japanese government could pursue GE for damages.

In fact, the design of these facilities–a design which, it should be noted, was also used in 23 nuclear plants operating in the US in Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Vermont–appear to have included serious flaws, from a safety perspective.

The drawings of the plants in question, called Mark I systems, provide no way for venting hydrogen gas from the containment buildings, despite the fact that one of the first things that happens in the event of a cooling failure is the massive production of hydrogen gas by the exposed fuel rods in the core. This is why three of the nuclear generator buildings at Fukushima Daiichi have exploded with tremendous force blasting off the roof and walls of the structures, and damaging control equipment needed to control the reactors.

One would have thought that design engineers at GE would have thought about that possibility, and provided venting systems for any hydrogen gas being vented in an emergency into the building. But no. They didn’t.

There is a worse problem though. Probably in an effort to keep the problem of nuclear waste hidden from the public, these plants feature huge pools of water up in the higher level of the containment building above the reactors, which hold and store the spent fuel rods from the reactor. These rods are still “hot” but besides the uranium fuel pellets, they also contain the highly radioactive and potentially biologically active decay products of the fission process–particularly radioactive Cesium 137, Iodine 131 and Strontium 90. (Some of GE’s plants in the US feature this same design. The two GE Peach Bottom reactors near me, for example, each have two spent fuel tanks sitting above their reactors.)

As Robert Alvarez, a former nuclear energy adviser to President Bill Clinton, has written, if these waste containers, euphemistically called “ponds,” were to be damaged in an explosion and lose their cooling and radiation-shielding water, they could burst into flame from the resulting burning of the highly flammable zirconium cladding of the fuel rods, blasting perhaps three to nine times as much of these materials into the air as was released by the Chernobyl reactor disaster. (And that’s if just one reactor blows!) Each pool, Alvarez says, generally contains five to ten times as much nuclear material as the reactors themselves. Alvarez cites a 1997 Nuclear Regulatory Commission study that predicted that a waste pool fire could render a 188-square-mile area “uninhabitable” and do $59 billion worth of damage (but that was 13 years ago).

Another nuclear scientist agrees with Alvarez, quoted in an article in the Christian Science Monitor:

“There should be much more attention paid to the spent-fuel pools,” says Arjun Makhijani, a nuclear engineer and president of the anti-nuclear power Institute for Energy and Environmental Research. “If there’s a complete loss of containment [and thus the water inside], it can catch fire. There’s a huge amount of radioactivity inside – far more than is inside the reactors. The damaged reactors are less likely to spread the same vast amounts of radiation that Chernobyl did, but a spent-fuel pool fire could very well produce damage similar to or even greater than Chernobyl.”

Adding to that worry, Alvarez says photos of Reactor 3 seem to show white steam rising from the damaged facility, from a location where the spent fuel pond would likely be.

But it gets worse. According to news reports, the Reactor 3 unit was being fueled with MOX, a controversial mixed oxides fuel rod, which includes, in addition to uranium, a significant amount of plutonium–a far more dangerous element both chemically as a toxin, and in terms of its radioactivity.

You have to ask, what kind of numbskull would put the waste “pond” for spend fuel right above the reactor of a nuclear plant, thus insuring that in the event of a meltdown, not only would the core of the reactor blow up into the environment, but also all of the spent fuel from prior years?

Read moreJapan Nuclear Meltdown: It’s Much, Much Worse Than It Looks (Thanks To The Stupidity of Nuclear Engineers!)