Fukushima radiation… what you need to know and why

By now, everyone knows about the disaster that occurred at Fukushima Daiichi. Tepco announced that they had successfully had cold-shut downs on the affected reactors. This is now commonly known to be false. Reactor’s 1 & 2 have melted down and the current location of the coriums is unknown. Reactor 3 is basically still an unknown due to the huge explosion that took place.

Reactor 3 explosion:
www.youtube.com...

It has now been over 1,000 days and Fukushima continues to leak radioactivity every single day…. There are estimates of somewhere between 300-400 tons of radioactive ground water going in the Pacific Ocean every day.

Should you be concerned about the effects of the radiation leaking from the stricken plant?
Absolutely.

Is it going to kill you over night?
Nope.

What kind of radiation are we talking about at Fukushima?

The ones you hear most are plutonium, tritium, cesium and strontium.… it is also leaking:
Beryllium-10
Carbon-14
Sodium-24
Sulfur-35
Chlorine-36
Argon-39
Iron-55

And so on…. The entire list can be seen here:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activation_product


The greatest threat at the moment from Fukushima is the bio-accumulation of fission byproducts that are leaking daily from the plant.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioaccumulation

Basically in a nutshell, it’s when an animal or organism takes in more of a harmful substance than it can eliminate… thus it slowly builds up as larger animals eat the smaller animals…. It will move up the food chain… how much will move up won’t be known until long after we are dead and gone… but your grand children and great grand children will know about Fukushima…. Because it will eventually be inside of them.

The problem with Fukushima is that there are just too many unknowns, any of which could quickly turn an already bad situation into a nightmare of global proportions worse than it already is.

1.) The ground is saturated with water and the buildings are sinking into the ground.

2.) The proposed ice wall solution is only good until the next big earthquake. And there will be more earthquakes…that is a given.

3.) Reactor buildings 1,2,&3 are deadly to humans and will remain so for decades if not centuries.

4.) There are a lot of fuel rods on site that should they have to abandon the site for any reason could possibly cause huge amounts of radiation to be released into the air.

How much radiation is bad for you? All radiation is bad for you… it exists all over the planet in various amounts. It’s known as background radiation. Anything that increases the background radiation is not good for you plain and simple. If the normal back ground radiation in your area is say .035, and the leakage from Fukushima raises your radiation level to say .490… then yes you have every right to be concerned.

Radiation levels and their effect on you:

www.nytimes.com/2011/04/05/health/05radiation.html?emc=eta1

Effects of radiation on cells:

www.jlab.org...

Effects of radiation on blood:

www.livestrong.com...

Effects of radiation on the human body:

www.atomicarchive.com...

Biological effects of radiation:

web.princeton.edu...

Radiation leaking from Fukushima isn’t going away…. It’s is going to bio accumulate in the food chain for possibly centuries… no one in their right mind could possibly think that Fukushima is a localized event and that the amount of radiation being released is only going to affect the local Japanese population….

You don’t have to wait for Godzilla to appear to realize that Fukushima Daiichi is a global disaster of epic proportions…..

So should you be concerned with the radiation leaking from Fukushima?

Absolutely… do what you can to avoid increasing your radiation intake….. I personally have stopped eating any pacific seafood…. There’s just too much bio-accumulation from all the nuclear testing and the Japan disaster to make me feel comfortable.

thanks for the thread and the wealth of information you provided with it.

Op looks very angry because someone do not shared his Opinion,
but anger is a bad reason to start a Discussion, Topic or What So Ever

I am "happy" that this Accident happen/ed here in Japan and not
somewhere else like in Bulgaria, Slovenia or any other old Eastern European Plant.

Human0815
Op looks very angry because someone do not shared his Opinion,
but anger is a bad reason to start a Discussion, Topic or What So Ever

I am "happy" that this Accident happen/ed here in Japan and not
somewhere else like in Bulgaria, Slovenia or any other old Eastern European Plant.

I have no idea what you mean... if you want to discuss the effects of the leakage at Fukushima... then go for it.... theres too much info out there if you simply research it.

What's the ATS motto?? Deny Ignorance

I am just trying to educate people about the long term effects of Fukushima


The fact that you stated that you are "happy" that the accident occurred in Japan is just plain morbid to me.... it should have never happened in the first place.

Wow, what a great, concise account of these horrible events. Thank you for sharing this with us.

Thank you for all the information, and the links.
I have been following Fukushima developments since the beginning, and find it frustrating that information is so difficult to come by.

RickinVa


The fact that you stated that you are "happy" that the accident occurred in Japan is just plain morbid to me.... it should have never happened in the first place.

edit on 13-1-2014 by RickinVa because: (no reason given)

For everyone who spend a bit of Time with this Topic (of Nuclear Energy)
it was clear that this happened sooner or later,
i put the Word happy into Apostrophes like so " h-a-p-p-y "
because happy is not the right word, in a way.

But do you have a imagination how the situation would lookalike
when the Accident happened somewhere else and in a Country
with much less intellectual Capacities and Money?

We all need to stop to act like Children or old People who living in their memories,
F'Shima happened and we can't return to the former Status Quo
but we can try to stop further Accidents and for this we need a living Resistance,
smart People and clever Children,
with Threads like this one you suggest that our Life is meaningless because we will
die anyway soon!

This historical knowledge has been very useful for understanding the effects Fukushima has had and will continue to have on the Pacific. Many excellent researchers from Japan and abroad have been investigating this closely since March 2011, and anyone who is hoping to know more about what impact Fukushima radiation will have on the ocean far from Japan– in Hawaii, Alaska, or near California, for instance — should become familiar with what Fukushima ocean studies have shown.

These researchers’ collaborations have been a model of cooperation among nations and institutions, and while the picture is not yet complete, the outlines — how much radiation is in the ocean, where it will go, and when it will get there — have been fairly well estimated.

These scientists conclude that the the Cs137 levels in the waterborne Fukushima radiation now reaching the North American Pacific coast will peak at between about 0.004 and 0.010 Bq/L, compared to about 0.001-0.002 Bq/L before the accident, will stay that way for a few years, and should start declining again around 2017.

Percentage-wise this means 2 to 10 times existing Cs levels, which we could say is a lot, especially since the entire Pacific will be affected. But when one considers that the added radiation represents only about 1/1000 or less of the 7.4 Bq/L of Cs 137 the US EPA allows in drinking water (Japan and the WHO both allow 10 Bq/L), most people would probably conclude that it represents a minuscule health risk if any even if you drank it.

The same appears to be true concerning the risks presented by the migratory Pacific bluefin tuna caught off California that had detectable levels of Cs137 as well: someone who ate 2 kg of it a week for a year would raise their risk of fatal cancer by only 0.00002%.

Source

Human0815

RickinVa


The fact that you stated that you are "happy" that the accident occurred in Japan is just plain morbid to me.... it should have never happened in the first place.

edit on 13-1-2014 by RickinVa because: (no reason given)

For everyone who spend a bit of Time with this Topic (of Nuclear Energy)
it was clear that this happened sooner or later,
i put the Word happy into Apostrophes like so " h-a-p-p-y "
because happy is not the right word, in a way.

But do you have a imagination how the situation would lookalike
when the Accident happened somewhere else and in a Country
with much less intellectual Capacities and Money?

We all need to stop to act like Children or old People who living in their memories,
F'Shima happened and we can't return to the former Status Quo
but we can try to stop further Accidents and for this we need a living Resistance,
smart People and clever Children,
with Threads like this one you suggest that our Life is meaningless because we will
die anyway soon!

Again you are putting words in my mouth that I never said,,,,, please show me where I "suggest that our life is meaningless because we will all die anyway soon!"

You are trying to bait me and I won't fall for it........so please stop it

"F'Shima happened and we can't return to the former Status Quo" I couldn't possibly agree more.... but ignoring it isn't going to make it go away either

I am curious about this because it seems ominous but then again, I have failed to see one "conclusive" piece of evidence to say that Earth is in mortal danger from this event. Don't get me wrong, I understand how serious it is and I understand the implications but why is it that everything I hear about Fukushima seems to be at odds with verifiable testing?

It's a valid question and that being the case, one of three things must be true.

1.)The situation is being misrepresented to sell more products based on fear by an immoral group of retailers who are paying to spread disinformation.

2.)Governments and those in charge are downplaying the situation in it's entirety to avoid mass panic and unrest and engaged in killing, threatening or paying off those who would speak out.

3.)Those who know best don't even know the true ramifications and are only starting to assess the real damage and potential damage this will cause.

Now, all three of those scenarios could be true in part or in whole or none of them could be, the thing to note is that at this point the conjecture doesn't seem to line up with the facts so someplace in the middle, somebody isn't being truthful about the circumstances or the ramifications.

I am not really worried about the amount of radiation in the ocean,,,,,,,, I am worried about the bio-accumulation in the fish that live there..... fish we as humans eat.....

I gave a link in my original post that tells you all about bio-accumulation. I suggest you read it.

Helious
I am curious about this because it seems ominous but then again, I have failed to see one "conclusive" piece of evidence to say that Earth is in mortal danger from this event. Don't get me wrong, I understand how serious it is and I understand the implications but why is it that everything I hear about Fukushima seems to be at odds with verifiable testing?

It's a valid question and that being the case, one of three things must be true. The situation is being misrepresented to sell more products based on fear by an immoral group of retailers who are paying to spread disinformation.

Governments and those in charge are downplaying the situation in it's entirety to avoid mass panic and unrest and killing, threatening or paying off those who would speak out.

Those who know best don't even know the true ramifications and are only starting to assess the real damage and potential damage this will cause.

Now, all three of those scenarios could be true in part or in whole or none of them could be, the thing to note is at this point is that the conjecture at this stage doesn't seem to line up with the facts so someplace in the middle, somebody isn't being truthful about the circumstances or the ramifications.

exactly.... the main idea of my post was to inform people about bio-accumulation and Fukushima..... People tend to think that just because radiation sinks to the bottom of the ocean, that it will remain there harmlessly for all eternity... it is going to get into the food chain even more that it already is and there is nothing that can be done about it.

There are a LOT of unanswered questions about Fukushima.... but one thing is a known fact: Radiation is leaking from the plant on a daily basis for the last 1,000+ days and will continue to so for a long long time.... radiation with a long half-life just simply doesn't dissappear........ it winds up in the food chain or in your body where it does damage at the cellular level.

I like how you say decades instead of centuries. Yes, I know that you included centuries. But Chernobyl is not even on the scale of Fukushima, and the timeline of Prypiat being inhabitable is, at the very least, 900 years. This could turn out to be rather catastrophic. I understand that GE, which is a major weapons manufacturer for the US, designed the facility.

RickinVa
I am not really worried about the amount of radiation in the ocean,,,,,,,, I am worried about the bio-accumulation in the fish that live there..... fish we as humans eat.....

Actually we know exactly this very well from the Irish-, the North- and the Baltic Sea
because of the NPS close to the Sea and all the Toxic Stuff we put into the Water:
Reference Material a Pdf

Human0815

RickinVa
I am not really worried about the amount of radiation in the ocean,,,,,,,, I am worried about the bio-accumulation in the fish that live there..... fish we as humans eat.....

Actually we know exactly this very well from the Irish-, the North- and the Baltic Sea
because of the NPS close to the Sea and all the Toxic Stuff we put into the Water:
Reference Material a Pdf

you are hopelessly continuing to come up with studies that have no relationship to Fukushima...... Fukushima is uncharted ground when it comes to a triple core melt down........ there's never been a study done before because it's never happened before... until the full impact of fukushima is known.....then trying to say it's safe and everything is going to be ok is just plain silly.

Do you know that when a 6+ EQ strikes close to the plant that things could go from really bad to horrific in a matter of minutes?
Trying to say Fukushima is harmless or has been rendered safe is nothing but wishful thinking.

normal discharge from an operational NPP can not possibly be compared to Fukushima.....


Fukushima is uncontrollable..... what is coming out of it hasn't been stopped for 1000+ days and won't be stopped for 1000's and 1000's of more days and could change with out notice due to earthquakes, typhoons etc.

Human0815

RickinVa


The fact that you stated that you are "happy" that the accident occurred in Japan is just plain morbid to me.... it should have never happened in the first place.

edit on 13-1-2014 by RickinVa because: (no reason given)

For everyone who spend a bit of Time with this Topic (of Nuclear Energy)
it was clear that this happened sooner or later,
i put the Word happy into Apostrophes like so " h-a-p-p-y "
because happy is not the right word, in a way.

But do you have a imagination how the situation would lookalike
when the Accident happened somewhere else and in a Country
with much less intellectual Capacities and Money?

We all need to stop to act like Children or old People who living in their memories,
F'Shima happened and we can't return to the former Status Quo
but we can try to stop further Accidents and for this we need a living Resistance,
smart People and clever Children,
with Threads like this one you suggest that our Life is meaningless because we will
die anyway soon!

This historical knowledge has been very useful for understanding the effects Fukushima has had and will continue to have on the Pacific. Many excellent researchers from Japan and abroad have been investigating this closely since March 2011, and anyone who is hoping to know more about what impact Fukushima radiation will have on the ocean far from Japan– in Hawaii, Alaska, or near California, for instance — should become familiar with what Fukushima ocean studies have shown.

These researchers’ collaborations have been a model of cooperation among nations and institutions, and while the picture is not yet complete, the outlines — how much radiation is in the ocean, where it will go, and when it will get there — have been fairly well estimated.

These scientists conclude that the the Cs137 levels in the waterborne Fukushima radiation now reaching the North American Pacific coast will peak at between about 0.004 and 0.010 Bq/L, compared to about 0.001-0.002 Bq/L before the accident, will stay that way for a few years, and should start declining again around 2017.

Percentage-wise this means 2 to 10 times existing Cs levels, which we could say is a lot, especially since the entire Pacific will be affected. But when one considers that the added radiation represents only about 1/1000 or less of the 7.4 Bq/L of Cs 137 the US EPA allows in drinking water (Japan and the WHO both allow 10 Bq/L), most people would probably conclude that it represents a minuscule health risk if any even if you drank it.

The same appears to be true concerning the risks presented by the migratory Pacific bluefin tuna caught off California that had detectable levels of Cs137 as well: someone who ate 2 kg of it a week for a year would raise their risk of fatal cancer by only 0.00002%.

Source

edit on 13-1-2014 by Human0815 because: add of Info

Perhaps the "scientists have been compromised?
How do we know these are accurate estimates?
The over all rad level means nothing if you are in a zone where the levels are fatal......
Saying the whole ocean will have a slightly higher radiation C137 content doesnt mean it wont be seriously higher depending on tides currents, and other factors locally......
The half life of some of these things are millions of years.....what about our future?
NO ONE KNOWS how bad it really is or will be later....NOBODY>>>>>>

"NO ONE KNOWS how bad it really is or will be later....NOBODY>>>>>>"

Exactly........its been going on 3 years now......... they don't even plan on touching the melted cores until the mid 2020's


That's a lot of radioactive water going into the Pacific ocean..... I hope I am around in 2030 or so when the truth about Fukushima may finally be known..... lets see what another 10 years of uncontrolled radioactive water going into the ocean is.


The real problem is NO ONE knows for sure exactly how much hot water is going into the ocean.. nor will they ever know...Tepco estimates 300-400 tons a day.......my money is on the bet that it is much much higher than Tepco is saying...based on their past performance of lying about everything else at Fukushima.

Kelp Watch 2014

Researchers from California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have launched “Kelp Watch 2014,” a scientific campaign designed to determine the extent of radioactive contamination of the state’s kelp forest from Japan’s damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant following the March 11, 2011, earthquake and tsunami.

newscenter.lbl.gov... rmine-extent-of-fukushima-contamination/


It will be interesting to see how this turns out........ its about the bio-accumulation in the kelp off the California coast.

hopefully this will be repeated in coming years to help monitor the situation!!!

bio-accumulation in layman's terms ( as I understand it )


organism A ingests some radioactive material along with already having absorbed some radiation in the local environment.

So lets just say that A = XX... X= ingested radiation and X= radiation absorbed into it's body due to local surroundings...

organism B comes along and eats organism A.... since both A and B are already at the state of XX, now organism B =XXXX because he has now absorbed that radiation that was in A, along with the radiation he had prior to eating A.


Now here comes little fishy C who happens to snack on organism B.... so now C would look like C= XXXXXX

and so on and so forth...... that's about as basic as I can put it and no that is not a scientific study.

We wont know the full impact for thousands of years. Thats scary in its self.

Take into consideration that there are hundreds of these plant worldwide.

Who wants to drink the kool aid first? Its a far better way to go than radiation poising.