Current Status of Japanese Tsunami Earthquake Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Areas
Posted: March 13th, 2011 by: h2
In general I tend to ignore surface noise as we scrabble around the floor of the pit we’re digging for ourselves, but now and then an event of such magnitude occurs that it’s just not possible to at least follow it as it unfolds.
Please note that some of these links will go offline as the world’s attention drifts towards other things, I’ll try to keep them fairly up to date.
Video Feeds
- NHK live stream on upstream.
- NHK live stream: direct link, no web page (offline as of March27, try nhk.or.jp/nhkworld instead)
- BBC live stream
- CNN live stream
News and Information Sources
- UCS Daily Press Briefing Has links to each day’s current press briefing
- english.kyodonews.jp Japan nuclear crisis – Live updates, also you can get live feed tsunami/earthquake news updates and nuclear disaster updates as well.
- www.jaif.or.jp/english/ Current pdf whitepapers on situation status
- Japan–Earthquake/Tsunami/Nuclear Energy Resources « INFOdocket. This page is full of handy links
- allthingsnuclear.org/tagged/Japan_nuclear Site is maintained by the Union of Concerned Scientists
- MIT NSE Nuclear Information Hub
- Wikipedia: Fukushima I nuclear accidents It’s wikipedia, for better or worse, but that page should be useful over time.
- WSJ Japan Earthquake/Nuclear Disaster Page Frequent updates.
Live / Current News Blogs
The following news sites have live blogs where you can find minute by minute updates:
- Union of Concerned Scientists: All Things Nuclear Fukushima oriented blog, updated frequently. Probably one of the most reliable sources out there.
- Kyodo News
- BBC Online
- The Telegraph, UK
- The Guardian, UK
- Al Jazeera Links to each day’s Japan blogs down the page a little bit.
- Reuters
Reports and Serious Analysis
- Japan nuclear crisis is here to stay – Asia Times – Apr 7 This is more of an opinion piece, but it’s an interesting point.
- U.S. Sees Array of New Threats at Japan’s Nuclear Plant – NYT – April 5
- “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” “George Monbiot’s nuclear conversion and an ecological visualisation of the elephant in the room that, it appears, no mainstream environmentalist, let alone the political class, dare talk about.” Read this one, forget all the pro-nuke garbage, this has the real energy utilization rates, CO2 data, etc. As usual, everything the nuclear industry says is a lie. That seems to be a solid framework to view these things from.
- We Are Looting the Past and Future to Feed the Present – Spiegel – March 23 “The entire affluence-based economic model of the postwar era, be it in Japan or here in Germany, is based on the idea that cheap energy and rising material consumption are supposed to make us happier and happier. This is why nuclear power plants are now being built in areas that are highly active geologically, and why we consume as much oil in one year as was created in 5.3 million years. We are looting both the past and the future to feed the excess of the present. It’s the dictatorship of the here and now.” Yes indeed, that just about sums it up I’d say.
- Status report: Reactor-by-reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant – CNN – March 25
- The Japanese Nuclear Power Crisis Deepens – Forbes – March 24 Despite progress in restoring electricity to some areas of FDI, a member of the Swedish Radiation Protection Authority commented yesterday, “We still judge the situation to be critical.”
- The Business Case Against Nuclear Power – WSJ – March 24(paywall, see excerpt here) “So how has anyone been able to afford to build any plants at all? In short, government support. The business model for nuclear power generation relies primarily on extracting huge amounts of taxpayer subsidies.”
- Atomic Cleanup Cost Goes to Japan’s Taxpayers, May Spur Liability Shift – Bloomberg – March 23 As usual, socialize risk, privatize profit. Too familiar in too many industries today.
- Kyodo News – Status of Fukushima nuclear power plants – March 22 Plant by plant status report
- Workers must cool 4,546 spent fuel rod bundles – Asahi.com – March 20 Good news report that explains the actual numbers of rods involved, and what needs to be done with them, as well as current status of reactors and cooling ponds.
- April 7 :: March 31 :: March 29 :: March 28 :: March 25 :: March 24 :: March 23 :: March 22 :: March 21 :: March 20 :: March 19 :: March 18 :: March 17 :: March 16 :: March 15 :: March 14 :: Union of Concerned Scientists Update on Japan’s Nuclear Power Crisis Daily (almost) Telepress Conferences (conferences main page)
- The NRC and Nuclear Power Plant Safety in 2010 UCS Report
- Examining the Fiction of Safe, Clean Nuclear Power: Case Study This was originally posted as a comment in theoildrum but it’s too good to let fade in thoe long discussion threads, so I saved it here as well.
- www.debito.org The article starts by stating: Another trustworthy source connected with the industry believes, short of a miracle, Fukushima reactors won’t be cooled enough in time; there will be “fission product release” – We’ll see how these insider reports pan out in the real world, March 18
- JAIF: Reactor Status and Major Events Update 12 – NPPs in Fukushima as of 16:00 March 18, 2011 (PDF file)
- JAIF: Current Status of Units 1 to 4 at Fukushima Daiichi NPS as of noon, March 17, 2011 (PDF file)
Pro Industry News / Information Sources
- www.world-nuclear-news.org This is pro-nuclear by definition but they have official reports and knowledge
- www.tepco.co.jp This one is useful simply to see how slow and sanitized the official output is
Online Discussions and Analysis
As usual, theOilDrum.com is my go-to discussion and information source when it comes to energy related issues and problems.
- OilDrum Focused Topic Discussions/Analysis
- Fukushima Dai-ichi status and prognosis – March 30
- Fukushima Dai-ichi status and slow burning issues – March 25
- Fukushima Dai-ichi status and potential outcomes – March 17
- Safety of nuclear power and death of the nuclear renaissance – March 15
- Stoneleigh – How Black Is the Japanese Nuclear Swan? – March 13
- OilDrum.com Fukushima Discussion Threads
- Other Discussions of Interest
- The Nuclear Nightmare Continues – Radio Ecoshock -Thursday, March 24, 2011 Part one of this episode has a major interview with world-famous anti-nuclear campaigner Dr. Helen Caldicott after the Fukushima Japan nuclear accident. Red hot. Covering nuclear power threats in Japan, the United States, Canada, France, and Europe generally (includes a full transcript).
- Club Orlov, written by Dmitri Orlov: Nuclear Meltdowns 101 – March 18 :: Earth Shakes, Sea Surges, Nukes Blow – March 15
- Cassandra’s legacy, written by Hugo Bardi: The Great Technological Wall – March 22 :: Fukushima: the nuclear martingale – March 17
- Greg Palast, the great investigative reporter: Tokyo Electric to Build US Nuclear Plants – The no-BS info on Japan’s disastrous nuclear operators – March 14 Read it and weep. He knows all the main players, including TEPCO, from previous investigative reports he’s done. Yes, it’s worse than PR shills are trying to paint it. Don’t miss this one!
Online Tools
- www.weatheronline.co.uk animation displays a potential dispersion of the radioactive cloud (Caesium 137 Isotope) after a nuclear accident in reactor Fukushima I
- www.weatheronline.co.uk – Cloud Spread – Fukushima I power plant Latest radioactive emissions plume forecasts
- Japan Radiation by Prefecture (map)
- Very good tool to see difference before/after of earthquake zones Just slide the bar starting at the left to see how the impact of the tsunami results in basically a sweeping clean of all human constructions. (site is Norwegian but the tools are intuitive)
- Chernobyl radiation map 1996 This gives you a good feel for what the radiation levels were as that event unfolded over time, it’s an image map.
Related Japanese Energy Issues
It’s not just the nuclear power plants that are going to give Japan big problems during the coming years as it tries to adapt to the new reality created by the earthquake/tsunami. The following articles outline other issues to be faced by Japan’s energy sector.
- The cuckoo that won’t sing. Sustainability and Japanese culture – Cassandra’s Legacy – April 6 An examination of Japan’s sustainable past, in population and consumption. That’s pre-industry, of course. There cannot be sustainable industrial production, for what should be obvious reasons.
- WSJ – Some Coal-Fired Plants Brought Back Online – March 19 This one demonstrates pretty well a point I’ve been trying to drive home now: Japan is already the world’s biggest coal importer, and is building several new coal plants. In other words, nuclear is exactly as I said, an add on to existing coal, not removing a single pound of consumption. Here’s more on current Japanese coal deals.
Nuclear Waste and Other Related Issues
Many times the primary problems of the radioactive waste products generated by nuclear power, as well as the question of uranium mining tailings, themselves radioactive, are pushed to the side by the ongoing, and aggressive, pro-nuclear lobby, and those who have internalized this message.
- Russia: Spent Fuel and Radioactive Waste – NTI.org Historically, the Soviet Union and Russia have disposed of radioactive waste in three ways: by dumping it into the Baltic and Arctic Seas as well as into the northern Pacific (primarily the Sea of Japan); by placing it in storage sites on the Kola Peninsula in the Russian North, and on the Shkotovo and Kamchatka Peninsulas in the Russian Far East; and by holding radioactive waste on storage ships servicing the Northern and Pacific fleets.
- Spent nuclear fuel throughout US stored by state – March 22 The Associated Press analyzed state-by-state data that nuclear power plants voluntarily report annually to the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry and lobbying group. As I’ve noted, the waste is not being handled, and the costs are being pushed to the future. Until waste is processed and permanently stored as it’s generated, there’s nothing to talk about in terms of the acceptability of nuclear energy.
- The French fix – There are no good choices for dealing with nuclear waste; but some aren’t as bad – www.seattlepi.com – April 22, 1998 Got to start somewhere with the waste, so let’s see where the French are at now, since they generate the most nuclear energy of any country out there percentage wise of total electrical base load. This is an excellent, in-depth, and fairly objective article. Summary? All choices with nuclear waste are bad, but some are worse than others. But in no case does there exist an actually good choice.
General Energy Information
It’s important to have a grasp of some of the basics about global and regional energy use. That’s mostly so you can recognize nuclear industry shills when they lie about energy related matters, the top lie of course being that nuclear replaces coal.
- World energy resources and consumption – wikipedia This shows quite clearly how all energy sources are increasing, especially coal and oil. Well, oil has hit a plateau since this article was written since it’s hit its probably global production maximum per day. I’m sure there are better resources that show this information in a more up to date way, but this is ok for now. Coal use is up about 100% from 1990 to 2009.
Previous Known, Lesser Known, or Unknown, Nuclear Problems
- Outside Magazine – Chernobyl, My Primeval, Teeming, Irradiated Eden Very long article about how a heavily irradiated, toxic, Chernobyl exclusion zone is doing today. Interesting stuff.
- Kyshtym disaster “According to Gyorgy, who invoked the Freedom of Information Act to gain access to the relevant Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) files, the CIA knew of the 1957 Mayak accident all along……but kept it secret to prevent adverse consequences for the fledgling American nuclear industry.” You will see a lot of this type of cover-ups by the way.
- Time Magazine report on Millstone reactor fuel handling / storage cover up Long, 14 page article that shows how failure to follow proper safety procedures is common and ignored. Same problem we saw, by the way, with Japan now, a history of corruption and other less than ethical actions designed to avoid expensive changes in materials handling and plant ioperations, like storing the massive amounts of spent fuel rods in the cooling ponds, only designed for a few months material initially.
NOTE: comment posters, please do not add discussion type comments to this thread, if you have new links that contain valuable resources, then post them, with a short explanation of what they are talking about in the link.
Feel free to post more general comments in any other currently active thread, however.