Robot in Japanese reactors detects high radiation
By MARI YAMAGUCHI, Associated Press
TOKYO – Readings Monday from robots that entered two crippled buildings at Japan's tsunami-flooded nuclear plant for the first time in more than a month displayed a harsh environment still too radioactive for workers to enter.
Nuclear officials said the radiation data for Unit 1 and Unit 3 at the tsunami-flooded Fukushima Dai-ichi plant �\ collected by U.S.-made robots that look like drafting lamps on treads �\ do not alter plans for stabilizing the complex by year's end under a "road map" released by the plant operator Sunday.
With the public growing increasingly frustrated at the slow response to the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crises, parliament grilled Prime Minister Naoto Kan and officials from plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co.
"You should be bowing your head in apology. You clearly have no leadership at all," Masashi Waki, a lawmaker from the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, shouted at Kan.
"I am sincerely apologizing for what has happened," Kan said, stressing that the government was doing all it could to handle the unprecedented disasters.
TEPCO's president, Masataka Shimizu, looked visibly ill at ease as lawmakers heckled and taunted him.
Workers have not gone inside the two reactor buildings since the first days after the plant's cooling systems were wrecked by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. Hydrogen explosions in both buildings in the first few days destroyed their roofs and littered them with radioactive debris.
But a pair of robots, called Packbots, haltingly entered the two buildings Sunday and took readings for temperature, pressure and radioactivity. More data must be collected and radioactivity must be further reduced before workers are allowed inside, said Hidehiko Nishiyama of Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.
"It's a harsh environment for humans to work inside," Nishiyama said.
Officials said the radiation findings should not hamper the goal of achieving a cold shutdown of the plant within six to nine months as laid out in a timetable TEPCO announced Sunday. Rather, the new information would help the company in figuring out how to push ahead with the plan.
"We have expected high radioactivity inside the reactor buildings, which was confirmed by data collected by the robot," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said. "Even I had expected high radioactivity in those areas. I'm sure TEPCO and other experts have factored in those figures when they compiled the roadmap."
TEPCO official Takeshi Makigami said the robots must pave the way for workers to be able to re-enter the building.
"What robots can do is limited, so eventually, people must enter the buildings," Makigami said.
The robots were set to investigate Unit 2 later Monday.
As work continues inside the plant to reduce radiation levels and stem leaks into the sea, the Defense Ministry said it would send about 2,500 soldiers to join the hundreds of police, outfitted with protective suits, who are searching for bodies in tsunami debris around the plant.
Around 1,000 bodies are thought to be buried in the muddy piles of broken houses, cars and fishing boats. As of Sunday, searchers had located 66 bodies and recovered 63, police said.
The combined earthquake and tsunami have left more than 27,000 people dead or missing.
The robots being used inside the plant are made by Bedford, Massachusetts company iRobot. Traveling on miniature tank-like treads, the devices opened closed doors and explored the insides of the reactor buildings, coming back with radioactivity readings of up to 49 millisieverts per hour inside Unit 1 and up to 57 millisieverts per hour inside Unit 3.
The legal limit for nuclear workers was more than doubled since the crisis began to 250 millisieverts. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recommends an evacuation after an incident releases 10 millisieverts of radiation, and workers in the U.S. nuclear industry are allowed an upper limit of 50 millisieverts per year. Doctors say radiation sickness sets in at 1,000 millisieverts and includes nausea and vomiting.
The robots, along with remote controlled miniature helicopters, have enabled TEPCO to photograph and take measurements of conditions in and around the plant while minimizing the workers' exposure to radiation and other hazards.
TEPCO's plan for ending the crisis, drawn up at the government's order, is meant to be a first step toward letting some of the tens of thousands of residents evacuated from the area around the company's Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant return to their homes.
Joined: 08 May 2007 Posts: 2331 Location: in South Atami Country:
Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2011 10:41 pm Post subject:
bmwracer wrote:
TEPCO's plan for ending the crisis, drawn up at the government's order, is meant to be a first step toward letting some of the tens of thousands of residents evacuated from the area around the company's Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant return to their homes.
I am not that optimistic when it comes to people returning home. But of course I hope TEPCO proves me wrong.
I also wonder how realistic a plan can be when they were "ordered" to come up with one.
Joined: 13 Aug 2009 Posts: 159 Location: france or japan Country:
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2011 1:45 pm Post subject:
EstherM wrote:
I am not that optimistic when it comes to people returning home. But of course I hope TEPCO proves me wrong.
I also wonder how realistic a plan can be when they were "ordered" to come up with one.
I'm very optimistic about people returning in their home: Tepco and the government will lie about the radioactivity and people will live in a radioactive environment. They already didn't evacuate some areas were the radioactivity is twice as high as the limit where you recommend to evacuate so...
Joined: 08 May 2007 Posts: 2331 Location: in South Atami Country:
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2011 5:01 pm Post subject:
bmwracer wrote:
I think it'll be even longer than that.
Yes, I also didn't want to say it but some people may never be able to return in their lifetime.
20 century boy wrote:
I'm very optimistic about people returning in their home: Tepco and the government will lie about the radioactivity and people will live in a radioactive environment. They already didn't evacuate some areas were the radioactivity is twice as high as the limit where you recommend to evacuate so...
I can only pray that this is not going to happen ...
A hard-hit Japanese city sees signs of hope in road repair, reopened shops
Workers in Ishinomaki, Japan, have cleared thousands of tons of debris from streets and buildings inundated by the March 11 tsunami. A long-time shopkeeper says customers are starting to return.
Tens of thousands of tons of concrete, wood, and metal – the remnants of houses, shops, and boats destroyed when the 9.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the northeastern coast of Japan on March 11 – are piled neatly along the sidewalks of Ishinomaki, one of the worst-hit cities when the tsunami hit land.
The waste is separated into categories for disposal, like police tape marking a crime scene, as the region sets about the huge task of recovering from damage unseen in Japan since the end of World War II.
Ishinomaki lost more than 5,500 of its 163,000 citizens; some 2,770 of those are still unaccounted for. The national death toll, meanwhile, is estimated at nearly 14,000, with another some 13,000 still missing. The walls of the city's evacuation centers are still papered with missing posters full of photographs of loved ones and cellphone numbers to call if they are found.
Still, amid all the unmissable signs of destruction, there are the beginning indications of recovery. Workers at Japan's stricken nuclear plant in nearby Fukushima Province began moving tons of highly radioactive water from a reactor building to on-site storage Tuesday. Local flights returned to Sendai late last week. And Ishinomaki has been transformed from the city of flooded streets and hungry citizens that it was just three weeks ago. Shops, even in the districts overwhelmed by water, are reopening, and roads are being repaired. Of the more than 53,000 people who were living in shelters a few weeks ago here, 14,778 remain, and the rest have returned to their homes or are staying with relatives, according to Yoshinori Sato, a city official.
TOKYO – Japan plans to send more than 20,000 soldiers into its northern disaster zone Monday in an intensive mission to recover the bodies of those killed in last month's earthquake and tsunami.
More than 12,000 people are missing and presumed dead from the twin disasters that hit March 11. Some were likely swept out to sea, while others are buried under the mass of rubble. About 14,300 are confirmed dead.
Defense Ministry spokesman Ippo Maeyama said Sunday that the military would send 24,800 soldiers to carry out a two-day search of the area. Police, coast guard and U.S. troops will also be involved.
Agriculture officials also plan to enter the evacuation zone around a stricken nuclear plant to check the fate of hundreds of thousands of animals abandoned by fleeing farmers.
An article in a french news paper explains that the best way to decontaminate a radioactive place is to grow cannabis ( remove 80% of the radioactivity). It was experimented in Tchernobyl.
The plants are burned and the toxic ashes treated.
Sunflowers works too.
A member of the Atomic and Alternative Energies Commission suggest it would be a good solution.
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Register
Log in
