Thread is about the various issues surrounding Japan in the aftermath of the recent earthquake. Don't bring the shit side of the internet to the thread, and post with the realization that this thread is very important, and very real, to your fellow members.
Do not post speculative and unconfirmed news you saw on TV or anywhere else. Generally the more dramatic it sounds the less likely it's true.
I have learned in this crisis to not believe anything when it is first published but I don't think it's possible this is fake.
How much of this water can leak into the ocean before world wide consequences are a result?
Oh, I don't know but I'd venture to guess a lot because they stated that the water only contained iodine 137 which has a half-life of about 8 days. So before it reaches the shore of any other county it's probably dissipated to a very large degree.
Maybe You shouldn't buy fish from the region for a while but otherwise you don't have any reason to panic until there's plutonium in the water
Not to mention that the ocean is... A very, very big place. It's really nothing to be concerned about.
I understand that the ocean is huge .... I am just curious how much radiation or whatever the compounds entering the water are called , how much before it becomes a full global problem. I'm not asking because its been scared into me that that is what is gong to happen, it is idle curiosity.
The only articles I read about that, are about business problems for fishers in Japan whose fishing grounds are mentioned in the news in reports about heightened radiation levels, which means consumers will not buy their fish anymore.
Then there is the shipping industry: their business is a global one and their problem is, if ships are standing out in routine checks for radiation, they will have problems in various ports and will lose time and money because of laws and controls. To avoid that, ships are not using whatever port Tokyo has and instead go to Osaka or somewhere else in Japan.
Other than that, I did not read about problems because of radiation in the water, so I guess no experts see problems for anyone outside of Japan.
On Friday, the Japan coast guard rescued a dog stranded on top of a house and mass of debris floating about 1.8km out at sea. It took the coast guard about 3 hrs to rescue the dog.
I have learned in this crisis to not believe anything when it is first published but I don't think it's possible this is fake.
How much of this water can leak into the ocean before world wide consequences are a result?
Oh, I don't know but I'd venture to guess a lot because they stated that the water only contained iodine 137 which has a half-life of about 8 days. So before it reaches the shore of any other county it's probably dissipated to a very large degree.
Maybe You shouldn't buy fish from the region for a while but otherwise you don't have any reason to panic until there's plutonium in the water
Not to mention that the ocean is... A very, very big place. It's really nothing to be concerned about.
I understand that the ocean is huge .... I am just curious how much radiation or whatever the compounds entering the water are called , how much before it becomes a full global problem. I'm not asking because its been scared into me that that is what is gong to happen, it is idle curiosity.
The only articles I read about that, are about business problems for fishers in Japan whose fishing grounds are mentioned in the news in reports about heightened radiation levels, which means consumers will not buy their fish anymore.
Then there is the shipping industry: their business is a global one and their problem is, if ships are standing out in routine checks for radiation, they will have problems in various ports and will lose time and money because of laws and controls. To avoid that, ships are not using whatever port Tokyo has and instead go to Osaka or somewhere else in Japan.
Other than that, I did not read about problems because of radiation in the water, so I guess no experts see problems for anyone outside of Japan.
Radioactive material that got into the ocean would disperse to low enough levels that it wouldn't be dangerous very quickly.
I mean, it's the ocean. Waters close to coastal Japan would be a little radioactive for a bit, but anything more than 50-150 kilometers would have materials in too low of levels to be dangerous.
In fact, dilution is one method of getting rid of radioactive material that has been used in the past. Mix it with enough water, then just dump it in the river. (though not in nuclear-power-plant size quantities)
I have learned in this crisis to not believe anything when it is first published but I don't think it's possible this is fake.
How much of this water can leak into the ocean before world wide consequences are a result?
Oh, I don't know but I'd venture to guess a lot because they stated that the water only contained iodine 137 which has a half-life of about 8 days. So before it reaches the shore of any other county it's probably dissipated to a very large degree.
Maybe You shouldn't buy fish from the region for a while but otherwise you don't have any reason to panic until there's plutonium in the water
If you look at the blog of the IAEA it isnt just iodine but also caesium which gets released in significant quantities into the water. Those isotopes have a much longer half-life measured in years and if they settle at the bottom of the sea close to the coast they might make fish in that region inedible for years OR you have to check each fish for radiation before it can be sold ... just like wild boars still have to be checked for radiation levels in southern germany, 25 years after Chernobyl. Lets just hope the sea level drops fast very close to Fukushima so there isnt much ground to be contaminated by these high concentrations of radioactive materials.
Cs137 = half-life 30 years = possible long time contamination if enough of it gets released
IAEA, 2 April 2011 On the 30 March, 180 000 Bq/l of I-131 and 15 000 Bq/l of Cs -137 were detected in the vicinity of the discharge water outlet of Unit 4.
The data reported for 27th - 30th March indicated that the levels at 30 m from the common discharge point of Units 5 and 6 were relatively constant at 45 000 - 55 000 Bq/l for I-131 and 10 000 - 15 000 Bq/l for Cs-137.
The increased values for radiactive materials at the discharge point of Units 5 and 6 are a bit worrying. First I thought that must be from the other discharge points, because these two units were in cold shutdown before the earthquake, but since the values for Cs - 137 are almost the same it doesnt seem logical. So why is that point discharging radioactive material?
P.S.: Dear IAEA, please format your blog so it is easier to comprehend and see. A wall of text is bad!
What may be worth noting about the latest updates on the condition of the reactors is with concrete being ineffective at containing the leaks they are now turning towards water based polymers as explained here. They'll then make sure the polymers are backed by concrete in an attempt to bring this situation to some kind of resolution. It's a dangerous balance that I guess more and more news websites are covering for the men and women on the ground attempting to contain this, classic catch 22. They must keep the material cooled, but the more water pushed through the structure the higher the likelihood of leaks.
Sadly, I doubt the concern over Cs137 concentrations in the leaks will be ending any time soon.
Dumping concrete into that pit is an act of "trial and error" IMO because these pits probably have an extremely smooth surface to minimize the surface area for water to attack its substance. Thus any new concrete has about zero chance to bind with the concrete of the wall. Thats one of the problems with concrete ... you cant really fix any holes in it and the "water based polymer" is probably only a temporary solution.
What bothers me is that there is still a lot of "red" in the presentation for the current status of the reactors. Three of the reactors have only half the fuel rods covered by water and even though they are listed as "stable" the water would probably help to reduce the radiation levels in the reactor even more. http://www.slideshare.net/iaea/summary-ofreactorstatus02april20111200utc
On the bright side of things, some fighting gamers from California just raised USD$30k for a Japan relief fund by streaming a charity tournament, asking for donations, and holding raffles sponsored by companies like Mad Catz, and Hori. Pretty awesome stuff considering over 20k of it was in online donations alone from people watching their stream on Justin called FightForRelief.
It's things like this that help pick up the pieces and bring a slight bit of normalcy to a devastated country after a tragedy like this. I've always been in support of anyone who is legitimately trying to raise funds for causes like this.
On April 04 2011 16:12 don_kyuhote wrote: Are places in southern part of Japan affected by electricty shortage too? This summer could be absolutely brutal if people can't have AC on.
no offence to you dude, but i think AC doesnt matter if you dont have clean watter or food. Also lack of electricitie would mean no transport etc.
Most of the things I've seen seem to be saying the prefectures on the east side of the country may be affected by the power outages - I guess it's down to where the remaining power plants are and where the demand is. Maybe the West part of the country has enough power to meet demand.
As an aside, thanks to all who are donating to Japan, people here do appreciate the help incoming from the rest of the world. If you haven't already, consider donating to charities working here, such as the Japanese Red Cross, or look into purchasing the Quakebook, a collection of tweets and messages from around the time of the quake, proceeds go to charities here. There's a lot of rebuilding to be done here, the nuclear issue is getting far more attention than it deserves.
On April 04 2011 16:12 don_kyuhote wrote: Are places in southern part of Japan affected by electricty shortage too? This summer could be absolutely brutal if people can't have AC on.
no offence to you dude, but i think AC doesnt matter if you dont have clean watter or food. Also lack of electricitie would mean no transport etc.
Life doesn't stop because there is electricity shortage. It just gets incredibly uncomfortable especially in 1st world country.
Just let you guys know that I am sending everyone a 30x40cm print of any picture on my flickr photostream if they donate over 20 GBP/USD/EUR for the cause!
Managed to accumulate over 500 Euro when the Haiti Earthquake happened!
On April 04 2011 16:12 don_kyuhote wrote: Are places in southern part of Japan affected by electricty shortage too? This summer could be absolutely brutal if people can't have AC on.
Absolutely not affected here, and yeah if we were the summer would be really really bad. Of course doesn't compare to people who lost their homes but summer in the south is indeed really brutal
On April 04 2011 18:37 Sanctimonius wrote: Most of the things I've seen seem to be saying the prefectures on the east side of the country may be affected by the power outages - I guess it's down to where the remaining power plants are and where the demand is. Maybe the West part of the country has enough power to meet demand.
according to an article i read, the west will be fine.
they are capable of sending 2 million kilowatts to the east, but due to transmission losses, that's all they can do and it's definitely not enough to meet the air conditioning and heating demands for the east.
that's why it's only affecting east japan, because they can't transfer enough electricity to actually make it affect all of japan.
The local Japanese association I am in (Yukon Canada) Just raised 16K$ Canadian for the relief fund having a Japanese festival day with food and a silent auction. I volunteered and feel proud since my wife is Japanese.
So the food shortages in Japan right now are becoming largely the product of irrational panic.
Some of the fish around Fukushima are contaminated, some areas worse than others, but a lot of it is completely safe. Yet people are refusing to buy any of the fish.
"There's no sense talking about whether the fish here is safe or the fish there is unsafe. It's Fukushima's fish that's unsafe, so we can't buy it."
Of course the fear mongering in the press is largely to blame, but it's a pretty common cognitive idiosyncrasy in Japanese society to think that arbitrary constraints like city borders can affect contiguous natural systems that precede artificial concepts -- that words can somehow change reality. I was worried this would happen.
It's also not at all unthinkable that someone in neighboring prefectures would go ahead and eat contaminated fish just because it's from a different prefecture.
EPT
It took the coast guard about 3 hrs to rescue the dog. 
