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Radiation levels & evacuation

The Japanese government is coming close to lifting the evacuation order; the radiation is declining quickly. Here are the cumulative numbers from 3/23/2011 to 5/2/2011:

5/2/2011: 24.14 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 5/1); +2.99 milli-sieverts from previous week)
4/25/2011: 21.15 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 4/24; +3.17 milli-sieverts from previous week)
4/18/2011: 17.98 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 4/17; +3.5 milli-sieverts from previous week)
4/11/2011: 14.48 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 4/10; +4.14 milli-sieverts from previoius week)
4/4/2011: 10.34 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 4/3; +5.527 milli-sieverts from previous week)
3/28/2011: 4.813 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 3/27; +3.276 milli-sieverts in 3 days)
3/25/2011: 1.537 milli-sieverts (3/23 - 3/24)

Source: http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/saigaijohou/syousai/1304002.htm

They intend to allow unrestricted repopulation of the area in early 2017. To get the 20 mSev level for 40 days, they had to pick the days right after the disaster.

The radiation levels are actually not that high these days, since most of the continuing leakages is from the poorly isolated holding pond, which they have failed to repair, into the the ocean, as opposed to into the air, which is what happened initially.

some claim

Did you know that some claim the Earth is flat? It's true!
Another poster (thanks Nojayuk) dropped this little gem. It's logs from scientists who have collected data at the site (yes, on-site) since last May. So yeah, I'm telling you that scientists are strolling off shore doing some testing.

The Japanese government science and education agency, MEXT has been publishing regular reports on seawater sampling and radioactive contamination around the Fukushima Daiichi plant, from just offshore at the inlet and discharge channels of the reactor complex to areas several hundred kilometres from the shore. You can find the reports going back to May last year here, as well as many other sample measurements such as land soil, sea sediments, air particulates etc: http://radioactivity.mext.go.jp/en/

The decontamination problem for agricultural areas hit by fallout in Fukushima province means removing a small amount of soil, usually the top few centimetres from the fields as that's where most of the fallout resides. Toshiba recently unveiled an experimental soil processing plant mounted on the back of a truck that is designed to extract cesium isotopes from soil. It's still in the development stage and needs to be tested and improved and it may not be cost-effective -- the truck unit currently can only process about 2 tonnes of soil a day which may not be enough.

On the other hand the decontamination of the thousands of hectares of land flooded by the tsunami in areas like Sendai starts with removing large pieces of debris such as houses, ships, cars, trucks, bridges, telephone poles etc. which ended up being dumped in the fields from the force of the water. After that gross part of the cleanup has been achieved attempts can be made to reconstruct the irrigation canals and other field structures which also got smashed. After that the restoration work bogs down somewhat as they have to remove the fuel oil, salt and other contaminants that were churned deep into the soil metres deep in places. After that they can maybe think about growing crops there again, five or ten years down the line. Removing most of the radioactive fallout from a field well inland in Fukushima province is a piece of piss in comparison.

As for seawater contamination, the Japanese government has been monitoring the situation around the Fukushima plant continuously since the accident, sampling seawater close-in and also further out to sea, at different depths. As of 18th Jan 2012 the only places registering any measurable amount of cesium isotopes are a kilometre or two offshore from the reactors themselves. The measured levels in seawater sampled in those places are about 1.8 Bq/litre for each of Cs-134 and Cs-137. All other areas sampled are under the lower limit of measurement, about 1 Bq/litre. In comparison, as I mentioned previously, the K-40 activity level of regular seawater is 10Bq/litre and that's everywhere on the planet, not just within a km or two of Fukushima. As for your point about food-chain concentration of cesium that also applies to potassium which is why human body tissue runs to about 60Bq/kg from K-40 radioactivity. Potassium is actively retained by body tissues, of course whereas cesium is not -- the biological half-life of cesium in human beings is about 70 days i.e. if you ingest an amount of cesium you will excrete about half of it in a seventy day period and half of the residual amount in the next 70 days and so on.

If you want to look up the historical measurement data recorded by the Japanese government you can find it at http://radioactivity.mext.go.jp/en/ where most of the numbers are published, including prefectural city centre monitoring, drinking water levels, land fallout measurements etc. as well as the sea monitoring program. There are other sources of data on contamination levels from TEPCO, universities etc. also available on the Web if you're interested in the subject.

If he lives in eastern Tokyo metropolitan area there is a slim chance that he indeed have something to worry about like in Chiba or in Saitama. If he lives in western Tokyo he doesn't have absolutely nothing to worry about. Levels in Tokyo in practical terms are at the same level than before the disaster. It would have been helpful if the poster wrote in which zone lives. The MEXT readings in the previous format put Bunkyo-ku as Tokyo's ward with the highest readings, but still not something to worry about.

Now, the most update info is here:
http://www.mext.go.jp/english/

Still, I liked more the previous graph version that MEXT had under prime minister Kan since it clearly put visual info about the highest levels recorded by prefecture, the normal recorded levels and the current levels.

From this map from MEXT, the shape will be like a lobe going up to 40 km Northwest from Fukushima Daiichi. The good news are that in a relatively short timeframe, they will reduce the evacuation zone at south and around Fukushima Daini.

http://www.mext.go.jp/component/english/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/05/10/1305904_042618.pdf

http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/04/85736.html

OPINION: How to minimize consequences of the Fukushima catastrophe
By Alexey V. Yablokov

The analysis of the health impact of radioactive land contamination by the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, made by Professor Chris Busby (the European Committee of Radiation Risk) based on official Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology data, has shown that over the next 50 years it would be possible to have around 400,000 additional cancer patients within a 200-kilometer radius of the plant.

I find that extremely unlikely since the radiation readings beginning at 20 km south of Fukushima Daiichi are barely above background levels. Now, based on the trend of the readings done around Fukushima Daiichi, I believe that the Japanese government instead of going into a evacuation zone based in a radius from the plant, will make a evacuation from the zone going up to 60 km from Fukushima Daiichi northwest 10-15 km wide, since only inside this polygon are radiation readings above 2 Sv/h. The highest reading outside the current evacuation zone are at reading point 32 in Namie town, at 28.6 Sv/h, around 32 km northwest from Fukushima Daiichi.

The last available reading from Fukushima:
http://www.mext.go.jp/component/english/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/04/18/1305090_041816.pdf

There are towns outside the radius that were getting 70 - 80 uSievert/hr. That's 1.6 mSievert/day. Saying they are worried that they will exceed 20mSievert a year is a joke, they exceeded that in the first 12 days once the radiation spiked. By my count that's the equivalent of a CT-scan every 3 days or so. Presumably indoors is not as bad, but the people have to eat and drink something, so that's not their only radiological load. http://www.mext.go.jp/component/english/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/04/12/1304852_041119_1.pdf And the readings have been climbing. As of April 11, there are now hotspots outside the 20km ring that are getting 100uSieverts/hr. I haven't superimposed their map of readings on the map showing population centers, so hopefully most of the hotspots are relatively uninhabited.

Which "radiation level" are you referring to?

All of them. take your pick; of all the prefectures listed, the only one with remotely "interesting" levels is Fukushima, and its levels are getting rather low as well-- until you get about 30km away, there isnt much in the way of radioactivity there either.

Its not peachy keen; the tsunami wrecked whole villages and people wont be living there again for some time. The radiation issue will be over long before the rest of the problems are dealt with. The tragedy in all of this is that when the japanese finally sort these reactors out once and for all, the world wont be letting out a collective sigh, or cheer, or congratulations; it will be far too busy bickering about whether this was another Chernobyl or not.

They are close to Japan. The plant is throwing up 24/7 for the last month or so.

Lets take an actual look at the data around Japan and see whether it matches up.

In particular, lets look at data from (courtesy of) Hiroshima (inland, southwest), Tokyo (east coast), Fukuoka (coastal, southwest), and Osaka (south).

All of those show near zeros across the board for environmental radioactivity-- with the highest reading @ Tokyo a mere 2% of the "notify your local official" level. Of them, only tokyo has detectable radiation in its water.

Im not nuclear scientist, but I think its fair game to call shenanigans when folks a thousand miles away start claiming that the radioactivity skipped over Hiroshima and landed in China.

here:
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/11040307-e.html

-Today at around 9:30 am, we detected water containing radiation dose overc
  1,000 mSv/h in the pit* where supply cables are stored near the intake
  channel of Unit 2. Furthermore, there was a crack about 20 cm on the
  concrete lateral of the pit, from where the water in the pit was out
  flowing.(We already informed.) During the same day, we injected fresh
  concrete to the pit, but we could not observe a reduction in the amount
  of water spilling from the pit to the sea.
  Therefore, we considered that a new method of stopping the water and
  determined to use the polymer. Necessary equipment and experts of water
  shutoff will be dispatched to the site and after checking the condition,
  we're doing continuous work to stop water by injecting polymer(April 3rd).
-Monitoring posts of No. 1 ?No.8 set up near the boundary of power station
  area have been restored. We will periodically monitor the data and
  announce the results of monitoring.

This crack maybe explains why the levels of I-131 had not dropped at the same rate than in the previous days in the readings of I-131 and Cs-137 published by MEXT in their readings of radiation and contamination of water by prefecture page. In most prefectures they have dropped to levels that are not detectable but in a few the levels of Cs-137 have increased.

http://www.mext.go.jp/component/a_menu/other/detail/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/03/19/1303887_1910.pdf shows measured doses 20-30km from the reactors.

I am not certain, but by my count, at least one of the dead worker was on a crane and died because of the earthquake itself, is it the same for the 4 others (out of the 5 you quote) or are they attributed directly to the meltdown itself? Maybe I missed some, but I have yet to see a death related to the meltdown itself. For me the earthquake itself followed by the tsunami is still a much much bigger tragedy and concern.

The incident level is still 5 of 7, so it's the same as the Three Mile Island incident in 79. Could it go further up? Maybe. Probably. Probably not. I don't know. They just got backup power up at unit 5 and 6 and they seem to be working harder than ever to try and keep it under control. Emergency agencies must plan for the worst of course, but the media doesn't have to fuel that at every turn. I still wish them luck and hope they keep all of it under control.

Here are the reading outside the 20km zone as of yesterday (it doesn't include background count) for those interested, I am no expert tho. I see they don't have monitoring posts much in the south.
http://www.mext.go.jp/component/a_menu/other/detail/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/03/18/1303727_1716.pdf

As far as I know, 400 mSv was the highest they recorded and that was between 2 reactors. Where's the source on the 1 Sievert? I probably missed it, quited interested in hearing about it.

The plans to "rewire" the power plants were from yesterday and, at the moment, they are just that, plans. This morning Toden announced that the construction of the electric cable that was supposed to be complete yesterday will be delayed until at least tomorrow. At the very end, they said also, in a markedly small voice, that they hope restoring the electricity will go smoothly, but there are worries that the equipment on the ground - pumps and transformers - may be out of order (maybe - after those explosions and all that water dumped on them from the air?), and that could probably hamper the effort.

In reality, there is no staff (except the firefighters, Chernobyl style) on the ground since Saturday - a relative and a former colleague worked at the plant and are already in Osaka since Tuesday - all measurements are taking place from the helos and from an observation points 30km away, and radiation in excess of 150 microgreys is being reported 30-40 km away upwind from the reactor by the local authorities.

So, there is only stalling, spinning, and no information.

Incidentally, here are the radiation reports by the ministry of science and bullshit (japanese, sorry, all data is in microsieverts, and if the last column is without dates, it has the long-term averages) : http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/saigaijohou/syousai/1303723.htm

• Free tuition
• Monthly living stipend
• Japanese technology (my Master's right now is in music + robots)

Since I began here 1.5 years ago, they started ANOTHER program called "Global 30", which means they're recruiting 300,000 foreigners for research, Master's, and PhD's from now till 2020. All over Japan. Here's an example of the program from Kyoto University. http://www.opir.kyoto-u.ac.jp/kuprofile/e/courses/index.html There are lots of programs in different fields, at different universities (Waseda, Tokyo University, Osaka University), so just browse around for what you like.

Just read about it in the newspaper. (Daily Yomiuri, for me.)

Unfortunately, the on-line version leaves off a few things.

For instance, Kaneko's lawyer's pointed out that auto manufacturers would not "be punished if speeding became rampant." (Reported in the print news.)

Also, the on-line version doesn't mention that, "A revised Copyright Law that prohibits users from downloading such peer-to-peer file sharing software will come into force in January." (The last line of the print article.)

I think the print version of the Yomiuri may have been slightly off on that point... the sources I have seem to say the law is dealing with copyrighted works, not programs that can be used to download them. Copyright act amended

Japan Strengthens Copyright Law Basically, the new legal ground seems to be that downloading works protected by copyright without permission is now officially a crime, but they have to prove the defendent knew the file was not distributed legally. Up until now, prosecution has been mostly (if not completely?) uploaders. Nothing is being said about downloading the software itself.

If you want it from the original source, and you can read Japanese, this link has the text of the bill itself in PDF format. I have not translated it so I can't verify whether the English news sources are correct in their interpretation or not.

While I have respect for the fact you took the time to compile a set of links in response to my inquiry, I have far less respect for the load of flamebait you prepared.

If you make a claim, you support it.

I'll look at the documents you provided and decide what I think about them. This gives you the opportunity to pick how you present your argument. It makes for a much more meaningful result as the information I'm looking at is related to what you think is most important.

In addition, if you want to pick a fight, I would like to see some support for your other claims:

"Most of the crops we eat today (including certified "organic" crops) have been produced by mutation breeding"
I hope that one of the last three links you sent covers this one, because the first three appear to not.

"the ancient Incas developed systems for [artificially] introducing mutations."
I believe what you're referring to is crossbreeding, not mutagens in this case.

and for fun
"the GM that you oppose is the safest kind of GM"
Where did I ever say I was opposed to the process. I have repeatedly stated that I oppose releasing the genes back into the wild.
Where did I ever say I support the other variety, if until this point, I was unaware of its existence, hence asking for resources.

In response to the links you supplied:

http://www.amazon.ca/Mutation-Breeding-Theory-Practical-Applications/dp/0521036828/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200536610&sr=1-6

This resource talks about inducing mutations.

However, this is a link to a book you can buy from Amazon. The information available is very limited. From the description, the page previews, and the table of contents, it never mentions once that the results are used or to be used for a viable food source. Section 1.2 describes how "plant breeding" can be used to improve 'yield,' 'harvests,' or 'crops.' This, however is not 'mutation breeding.' From the book: "In most cases yield is considered in relation to food and fodder crops, but yield could also refer to the production of latex, fibers, wood, or number of flowers per unit of area"

From the first six pages, which are all that are available on the site, they push the issue that the technique applies to non-food crops, and never mention that current practice is to use these techniques on food crops.

They also don't specify mutagens or radiation. For this one, I concede nothing.

The second link: https://www.vedamsbooks.com/no38082.htm
is much more interesting.

While it doesn't contain any content from the book except the table of contents, it does mention using gamma radiation to modify a fuel source. It also has a short excerpt stating "A large number of new promising varieties in different crops have successfully been developed world wide using both physical and chemical mutagens." It goes on to say that the developments include successes in edible crops and oils. The only thing is... they describe the process as experimental. Yes, they're studying it. Yes they're using radiation and chemicals to induce these changes. No, it doesn't hint that they are using the techniques as you claimed, and I quote "Most of the crops we eat today (including certified "organic" crops) have been produced by mutation breeding."

As I said before, I'm quite amused that the techniques actually exist. I am surprised. This is not enough to support your statement yet.

On to the 3rd link?
http://www.fnca.mext.go.jp/english/mb/mbm/e_mbm.html
This is an extraordinary resource.
Full text available discussing everything from chemical techniques to radiation. This includes a discussion of the inner workings of the cell.

This is exactly t

Show me a source other than TMNT, the DC universe, or the marvel universe that describes the use of radiation and mutagenic (carcinogenic) agents in order to produce viable food. I would be ever so entertained.

First in hydrogen bombs. But even in a tokamak breakeven conditions have been achieved. JT-60 did it in 1998, i.e. more energy got out than had been put in. ITER aims to go one step further: make a burning plasma. A burning plasma is one that given bootstrap heat perpetually self-heats itself on its own. After ITER they aim to fix the remaining problem: make the fusion plant cheap, and easy to maintain. The conditions inside a D-T fusion tokamak are hardly forgiving to the materials the reactor is made of.

The Japanese Government has a great set of scholarship programas for overseas students. You should try contacting the Japanese Embassy, and ask for information on the Mombusho (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology).

I'm not a physicist, but from what I can tell, the key phrasing in that article is "equivalent energy."

According to a half dozen other sites, you are correct, we have reached the break even point, with a radically different technique. The problem is that containment of the fusion has not exceeded 1.2 seconds, and required constant energy input to continue the reaction.

Ignition reactors will create a self-sustaining fusion reaction, so that the amount of energy to start it would be a one time thing. I would guess they mean exceed the break even point for a sustained reaction, which would be necessary if we intended to harness it somehow...

http://www.mext.go.jp/english/news/1998/06/980611. htm

Next they ought to combine efforts with these people, and with these folks to set up a recruitment program for pilots...