Fukushima Could Have Been Worse...And WILL Be

Fukushima Could Have Been Worse...And WILL Be


From TC Burnett

Exclusive to Rense.com

4-24-11



Fukushima Daiichi is releasing 154 teraBecquerels of radionuclide particulate matter a day. Almost all of the reports repeat the statement that Fukushima has (so-far) released only about 10~ of the radiation Chernobyl released. No problem. Well, they say, "It COULD have been worse."

IT WILL BE!



Chernobyl is over. Fukushima hasn't really begun. Chernobyl released a huge radioactive cloud when it blew up. Fukishima will exceed the Chernobyl release in a year no matter what else happens. It will easily exceed the fallout created by all 2000+ nuclear tests - which were stopped because enough tests make a nuclear war unnecessary. Once you irradiate all the plants and all the animals and all the fish and all the people, dropping bombs is superfluous.

Those melting nuclear cores aren't going away. There are additional differences. Chernobyl didn't dump radioactive water into the world's primary fishing waters. Fukushima will have to dump highly radioactive water into the oceans for many years just to PREVENT a Chernobyl-type accident ­ Fukushima will be many times worse than Chernobyl and will continue for, possibly, hundreds of years.



I was asked yesterday how soon someone could go back to the area of Fukushima Daiichi, buy land, build a house and do a little farming and fishing. 20,000 years. "No, really." Well...three hundred years after the last fission reaction stops. And then another 15,700 to allow all the isotopes it cooks up to decay. Yep. 20,000.



I have information from Yoichi 'boots on the ground' that smoke was emitting from the Kashiwazaki last week after the MAG 7,1 EQ. which occurred off Honshu on 7 APR 2011. I have further information that in addition to Fukushima Daiichi, the nuclear plants at Onagawa, Fukushima Daini, Tokai and now Kashiwazaki, were ALL damaged by the MAG 9.0 EQ of March 11 and are in shut-down status.



"I saw something really interesting today. I went to Google Earth (tm) and flew over Onagawa. The inlets north and south of the reactor and everywhere else I looked suffered enormous damage from the tsunami. Everywhere. But not even a stone was out of place at the Onagawa nuclear plant. The date on the map was 11 March, 2011.

The picture of the plant probably came from Digital Globe one minute before the tidal wave hit - but they may be from last year. I'll wager it doesn't look like that today."



The 'after' pictures show the disaster everywhere except at the reactor. I thought that was odd...so I looked at Fukushima Daiichi. The reactors are damaged - we have all seen the pictures - but the photo has been manicured. Take a look. I looked at Fukushima Daiini, only 11km south of Fukushima Daiichi. The tsunami destroyed the entire coastline but somehow didn't hit the reactor at all. Which is impossible. I ran out of time before I got to Tokai, but now you know where to look. The attached report is interesting.



TEPCO wanted to re-start the three reactors at Kashiwazaki (which were damaged in a 2007 earthquake and have been off ever since).

That is not an example of forward thinking - it is pure, naked desperation.



Their idea of restarting Fukushima Daiichi reactors #5 and #6 further supports desperation. There are so many problems at SEVERAL of their nuclear plants that rolling blackouts are now the norm.

Every functional nuclear plant is being pushed to the limit and beyond in order to maintain a semblance of normality - but they are ALL in bad repair and are sitting ducks for the next mega-quake....or for ONE overworked plant manager to make a bad decision. Or simply overuse.

As of March 23, neutron beams have been reported at least thirteen times at Fukushima Daiichi. The Japanese government states that these are not the result of criticality accidents and then go right on to state that limited fission may be occurring.



Do tell! If a neutron beam is observed at Fukushima, it is from a fission excursion. You can call it 'limited fission', 'not a criticality accident', 'bubbles in the bathtub' or any other name you like but nuclear criticality is the only thing that produces a neutron beam.



They are almost certainly leaving the isle of denial by now and coming to the belated realization that they can't stop it. Remember that 6 to 9 month plan for 'repair'? You won't hear that anymore.

Do you remember the idea of constructing a huge, steel tank to hold radioactive water? That probably won't happen. They would simply fill it up and wait for the next earthquake to breach it. Huge, steel water tanks do not survive MAG 6.9 earthquakes. But the water must keep flowing. 20 cubic meters of it an hour, or the genie wakes up.

Furthermore, it is now becoming more likely that a small Chernobyl-type explosion DID occur at Fukushima Daiichi reactor #3. I have to write the name out instead of abbreviating because there also seem to be problems at :



Onagawa reactor #3

Fukushima Daini reactor #3

Tokai Reactor #3

Kashiwazaki reactor #3



The evacuation zones are not going to be reduced at all - On April 23, while a school doctor was telling the kids that the radiation danger is over, the Japanese government was EXPANDING the evacuation zones. I didn't read the wording of that announcement yet but Jeff Rense' source in Japan said "The wording on the upcoming evacuation sounds eerily like expectation of another larger blast/meltdown."



Which is it? We already know. On March 12 when the fuel tubes ruptured and the fuel pellets began to fission and melt together, it no longer mattered whether ALL of them did or not. The ones which are fissioning will continue. The ones which haven't YET are merely waiting for the water to be turned off.



Again: SOME amount of fissile material is fissioning and continues to fission. It is in a steel can which is partially full of boiling water. There is not enough water to cover the fuel rods and too much to risk putting more water in - the container was not designed to hold water and it may rupture from the weight. It is, in effect, a nuclear cauldron. If they pump the boiling water out (and into the ocean), the core will probably explode. If they don't pump it out, the next earthquake will breach the can and spill boiling radioactive water all over... and THEN the core will explode.



They don't know the status of the fuel core. They cannot get near it. The heat and radioactivity melts robots and cameras. The core is protected by a hardened concrete caisson (called a containment vessel) which surrounds the reactor itself and is designed to protect them from bombs and airplane strikes AND TO KEEP THIS VERY THING FROM HAPPENING - but it is now cracked - so the bad stuff can get out and nothing can get in except some water through secondary lines. And the core is generating deadly radiation.



MULTIPLY THAT FOUR OR FIVE OR SIX TIMES. Welcome to Honshu.



About the only viable plan left is to run away, but there is nowhere to run. Or invent a scenario in which all of the remaining fuel is vaporized at once. Nuke all the cores at once and burn off all the fissile material. THEN you can compare it to Chernobyl. Or just wait and hope the extinction event doesn't happen in your lifetime - but it will. People will start dying in a big way by 2020. The ones still alive in 2034 won't necessarily be the luck ones.





Damage Needs Assessment Report - pdf