Tokyo Electric Power Company says it has determined that water containing radioactive substances leaked from a tank at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant for more than two years.
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Officials later found that the water level of a nearby tank had dropped since around November 2016. They say about 300 tons of water leaked from the tank.
Read more at Fukushima Tank Leaked 300 Tons Of Radioactive Water Since 2016
福島県伊達市の住民の個人被ばく線量を分析した論文に本人の同意がないデータが使われていた問題で、国の放射線審議会は25日、東京電力福島第1原発事故後に策定された放射線基準を検証する資料に引用していた同論文を削除した。事務局の原子力規制庁が「引用を差し控えるのが適切」と説明、委員から異論はなかった。
引用していた論文は、早野龍五東京大名誉教授と宮崎真福島県立医大講師の共著で、16年に英専門誌に掲載。
Re: A new abnormal: It is still two minutes to midnight
Date: January 24, 2019Humanity now faces two simultaneous existential threats, either of which would be cause for extreme concern and immediate attention. These major threats—nuclear weapons and climate change—were exacerbated this past year by the increased use of information warfare to undermine democracy around the world, amplifying risk from these and other threats and putting the future of civilization in extraordinary danger.
In the nuclear realm, the United States abandoned the Iran nuclear deal and announced it would withdraw from the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), grave steps towards a complete dismantlement of the global arms control process. Although the United States and North Korea moved away from the bellicose rhetoric of 2017, the urgent North Korean nuclear dilemma remains unresolved. Meanwhile, the world’s nuclear nations proceeded with programs of “nuclear modernization” that are all but indistinguishable from a worldwide arms race, and the military doctrines of Russia and the United States have increasingly eroded the long-held taboo against the use of nuclear weapons.
On the climate change front, global carbon dioxide emissions—which seemed to plateau earlier this decade—resumed an upward climb in 2017 and 2018. To halt the worst effects of climate change, the countries of the world must cut net worldwide carbon dioxide emissions to zero by well before the end of the century. By such a measure, the world community failed dismally last year. At the same time, the main global accord on addressing climate change—the 2015 Paris agreement—has become increasingly beleaguered.The United States announced it will withdraw from that pact, and at the December climate summit in Poland, the United States allied itself with Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait (all major petroleum-producing countries) to undercut an expert report on climate change impacts that the Paris climate conference had itself commissioned.
Amid these unfortunate nuclear and climate developments, there was a rise during the last year in the intentional corruption of the information ecosystem on which modern civilization depends. In many forums, including particularly social media, nationalist leaders and their surrogates lied shamelessly, insisting that their lies were truth, and the truth “fake news.” These intentional attempts to distort reality exaggerate social divisions, undermine trust in science, and diminish confidence in elections and democratic institutions. Because these distortions attack the rational discourse required for solving the complex problems facing humanity, cyber-enabled information warfare aggravates other major global dangers—including those posed by nuclear weapons and climate change—as it undermines civilization generally.
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Read more.
For more views and coverage, see here.
Mark Z. Jacobson
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Here is why nuclear, fossils with CCS, and biofuels should be excluded.
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For example, onshore wind and utility PV are now the cheapest forms of electricity in most countries, including the U.S. New nuclear today costs 4 to 6 times that of new solar or wind to produce the same electricity. Further, a nuclear plant takes 5 to 17 years longer between planning and operation than does a solar or wind farm.
Thus, every dollar spent on nuclear results in 1/5th the energy production and 5 to 17 years more coal and gas burning than if wind or solar were installed instead. This delay and lower energy production from new nuclear condemns millions more to die from air pollution, which today kills 4 to 9 million people worldwide.
By choosing to build several nuclear plants a decade ago that have yet to operate, China suffered an increase in its overall CO2 emissions by 1.4 percent between 2016 and 2017 rather than seeing a decrease of 3.4 percent if it had spent the money on wind and solar instead.
Given that many 100% renewable policies call for a full transition of electricity by 2035, and given the financial and time requirements of nuclear, it is all but impossible for any more than a few new nuclear plant to be in place in by then.
In terms of emissions, nuclear is not zero carbon. A new plant emits 9 to 37 times the carbon emissions over its life as onshore wind, partly due to the fossil fuels used in mining and refining uranium continuously and building the facility but more because coal and gas plants are emitting during the long planning-to-operation time of a nuclear plant.
Just as importantly, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, there is “robust evidence and high agreement” that nuclear power raises concerns about weapons proliferation, core meltdown, creation and storage of radioactive waste, and land-use degradation from mining. Wind and solar power do not have these concerns.
二本松市新エネルギー推進市民会議主催の小泉純一郎元首相講演会は二十三日、市民会館で開かれた。小泉元首相は「日本の歩むべき道」と題して、脱原発を訴えた。
同市は新エネルギーを推進し、エネルギーの地産地消を目指している。今回は「原発ゼロ・自然エネルギー推進連盟」の顧問を務める小泉元首相の講演を通じ、新エネルギーへの理解を深めてもらおうと企画した。
小泉元首相は東日本大震災と東京電力福島第一原発事故後、国内のほぼ全ての原発が停止しても電力不足による停電は発生していないため、脱原発は可能だと強調。
環境省は２４日、東京電力福島第１原発事故の帰還困難区域で捕獲したイノシシを、福島県浪江町の焼却施設で処理することで町と合意した。焼却しやすくするための発酵処理施設を新たに整備し、７月から年間約７００頭の処理を見込む。
（略）
周辺５町村の帰還困難区域で捕獲したイノシシを、牛ふんや米ぬか、木質チップを使い発酵処理した後、既存の施設で焼却する。環境省が２０１８年１～３月に行った実証試験では、発酵でイノシシを半分程度まで減量でき、解体しやすくなることが確認された。（共同通信）
Christian Ruhl
The U.S. Navy recently asked Congress for $139 billion to update its fleet of nuclear-powered submarines. Unlike “conventional” submarines, which need to surface frequently, nuclear submarines can cruise below the sea at high speeds for decades without ever needing to refuel. Defense planners expect that the new submarines will run on one fueling for the entirety of deployment—up to a half century.
The advantages of nuclear submarines over their conventional cousins raise a question about another component of the military arsenal: Why don’t airplanes run on nuclear power?
The reasons are many. Making a nuclear reactor flightworthy is difficult. Shielding it from spewing dangerous radiation into the bodies of its crew might be impossible. During the Cold War, when the threat of nuclear apocalypse led to surprisingly pragmatic plans, engineers proposed to solve the problem by hiring elderly Air Force crews to pilot the hypothetical nuclear planes, because they would die before radiation exposure gave them fatal cancers.
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But nuclear power came with its own problems. The reactor would have to be small enough to fit onto an aircraft, which meant it would release far more heat than a standard one. The heat could risk melting the reactor—and the plane along with it, sending a radioactive hunk of liquid metal careening toward Earth.
The problem of shielding pilots from the reactor’s radiation proved even more difficult. What good would a plane be that killed its own pilots?
To protect the crew from radioactivity, the reactor needed thick and heavy layers of shielding. But to take off, the plane needed to be as light as possible. Adequate shielding seemed incompatible with flight.
Still, engineers theorized that the weight saved from needing no fuel might be enough to offset the reactor and its shielding. The United States spent 16 years tinkering with the idea, to no avail. The Soviet Union pursued nuclear aircraft propulsion too, running up against the same problems. By 1958, an infamous article in Aviation Week, mostly made-up, claimed that the Soviets were already testing a functional nuclear airplane. Shortly after, President Dwight Eisenhower counseled calm and denounced the article as contrived. A representative of the Soviet program explained that “if we had flown an atomic-powered aircraft, we would be very proud of the achievement and would let everyone know about it.” Unfortunately for atomic-flight enthusiasts, both countries had little to brag about.
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Read more.
Environmentalists and nuclear watchdog groups are lining up against plans to build a $2.4 billion storage facility in southeastern New Mexico for spent nuclear fuel from commercial reactors around the United States.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Environmentalists and nuclear watchdog groups are lining up against plans to build a $2.4 billion storage facility in southeastern New Mexico for spent nuclear fuel from commercial reactors around the United States.
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New Jersey-based Holtec International has applied for a license to construct the facility about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Carlsbad. It would be capable of storing as much as 120,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste.
Opponents have concerns about the project’s legality, the safety of transporting the fuel across the country and potential environmental effects.
The US Department of Energy (DOE) has completed an environmental assessment clearing the way for the fabrication of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) fuel for advanced nuclear reactors at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL). Meanwhile, the US Department of Defense (DOD) has issued a Request for Information (RFI) for a small mobile reactor using HALEU fuel to provide electrical power in rapid response scenarios.
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The DOE’s HALEU is from used fuel from the Experimental Breeder Reactor-II (EBR-II), which operated at the site from 1964 to 1994. Since 2000, DOE has employed an electrometallurgical treatment process at the MFC to refine and downblend the used high-enriched uranium fuel from the now-decommissioned reactor. About 10 tonnes of HALEU has been produced as a result of this process and is currently stored at INL.
Many advanced reactor designs currently under development will require HALEU fuel, enriched to between 5% and 20% in fissile uranium-235 (U235). The low-enriched uranium fuel used in today’s nuclear power plants typically contains less than 5% U235. There are at present no commercial facilities in the US that are immediately capable of producing HALEU.
The decision means the federal government can fabricate HALEU fuel at INL from the lab’s existing HALEU feedstock – mostly from the treatment of EBR-II fuel but also from some other small quantities of HALEU stored at the site – to support the near-term research, development and demonstration needs of private-sector developers and government agencies, including advanced reactor developers.
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The mobile nuclear reactor is required to produce a threshold power of 1-10 MWe of generation, which it must be able to produce for at least three years without refuelling. It must weigh less than 40 tonnes and be sized for transportability by truck, ship, and C-17 aircraft. Designs must be “inherently safe”, ensuring that a meltdown is “physically impossible” in various complete failure scenarios such as loss of power or cooling, and must use ambient air as their ultimate heat sink, as well as being capable of capable of passive cooling.
Read more at USA clears way for HALEU
福島第１原発事故による賠償請求の説明会や相談会を開いている県司法書士会は２月２日、郡山市で、主に自主的に避難した被災者を対象とした無料相談会を開く。
県司法書士会ではこれまで、原子力損害賠償紛争解決センターの裁判外紛争解決手続き（原発ＡＤＲ）への申し立てを支援してきた。避難の際の引っ越し費用や交通費などが認められたケースがある一方、「原発ＡＤＲ」と聞くだけで尻込みする人も多いという。
司法書士の松本亮真さんは「証拠がないからといって諦めなくてもいい。
（略）
被災者の権利が実現するよう支援したい」と話している。相談会は午前１０時～午後４時。郡山市労働福祉会館１階第２会議室で。問い合わせは県司法書士会（０２４・５３４・７５０２）。【柿沼秀行】
A nuclear power plant in Byron, Illinois. Taken by photographer Joseph Pobereskin (http://pobereskin.com).
