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Previously-Secret 1955 Government Report Concluded that Ocean May Not Adequately Dilute Radiation from Nuclear Accidents

George Washington's picture




 

The operator of the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant has been dumping something like a thousand tons per day of radioactive water into the Pacific ocean.

Remember, the reactors are “riddled with meltdown holes”, building 4 – with more radiation than all nuclear bombs ever dropped or tested – is missing entire walls, and building 3 is a pile of rubble.

The whole complex is leaking like a sieve, and the rivers of water pumped into the reactors every day are just pouring into the ocean (with only a slight delay).

Most people assume that the ocean will dilute the radiation from Fukushima enough that any radiation reaching the West Coast of the U.S. will be low.

For example, the Congressional Research Service wrote in April:

Scientists have stated that radiation in the ocean very quickly becomes diluted and would not be a problem beyond the coast of Japan.

 

***

 

U.S. fisheries are unlikely to be affected  because radioactive material that enters the marine environment would be greatly diluted before reaching U.S. fishing grounds.

And a Woods Hole oceanographer said:

“The Kuroshio current is considered like the Gulf Stream of the Pacific, a very large current that can rapidly carry the radioactivity into the interior” of the ocean, Buesseler said.

“But it also dilutes along the way, causing a lot of mixing and decreasing radioactivity as it moves offshore.”

But – just as we noted 2 days after the earthquake hit that the jet stream might carry radiation to the U.S. by wind – we are now warning that ocean currents might carry more radiation to the at least some portions of the West Coast of North America than is assumed.

Specifically, we noted more than a year ago:

The ocean currents head from Japan to the West Coast of the U.S.

 

As AP notes:

The floating debris will likely be carried by currents off of Japan toward Washington, Oregon and California before turning toward Hawaii and back again toward Asia, circulating in what is known as the North Pacific gyre, said Curt Ebbesmeyer, a Seattle oceanographer who has spent decades tracking flotsam.

 

***

 

“All this debris will find a way to reach the West coast or stop in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” a swirling mass of concentrated marine litter in the Pacific Ocean, said Luca Centurioni, a researcher at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego.

Here is what the North Pacific Gyre looks like:

 

North Pacific Subtropical Convergence Zone Previously Secret 1955 Government Report Concluded that Ocean Wont Produce a Gradual Spread and Dilution of Radiation, But Will Produce Pockets and Streams of Concentrated Radiation

 

NPR reports:

CNN said that “the Hawaiian islands may get a new and unwelcome addition in coming months — a giant new island of debris floating in from Japan.” It relied in part on work done by the University of Hawaii’s International Pacific Research Center, which predicts that:

“In three years, the [debris] plume will reach the U.S. West Coast, dumping debris on Californian beaches and the beaches of British Columbia, Alaska, and Baja California. The debris will then drift into the famous North Pacific Garbage Patch, where it will wander around and break into smaller and smaller pieces. In five years, Hawaii shores can expect to see another barrage of debris that is stronger and longer lastingthan the first one. Much of the debris leaving the North Pacific Garbage Patch ends up on Hawaii’s reefs and beaches.”

Indeed, CNN notes:

The debris mass, which appears as an island from the air, contains cars, trucks, tractors, boats and entire houses floating in the current heading toward the U.S. and Canada, according to ABC News.

The bulk of the debris will likely not be radioactive, as it was presumably washed out to sea during the initial tsunami – before much radioactivity had leaked. But this shows the power of the currents from Japan to the West Coast.

An animated graphic from the University of Hawaii’s International Pacific Research Center  shows the projected dispersion of debris from Japan:

Simulation of Debris from March 11 2011 Japan tsunami Previously Secret 1955 Government Report Concluded that Ocean Wont Produce a Gradual Spread and Dilution of Radiation, But Will Produce Pockets and Streams of Concentrated Radiation

Indeed, an island of Japanese debris the size of California is hitting the West Coast of North America … and some of it is radioactive.

In addition to radioactive debris, MIT says that seawater which is itself radioactive may begin hitting the West Coast within 5 years.  Given that the debris is hitting faster than predicted, it is possible that the radioactive seawater will as well.

And the Congressional Research Service admitted:

However, there remains the slight potential for a relatively narrow corridor of highly contaminated water leading away from Japan …

 

***

 

Transport by ocean currents is much slower, and additional radiation from this source might eventually also be detected in North Pacific waters under U.S. jurisdiction, even months after its release. Regardless of slow ocean transport, the long half-life of radioactive cesium isotopes means that radioactive contaminants could remain a valid concern for
ears.

Indeed, nuclear expert Robert Alvarez – senior policy adviser to the Energy Department’s secretary and deputy assistant secretary for national security and the environment from 1993 to 1999 – wrote yesterday:

According to a previously secret 1955 memo from the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission regarding concerns of the British government over contaminated tuna, “dissipation of radioactive fall-out in ocean waters is not a gradual spreading out of the activity from the region with the highest concentration to uncontaminated regions, but that in all probability the process results in scattered pockets and streams of higher radioactive materials in the Pacific. We can speculate that tuna which now show radioactivity from ingested materials [this is in 1955, not today] have been living, in or have passed through, such pockets; or have been feeding on plant and animal life which has been exposed in those areas.”

Because of the huge amounts of radioactive water Tepco is dumping into the Pacific Ocean, and the fact that the current pushes waters from Japan to the West Coast of America, at least some of these radioactive “streams” will likely end up impacting the West Coast.

 

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Sun, 06/10/2012 - 12:07 | 2512142 ATG
ATG's picture

"And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 07:23 | 2488746 Treason Season
Treason Season's picture

Japanese company releasing mobile phone w/ radiation detector.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/softbank-unveils-worlds-first-pho...

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 03:40 | 2488654 supermaxedout
supermaxedout's picture

Guten Appetit.

Somehow the Fukushima tragedy is an irony, The so called peaceful use of atomic energy was pulled in the open by this accident. The main purpose of the Japanese reactors was to produce material for the bombs and warheads for the US military industry. 

There exists potocolls in Germany of the early sixties where the big power plant operators overthere like giant  RWE and others explain to the German government, that it is not profitable at all to produce electricity through nuclear reactors. For the reason, that the used radioactive material needs guarded storage for thousands of years, that no insurance exists in case of an accident, whcih means each accident could result in the bankruptcy of the company,  plus at that time oil and coal was still dirt cheap.

But the German government wanted to have these reactors anyhow because it had to promise to deliver to the US the material breeded in the reactors for further use in atomic bombs etc.

I assume, that in Japan the situation was not much different. So once the governments shouldered the uncalculatable tail risk for the nuclear reactors then suddenly the electricity produced there became dirt cheap. 

Its a pity that the things went in that direction then, because Japan by no doubt would have been otherwise one of the pioneers in renewable energy, since its ideal located for wind power, sea wave power etc.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 21:58 | 2488186 Ocean22
Ocean22's picture

I would prefer my oceans completely free of radiation, oil, garbage, pollution, chemicals of all sorts, dead Osama bin ladens and toe nail clippIngs if you don't mind.

I don't care if it does get diluted in a gazzillion gallons of sea water or not. Thats NOT the point It's still POLLUTION! Stop pollution the bloody water, air and food people . We are killing this fucking planet and therefore ourselves and our children. We think we are so smart.

Boy, do we have an eye opener coming. If aliens ever visit earth I be will hiding my head in shame. Even pigs don't shit where they sleep.

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 02:37 | 2488591 Element
Element's picture

 

I don't care if it does get diluted in a gazzillion gallons of sea water or not.

 

Well you should care, because that's called having no sense of proportion, without which it's not possible to keep things in perspective.  Plus it becomes impossible for such a person to make objective sense and assessments of the degree of actual risk that a chronic hazard to health and environmental integrity represents, in daily practice, exposure and long-term implications.  Which means you become hysterically reactive as well as absurdly puritanical, dippy and thoroughly unrealistic.

And so it is.

You should have a look into what elephants do to foliage when they eat, then you might understand that all sorts of animals temporarily destroy or damage the environment in the process of obtaining what they need from it. The trick the environment pulls to sustainably deal with that is for the 'repair' rate to be NET faster than the cumulative degradation.  It is entirely feasible that dilution (as pollution) and degradation still provides us the time and distance buffers necessary to allow nuclear decays and sedimentary burials and ecological repairs to occur.

For the Japanese marine environment that remains to be seen though.  I wouldn't eat anything from it for decades, even if all the leakage stopped today. 

In the interim, we also have some considerably more immediate and globally distributed and unrestricted challenges facing all of us, that won't be ignored, nor take the back seat.  I'll just assert that these are potentially more damaging, unhealthy, environmentally degrading, and definitely much more lethal (that's this sense of proportion thing kicking in again).

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 12:15 | 2487246 Hobbleknee
Hobbleknee's picture

In the graphic, the radiation reaches the coast of California around year 2.25.  But in reality, it's only been 1.2 years, and the radiation has already reached the coast.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 15:08 | 2487538 Uncle Remus
Uncle Remus's picture

Recon.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 21:22 | 2488117 fourchan
fourchan's picture

short hawaii, long garbage 2015

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 11:08 | 2487147 Element
Element's picture

Not buying this idea that it can't be diluted enough by the ocean. 

Nor that heavy metals tend to stay within the water column, and thus are highly mobile.  Changes in salinity, pressure, temperature and acidity alters the atomic metals solubility of sea water. 

If these factors supporting and controlling metals solubility declines, the solubility of metal in solution (i.e. not in 'suspension', as we aren't talking about particulates, we are talking about metal cations which are net positive charge atoms that easily incorporate into clay mineralogy's. As the factors supporting solubility declines (each metal has its own solubility concentration in water), the subsequently insoluble fraction of the metal, instantly precipitates out of solution, and is progressively taken up within sedimentation and biological overturning of this freshly laid sediment pile. 

And if one tonne of water is emitting radiation that's 10,000 times higher than the allowable limit, you can mix it with 10,000 tonnes of sea water ... and now it more or less isn't a danger, unless it precipitates, or is concentrated biologically in tissues and bones. 

200,000 tonnes of highly-radioactive water is pretty much laughably insignificant in the total volume of the North Pacific ocean basin water volume (people need to get a sense of proportion about this stuff), but certainly would be detected, and very easily at great distances, but will rapidly lose concentration to low-levels within several hundred kilometers of the reactor site.

As I've pointed out before, the heavy metals tend to integrate very quickly into plate-like minerals in fine marine sedimentary clays, that are very prevalent in river mouth tidal estuaries, and delta's, and also on the bottom of mid-shelf littoral troughs and flats

i.e. these are the fish 'nursery' areas, and the actual prime catch zones.

So the really chronic hazard will be within central Japan's east-coast fishery zone, mostly well within its EEZ. 

The marine story has always been about cumulative ingestion via biological concentration, primarily from filter-feeders eating microbial and cellular biological detritus, then to shellfish, crustaceans, fish ... and on to us.  So I wouldn't eat ANY food or medicines caught in seas along the central Japanese east coast, for several decades.   Migratory predator fish will also create problems. 

Then, just maybe the hazard will have decreased to edible levels, as long as you only eat it occasionally.

(although marine life has no choice but to eat it ... and that is not good)

The reality of this is more than sufficenty serious without people always hyping further, to a point where it just becomes wild-eyed BS.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 11:34 | 2487198 TradingTroll
TradingTroll's picture

So you're not buying it. Well whoop-de-doo. It was written by a scientist you know,. and who the fuck are you?

 

 

I remember the acid rain from factories in the US Northeat ruining Eastern Canada. That 'equal distribution' thingie didnt work out well in that scenario either.

 

"The reality of this is more than sufficenty serious without people always hyping further, to a point where it just becomes wild-eyed BS."

 

The reality? Like MSM covers this at all? You surely jest, you fool. Any overhyping merely moves the average coverage of Fukushima from page 17 to page 16. Its necessary, and George is to be applauded. Show me one MSM article where this research from the 50's is dissected and discussed.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 19:55 | 2487968 Element
Element's picture

You seem to fall well inside the wild-eye BSing camp.

Who am I?  A scientist with authorship of peer-reveived papers in my field of geology (and I'm far from impressed by a 60-something year-old paper that's theoretically claiming to KNOW about ocean circulation, mixing and dilution ... what utter bullshit!).

And what are you then? ... Mr "Trading Troll"?

I think this article of GWs is over-blown and basically nonsense.  I'm just calling that as I see it.

As I pointed out, the serious longer term chronic health concern is on the Eastern Japanese litorral, and mostly within their EEZ.

People can make all the dumb hyperbolic claims they want about currents and rates of diffusion into the environment, etc., but what is happening is people are simplistically extrapolating the textbook memes into computer models, but not measuring and observing the happenings, first-hand. 

Garbage in = Garbage out

That will never cease to be true. 

The point of FACT remains, that if you mix one tonne of highly-contaminated water with a million tonnes on not contaminated water, you eventually get 1-million tonnes of easily measurable, but now EXTREMELY LOW-LEVEL radioactive contamination in it.

Oh, you're not buying that? ... well whoop-de-doo Mr Trading Troll.

Almost ALL of the dissolved metals and particulates will NOT stay dissolved or suspended and thus mobilised, it will go into sediments and into biological structures, which may or may not work their way up the food chain (remobilise it).  Only a small but readily detectable remnant will remain mobilised in areas of the water column itself, at any given time.

The serious contamination is going to be within the SEDIMENT AND THE SESILE OR PELAGIC BIOLOGICAL STRUCTURES, just off the East Japanese coast and littoral.

The serious contamination is NOT off the US west coast, and it is NEVER going to be off the US west coast.  The RADIATION (not the debris) that may show up off the US west coast waters will be EXTREMELY DILUTE, compared to the near-Japan impact.  Japan, and near Japan is where almost all of the significant impact is.

If you can't grasp this, you are just not very bright. 

But if you were actually interested in understanding the situation you would in fact welcome commentary that challenged you to examine your pet confirmation-bias.

 

The situation I described is more than sufficiently problematic without listening to dumb people stupidly making shit-up about what has transpired and its most likely geographical impact, and environmental and health implications. 

But I would like to hear what several actual marine geochemists and marine sedimentation specialists would have to say on the topic. 

I'll leave it up to you to prod the MSM to examine a 60 year-old paper about a theoretical speculation (good luck with that, you'll need it).

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 09:28 | 2488865 Dugald
Dugald's picture

Fine, you are a scientist....so how long will radioactive water be pumped into the pacific ocean, my take is it is going to be many years, if I am correct are you still cosy about the situation where an ongoing supply of radioactive water is going into a fairly static quantity of water.

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 09:41 | 2488873 Element
Element's picture

That would be a gross misreading of what I said.

I took some effort to be very clear that there is a real problem, that it is on-going, what it is, and where it is.

I don't see where you have contributed anything to the discussion.

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 08:58 | 2488847 Blue Dog
Blue Dog's picture

I agree with you. I also think that the dangers from radiation have been exaggerated by the environmentalists who wish to demonize nuclear power. The PBS show "Nature" had a program about all the wildlife living in Chernobyl and how healthy all the animals looked. Based on what we were told about nuclear power and radiation we would've expected a complete dead zone empty of all life or filled with very sick and deformed animals. You can see a clip from the show here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=339ZGwWQVXM

Sun, 06/03/2012 - 10:27 | 2488926 Element
Element's picture

Chernobyl was certainly hyped, distorted and lied about to the max by environmentalists to induce fear, but it is still a real contamination zone.

Maybe one thing to be careful about in concluding that is to remember that humans tend to live longer than most animals, and ingest more matter, so potentially can accrue more damage from internal emitters, and also external radiation emitters. 

Plus health complications can stem from unrelated diseases that become complicated and more damaging due to the weakening and sapping effects of chronic radiation exposures.

There is abundant historical evidence from atmospheric nuclear testing and the nuclear attacks on Japan that radioactive fallout creates terrible diseases, like leukaemia, lung cancer, bone cancer, and thyroid tumours.  Many of these were once a death sentence but now often aren't within developed prosperous countries.  But elsewhere you've got a real good chance of dieing from them.

It is also true that Hiroshima and Nagasaki are both thriving cities today, full of healthy people, so clearly a time is reached where the decay and dilution within the environment becomes more or less readily survivable on a longer-term basis.  So the surrounding environmental pollution is just fading away, and becoming immobilised, ceaseing to be a major health hazard to locals.

Chernobyl's surrounds may be arguably viable to live in again, but the building surrounding that old decomposing reactor core certainly isn't, and may collapse and remobilise a highly radioactive dust plume into the surrounding area.  That seems to be the prime reason to not live there.  So I'd want to know if that outer structure really is as structurally unsound and ready to collapse, catastrophically, as people keep claiming, for about the past 20 years.

It would not surprise me to find that other than parts of it being open to air flow, and to bird and insect life moving in an out of it, there's nothing much structurally wrong with it.  The talk about building a new containment structure seems to be more about doing something that will be more viable, longer term, rather than due to fear that the old structure is going to come crashing down. 

(have a look at it, it appears to be pretty fricken sturdy!)

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 19:57 | 2487996 JamesBond
JamesBond's picture

you mean like the global warming 'model' hyperbole....

spot on analysis.

 

jb

 

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 09:33 | 2487084 sharkbait
sharkbait's picture

.....The operator of the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant has been dumping something like a thousand tons per day of radioactive water into the Pacific ocean......

negative 1000 ponts for vague use of attention getting language.   "Dumping"  does that mean proactively discharging with pumps or does it include normal rainwater runoff and groundwater seepage?  'radioactive water', how radioactive.  With a sensitive enough scale, a lot of water quaifies as radioactive.  Is this melt your face radioactive or flying in 747 or getting an xray radioactive?

You write some good stuff but you lose credibility when you use emotionally laden jargon intended to evoke a visceral response that doesn't really provide meaningful information.  

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 11:12 | 2487174 dcb
dcb's picture

@shark, sorry but you are really wrong about this one. the japs have been pumping water into the piles to keep them clean. they expected to find a certain amouint when they looked in. it wasn't there, a huge amount was leaking through the ground into the sea. in effect dumping thousands of tones of radioactive water into the sea each day.

I've come to the conclusion that there are operatives who are paid to follow george because the wqay he gets attacked is different than anybody else on this site. I give crap to almost everryone when they deserve it. Now you attack george, he does provide some source data, but then you in fact provide no supporting data to support your positions. George posted the tuna data, but nobody then provides supporting data to compare to background, etc. It's really fishy. Plus where do all these people come from who seem to know this esoteric crap reading zerohedge. It just doesn't fly. When george was doing the stuff on bp there were all these opil experts telling how wrong he was. But he turned out to be right. bp and the government were telling lies about the amount of oil released, they were making sure th epress didn't have access, etc.

In regards to fukushima george has also been largely correct in the reports saying it was much worse than they were saying, and once more there really seems to have been an overt governmet industry cover up. That is rather well documented, and all one needs to do is follow what is happening in japan and the scandals.

 A large amount of radioactive water escaped into the ocean, through leaks and the dumping of 11,500 tons of seawater that was used to cool the reactor during the emergency.

http://calpirg.org/reports/caf/too-close-home

April 26, 2012
Mainichi Japan

TOKYO (Kyodo) — The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant said Wednesday that work is now fully in progress to build a wall along the Pacific coast, where the nuclear complex is located, to reduce the risks of further contaminating the sea with radioactive substances.

http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/2012/05/04/work-on-leakage-prevention-wall-at-fukushima-plant-fully-in-progress/

and this

TOTAL Ocean Radiation Release
 
“In October, a U.S. study – co-authored by oceanographer Ken Buesseler, a senior scientist at the non-profit Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Woods Hole, Mass., – reported Fukushima Daichi alone caused history’s biggest-ever release of radiation into the ocean – 10 to 100 times more than the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe.” http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/After%2BFukushima%2Bfish%2Btales/5994237/story.html#ixzz1jfk19Yl6
 
Read more: Fukushima already ten times worse than Chernobyl just with what went into the ocean waters, suggests data Saturday, June 11, 2011 Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032678_Fukushima_ocean.html#ixzz1P1ShowKB 
 
Of course, these radiation releases continue through leaks from the basements of Fukushima, and from radiation releases from the site, so it is only getting worse. There is no total yet, because the disaster is not over yet and accidental ‘spills’ are still happening from the Fukushima plant, with unknown amounts ending up in the ocean..
 
The nuclear explosion at Unit #3 spent fuel pool blew uranium and plutonium pellets as well as particles, dust and melted fuel in a radius of up to 3 kilometers. Since the plant sits right next to the ocean, much of this highly radioactive fuel went into the ocean, and is sitting on the bottom, radiating all of the ocean water that is going by, plus all of the sea life. What Really Happened At Fukushima Reactor And Spent Fuel Pool #3? 
 
High-level radiation found over 300 km stretch off Fukushima ... May 28, 2011 ... For more information see: Fukushima I Nuke Plant: High Concentration of Radioactive Cesium in the Ocean Soil in 300-Kilometer Strip Along ... http://www.enenews.com/high-level-radiation-found-over-300-km-stretch-reconcentration-of-radioactive-substances-observed-tepco-had-said http://agreenroad.blogspot.com/2012/02/total-fukushima-radiation-released-into.html#!/2012/02/total-fukushima-radiation-released-into.html

@George: you are taking a lot of BS, from BSer's. they attack yiou but provide no supporting data. everyone who reads these doubters should take note of their style, and the language (very emotive) to discredit and discount george without really providing data to say george isn't wrong. These are classic smear tactics, and one should easily see through them having seen it most of our lives. At the same time george, you need to reference yourself much much less. source the original data, not yourself. That's bad form.

@all: For those who attack george and use emotive lanaguage to discredit him, but don't use my style and but not just say you are wrong, and here is the data, readers shouldn't trust those people. see above as to how it's done in the proper way and not some troll who seems to be being paid to influence public opinion

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 14:30 | 2487473 sharkbait
sharkbait's picture

I was not agreeing or disagreeing with the message.  But state them with definitive precision rather than vague but significant sounding innuendo

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 18:12 | 2487860 skank
skank's picture

whatever...

innuendo gets me hard !

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 05:27 | 2486979 mrdenis
mrdenis's picture

.....Anybody know who won on DWTS last night ,my granpa wants to know ....I was up all night watching the vid of radioactive waste hitting the beaches of CA.....

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 04:56 | 2486973 AurorusBorealus
AurorusBorealus's picture

and the name of the star is called wormwood; and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, for they were made bitter.

Anyone know how to translate Chernobyl into English?

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 13:30 | 2487381 Fascist Dictator
Fascist Dictator's picture

Chernobyl is Ukrainian for Wormwood.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 04:38 | 2486956 chebetts
chebetts's picture

Here's the late Dr.Bob Beck telling you how to cure cancer and all known human diseases. Blood electrification, as well as other things.  The medical industry is exactly like Wall St. and our government, a customer cured is a customer lost etc. WORD

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbAjfm0J134&list=PLC48DA25F1CBFA833&index...

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 00:49 | 2486793 Walt D.
Walt D.'s picture

George:

Isn't this the same reason that tuna and swordfish get contaminated with mercury (another heavy metal)?

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 00:43 | 2486790 monad
monad's picture

Go Go Godzilla!

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 23:59 | 2486734 Jim in MN
Jim in MN's picture

TEPCO recently admitted it had underestimated the nuclear release by 60%.  Their new cesium 137 estimate of 360,000 terabequerels is about 4.25 times that from Chernobyl. But they still don't count the vast majority of the water as 'released'. 

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T120523005514.htm

Multiples of Chernobyl when it comes to long-lived isotopes (Chernobyl had less irradiated fuel and blew out a lot of short-lived iodine and tellurium).  Don't let anyone fool you otherwise.  And, yes, still ongoing.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 13:40 | 2487401 AnAnonymous
AnAnonymous's picture

Usually, when US citizens admit something, it is when they are beyond the point of no return, meaning that no matter what, they can not be stopped in their endeavour (or estimate they can not be) so they tell.

TEPCO must be confident enough they have reached the point and it is now their ways or their ways, no alternative.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 23:49 | 2486721 bankruptcylawyer
bankruptcylawyer's picture

the ocean is extremely vast. if you're worried about nuclear contamination of the oceans, 

jsut ask the russians. they've done more than their fair share of polluting the oceans with radioactive cores of nuclear powered submarines and decommissioned icebreakers. 

 

it is likely the tepco situation is still actually getting worse, and this is the problem. if it could be solved politically, it wouldn't be a problem. 

japan is broken, the reactors will sit there until the chinese invade japan and force them to solve their problems , or simply kill the japanese , take authority, and then clean it up themselves. 

the japanese are totally incapable of solving their problems. they are literally waiting for a massive crisis in their country. too many old people and too much institutional imperative and reverance for authority in a culture will take a nation to the brink of debilitation and dependance.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 10:43 | 2487141 General Decline
General Decline's picture

Speaking of Russians and loosey-goosey nuclear power...

 

 

http://englishrussia.com/2009/01/06/abandoned-russian-polar-nuclear-lighthouses/

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 22:31 | 2486661 bigwavedave
bigwavedave's picture

Surf's Up Dude

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:16 | 2486543 world_debt_slave
world_debt_slave's picture

should be some instresting, new discoveries of unknown life forms in the Pacific for generations to find

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:24 | 2486554 dexter_morgan
dexter_morgan's picture

Not to be a downer here, but they detonated 23 nuclear devices in the Bikini Atoll between 1946 and 1958, but no new life forms have been discovered thus far, in fact sea life is thriving there. Just don't eat the coconuts.......

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:47 | 2486598 world_debt_slave
world_debt_slave's picture

yeah, I watched a vid on that, and how the US gov lied to the natives that lived there that they could return after the tests. Also, US Navy sailors that were on those radiated ships after the test without any radioactive protective gear. One sailor put a small rock in his pocket for a souvenier and later in life died a horrible death.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:15 | 2486539 Westcoastliberal
Westcoastliberal's picture

Thanks again, GW for keeping the masses up to date on what's really going on.

Clif High's web bots have been predicting we would see a lot more use of the words "radioactive" and "radioactivity" in the near future, especially as it

relates to food. See what you think of this timeline: http://halfpasthuman.com/summertime.html

Good luck everyone.  We will need it.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:23 | 2486552 Buck Johnson
Buck Johnson's picture

Where going to find out that much of our seafood won't be able ot be eaten in the near future.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:52 | 2486511 CPL
CPL's picture

Enjoy the Chilean Sea Bass and Tuna.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:53 | 2486505 Pee Wee
Pee Wee's picture

The way to effectively control nuclear power is to distribute it.  Smaller is better.  Subs & carriers use it, why not distribute the solution to local co-ops and diversify/contain the radiation risks at the same time?

Why not fix the power grid while the next generation of power-workers are out?

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:41 | 2486494 strangeglove
strangeglove's picture

Mah Balls hurt.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 15:20 | 2487562 WmMcK
WmMcK's picture

And mine feel like a pair of maracas. Apologies to Zappa.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:41 | 2486491 snblitz
snblitz's picture

The dilution principle fails to take into account that fish are concentrators.  So even if the PPM goes way down in the ocean, the fish concentrate it back up in their bodies.  Then we are silly enough to eat them.  There are videos on youtube of people demonstrating current cans of tuna with twice background levels of radiation.  Has someone been dumping radioactive waste without telling us?

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 09:25 | 2487079 Getting Old Sucks
Getting Old Sucks's picture

What about cruise ships?  They make their own water from sea water.  Do those machines filter this radiation out?  Haven't heard anyone speak of this, but I'm assuming there are a lot of people cruising the Pacific right now not knowing they're killing themselves.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 01:51 | 2486842 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

Not just the fish, but everything from the plankton up to the whales; bioaccumulation works its way up the food chain. And as you said, "Then we are silly enough to eat them."

As for the extra radioactive waste, I know a Russian nuclear sub went down a few years back, and I'm sure there have been many other unreported or under-reported stories of this kind. 

What I really wonder about is inter-generational bioaccumulation. By this, I mean the accumulation of toxins and radionuclides passed down from mother to child to grandchild, and so on. The question I have is whether there is a point beyond which reproduction itself becomes impossible, and I think the answer is yes, based upon some animal studies. Outcomes that are determined by cumulative exposures, rather than acute exposures, are not well studied, but I suspect that more developed countries have higher rates of cancer and other kinds of disease largely due to the accumulated exposures of all their ancestors, which are far higher than in developing countries.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:19 | 2486451 Homeland Security
Homeland Security's picture

Remember kids "Dilution is the solution to radioactive ocean polution!"

Your parents had "Duck and Cover!" Now, you have your own phrase to tell your children.

What exciting times these are.

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 23:30 | 2486704 Terrorist
Terrorist's picture

Can I have your home address? I need to mail you something.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 00:01 | 2486743 Homeland Security
Homeland Security's picture

Of course -

Secretary Janet Napolitano
Department of Homeland Security
U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528

Anything you provide may be of help.

Sat, 06/02/2012 - 10:53 | 2487156 TSA gropee
TSA gropee's picture

Ha, funny thread. +1

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:09 | 2486437 Red Heeler
Red Heeler's picture

Now we'll find out who's genetically predisposed to contract cancer from cesium exposure.

Bullish Natural Selection

Fri, 06/01/2012 - 21:13 | 2486531 Divine Wind
Divine Wind's picture

 

 

 

The human body treats cesium the same as potassium. Straight to the muscles. It is referred to as a 'muscle seeker'.

That pretty much includes everyone.

 

This is also why the cesium concentrates in the meat of the fish which is also muscle.

 

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Fri, 06/01/2012 - 20:01 | 2486431 Divine Wind
Divine Wind's picture

Threat Journal was warning about this back in August.

 

http://www.threatjournal.com

 

Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site!