Sunday, June 12, 2011

#Radioactive Strontium from Groundwater at Fukushima I Nuke Plant for the First Time

Radioactive strontium (strontium-89 and -90) was detected from the sub-drain pits at the Reactor 1 turbine building and the Reactor 2 turbine building. The samples were taken on May 18.

It is the first time that radioactive strontium was detected from the groundwater at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant.

The sub-drain pits are located outside the turbine buildings to collect groundwater so that the basements don't get flooded.

From TEPCO's press release on June 12, English labels added by me (measurement unit: becquerel/cubic centimeter):

In addition, strontium-89 and -90 were detected from the seawater samples taken on May 16 at 3 locations: at the water intake canals for the Reactors 1 through 4, inside the silt screen for the Reactor 2, and inside the silt screen for the Reactor 3.

From TEPCO's English press release on June 12 (measurement unit: becquerels/liter, or 1000 cubic centimeters):

The amount of strontium-90 in the seawater inside the silt fence for the Reactor 3 was 240 times as high as the legal limit allowed for nuclear plant operations.

Note that the sub-drain water analysis is in becquerels/cubic centimeter, and the seawater analysis is in becquerels/liter (1000 cubic centimeter). Obfuscate, obfuscate. I'll translate the numbers for the sub-drains into liters to compare. (Or if someone can do it for me, I'd much appreciate.)

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

In short: The Nuclear Reactor Complex has become the AK-47 of the 21 Century and it can and probably will be used against mankind by terrorists and or any Rogue Gov't.'s to poison the Earth!

Anonymous said...

Strontium 90 is a real 'blast from the past' for those who were children during the open air atomic test era. The stuff was showing up in cow milk in the areas downwind from the Nevada test sites. The 'downwinders' as they became known had all manner of maladies and cancers that they blamed on the tests and childhood leukemia cases were especially tragic and there were a lot of them.

That this poison is showing up in ground water is really bad news. Hopefully the concentrations are low and do not spread but I sure wouldn't use well water for human or animal consumption without having it tested first.

Anonymous said...

Robbie001 sez:

Give it time it only took a few months for it to show up in a few months more they may want to avoid this topic like the plague. I've got a feeling the public is being slowly boiled like a frog with all the constant "revelations" that revise the total release upwards. TEPCO and the JGOV played the media game perfectly they didn't report any damning information while the world media was watching. Now it comes out in incoherent dribs and drabs at press conferences that are poorly attended if at all.

The Sr-90 contamination path may point to the location of errant fuel. How does TEPCO expect to close the cooling loop in these shattered reactors? I haven't heard much on that subject lately. The waste water facility they just built had leaks wait until they try to recycle water in the broken RPV and primary containment. Do they even know where to direct the water? I think all their assumptions were based on the RPV and PC being relatively intact.

BTW, I would suggest to people new to this type of blog to use the "label" function found at the end of each article. The key words lead to related articles and comments it is a helpful feature.

Anonymous said...

TEPCO just started full-fledged operation of 2 filtering devices designed to remove radioactive cesium from sea water inside the silt fences near the water intakes.
According to NHK "each device is capable of treating up to 30 tons of seawater per hour. Tests showed the machines reduced cesium levels by 20 to 30 percent".
In other words: 720 tons of water that still contains 70-80% of its Cs-134 and Cs-137 contamination will be pumped into the ocean per day! No word about removing I-131, Sr-89 and Sr-90.

Up to 77,000 Bq/L I-131, 62,000 Bq/L Cs-134, 66,000 Bq/L Cs-137, 24,000 Bq/L Sr-89 and 7,300 Bq/L Sr-90 have been detected inside the silt fences just yesterday.

groundwater consultants said...

Groundwater is likely to play an even greater role for human development under changing climatic conditions hence the need for the resource to be well protected, and properly managed as a measure to mitigate climate change effects.

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