Friday, July 15, 2011

Radioactive Cesium from Shiitake Mushrooms Grown Indoors in Date City, Fukushima

(Update: 28 kg of Date City shiitake were sold within Fukushima. 129 kg of Motomiya City shiitake went to the fresh produce wholesale market in Tokyo, according to Asahi.)

1,770 becquerels per kilogram. That's the first since the government started the sample testing of food items. Date City is more than 50 kilometers northwest of Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant.

From Yomiuri Shinbun (10:08AM JST 7/16/2011):

厚生労働省は15日、福島県伊達市の施設栽培シイタケで暫定規制値(1キロ当たり500ベクレル)を上回る同1770ベクレルの放射性セシウムが検出され たと発表した。 本宮市でも560ベクレルを検出した。露地栽培シイタケではすでに同県内の16市町村で出荷が制限されているが、施設栽培シイタケで規制 値を上回ったのは初めて。政府は出荷制限を検討する。

The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare announced on July 15 that 1,770 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium was detected from shiitake mushrooms grown indoors in Date City, Fukushima Prefecture. The provisional safety limit is 500 becquerels/kg. Shiitake mushrooms grown in Motomiya City in Fukushima also tested 560 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium. Already, 16 municipalities in Fukushima Prefecture restrict the shipment of shiitake mushrooms grown outdoors. This is the first time that shiitake mushrooms that were grown indoors tested above the safety limit. The national government will consider the shipment restriction.

Where did this cesium come from, if the mushrooms were grown indoors? Is the indoor air just as contaminated as the outdoor air in Date City? Or was it the mushroom substrate blocks (for indoor cultivation) that were contaminated?

In the meantime, the minister in charge of the Fukushima nuke accident and the assistant of PM Kan apparently told the governor of Fukushima that the so-called "step 1" (stable cooling of the reactors, among others) of the so-called "roadmap" by TEPCO has been "successfully completed" (link is in Japanese).

July 17 is the so-called "deadline" to so-called "complete" the so-called "step 1". Upon the so-called "completion", the government is set to announce the reduction and/or elimination of the "emergency evacuation-ready zone". Never mind that is where the radioactive cows that ate the radioactive rice hay come from.

Date City was not even in the "emergency evacuation-ready zone" until June 30, even though the air radiation level had consistently measured high, the level of "planned evacuation zone".

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

this is a good news for TEPCO senior managers, they will now able to come and live near the reactor with their family. A truly long, healthy and happy life without terrible disease nor any risk of explosion or contaminated water from the corium leaking into the ground. They will be able to go swim in the sea every day. They should make their home "international resort hotels!".
Again, allowing life where it is too contaminated is genocide as far I am concerned. Their is also a risk that some of the persons responsible will be taken to the international court of justice for crime against humanity. I could go where there is high level of contamination and take the worst part of the highly contaminted items, and use it to literaly kill people by making them eating it. Would this be legal? Well, they are doing the same thing, with less concentration of the plutonium and other very bad isotopes.

moonkai said...

From I have understood watching the June 29th CRIIAD report is that being indoors does not prevent radiation exposure. They said "if you have high radioactive levels outside your doors, the rays go through the walls and irradiate as well" The levels decrease a little but staying indoors does not protect you from exposure. That might have happened with those mushrooms grown indoors, meaning outside of the farm must be highly contaminated.

I recall the govt calling onto people to remain indoors in march ... unbelievable !! So much incompetency is very laughable, even in these trying times.

Anonymous said...

Three times the legal limit of radioactive Cs found in mushrooms cultivated indoors?
And they don't know why?
Who needs 'baseless rumours' when the official information is like that?

Anonymous said...

In May, the government lifted their restrictions on outdoor log-grown shiitake in parts of Fukushima prefecture (http://www.mhlw.go.jp/english/topics/2011eq/index.html), clearly a dumb move if they can't even grow them inside safely.

I haven't felt comfortable buying any shiitake mushrooms because the logs/materials they're grown on could have come from Fukushima. The government is once again trying to go back to business as usual before it's safe to do so. After green tea and beef, this could be the next food scandal.

The government is doing more damage by ignoring and hiding risks until they end up on the evening news than if they were just honest about things in the first place. They've proven beyond a doubt that they can't be relied on.

nika said...

there is a difference between being irradiated and contaminated. these shiitake are contaminated which means they took up radioactive particles.

you can stand next to a gamma source - get lethal doses - and walk away without being contaminated - a dosimeter will not detect anything on you. there IS nothing on you but you will soon die due to tissue and organ failure. this is why those images of people being scanned by geiger counters after 3.11 was so extremely frustrating because that was absolutely uninformative for initial exposures. - especially on the little ones

mushrooms are well know bioaccumilators of radioactive nuclides - they are useful for cleaning up spills.

shiitake grow on solid logs or log-like cellulose substrate and the time from inoculation to fruiting is longer than the few months since 3.11 - i doubt its the growth medium.

that leaves you with the likely sources being radioactive water (most likely) and air (less likely to be a major source of contamination very far from Fukushima)

Anonymous said...

from france...
of course the jap. authorities (tepco+gov.) are strongly pushed by international nuke lobbies ( US+french) not to disclose & reveal the truth and the appropriate decisions to be implemented and taken urgently ( under such conditions population of Tokyo and from the suroundings (may be 30 to 40 millions poeple!) should have been driven away to try to protect their health! But at that time, it would have lead to a huge economical collapse and breakdown onto worlwide stockexchanges and not only on economical Jap. activities which also would have sustain a severe shock and decline! Maintaining the population in contaminated area means "see, no danger beyond visual distance from the plant"& business as usual": Japanes poeple are kindly requested to be spred with radiations and to die in silence in order to protect world business organisation! You were a population of samourais in the past.Now you have to stand -up to recall that to the poeple who bring you to the slaughterhouse!

Anonymous said...

Robbie001 sez:

Nika is right, many types of melanotic organisms have an affinity for radioactive contamination. Just as some species of Spiderwort are effected by ionizing radiation exposure (the stamen hairs changes from blue to pink).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tradescantia#Stamen_hairs_and_ionizing_radiation

"Organisms that make melanin have a growth advantage in this soil," says microbiologist Arturo Casadevall of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. "In many commercial nuclear reactors, the radioactive water becomes contaminated with melanotic organisms. Nobody really knows what the hell they are doing there."

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=radiation-helps-fungi-grow

http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2011/06/bioremediation-of-radiation-can-melanin.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1589573

http://www.asknature.org/strategy/3edf10d5be81cda6b5aabadfb9a0c424

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0265931X06000762

"Due to the large absorbing surface of the mycelium that grows in the upper parts of the soil mushrooms take up higher amounts of 137Cs and 40K than lichens. Besides these nuclides only the long-lived radionuclides125Sb and60Co could be measured; but not the short-lived fission-products144Ce,95Zr and95Nb which probably decayed before absorption into the mycelium. These nuclides, however, are present in lichens because of their surface structures which enable high foliar deposition."

http://www.springerlink.com/content/np2h7200768u0l51/

Anonymous said...

As a matter of comparison with Tchernobyl, dusts dropped over Europe & france in 1986: Data collected on spots in Year 1999/2000/2001( 15 years after the "spreading"!) by the CRIIRAD display following figures: northern France/Paris around 3000 Bq/M2, whereas south-east of France & Corsica Island diisplay figures between 20 000 & 40 000 Bq/M2. If northern France was not particulary affected in terms of "heavy" health consequences, Corsica however was highly hit by surnumerous cases of thyroidcancers that occur within years after the accident.These patients are cured in "la Timone" hospital special division of which was called "tchernobyl sector" by the doctors & patients themselves!
In Fukushima district MORIAI: Data collected in May by the CRIIRAD:490 000 Bq/M2! ; 700 000 Bq/M2 in WATARI sector.... Think over...

Anonymous said...

The mushrooms were contaminated by the irrigation water. There is more to be concerned about than just radioactive particles. Many of the isotopes are gasses that fallout in rain and then get into reservoirs and ground water. All questionable water must be avoided. Food crops grown with this water must be avoided as well.
What we are facing is the end of civilization as we know it. What will replace it has been planned by the same corrupt occult elite that created this catastrophe. Search Georgia guide stones to get an idea of their evil plans.
The most valuable commodities in the future will be safe food and water.
I pray for the people of Japan, especially the children.

Anonymous said...

M-A-Y-B-E, the Japanese need more of these;

watch?v=lBB8puMtwJM

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