Radioactive Iodine Detected in Wide Areas of Europe Since Mid October

IAEA's press release mentions only Czech Republic and other areas in Europe.

According to NHK News (11/12/2011), CTBTO says Russia, Sweden, and Austria.

NHK adds Hungary and Germany.

IAEA says it is probably not from a nuclear power plant accident, and it is not from Fukushima, and it doesn't affect health because the amount is minute.

If CTBTO stations have been catching it, iodine-131 is airborne; you can't say someone treated for thyroid illness is peeing.

NHK News speculates the origin of this artificial iodine as follows:

放射性物質の「ヨウ素１３１」は、自然界に本来は存在せず、ウランなどの核分裂によって生成されます。原子力施設で重大な事故が起きた場合、ヨウ素１３１が外部に漏れ出すことがあります。旧ソビエトで起きたチェルノブイリ原発事故の際には、ヨウ素１３１が大量に放出され、被ばくした住民に深刻な健康被害をもたらしました。また、福島第一原発の事故でも大量に放出されました。ヨウ素１３１は、病気の検査や治療など主に医療用にも使われています。ヨウ素１３１をはじめ、医療や研究目的などで製造される放射性物質については、病院や研究所、企業などに安全に管理する責任がありますが、不適切な管理が報告されるケースも少なくありません。

Radioactive iodine-131 does not exist in nature. It is caused by nuclear fission of materials like uranium. When a serious accident happens in a nuclear facility, iodine-131 may be released into the environment. In the Chernobyl nuclear plant accident that took place in the former Soviet Union, a large amount of iodine-131 was released, causing grave health damage to the residents who were exposed to the nuclide. Iodine-131 was released in the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident. Iodine-131 is also used in the medical purposes like diagnosis and treatment. Hospitals, laboratories and corporations are responsible for the safe management of the radioactive materials including iodine-131 for medical and research purposes, there are cases reported of inappropriate management.

... meaning some hospital, lab, or manufacturer has been releasing iodine-131 by accident or by neglect, according to the insinuation of IAEA and NHK.

OK, so where is it coming from? IAEA says there is no health effect. (Paging Mr. Edano...)

Well, there was an earthquake that hit Turkey on October 23. There was a report/rumor on the Iranian state radio in Japanese that the "most dangerous in the world" Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant in Armenia was damaged in the earthquake. But if the CTBTO station in Austria started detecting iodine-131 on October 17 (1 nanosievert/hour max, 1/100 of the level seen after the Fukushima accident), the Armenian plant cannot be it.

IAEA's press release (11/11/2011):

The IAEA has received information from the State Office for Nuclear Safety of the Czech Republic that very low levels of iodine-131 have been measured in the atmosphere over the Czech Republic in recent days.

The IAEA has learned about similar measurements in other locations across Europe.

The IAEA believes the current trace levels of iodine-131 that have been measured do not pose a public health risk and are not caused by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident in Japan.

Iodine-131 is a short-lived radioisotope that has a radioactive decay half-life of about eight days.

The IAEA is working with its counterparts to determine the cause and origin of the iodine-131.

The IAEA will provide further information via its Website as it becomes available.

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Arnie Gundersen: "On-and-Off Recriticality Possible in Reactor 3"

I was listening the podcast of the interview Arnie Gundersen gave to Chris Martenson the other day (in order to translate into Japanese) and noticed something I had missed when I skimmed through the transcript for my post.

Gundersen is saying that 10% of the fuel core of the Reactor 3 may be repeating a re-criticality, on and off:

"Unit 3 may not have melted through and that means that some of the fuel certainly is lying on the bottom, but it may not have melted through and some of the fuel may still look like fuel, although it is certainly brittle. And it's possible that when the fuel is in that configuration that you can get a re-criticality. It's also possible in any of the fuel pools, one, two, three, and four pools, that you could get a criticality, as well. So there’s been frequent enough high iodine indications to lead me to believe that either one of the four fuel pools or the Unit 3 reactor is in fact, every once in a while starting itself up and then it gets to a point where it gets so hot that it shuts itself down and it kind of cycles. It kind of breathes, if you will.

"I think it's a relatively significant amount – maybe a tenth of the nuclear reactor core starts back up and shuts back down and starts back up and shuts back down. And that’s an extra heat load; you are not prepared to get rid of one tenth of a nuclear reactor’s heat by pumping water in the top."

Hiroaki Koide of Kyoto University suspected an on-and-off recriticality in the Reactor 1 back in early April when TEPCO announced, supposedly erroneously, chlorine-38 was detected. Dr. Tetsuo Matsui of Tokyo University suspected recriticality in the Reactor 2 and/or the Reactor 4 Spent Fuel Pool. Gundersen suspects an on-and-off recriticality in the Reactor 3 (or any of the Spent Fuel Pools).

Below is the chart of iodine-131 detection at the Federal Office of Radiation Protection in Germany, plotting the CTBTO station data from around the world. Station 38 is Takasaki, Gunma Prefecture in Japan, 218 kilometers (135 miles) from Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant. I always thought it was rather peculiar that there seemed to be periodic spikes in the amount of iodine-131 (also of cesium-137 but to a lesser degree) followed by a relatively calm, steady decline.

Could these spikes indicate what Gundersen is talking about? On-and-off recriticality?

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#Fukushima I Nuke Plant: Charts Showing Release of Radioactive Iodine and Cesium into Air May Be Going Up Again

Found them @Physics Forums, posted by clancy688 today. The poster doesn't link to the original site where the charts came from. Labels are in German, so they could be from DWD (Deutscher Wetterdienst), as CTBTO does not have a mandate to disclose the data.

CTBTO stands for "Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization", and "38" is their Takasaki Station in Gunma Prefecture in Japan.

It looks as if something had happened around April 18, and both cesium 137 and iodine-131 are on the rise again in a volatile fashion in Japan. The US West Coast is following suit.

I do not know and do not guarantee the authenticity of the charts.

Unit is becquerels in cubic meter, and the red dotted line indicates the highest daily amount in Germany (May 1, 1986 in Bavarian Forest) during the Chernobyl accident.

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#Fukushima I Nuke Plant Is Polluting the Entire Planet, Says the Preparatory Commission For CTBTO

No escape.

The Preparatory Commission for Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) announced on April 13, 2011 that the radioactive materials from the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant had reached the southern hemisphere:

- Update 13 April: radioactivity also measured in the southern hemisphere -

Since the double disaster of the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami that affected hundreds of thousands of people and seriously damaged the Fukushima Daichi power plant in Japan on 11 March 2011, minute traces of radioactive emissions from Fukushima have spread across the entire northern hemisphere. A monitoring network designed to detect signs of nuclear explosions picked up these traces from the stricken power plant.

To date, more than 35 radionuclide stations that are part of the International Monitoring System (IMS) have provided information on the spread of radioactive particles and noble gases from the Fukushima accident. The IMS is a global network that will comprise 337 facilities when complete. Sixty-three of the 80 planned IMS radionuclide stations are already operational and able to detect airborne radioactivity.

Initial findings

The first analysis results of the monitoring data became available a few days after the accident. A clear picture quickly emerged. Initial detections of radioactive materials were made on 12 March at the Takasaki monitoring station in Japan just 250 km away from the troubled power plant. The dispersion of the radioactive isotopes could then be followed to eastern Russia on 14 March and to the west coast of the United States two days later.

Spreading across the entire globe

Nine days after the accident, the radioactive cloud had crossed Northern America. Three days later when a station in Iceland picked up radioactive materials, it was clear that the cloud had reached Europe. By day 15, traces from the accident in Fukushima were detectable all across the northern hemisphere. For the first four weeks, the radioactive materials remained confined to the northern hemisphere, with the equator initially acting as a dividing line between the northern and southern air masses. As of 13 April, radioactivity had spread to the southern hemisphere of the Asia-Pacific region and had been detected at stations located for example in Australia, Fiji, Malaysia and Papua New Guinea.

(The full announcement at the link.)

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