OT: Zoom, Zoom...Goes His Majesty's Honda Integra...

Footage is from 2009 NHK documentary. His car is 1991 Honda (Acura) Integra, stick shift. (It's clearly doctored, but...)

Tweet

180 Peaches from a Town in #Fukushima to Be Offered to the Imperial Household (Again)

Deja vu. Since they did exactly the same thing last year when the higher levels of radioactive cesium were being detected in peaches, why not this year, too?

As Yomiuri presents the story, the peach farmers in Koori-machi in Fukushima seems eager to use the Imperial Family as the endorsement of the safety of their peaches.

From Yomiuri Shinbun (8/8/2012):

皇室「献上桃」、１８０個厳選し箱詰め…福島

Fukushima - 180 hand-picked peaches packed, to be offered to Imperial Family

福島県桑折(こおり)町で８日、皇室への「献上桃」の選果と箱詰式が行われた。９日に皇室に献上される予定。

A ceremony to pick the peaches to be offered to the Imperial Family was conducted in Koori-machi in Fukushima Prefecture on August 8. The peaches will be presented to the Imperial Family on August 9.

作業は８日、同町のＪＡ伊達みらい桑折総合支店で行われた。町内で収穫された桃のうち、糖度や大きさなどの基準を満たした１０２０個から、形や色合いが特に優れた１８０個を厳選して箱詰めした。

The work was done at the JA Date Mirai Koori Branch on August 8. 1020 peaches were selected first from all the peaches harvested in the town which cleared the standards for sweetness and size. From those 1020 peaches, 180 was carefully hand-picked that were of particularly high physical beauty in terms of shape and color, and packed in the boxes.

同町は桃の産地として知られ、東京電力福島第一原発からは６０キロ・メートル以上離れているが、原発事故後は風評被害に悩まされ、同ＪＡによると、今年出荷した桃の価格も震災前に比べて７～８割に低迷しているという。大橋信夫組合長（６４）は「農家は皇室への献上を誇りにしている。風評被害に負けず頑張っていきたい」と話していた。

The town is well-known for its peaches. It is more than 60 kilometers away from TEPCO's Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant, but it has suffered baseless rumors after the nuclear accident. According to the JA Date Mirai, the prices of this year's peaches are about 70 to 80% of the pre-disaster prices. Co-op president [of the branch] Nobuo Ohashi (age 64) says, "Farmers are proud to be offering to the Imperial Family. We will fight the baseless rumors and do our best."

Baseless rumors. Many farmers and government officials in Fukushima have said "baseless rumor" to any detection of radioactive materials less than the government safety standards (first it was 500 becquerels/kg provisional limit, then the current 100 becquerels/kg, for cesium), even though the testing was "monitoring" - i.e. sampling - and less than 1% of vegetables shipped were tested at least initially.

So how "baseless" (radioactive) are the peaches from this particular town (Koori-machi) this year? According to the Fukushima prefectural government site, a government-funded organization is measuring the radiation of the peaches grown in Fukushima. It is still a sample monitoring, taking peaches from all peach growers in Fukushima. The measurement is done using NaI scintillation survey meter, and as long as there is no detection above 50 becquerels/kg, the organization declares it "safe".

For peaches from Koori-machi,

• No. of peaches tested: 739 (from 6/25 to 8/5/2012)

• No. of peaches with less than 25 Bq/kg of cesium: 727 (98%)

• No. of peaches 25 to 50 Bq/kg of cesium: 12 (2%)

(Screen capture of the test results for peaches in Koori-machi, from the Fukushima prefectural government webpage)

Koori-machi's percentage of peaches with cesium between 25 to 50 Bq/kg is the second highest among cities and towns whose peaches are being tested. (The highest percentage, 3%, is from Date City.)

They don't even know (or care to know) exactly how much below 25 Bq/kg.

There are a few tests of peaches from Koori-machi done by the prefectural government, using the germanium semiconductor detector. So far this year, two samples out of 6 tested positive for radioactive cesium, and the highest was 10.24 Bq/kg. Detection limits are rather high, between about 5 and 10 Bq/kg.

(Screen capture of the Fukushima Prefecture's "Fukushima Shin Hatsubai" search result of the sampling tests of peaches in Koori-machi, in English)

The tweet with the link to this Yomiuri article was tweeted by someone I follow, a university researcher who has been vigorously testing the everyday food items that are being sold in the marketplace and cautioning people. He tweeted the link, and and his comment was "With no comment".

I've read anecdotes of farmers in Fukushima, shyly offering visitors if they would like to try their pickled vegetables (or any other food items) that they grew and made, saying "Only if you want to try, we have it tested and there was no radioactive material". I think it's a sad, painful story. But the farmers in the above Yomiuri article don't seem to have any problem, pushing their produce to the Imperial Family which has small children.

Oh yes it's all because of TEPCO's accident, and the farmers are victims.

Tweet

#Radiation in Japan: Small News and Baseless Rumors

Loose ends of small news and "baseless rumors" at the end of the weekend. Links are mostly in Japanese. Sorry English readers...

The case of the high-radiation supermarket in Setagaya-ku, Tokyo:

The contractor hired by the government dug up the location in the parking lot with 110 microsieverts/hour radiation, and found a glass bottle 40 centimeter below the surface. The radiation on that spot was the Fuku-I Nuke Plant level radiation of 40 millisieverts/hour. After removing the glass bottle, the radiation dramatically dropped to 25 microsieverts/hour (which is still very high, actually). The bottle allegedly contained radium-226, again. There are 15 locations in the supermarket compound (including inside the store) that are emitting high radiation, and it will take several weeks at least to dig up those locations to see what's buried. (From various sources: Nikkan Sports 11/2/2011, FNN News 11/3/2011, Nikkei Shinbun 11/2/2011, etc.)

They also dug up the location with 65 microsieverts/hour radiation and found a piece of glass with a small amount of radium from 20 centimeter below the surface. Once the glass was removed, the radiation dropped to 4 microsieverts/hour. (Mainichi Shinbun Japanese, 11/6/2011)

The case of acute lymphocytic leukemia:

No, not in a young child in a high radiation spot that is often talked about on Twitter. A 63-year-old TV newscaster has been diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia and is now hospitalized, getting ready for chemo. He felt a strange lump in his neck on October 28, he says. (Various news sources including: Zakzak 11/7/2011, Yomiuri Shinbun 11/6/2011)

In his morning program on Fuji TV he's been promoting Fukushima produce by eating them in the show. He also happened to be in Fukushima in March 15. Just a coincidence. Never mind that ALL is predominant in small children, and an adult case is one in 100,000 annually in Japan.

The case of Japan's Imperial Family getting sick:

The 9-year-old daughter of the crown prince and princess was hospitalized for a few days for mycoplasma pneumonia (NHK News 11/5/2011). The empress has been ill with aches and pains in the arms and legs (Sankei Shinbun 10/12/2011). Now the emperor himself is being hospitalized for bronchitis (Mainichi Shinbun 11/6/2011).

The areas surrounding the imperial household in the center of Tokyo in Chiyoda-ku has elevated radiation levels. The foodstuff that is used in the imperial household - vegetables, milk, egg, beef - comes from the imperial farm in Nasu, Tochigi Prefecture (Imperial Household Agency, announcement on 7/21/2011) where the radiation is even more elevated and where the meat cow nearby was found with high level of radioactive cesium. (This link goes to my English blog post.)

The daughter of the crown prince and princess spent her summer vacation in Nasu. (This link is also in English.) The Kan administration sent the emperor and empress in April and May to cheer up the quake/tsunami victims in Chiba, Ibaraki, Miyagi, Fukushima, Iwate, 7 weeks in a row. They ate food in Fukushima, and bring some home for their sons' families.

The case of radioactive rice in Yokohama City:

The public park where 2770 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium was found from the dried shiitake mushrooms, most of which had been fed to the public including 256 small children also grew rice in the rice paddies. The rice was found with 13 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium. Oh such a minute amount, no effect on health!

But the contamination level of Yokohama rice seems no different from the rice grown and harvested in Fukushima and southern Miyagi, two of the most contaminated prefectures. If you calculate the soil contamination level from the radioactive cesium in the rice and the transfer coefficient (the real one, between 0.01 and 0.001, not the one (0.1) used by the government for political reasons), the contamination of the rice paddies could be 1,300 becquerels/kg of cesium (coefficient 0.01) or 13,000 becquerels/kg (coefficient 0.001). (If you read Japanese, go to my post in my Japanese blog.)

Start of yet another week where financial and political shenanigans in Europe will dominate the headlines. Greece's Papandreou (G-Pap, a la Zero Hedge) is being replaced by Lucas Papademos (L-Pap) as the prime minister, and the world tries to muddle through yet another week. L-Pap may have a better chance of muddling through, as he is a favorite of the US Federal Reserve. Well, he worked in the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston as a senior economist.

Gold is going up in Asia. Gold spot at US$1771 (kitco.com).

Tweet