Obama’s outlined a New Energy Policy as he periodically does without any far reaching national goals on to reduce America’s dependence on billions of barrels of imported oil which cause global warming,finance terrorist and prop up brutal regimes in the Middle East.However his periodic bursts of rhetoric on the US Energy Policy is nothing but a lot of empty gas without any specifics.Earlier he used to stress on nuclear energy which has been thrown out of the window with the Fukushima nuclear disaster.His plans of supporting the nuclear energy industry with $36 billion in DOE loans seems a bad if not a gruesome joke.Similarly last year his plans of allowing offshore drilling for Oil also fell flat after the massive BP Oil Spill ecological disaster.
The Reactor 1 of the failed Fukushima Daichi plant might be recritical as Radioactive Chlorine has been detected suggesting chain reactions continued after the reactor shut down.This is quite alarming and has made Japan thing about pouring concrete into its crippled Fukushima atomic plant IEAE warned that a potential uncontrolled chain reaction could cause further radiation leaks.The risk to workers might be greater than previously thought because melted fuel in the No. 1 reactor building may be causing isolated, uncontrolled nuclear chain reactions.Dumping concrete on the plant would serve a second purpose: it would trap contaminated water, said Tony Roulstone, an atomic engineer who directs the University of Cambridge’s masters program in nuclear energy.
The radioactive fallout from the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster is not only keeping Japan on high alert but also its neighbours.China has said that it has detected trace radiation levels from the spreading radiation in its provincial regions bordering Japan.Note most of the Chinese economic centres are situation near the eastern coast near Japan.Its 2 main cities of Guangdong and Shanghai have also detected trace levels of radioactive elements like iodine and caesium.Note China has turned back vessels and people from Japan in the last week because of high radiation levels.
The Fukushima Nuclear Disaster shows more dangerous radiation signs each day.While Plutonium Poisoning was found in the soil near the Nuclear Reactors,a more alarming development is the high levels of Caesium being found in areas far away from the plant.Note Caesium is a heavy element which is found in areas of radioactivity like Iodine 130.Caesium has a much bigger half life than iodine and can cause radiation poisoning for a much longer period.
TEPCO the beleaguered Japanese utility said that plutonium was found around the damaged nuclear reactor.Plutonium has been detected in soil at five locations at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said in a statement on MondayThe company could not confirm which of the reactors in the plant was leaking plutonium which is a very dangerous radioactive element.The No. 3 reactor is the only one at the six-reactor facility to use plutonium in its fuel mix.The United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency said the find was expected due to known fuel degradation, however Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency is highly worried about the radioactivity of the plutonium samples detected.
Dangerous levels of radiation has been detected in the water around the reactors as the Japanese government says that a partial meltdown has occured.While there is no confirmation about cracks in the pressure and containment vessels around the reactors,the radiation in the water inside Unit 2 has tested at radiation levels some 100,000 times normal amounts.Workers also discovered radioactive water in the deep trenches outside three units, with the airborne radiation levels outside Unit 2 exceeding 1,000 millisieverts per hour _ more than four times the amount that the government considers safe for workers.TEPCO officials said Sunday that radiation in leaking water in Unit 2 was 10 million times above normal.TEPCO has been giving confusing figures for radiation making it all the more difficult in understanding the gravity of the nuclear crisis.Note this disaster is only second to Chernobyl in its scale of radiation destruction.Tokyo and other parts have reported intermittently about high radiation in water and air.A ship from Mitsui was recently turned back from a Chinese port because of high levels of radiation.