Fukushima rice to be sold in Britain

Rice harvested in Japan's Fukushima region, heavily affected by a nuclear meltdown in 2011, is returning to the EU, starting with Britain next month, the Japan Times reports.

A total of 1.9 tons of Fukushima rice called Ten no Tsubu will be sold in London, making the UK the first EU nation to import the region’s produce after the nuclear disaster. The sale became possible after a long campaign from Fukushima natives in London to fend off rumors about the potential danger of the crops, the media said.

“With the UK as a foothold, we hope to expand the sale of prefecture-produced rice to other EU member countries,” said Nobuo Ohashi from Japanese farmers group Zen-Noh.

Brussels requires rice from Fukushima to undergo a radiation test in Japan or the importer country .... https://www.rt.com

Mutations, DNA damage seen in Fukushima forests: Greenpeace

Radiation spread over a wide area and forced tens of thousands of people from their homes -- many of whom will likely never return -- in the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl in 1986.

As the fifth anniversary of the disaster approaches, Greenpeace said signs of mutations in trees and DNA-damaged worms were beginning to appear, while "vast stocks of radiation" mean that forests cannot be decontaminated.

In a report, Greenpeace cited "apparent increases in growth mutations of fir trees... heritable mutations in pale blue grass butterfly populations" as well as "DNA-damaged worms in highly contaminated areas", it said.

The report came as the government intends to lift many evacuation orders in villages around the Fukushima plant by March 2017, if its massive decontamination effort progresses as it hopes .... http://news.yahoo.com

5 Years Later, TEPCO Admits It Lied About Meltdown ... 3 Former Executives Charged Over Meltdown

TEPCO admitted it was aware of the meltdowns from the inception and apologized, saying a declaration should have been made to the public.

Many news agencies downplayed the significance of TEPCO telling on itself with soft headlines like, “Fukushima meltdown announcement made months late,” ” Fukushima disaster: Tepco admits late meltdown announcement,” and, “TEPCO admits announcing Fukushima nuclear plant meltdowns far too late.” TEPCO shall get no such treatment at EnviroNews World News.

“Lied” is a strong word, but let’s be clear: Intentionally deciding to selectively not disclose certain facts as part of a damage control campaign is a lie, and in TEPCO’s case wreaks of negligence. Interestingly, in other TEPCO headline news, just today, Japanese lawyers overseeing the case announced that criminal indictments against three TEPCO executives, including its chairman are immanent, and could be filed as early as Monday .... https://www.popularresistance.org

Researchers: Fukushima Reactor 2 may have had 100% meltdown

Tokyo - Japan's Nagoya University announced that ongoing research into Reactor No. 2 at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant has revealed that almost 100 percent of the reactor core has melted. They are presenting the results today in Osaka.

The research team has been examining the plant's No. 2 reactor since April of 2014 using muon particle scanners in a search for reactor fuel in what remains of the reactor's core .... http://www.digitaljournal.com

Fukushima disaster was preventable - new study

According to the research carried out by the University of Southern California, one of the main faults was the decision to install critical backup generators in low-lying areas, as this was the first place the 2011 tsunami would strike, following the massive earthquake.

Backup generators are a key part of any nuclear power plant – they are essential to cool the plant in the event of power loss, in order to prevent a reactor meltdown. These generators were the first to be affected by the disaster, which the author describes as “a cascade of industrial, regulatory and engineering failures.”

Unable to cool itself, the Fukushima Daiichi power plant’s reactors fell like dominos .... http://www.rt.com

TEPCO Officials to be Tried for Role in Fukushima Meltdown

A Japanese citizens’ judicial committee has overruled government prosecutors and forced them to bring three former executives of the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) to trial on charges of criminal negligence for their inability to prevent the 2011 nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. But it appears unlikely that the defendants can be convicted.

The decision by the panel of 22 anonymous citizens, was reached July 17 but not announced until July 31. It overrules two previous decisions by the Tokyo prosecutors not to indict the former executives. The defendants are Tsunehisa Katsumata, 75, chairman of Tokyo Electric Power Co. at the time of the crisis, along with Sakae Muto, 65, and Ichiro Takekuro, 69, who were then vice presidents of the utility.

Decisions by the prosecutors in September 2013 and in January 2015 said they lacked sufficient evidence to bring criminal charges against the three men. In response, the citizens’ panel voted twice to demand the former executives’ indictment, trumping the prosecutors’ decisions .... http://oilprice.com

Officials: Much of Pacific Ocean threatened by Fukushima releases, an area covering 1/3 of globe

IAEA Board of Governors Meeting, Ambassador Glyn Davies, Permanent U.S. Representative to the IAEA, 2011: Today the Secretariat has presented to us a new Technical Cooperation project entitled “Marine benchmark study on the possible impact of the Fukushima radioactive releases in the Asia-Pacific Region.”… Member States in the region areunderstandably concerned for the safetyof their marine environments .... http://enenews.com

What’s Really Going On At Fukushima?

Fukushima’s still radiating, self-perpetuating, immeasurable, and limitless, like a horrible incorrigible Doctor Who monster encounter in deep space.

Fukushima will likely go down in history as the biggest cover-up of the 21st Century. Governments and corporations are not leveling with citizens about the risks and dangers; similarly, truth itself, as an ethical standard, is at risk of going to shambles as the glue that holds together the trust and belief in society’s institutions. Ultimately, this is an example of how societies fail.

Tens of thousands of Fukushima residents remain in temporary housing more than four years after the horrific disaster of March 2011. Some areas on the outskirts of Fukushima have officially reopened to former residents, but many of those former residents are reluctant to return home because of widespread distrust of government claims that it is okay and safe .... http://www.zerohedge.com

Area around Fukushima is now a radioactive wasteland that will be uninhabitable for decades

A foreign correspondent whose career consists of traveling to dangerous regions around the world has called the area around Fukushima, Japan, one of the most hopeless places he has ever visited, likening it to a “post apocalyptic ghost town.”

“I have seen abandoned villages before; most times there is a sense of finality to them,” writes Arglit Boonyai, host of the weekly Channel NewsAsia show Danger Zone. “It is as though the town’s time is up and the people have moved on. Fukushima is nothing like that. It’s like time just stopped.”

Danger Zone is a show about Boonyai’s visits to some of the world’s most dangerous places in order to try to understand of how ordinary people cope with living there. In addition to Fukushima, he has previously traveled to Iraq and into the heart of the Liberian Ebola epidemic .... http://www.naturalnews.com

US university testing animals in Pacific for Fukushima radiation

Apr 13, 2015 (emphasis added): CSU partners with Fukushima University to study radiation effects… Many CSU faculty and researchers are contributing to radiation research in Japan… including Thomas Johnson… professor of health physics, who is testing trace radiation samples in seal populations in the northern Pacific Ocean, where radiation from the Fukushima disaster was released.

Digestive system: microdontia teeth smaller than normal, chronic interstitial pancreatitis inflammation of pancreas, hepatic cyst liver, cholestatic jaundice yellowing of skin caused by thickening of bile or problems in liver, geophagia eating dirt, and primary diffuse peritoneal tumor membrane lining abdomen; A variety of the observed disease conditions are reported for the first time in ice seals and/or walruses .... http://enenews.com

Radioactive water leaked from Fukushima storage tank – TEPCO

A minor leakage of radioactive water has been detected at Japan’s crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co said. Radioactive liquid was detected under a storage tank with radiation-contaminated water.

A total of 40 milliliters of water was discovered, Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the plant’s operator, said on May 1.

The company believes that the liquid leaked from the storage tank, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun paper reported Saturday.

TEPCO stated that it placed bags of sand around the tank to prevent water from contaminating other areas .... http://rt.com

More Illegally Dumped Radioactive Waste Found on Somalia’s Coast

Yesterday the BBC reported that radiation levels at the crippled Fukushima reactor site are ten million times normal levels. As the oceans near the damaged nuclear plant are becoming contaminated with increasing amounts of nuclear radiation, concerns are growing about how much radioactive poison the planet’s seas can withstand.

However, although it is not receiving anywhere near as much attention as the unfolding disaster in Japan, the massive amounts of illegally dumped radioactive nuclear waste that are still being thrown into Somalia’s oceans potentially could prove to be an even more deadly catastrophe .... http://ecolocalizer.com

TEPCO may evaporate contaminated Fukushima water

Tainted water from Fukushima nuclear plant storage may be evaporated or stored underground instead of following earlier plans to release it into the ocean.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), which is responsible for cleaning up the crippled power plant, planned to release the tritium-laced water into the ocean. However, it suffered a setback following protests by local fishermen who are already struggling with their livelihood following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that led to the meltdown of three reactors.

Water is used to keep the wrecked reactors cool enough to prevent further radioactive releases, but there is no available technology to remove the tritium .... http://rt.com

TEPCO under fire after hiding massive radioactive waste leak at Fukushima for a full year

A major bombshell has dropped concerning the failed cleanup efforts at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan. The shuttered plant’s operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), has apparently been hiding for an entire year the fact that radioactive waste has been quietly pouring into the ocean from an onsite drainage ditch.

Sputnik News reports that TEPCO, which is also managing remediation efforts at the site (with guidance from the Japanese government), concealed from the public the fact that highly contaminated radioactive water has been flowing from the drainage ditch directly into the ocean. Local fishermen and others have since expressed outrage over the news .... http://www.naturalnews.com

TEPCO Confirms Almost All Nuclear Fuel Has Melted In Reactor 1

The Tokyo Electric Power Co. says almost all the nuclear fuel in one of its reactors at the Fukushima plant has melted. The discovery at Reactor 1 should help with the clean-up operation and decommissioning of the stricken nuclear power station.

The Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) and the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning (IRID) have been working since February, studying the interior of the reactor building at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant .... http://rt.com

TEPCO Admits Delaying Report Of Major Radiation Leak Into The Pacific Ocean For 10 Months

TEPCO officials have admitted that it’s investigating the cause of a spike in radiation levels (23,000 becquerels/liter vs the legal limit of 90) in drainage water that it believes subsequently leaked into the Pacific ocean from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant. The bigger problem, as NBC reports, TEPCO failed to report the leak for 10 months .... http://www.zerohedge.com

After Spike In Earthquake Activity , New Fukushima Leak Sees 70x Increase In Radiation

While it is unclear if it is directly related to the recent surge in tectonic activity, overnight another radioactive water leak in the sea was detected at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, the facility’s operator TEPCO announced. Contamination levels in the gutter reportedly spiked up 70 times over regular readings. 

The levels of contamination were between 50 and 70 times higher than Fukushima’s already elevated radioactive status, and were detected at about 10 am local time (1.00 am GMT), AFP reported. After the discovery, the gutter was blocked to prevent leaks to the Pacific Ocean .... http://www.zerohedge.com

Japan orders Fukushima waste to be released into ocean after worker falls into tank of radioactive water and dies

According to the Star Tribune, the 55-year-old man died of multiple injuries after falling through an opening at the top of the 10-meter (33-foot) high tank. He was one of three men who was inspecting the tank at the time of the fall .... http://www.naturalnews.com

Radioactive Fukushima Water to be Cleaned and Dumped Into Pacific Ocean

Japan’s nuclear watchdog says the radioactive water that has accumulated at the battered Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant must be decontaminated and dumped into the ocean, local media reported. The news has sparked concern from local fisherman .... http://rt.com

Fukushima radiation reaches California coast in tiny doses

Radioactivity from Japan's 2011 Fukishima nuclear plant meltdown has been detected off the California coast in tiny doses, a scientist monitoring the levels said this week.

He later noted in a Reddit AMA that while radioactive cesium was found 100 miles west of Eureka, "So far, we have not YET seen any of the telltale Fukushima cesium-134 along the beaches." .... http://www.utsandiego.com