Group items tagged

At least two dozen countries around the globe get energy from nuclear power, yet not one has been able to pull off a permanent disposal site. Finding communities willing to live with such dangerous stuff has been a big sticking point. But in Sweden, two communities have stepped up, and are willing to take the country's waste. Like many countries, Sweden has had its share of political meltdowns over nuclear power. Protests stirred an uproar in the early 1980s when the Swedish nuclear industry simply decided where to begin testing for a possible geologic disposal site.

But today, instead of deflecting protesters, the nuclear industry shuttles visitors by the busloads for guided tours of facilities. More than 1,100 feet below the surface, exotic machinery and copper tubes wide enough to fit two men fill an underground cavern carved from crystalline bedrock. In this working lab in eastern Sweden, a private nuclear waste company tests methods for permanently storing used fuel. It plans to encase the fuel rods in copper capsules, then bury them 1,500 feet down in bedrock where it is supposed to sit for the next 100,000 years.

how did nuclear waste in Sweden go from a toxic topic to a field trip? People in the area said the industry needed to start over with things like public participation, a transparent, predictable process and trust. The industry took these lessons to heart. "We know that we have to meet people and communicate what we want to do, why we want to do it and how we will find a place for it," says Inger Nordholm, a spokeswoman for the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company, or SKB.

As blogger on nuclear energy for the past five years, I realize I’m writing on a niche subject that isn’t going to pull in millions of readers. Unlike some entertainment blogs, a site on nuclear energy is never going to be able to link the words “reactor pressure vessel” with the antics of a Hollywood celebrity at a New York night club. So, what can be said about the use of social media and how it has evolved as a new communication tool in a mature industry?

EBR-1 chalkboard ~ the 1st known nuclear energy blog post 12/21/51 on the Arco desert of eastern Idaho

Evidence of acceptance of social media is widespread, with the most recent example being the launch of the Nuclear Information Center, a social media presence by Duke Energy (NYSE:DUK). Content written for the Nuclear Information Center by a team of the utility’s employees is clearly designed to reach out to the general public. This effort goes beyond the usual scope of a utility Web site, which includes things like how to pay your bill online, where to call when the lights go out, and so forth.

There are battles being fought on two fronts in the five months since a massive earthquake and tsunami damaged the Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan. On one front, there is the fight to repair the plant, operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) and to contain the extent of contamination caused by the damage. On the other is the public’s fight to extract information from the Japanese government, TEPCO and nuclear experts worldwide.

The latter battle has yielded serious official humiliation, resulting high-profile resignations, scandals, and promises of reform in Japan’s energy industry whereas the latter has so far resulted in a storm of anger and mistrust. Even most academic nuclear experts, seen by many as the middle ground between the anti-nuclear activists and nuclear lobby itself, were reluctant to say what was happening: That in Fukushima, a community of farms, schools and fishing ports, was experiencing a full-tilt meltdown, and that, as Al Jazeera reported in June, that the accident had most likely caused more radioactive contamination than Chernobyl

As recently as early August, those seeking information on the real extent of the damage at the Daiichi plant and on the extent of radioactive contamination have mostly been reassured by the nuclear community that there’s no need to worry.

: Dr. Helen Caldicott

All areas of Japan should be tested to assess how radioactive the soil and water are because the winds can blow the radioactive pollution hundreds of miles from the point source at Fukushima. Under no circumstances should radioactive rubbish and debris be incinerated as this simply spreads the isotopes far and wide to re-concentrate in food and fish. All batches of food must be adequately tested for specific radioactive elements using spectrometers. No radioactive food must be sold or consumed, nor must radioactive food be diluted for sale with non-radioactive food as radioactive elements re-concentrate in various bodily organs. All water used for human consumption should be tested weekly. All fish caught off the east coast must be tested for years to come. All people, particularly children, pregnant women and women of childbearing age still living in high radiation zones should be immediately evacuated to non-radioactive areas of Japan. All people who have been exposed to radiation from Fukushima – particularly babies, children, immunosuppressed, old people and others — must be medically thoroughly and routinely examined for malignancy, bone marrow suppression, diabetes, thyroid abnormalities, heart disease, premature aging, and cataracts for the rest of their lives and appropriate treatment instituted. Leukemia will start to manifest within the next couple of years, peak at five years and solid cancers will start appearing 10 to 15 years post-accident and will continue to increase in frequency in this generation over the next 70 to 90 years. All physicians and medical care providers in Japan must read and examine Chernobyl–Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment by the New York Academy of Sciences to understand the true medical gravity of the situation they face. I also suggest with humility that doctors in particular but also politicians and the general public refer to my web page, nuclearfreeplanet.org for more information, that they listen to the interviews related to Fukushima and Chernobyl on my radio program at ifyoulovethisplanet.org and they read my book NUCLEAR POWER IS NOT THE ANSWER. The international medical community and in particular the WHO must be mobilized immediately to assist the Japanese medical profession and politicians to implement this massive task outlined above. The Japanese government must be willing to accept international advice and help. As a matter of extreme urgency Japan must request and receive international advice and help from the IAEA and the NRC in the U.S., and nuclear specialists from Canada, Europe, etc., to prevent the collapse of Fukushima Dai-ichi Unit 4 and the spent fuel pool if there was an earthquake greater than 7 on the Richter scale.As the fuel pool crashed to earth it would heat and burn causing a massive radioactive release 10 times larger than the release from Chernobyl. There is no time to spare and at the moment the world community sits passively by waiting for catastrophe to happen. The international and Japanese media must immediately start reporting the facts from Japan as outlined above. Not to do so is courting global disaster.

A nuclear or radiological emergency presents complex public health, environmental and engineering challenges. A constant flow of detailed, reliable information is indispensable to be able to marshal and coordinate the needed response which includes the prompt mobilisation and dispatch of specialised human and equipment resources, as requested. The global focal point for such coordination and information exchange is the IAEA's Incident and Emergency Centre, or IEC. It is the IEC's task to inform many different official designated actors around the world as quickly as possible whenever a nuclear or radiological emergency occurs. A sustained and reliable information flow is one of the most important resources in effective incident and emergency response. New Platform

One of the IEC's tasks is to develop and improve the communication and coordination systems that deliver authenticated and verified information to the emergency responders who need it. During the emergency response to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident, the IEC launched a new, secure web-based communications platform, the Unified System for Information Exchange on Incidents and Emergencies, or USIE. The new system, which had been in development since 2009, replaces two existing communication systems, thus simplifying the emergency information exchange. "The new USIE system delivers a solution the emergency response community needed and requested from the IAEA," said Denis Flory, IAEA Deputy Director General for Nuclear Safety and Security. "When the IAEA's Member States respond to a nuclear incident or emergency, they need a single, secure, straight-forward system that easily adapts to their needs. That is exactly what USIE does."

Alert System Like its predecessor systems, USIE is a secure website to which registered users have access. Instead of monitoring two separate systems that previously reported on different types of incidents, users now receive alerts from the new USIE system when new information is issued about any type of incident, ranging from a lost radioactive source to a full-scale nuclear emergency. The platform delivers alerts, based upon the user's preferences, via text messages delivered to a mobile device, or via email, or via fax. The system tracks multiple events, issuing information that has been authenticated by the country reporting an accident or incident. The platform meets demanding security standards thus offering its users the assurance that the information received is reliable.

SciDev.Net reporters from around the world tell us which countries are set on developing nuclear energy despite the Fukushima accident. The quest for energy independence, rising power needs and a desire for political weight all mean that few developing countries with nuclear ambitions have abandoned them in the light of the Fukushima accident. Jordan's planned nuclear plant is part of a strategy to deal with acute water and energy shortages.

The Jordan Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) wants Jordan to get 60 per cent of its energy from nuclear by 2035. Currently, obtaining energy from neighbouring Arab countries costs Jordan about a fifth of its gross domestic product. The country is also one of the world's most water-poor nations. Jordan plans to desalinate sea water from the Gulf of Aqaba to the south, then pump it to population centres in Amman, Irbid, and Zarqa, using its nuclear-derived energy. After the Fukushima disaster, Jordan started re-evaluating safety procedures for its nuclear reactor, scheduled to begin construction in 2013. The country also considered more safety procedures for construction and in ongoing geological and environmental investigations.

The government would not reverse its decision to build nuclear reactors in Jordan because of the Fukushima disaster," says Abdel-Halim Wreikat, vice Chairman of the JAEC. "Our plant type is a third-generation pressurised water reactor, and it is safer than the Fukushima boiling water reactor." Wreikat argues that "the nuclear option for Jordan at the moment is better than renewable energy options such as solar and wind, as they are still of high cost." But some Jordanian researchers disagree. "The cost of electricity generated from solar plants comes down each year by about five per cent, while the cost of producing electricity from nuclear power is rising year after year," says Ahmed Al-Salaymeh, director of the Energy Centre at the University of Jordan. He called for more economic feasibility studies of the nuclear option.

Though nuclear power produces electricity with little in the way of carbon dioxide emissions, it, like other energy sources, is not without its own set of waste products. And in the case of nuclear power, most of these wastes are radioactive.1 Some very low level nuclear wastes can be stored and then disposed of in landfill-type settings. Other nuclear waste must remain sequestered for a few hundred years in specially engineered subsurface facilities; this is the case with low level waste, which is composed of low concentrations of long-lived radionuclides and higher concentrations of short-lived ones. Intermediate and high-level waste both require disposal hundreds of meters under the Earth’s surface, where they must remain out of harm’s way for thousands to hundreds of thousands of years (IAEA, 2009). Intermediate level wastes are not heat-emitting, but contain high concentrations of long-lived radionuclides. High-level wastes, including spent nuclear fuel and wastes from the reprocessing of spent fuel, are both heat-emitting and highly radioactive.

When it comes to the severity of an accident at a nuclear facility, there may be little difference between those that occur at the front end of the nuclear power production and those at the back end: An accident involving spent nuclear fuel can pose a threat as disastrous as that posed by reactor core meltdowns. In particular, if spent fuel pools are damaged or are not actively cooled, a major crisis could be in sight, especially if the pools are packed with recently discharged spent fuel.

Elements of success

In recent weeks I have been excited to witness several genuine grassroots efforts in support of nuclear energy emerging on the scene. Several have already been covered on this forum, like the Rally for Vermont Yankee and the Webinar collaboration by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the American Nuclear Society. Both of these efforts proved to be very successful in bringing together nuclear supporters and gaining attention from the mainstream media.

I’d like to share some information about another opportunity to actively show your support for nuclear. The White House recently launched a petition program called “We the People.” Here is the description of how it works: This tool provides you with a new way to petition the Obama administration to take action on a range of important issues facing our country. If a petition gets enough support, White House staff will review it, ensure it’s sent to the appropriate policy experts, and issue an official response. One of the first and most popular petitions on the website is a call to end subsidies and loan guarantees for nuclear energy by 2013. As I write this, it is only about a thousand signatures away from reaching the White House. In response to this petition, Ray Wallman, a young nuclear supporter and filmmaker, wrote a counter petition called “Educate the Public Regarding Nuclear Power.” It needs 4,500 more signatures before October 23 in order to get a formal response, and reads as follows:

Due to the manufactured controversy that is the nuclear reactor meltdown in Fukushima, Japan, perpetuated by a scientifically illiterate news media, the public is unnecessarily hostile to nuclear power as an energy source. To date nobody has died from the accident and Fukushima, and nuclear power has the lowest per Terra-watt hour death toll of any energy source known to man: http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/03/deaths-per-twh-by-energy-source.html The Obama administration should take better strides to educate the public regarding this important energy source.

SOURCE: German TV-channel ZDF talks with TEPCO-employees (german, english subs), October 8, 2011 At 5:55 in Fukushima prefecture health adviser (Shunichi Yamashita, MD, PhD. Dean. Nagasaki University Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences): Those who smile will have no radiation damage, only those who make constant worry… At 6:10 in Less than 100 MICROsieverts per HOUR no danger to health, or 876 millisievert per year — over double Germany’s 400 millisievert LIFETIME exposure limit for nuclear workers…

And from an article today on the Energy Collective: [Emphasis Added]

Harold Swartz of Dartmouth Medical School [...] basically said that in the real events of Fukushima [...] the “worried well” are the major issue. Civilians will not experience exposure at a dose which would measurably increase their chances of getting cancer or limit their life-expectancy. At the same time, they will not believe any official reassurances that “everything is okay.” It would be the duty of the scientific community to explain that people are not in danger of cancer or early death. In other words, it would be the duty of the scientific community to reduce one of the major public health effects of any type of accident: fear and anxiety.

95% disagree with “Beyond Nuclear”. Let’s make it 99% by Rod Adams on October 14, 2011 in Antinuclear activist , Politics of Nuclear Energy , Unreliables , Wind energy Share0 One of the more powerful concepts that I studied in college was called “groupthink.” The curriculum developers in the history department at the US Naval Academy thought it was important for people in training to become leaders in the US Navy learn to seek counsel and advice from as broad a range of sources as possible. We were taught how to avoid the kind of bad decision making that can result by surrounding oneself with yes-men or fellow travelers. The case study I remember most was the ill fated Bay of Pigs invasion where virtually the entire Kennedy Administration cabinet thought that it would be a cakewalk . If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be. Aside: Don’t we live in an amazing world? I just typed “Bay of Pigs groupthink” into my browser search box and instantly hit on exactly the link I needed to support the statement above. It even cites the book we used when I was a plebe in 1977, more than 33 years ago. End Aside. Not everyone, however, has the benefit of early leadership lessons about the danger of believing that a small group of likeminded people can provide actionable advice. Some of the people who are most likely to be victims of groupthink are those who adamantly oppose the continued safe operation of emission-free nuclear power plants. The writers who exclusively quote members of that tiny community have also fallen into the groupthink trap.   On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants . Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuc

95% disagree with “Beyond Nuclear”. Let’s make it 99% by Rod Adams on October 14, 2011 in Antinuclear activist, Politics of Nuclear Energy, Unreliables, Wind energy Share0 One of the more powerful concepts that I studied in college was called “groupthink.” The curriculum developers in the history department at the US Naval Academy thought it was important for people in training to become leaders in the US Navy learn to seek counsel and advice from as broad a range of sources as possible. We were taught how to avoid the kind of bad decision making that can result by surrounding oneself with yes-men or fellow travelers. The case study I remember most was the ill fated Bay of Pigs invasion where virtually the entire Kennedy Administration cabinet thought that it would be a cakewalk. If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be.Aside: Don’t we live in an amazing world? I just typed “Bay of Pigs groupthink” into my browser search box and instantly hit on exactly the link I needed to support the statement above. It even cites the book we used when I was a plebe in 1977, more than 33 years ago. End Aside. Not everyone, however, has the benefit of early leadership lessons about the danger of believing that a small group of likeminded people can provide actionable advice. Some of the people who are most likely to be victims of groupthink are those who adamantly oppose the continued safe operation of emission-free nuclear power plants. The writers who exclusively quote members of that tiny community have also fallen into the groupthink trap.  On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants . Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear said. “Granted that some of that has been moved into dry cast storage, but the pool remains full to its capacity,” Kamps said. “And this was a re-rack capacity. Much later in terms of quantity of high level radioactive waste than it was originally designed for.” This represents 125 million curies of radioactive cesium-137 and the NRC has reported that up to 100 percent of the hazardous material could be released from a pool fire, Kamps said. “I would like to point out that Fukushima Daiichi units one, two, three and four combined in terms of the inventory of high level radioactive waste in their storage pools does not match some of these reactors I mentioned in terms of how much waste is in these pools,” Kamps said. “So the risks are greater here for boil downs and the consequences of a radioactive fire in these pools.” Fortunately, the people who are not a part of the antinuclear community are finally beginning to recognize their own strength and to realize that they do not have to remain silent while the lies are being spread. Here is how a knowledgable commenter responded to the above segment of the article: If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be.

On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants. Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear said. “Granted that some of that has been moved into dry cast storage, but the pool remains full to its capacity,” Kamps said. “And this was a re-rack capacity. Much later in terms of quantity of high level radioactive waste than it was originally designed for.” This represents 125 million curies of radioactive cesium-137 and the NRC has reported that up to 100 percent of the hazardous material could be released from a pool fire, Kamps said. “I would like to point out that Fukushima Daiichi units one, two, three and four combined in terms of the inventory of high level radioactive waste in their storage pools does not match some of these reactors I mentioned in terms of how much waste is in these pools,” Kamps said. “So the risks are greater here for boil downs and the consequences of a radioactive fire in these pools.”

The cyber-security of the North American power grid is "in a state of near chaos," according to a report by a respected U.S. energy consultancy monitoring the industry's transition to wireless digital technologies.The white paper by Pike Research reveals that a $60 smart phone application can bypass security measures and allow direct communications between the phone and some control systems (ICS) that regulate breakers, relays, feeders and the flow of electricity.The news comes on the heels of a warning from the cyber-security arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that the hacker collective known as Anonymous appears intent on exploiting the ICS vulnerabilities within the energy industry.

In an unclassified October bulletin obtained by the website Public Intelligence, the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center believes the group has, "a limited ability to conduct attacks against ICS. However . . . Anonymous could be able to develop capabilities to trespass on control system networks very quickly."In July, Anonymous threatened to target companies involved with Alberta's oilsands.

North America's power supply has never been disrupted by hackers, though there have been numerous uneventful penetrations of the system, including at Ontario utilities.A chill went through the critical infrastructure industry last summer when a malicious computer worm called Stuxnet attacked Iran's uranium enrichment plants.

When dreadful events occur, reporters, readers, and interested citizens contact the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists asking whether we will move the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock. The alarming nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi Power Station on March 11 prompted e-mails and calls to our office seeking the Bulletin's reaction as well as accurate information about what was happening in Japan. The Bulletin responded by devoting its website to daily briefings from experts in Japan and to news from Bulletin writers on what they were hearing about this second-worst disaster in the history of the nuclear power industry. Additionally, the Bulletin will take deeper dives into the lessons and impacts of Fukushima in the September/October issue of its digital journal. Still, the larger question remains: Should we move the hand of the Doomsday Clock? What does the Fukushima event imply for humanity's future on the planet?

How do we determine the time? In annual Clock discussions, the Bulletin's Science and Security Board -- the keepers of the Clock -- reviews the trends and current events that reveal how well or how poorly humanity regulates the perilous forces unleashed by our own ingenuity and industry. Moving the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock is a judgment, then, an assessment of the human capacity to control technologies that can lead to irreversible catastrophe -- to the end of civilization. With growing worldwide interest in nuclear energy for economic development, it's important to know how well firms and societies are handling this dangerous technology

Questions for a post-Fukushima world. The Bulletin's Board members are following the events at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan very closely. Questions about the continuing disaster range from the detailed and technical to the societal and ethical; the answers will have implications for any long-term commitment to nuclear power.

I have been rereading a 1982 book by Bertrand Goldschmidt titled “The Atomic Complex: A Worldwide Political History of Nuclear Energy.”

The two self-assigned homework projects are as part of a reflective effort to understand more about how human society moved from a period of optimism based on a vision of “Atoms for Peace” to a period where someone reading the advertiser supported press would believe that sensible people would logically consider giving up the whole technology out of fear of radiation and its health consequences.One of the hopeful lessons I have learned so far is that the initial conditions of our current fight to defend and expand the safe use of atomic energy are far different from those that faced the people engaged in the earliest battles against a well organized opposition to nuclear technology development. We have a much better chance of success now than we did then – and there are several reasons why that is true.

One condition that is vastly different is the ability of nuclear professionals to have their voices heard. No longer are most people who understand nuclear energy isolated in small communities with few media outlets. In the 1970s, a large fraction of nuclear professionals were located near remotely sited national laboratories or power stations. Today, though many still work at national labs or in small market communities like Lynchburg, VA, we are all globally connected to a vast network on the Internet. We have Skype, YouTube and blogs. Some of us know that major decision makers and journalists read or listen to our words on a regular basis. We are no longer shy about responding to misinformation and unwarranted criticism.

The tiny Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians Reservation in Utah is targeted for a very big nuclear waste dump. Private Fuel Storage (PFS), a limited liability corporation representing eight powerful nuclear utilities, wants to "temporarily" store 40,000 tons of commercial high-level radioactive waste (about 80% of the commercial irradiated nuclear fuel in the U.S. as of the end of 2004) next to the two-dozen tribal members who live on the small reservation. The PFS proposal is the latest in a long tradition of targeting Native American communities for such dumps. But there is another tradition on the targeted reservations as well–fighting back against blatant environmental racism, and winning.

NIRS, joining with allies such as Indigenous Environmental Network and Honor the Earth, has been privileged and honored to assist tribal members opposing dumps targeted at their communities for well over a decade. Of 60 Indian communities directly targeted by the nuclear power establishment, 59 have fended off the threat. But the Skull Valley proposal has advanced further than any other before, and could be granted an operating license by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission sometime in early 2005. NIRS and Skull Valley Goshute tribal opponents to this environmental racism – and threat of irradiated fuel trains by the hundreds rolling through dozens of U.S. states as early as 2007 – need YOUR help today!

Risk below 100 mSv is so low you cannot measure it by Rod Adams on October 15, 2011 in Health Effects, LNT, Nuclear Communications Share48 One of my favorite jokes about the difference between scientists and engineers is the one in which a scientist and an engineer are both put into a room with a pot of gold on the other side. They are given the rules of the challenge – the gold will be given to the person who reaches it first. There is one caveat – each contestant is limited to moving only half way to the goal with each turn. The scientist gives up and claims that the goal is unreachable because the distance to the gold will never be zero. The engineer walks across the room, picks up the pot of gold and says – “I may not be able to get here, but I can get close enough.” During the question and answer session following the presentations at the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan (ACCJ) meeting on food safety, Dr. Allison, a life-long scientist, proves that some scientists recognize that close is often good enough. As he says in answer to a lengthy question from the audience, the risk from a dose of 100 mSv each year may not be zero. However, the life span survivor studies of the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki show that it is so close to zero that it is impossible to measure. That study included a population of approximately 100,000 people monitored carefully for more than 50 years. It is difficult to conceive of a larger or more well followed study group.

From inspectors’ abandoning of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant as it succumbed to disaster to a delay in disclosing radiation leaks, Japan’s response to the nuclear accident caused by the March tsunami fell tragically short, a government-appointed investigative panel said on Monday.

Officials of Japan’s nuclear regulator present at the plant during the quake quickly left the site, and when ordered to return by the government, they proved of little help to workers racing to restore power and find water to cool temperatures at the plant, the report said.

The panel attacked the use of the term “soteigai,” or “unforeseen,” that plant and government officials used both to describe the unprecedented scale of the disaster and to explain why they were unable to stop it. Running a nuclear power plant inherently required officials to foresee the unforeseen, said the panel’s chairman, Yotaro Hatamura, a professor emeritus in engineering at the University of Tokyo. “There was a lot of talk of soteigai, but that only bred perceptions among the public that officials were shirking their responsibilities,” Mr. Hatamura said.

Seven decades after scientists came here during World War II to create plutonium for the first atomic bomb, a new generation is struggling with an even more daunting task: cleaning up the radioactive mess.The U.S. government is building a treatment plant to stabilize and contain 56 million gallons of waste left from a half-century of nuclear weapons production. The radioactive sludge is so dangerous that a few hours of exposure could be fatal. A major leak could contaminate water supplies serving millions across the Northwest. The cleanup is the most complex and costly environmental restoration ever attempted.And the project is not going well.

A USA TODAY investigation has found that the troubled, 10-year effort to build the treatment plant faces enormous problems just as it reaches what was supposed to be its final stage.In exclusive interviews, several senior engineers cited design problems that could bring the plant's operations to a halt before much of the waste is treated. Their reports have spurred new technical reviews and raised official concerns about the risk of a hydrogen explosion or uncontrolled nuclear reaction inside the plant. Either could damage critical equipment, shut the facility down or, worst case, allow radiation to escape.The plant's $12.3 billion price tag, already triple original estimates, is well short of what it will cost to address the problems and finish the project. And the plant's start-up date, originally slated for last year and pushed back to its current target of 2019, is likely to slip further.

"We're continuing with a failed design," said Donald Alexander, a senior U.S. government scientist on the project."There's a lot of pressure … from Congress, from the state, from the community to make progress," he added. As a result, "the design processes are cut short, the safety analyses are cut short, and the oversight is cut short. … We have to stop now and figure out how to do this right, before we move any further."