Live webchat with Professor Paddy Regan, nuclear physicist, tonight, 21 Mar, 8-9pm

[GeraldineMumsnet]

We're very pleased that Paddy Regan, professor of physics at the University of Surrey in Guildford, is our webchat guest this evening between 8pm and 9pm.

In the wake of the Fukushima crisis in Japan, you asked on this thread if we could get a nuclear physicist on. So thanks to Prof Regan for agreeing to come on to MN.

He's a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, and holds visiting researcher and teaching positions at Yale University and the University of Notre Dame.

He's interested in measurements of naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) in the environment using gamma-ray spectroscopic techniques.

In his 'spare' time, he says he plays a poor game of squash, even worse golf and tries to do the occasional sponsored run for the Mental Health Charity MIND. He is married to Susie, a nurse, and they have four children.

So Asahi Shimbun is quoting the Japanese NRC saying Fukushima has now been officilly upgraded to a 'Level 6 Serious Accident'. That is worse than Three Mile Island and one notch below Chernobyl.

As I said, just a little way back up the thread this is a boiling frog issue.

It was supposed ot be getting better by now but is still edging slowly slowly to a catastrophic situation. At present there are 13 million people in Tokyo afraid to drink tap water. Not lethal but just getting a bit worse every day.

According to Wikipedia:

New Scientist reported on the 24 March that the radioactive fallout was nearing "Chernobyl levels". It said that the organisation set up to verify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, using its world wide detection network, had detected daily release levels of iodine-131 at 73% of the Chernobyl disaster and the daily amount of caesium-137 released was around 60%.

The reports today are sayng that the reactor containment vessel on reactor 3 is possibly breached, it has a stick valve and TEPCO is saying there is a higher risk of a significant radiation release and has just expanded the 'voluntary evacuation zone to 30km form 20km.

Still not getting any better then.

The newspapers are saying that radioactive particles from Fukushima have been found in Iceland. They must have some way of identifying them as coming from Fukushima, I don't know how.

Fucking hell. IN Iceland !!!!

you're right BeenBeta. It has been a boiling frog. Because of CHernobyl and the way it affected Wales, I've sort of known about how bad a nuclear meltdown could be. I suppose every European does. But the Japanese seem to be completely oblivious. I don't think it's just stoicism, i think the media is massively downplaying everything here.
Babies unable to drink tapwater because it's radioactive and they might get cancer! I mean WTF

sakura - I trust you and your friends and family are OK?

We had happy news from our friends in Japan that they are well and all their family are too although most are still in Tokyo.

Interesting point that you make about the Japanese being seemingly oblivious. However, this from Kyodo News suggest that attitude may change as TEPCO admit they have not been releasing info on a timely basis.

"TEPCO's Fukushima office acknowledged Saturday that it had known earlier that the radiation in the underground level of the turbine building of one of the reactors was extremely high, but had not made the information available to pertinent parties.

Edano criticized the utility's handling of the data, saying unless it reports necessary information to authorities in a timely manner, ''the government will not be able to give appropriate instructions and (TEPCO) will make workers, and eventually the public, distrustful'' of the firm."

I agree it is still not good news that it is taking this long to deal with things at the plant, and I wouldn't want to be in the 30km zone, but levels in Tokyo are going back down, I heard.

Updated advice from the UK chief scientific officer. I hadn't realised that Japanese standards for radiation were actually stricter than the EU, and the limits are based on regular consumption for 2 months (radiation levels in Tokyo water are now down again, so were only over the limit for babies for about two days).
How much radiation is too much radiation?

your post was reassuring exexpat.
I feel like I'm on a bloody rollercoaster. When you've made your home somewhere you don't want to do anything drastic unless it's absolutely necessary, but at some point you have to face facts. If radioactive dust has been found in Europe then it's definitely all over the place in Japan.

Thanks BeenBeta, we are okay, but just worrying about this. What will make the Japanese turn off all the bloody unecessary vending machines if not this? I read that one vending maching consumes the same amount of electric as a house!

Wikipedia is now saying that a fission reaction is underway in unit 2 (confirmed). What does that mean?

All power to the Tokyo demonstrators against nuclear power!

Latest kyodo news report has Tepco correcting an earlier report that an iodine isotope only found within an hour of a fission reaction was found in water in unit 2. They now say it is a different isotope which presumably stays around for longer, so not necessarily confirmation that there is a fission reaction going on now.

'Confirmed' on wikipedia doesn't really mean anything...

Thanks for the updates

Sakura - hope you're doing ok and not getting too worried. Are you having power cuts where you are? Tokyo friends who have escaped power cuts so far say they are due to start getting scheduled ones soon.

I just found this visual guide to radiation doses - one of the most thorough but clearest guides I have found so far.

Am getting a bit worried now! The power cuts are just for show, all the vending machines are still on and there are even some theme parks running. TEPCO just want to convince everyone that nuclear energy is necessary.,

I didn't know they were demonstrating in Tokyo until I read ambi's post. I think that's bloody brilliant.

Interesting and measured article here in The Register.

The journalists there are usually quite good - they did an article recently on something that I am involved in (they even quoted me) so that I know that what they wrote was accurate (some monir errors but nothing that changed the integrity of what they wrote even if they didn't put in all the positives that I would have liked ).

Welsh farmers are still routinely checking their sheep for radioactive materials, 25 years after Chernobyl (as I've just posted somewhere else).

How is nuclear power safe?

This is interesting. It says there are still 300 hill farms in Wales under radiation restrictions because of caesium fallout from Chernobyl. 300!

And they're trying to put a huge steel dome over Chernobyl to stop more radiation escaping. I want a huge steel dome over my house and garden...and the dcs' schools...to keep the blardy radiation off us.

Love Mumsnet, disappointed they contacted Sense About Science for advice on who to interview on this topic. They have vested interest in downplaying radiation risks: see www.powerbase.info/index.php/Sense_About_Science
For the truth about how the radiation from Fukushima is already all over the US and Europe, is contaminating US rainwater thousands of times above safety limits, why it will affect us, and while the radiation type is not comparable to X-rays or spending time in Cornwall, google Dr Helen Caldicott or Dr Chris Busby. Research the topic of internal emitters and don't be fooled by reassurers' focus on iodine, which has a short half-life--we also need to think about cesium, plutonium etc, which are already here in large amounts, have long-half-lives, and are hugely toxic in minuscule amounts once inside our bodies. And as Mellowfruitfulness says, Welsh farmers are still under restrictions because their products are contaminated by Chernobyl fallout. Nukes aren't worth the risk. The technology is uncontrollable.

To clarify, Sense About Science is funded by GE Healthcare, whose parent company is GE (General Electric), which supplied the disastrous nukes to Japan that have caused the world's most serious nuke disaster. Follow the money... Here's a rather more honest assessment of the problem at Fukushima: www.huffingtonpost.com/vivian-norris-de-montaigu/deadly-silence-on-fukushi_b_859241.html