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DESCRIPTION:6/11 Rally-Speak Out Stop Restarting Japan Nuke Plants-Defend Children and 
 Families of Fukushima/Shut Down Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant\nMonday July  
 11, 2016  3:00 PM and March to PG&E To Demand Closure Now Of Diablo Canyon 
 Nuclear Plant at 3:30 PM\n275 Battery St./California St.\nSan 
 Francisco\nMarch to PG&E Headquarters\n245 Market Street, San 
 Francisco\nPress Conference 3:45 PM\n\n The Japanese Abe government 
 continues to seek the restart of many nuclear plants despite the great 
 dangers of another Fukushima melt-down. The Abe government has attacked 
 reporters through a secrecy law and are preventing information getting out 
 about the critically serious continuing dangers at the Fukushima plant and 
 the dangers at other nuclear plants that the government wants to 
 reopen.\nJapanese children and people throughout the country continue to 
 get thyroid cancers and the number of surgeries is growing. The government 
 refuses to release the statistics of thyroid cancer surgeries throughout 
 the country.\nThe government has raised the level of "acceptable" limits of 
 radioactive contamination in order to push for continuation of the nuclear 
 program and some of Abe's Liberal Democratic politicians are telling people 
 that the Japanese can "overcome" radiation and the government is telling 
 people that you can decontaminate Fukushima.\nThe government which now runs 
 TEPCO is also allowing the Yakuza to bring in subcontracted workers who are 
 not properly trained or protected. This systemic corruption and criminal 
 negligence of the Abe government must be challenged and publicly exposed. 
 We also call for support to the US sailors who were contaminated by the 
 Fukushima melt-down. TEPCO and the Japanese government continue to fight 
 their liability for their contamination and cancers from the Fukshima 
 melt-down.\nNuclear whistleblowers are also retaliated against and during 
 the major earthquake in Kumamoto-Kyushu the Abe government appointed 
 director of NHK told reporters not to "excite" people about the 
 dangers.\nWe call for the evacuation of the children and families in 
 Fukushima with compensation and oppose the propaganda that Fukushima has 
 been "decontaminated" and that the Japanese people can \nThey need to speak 
 out for the people of Fukushima and the world that the nuclear plants in 
 Japan as well as the US need to be closed including Diablo Canyon which is 
 also on an earthquake fault. We will also continue to call for the closure 
 of the   PG&E run  Diablo Canyon nuclear plant which was built on an 
 earthquake fault and threatens another Fukushima on the coast of 
 California. NNA is against the deal made to keep the plant open for many 
 years despite the   dangers of a major catastrophe. After the press 
 conference and rally at the Japanese consulate we will march to PG&E 
 headquarters on 245 Market Street and have a press conference outside PG&E 
 to call for the immediate closure of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant. PG&E 
 cannot be allowed to control our health and safety. We support the 
 protection of the workers and not the stockholders and executives who are 
 still making many millions of dollars from the nuclear industry. Lt. 
 Governor Gavin Newsom, the Brown controlled PUC Chair Picker and PG&E have 
 colluded to avoid following the law in protecting the public.\nDefending 
 the people of Fukushima Japan and the people of California comes first 
 before the protection of TEPCO executives, the nuclear industry and the 
 politicians who are controlled by these corporations.\nWe support the 
 closure of all nuclear plants and facilities like Hanford WA to defend the 
 workers and the people of the United States.\n\nStop Restarting Japan's 
 Nuclear Plants\nDefend the Children and Families of Fukushima\nEnd the 
 Secrecy Laws In Japan\nClose PG&E's nuclear plant now-NO More Illegal 
 Extensions of Nuclear Power in California\nClose All Nuclear Plants in The 
 US And Defend Nuclear Industry Workers and Whistleblower\n\nRally 6/11 
 Japanese Consulate\n3:00 PM 245 Battery/California\nMarch To PG&E\n3:45 
 PM\nPress Conference PG&E\nShut Down Diablo Canyon Now\n\nSpeak Out and 
 Rally initiated by\nNo Nukes Action 
 Committee\nhttp://nonukesaction.wordpress.com/\nFor more information and to 
 endorse and speak at rallies\nContact\n(510) 495-5952\n\nFormer Prime 
 Minister Koizumi backs U.S. sailors suing over Fukushima 
 radiation\nhttp://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/05/19/national/former-prime-minister-koizumi-backs-u-s-sailors-suing-over-fukushima-radiation/#.V23nLDc8y-Q\nKYODO\nMAY 
 19, 2016\nCARLSBAD, CALIFORNIA – Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi 
 has thrown his support behind a group of former U.S. sailors suing the 
 operator of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant. The sailors claim health 
 problems they now suffer were caused by exposure to radiation after a 
 triple meltdown at the plant following an earthquake and tsunami in March 
 2011.\n\nSpeaking at a news conference Tuesday in Carlsbad, California, 
 with some of the plaintiffs, Koizumi said, “Those who gave their all to 
 assist Japan are now suffering from serious illness. I can’t overlook 
 them.”\n\nThe lawsuit was lodged in 2012 against plant operator Tokyo 
 Electric Power Co., which was last month renamed Tokyo Electric Power 
 Company Holdings Inc.\n\nThe plaintiffs include crew members of the U.S. 
 aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan, which provided humanitarian relief along 
 the tsunami-battered coastline in a mission dubbed Operation 
 Tomodachi.\n\nKoizumi spent Sunday through Tuesday meeting 10 of the 
 plaintiffs, asking about the nature of the disaster relief they undertook 
 and about their symptoms.\n\n“I learned that the number of sick people is 
 still increasing, and their symptoms are worsening,” he told the news 
 conference.\n\nKoizumi called on those in Japan, both for and against 
 nuclear power, to come together to think of ways to help the ailing U.S. 
 servicemen.\n\nThe group of about 400 former U.S. Navy sailors and Marines 
 alleges the utility did not provide accurate information about the dangers 
 of radioactive material being emitted from the disaster-struck 
 plant.\n\nThis led the U.S. military to judge the area as being safe to 
 operate in, resulting in the radiation exposure, the group claims.\n\nOne 
 of the plaintiffs at the news conference, Daniel Hair, said Koizumi’s 
 involvement made him feel for the first time that Japan is paying serious 
 attention to their plight.\n\nAccording to lawyers for the group, seven of 
 its members have died so far, including some from leukemia.\n\nKoizumi, who 
 served as prime minister between 2001 and 2006, came out in opposition to 
 nuclear power in the wake of the 2011 disaster. He has repeatedly urged the 
 administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to halt its efforts to restart 
 dormant reactors across Japan.\n\nFukushima 3/11 Breeds 
 Cynicism\nhttp://www.counterpunch.org/2016/06/21/fukushima-311-breeds-cynicism/\nJUNE 
 21, 2016\nFukushima 3/11 Breeds Cynicism\nby ROBERT 
 HUNZIKER\n\n\n\n\nThere’s an old saying “disasters bring out the best 
 in people,” but Fukushima 3/11 of March 11, 2011 has put an exclamation 
 point on cynicism rather than heartfelt concern.\n\nSimilar to America’s 
 experience of outright lies by its government about the Iraqi Massacre, the 
 blowback of cynicism and contempt bring forth a strain of populism, 
 rejecting establishment, attracting lowly dishonorable politics, as America 
 gooses-up an abomination!\n\nFukushima’s a horror story of hidden 
 agendas, lies, scare tactics, and harsh secrecy laws, yet it’s held up as 
 a icon of safe nuclear power by clever mastery of pro-nuke Oceania 
 Newspeak, which, in the novel 1984 penalized “rebellious thoughts” as 
 illegal, similar to Japan’s 2013 secrecy law wherein the “act of 
 leaking itself” is bad enough for prosecution, regardless of what, how, 
 or why, off to jail for 10 years. These decadent precepts are hard to 
 accept with a straight face.\n\nHowever, the day is fast approaching when 
 the pro-nukie crowd, which claims Fukushima 3/11 caused few, if any, major 
 radiation casualties, will be forced to “munch on their own words.” As 
 time passes, it becomes ever more obvious that pro-nuke arguments, 
 supporting big fat cumbersome nuclear power plants, metaphorically, hang by 
 fingertips on an electric fence.\n\nAs an aside, it is rumored, thru the 
 grapevine in Japan, that hospitals have been instructed to categorize, and 
 officially report, patients’ radiation symptoms as “stress-related 
 cases.” Hmm!\n\nAs for pro-nuclear news:\n\n“In spite of this whole 
 theatrical drama the result was…nobody killed or injured, and no 
 indication of long term negative radiation effects on people. So the lesson 
 of Fukushima is that nuclear power is much safer than people thought,” 
 Kelvin Kemm, The Lesson of Fukushima – Nuclear Energy is Safe, Cfact, 
 Feb. 16, 2015.\n\nAnother example:\n\n“No one has been killed or sickened 
 by the radiation — a point confirmed last month by the International 
 Atomic Energy Agency. Even among Fukushima workers, the number of 
 additional cancer cases in coming years is expected to be so low as to be 
 undetectable, a blip impossible to discern against the statistical 
 background noise,” George Johnson, When Radiation Isn’t the Real Risk, 
 New York Times, Sept. 21, 2015\n\nAnd, one more:\n\n“There were no cases 
 of radiation sickness among plant workers, because their radiation doses 
 were too low to produce sickness,” Georgetown Radiation Expert, Author 
 Reflects on 5th Anniversary of Fukushima Meltdown, Georgetown University 
 Medical Center, Newswise, Feb. 23, 2016.\n\nBunk! To the contrary, not only 
 have several independent sources in Japan reported cover ups of Fukushima 
 worker deaths, bodies incinerated with ashes hidden in Buddhist temples, 
 and instances of hair falling out, nose bleeding, and assorted serious 
 ailments unique to radiation poisoning, now several deaths of U.S. sailors 
 may be closely linked to this disaster that a pro-nuclear crowd claims 
 demonstrates how “safe” nuclear power really is.\n\nThus, begging the 
 question: Are the pro-nukites liars and/or are they being lied to, or 
 what’s up? Who knows, and who really cares which, but their published 
 articles, grandstanding nuclear power, are prominent throughout mainstream 
 big time, and small time, magazines and newspapers and hyperspace, Oceania 
 redux.\n\nWhereas, in vivid contrast to this pro-nuke claptrap, one of 
 Japan’s most eminent former prime ministers Junichiro Koizumi (2001-06) 
 declares support for the U.S. sailor’s TEPCO lawsuit, more on this 
 later.\n\nAdditionally, PM Koizumi has repeatedly urged PM Abe to halt 
 efforts to restart Japan’s nuclear reactors. He is the second former 
 Japanese prime minister, including PM Naoto Kan (2010-11), to plea for a 
 halt to nuclear power. They claim nuclear power is not safe!\n\nLuckily for 
 the nuclear power industry, Abe is the prime minister.\n\nYet, there’s a 
 festering problem, prevalence of radiation-poisoned deaths:\n\n“The ashes 
 of half a dozen unidentified laborers ended up at a Buddhist temple in this 
 town just north of the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. Some of the dead 
 men had no papers, others left no emergency contacts. Their names could not 
 be confirmed and no family members had been tracked down to claim their 
 remains. They were simply labeled “decontamination troops” — unknown 
 soldiers in Japan’s massive cleanup campaign to make Fukushima livable 
 again five years after radiation poisoned the fertile countryside,” Mari 
 Yamaguchi, Fukushima ‘Decontamination Troops’ Often Exploited, Shunned, 
 AP & ABC News, Minamisona, Japan, March 10, 2016.\n\nAnd, here’s 
 another:\n\n“It’s a real shame that the authorities hide the truth from 
 the whole world, from the UN. We need to admit that actually many people 
 are dying. We are not allowed to say that, but TEPCO employees also are 
 dying. But they keep mum about it,” Katsutaka Idogawa, former mayor of 
 Futaba (Fukushima Prefecture), Fukushima Disaster: Tokyo Hides Truth as 
 Children Die, Become Ill from Radiation – Ex-Mayor, RT, April 21, 
 2014.\n\nAnd, one more:\n\nMako Oshidori, director of Free Press 
 Corporation/Japan, investigated several unreported worker deaths, and 
 interviewed a former nurse who quit TEPCO: “I would like to talk about my 
 interview of a nurse who used to work at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear 
 Power Plant (NPP) after the accident… He quit his job with TEPCO in 2013, 
 and that’s when I interviewed him… As of now, there are multiple NPP 
 workers that have died, but only the ones who died on the job are reported 
 publicly. Some of them have died suddenly while off work, for instance, 
 during the weekend or in their sleep, but none of their deaths are 
 reported.”\n\n“Not only that, they are not included in the worker death 
 count. For example, there are some workers who quit the job after a lot of 
 radiation exposure… and end up dying a month later, but none of these 
 deaths are either reported, or included in the death toll. This is the 
 reality of the NPP workers,” (The Hidden Truth about Fukushima by Mako 
 Oshidori, delivered at the international conference Effects of Nuclear 
 Disasters on Natural Environment and Human Health held in Germany, 2014 
 co-organized by International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear 
 War).\n\nStill and all, PM Abe insists upon fireside chats with pro-nuke 
 campers whilst reopening nuclear power plants even though Japan survived 
 just fine for five years without. He appears to have ants in his pants, 
 pushing hard to restart the ole nuke plants A-SAP.\n\nMeanwhile, in another 
 universe, former PM Koizumi supports the lawsuit of U.S. sailors aboard the 
 USS Ronald Reagan that participated in Operation Tomodachi, providing 
 humanitarian relief after the March 11th Fukushima meltdowns. Allegedly, 
 they were assured that radiation levels were okay!\n\n“There is no excuse 
 for Tokyo Electric Power Co. not to give the 400 U.S. sailors and marines 
 who are now suing the company the proper facts. Things are looking 
 especially good for the plaintiffs now that former Prime Minister Junichiro 
 Koizumi is backing the lawsuit over the Fukushima radiation,” Support for 
 U.S. Sailor’s Tepco Suit, The Japan Times, June 17, 
 2016.\n\n“Undoubtedly, Koizumi was convinced to help the sailors because 
 they now suffer from radiation poisoning. He said: ‘Those who gave their 
 all to assist Japan are now suffering from serious illness. I can’t 
 overlook them,” Ibid.\n\nAccording to lawyers representing the sailors, 
 Charles Bonner & Cabral Bonner & Paul Garner, Esq., Sausalito, CA, seven 
 sailors have already died, including some from leukemia.\n\nWith passage of 
 time, the number of plaintiffs and numbers of deaths grows as the latency 
 effect of radiation sets in. Thus, over time, the latency effect works 
 against the pro-nuclear squawk talk that “all’s clear.”\n\nInitially, 
 the lawsuit represented less than 200 sailors but over time, the latency 
 effect brings forward 400 sailors claiming radiation-poison complications, 
 including leukemia, ulcers, gall bladder removal, brain cancer, brain 
 tumors, testicular cancer, uterine bleeding, thyroid illness, stomach 
 ailments, and premature deaths. These are youngsters.\n\nThe lawsuit 
 process has been exacting for the young sailors: “Lindsey Cooper, for 
 example. The woman who started the whole thing was torn apart on a CNN 
 program by atomic energy experts and was later mocked on conservative radio 
 shows,” Alexander Osang, Uncertain Radiological Threat: US Navy Sailors 
 Search for Justice After Fukushima Mission, Spiegel Online International, 
 Feb. 5, 2015.\n\nAs it happens, it’s not disasters that turn people’s 
 stomachs as much as cover-ups and lying, bringing forth cynicism, contempt, 
 and ultimately populist blowback as people get fed up with establishment 
 politics.\n\nIt is very likely that, similar to American populist blowback, 
 Japan will meet the same fate.\n\nOn second thought:\n\n“There is one 
 thing that really surprised me here in Europe. It’s the fact that people 
 here think Japan is a very democratic and free country.” (Mako Oshidori, 
 director/Free Press Corporation/Japan, speech in Germany)\n\nEvacuation 
 lifted for Fukushima village; only 10% preparing 
 return\nhttp://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201606120031.html\nTHE ASAHI 
 SHIMBUN\nJune 12, 2016 at 16:35 JST\n\nLights appears at only a few houses 
 in Katsurao, Fukushima Prefecture, on June 11, the eve of the 
 government’s lifting of the evacuation order following the 2011 nuclear 
 accident. Waste from decontamination operations is covered with sheets in 
 the foreground. (Yosuke Fukudome)\nThe government on June 12 lifted the 
 evacuation order for Katsurao, a village northwest of the crippled 
 Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, but most of the residents appear 
 reluctant to return home.\n\nThe lifting of the order covers more than 90 
 percent of the households in Katsurao. The entire village was ordered to 
 evacuate after the crisis at the Fukushima plant started to unfold on March 
 11, 2011.\n\nKatsurao is the fourth municipality in Fukushima Prefecture 
 that had the evacuation order lifted, following the Miyakoji district in 
 Tamura, the eastern area of Kawauchi village and Naraha.\n\nGovernment 
 officials said cleanup and other efforts have reduced radiation levels in 
 Katsurao to a point that poses little problem. The lifting of the 
 evacuation order means that 1,347 people from 418 households, out of 1,466 
 people from 451 households in Katsurao, can return to their homes to live 
 in the village.\n\nBut only 126 people from 53 households, or 10 percent of 
 those eligible to return, have signed up for a program for extended stays 
 in the village to prepare for their return, according to Katsurao 
 officials.\n\nThe officials said they believe that many evacuees would 
 rather go back and forth between temporary housing and their homes in 
 Katsurao for the time being, given the situation in the village.\n\nMedical 
 institutions and shops have yet to resume operations in Katsurao. And 
 nearly half of the rice paddies there are being used for the temporary 
 storage of radioactive waste produced in the cleanup operation.\n\nLocal 
 officials say they have no idea when the waste can be moved out of the 
 village for permanent storage.\n\nAmong the Katsurao residents eligible to 
 return are those with homes in the government-designated “residence 
 restricted zone,” where the annual radiation dose was projected at more 
 than 20 millisieverts and up to 50 millisieverts as of March 2012.\n\nThis 
 was the first time evacuees from such a zone have been permitted to return 
 home.\n\nOnly the “difficult-to-return zone” carries a higher annual 
 radiation dose.\n\nThe government plans to lift evacuation orders for other 
 parts of the prefecture by the end of March 2017, except for the 
 “difficult-to-return zone,” where the annual radiation dose was 
 estimated at 50 millisieverts or higher as of March 2012.\n\nThe additional 
 lifting of the evacuation orders would allow 46,000 of 70,000 displaced 
 residents to return to their homes to live.\n\n(This article was written by 
 Makoto Takada and Yuri Oiwa.)\n\nTime to permanently shut down Japan  Monju 
 nuclear 
 reactor\nhttp://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20160606/p2a/00m/0na/018000c\n\nJune 
 6, 2016 (Mainichi Japan)\n\nJapanese version\n\nThe Ministry of Education, 
 Culture, Sports, Science and Technology expert committee tasked with 
 considering the future of the Monju experimental fast-breeder nuclear 
 reactor in Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture, has put together its report.\n\n	• 
 【Related】Japan enacts law to expand gov't role in nuclear fuel 
 reprocessing\n	• 【Related】Decommissioning of troubled fast-breeder 
 reactor Monju would cost 300 billion yen\n	• 【Related】Nuclear Watch: 
 The Monju reactor's enormous expense\nThe Monju project has been plagued by 
 mishaps and scandals, including serious oversights during inspections. As 
 such, the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) advised the science minister 
 in November last year that the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) should 
 "exit" as Monju's managing body.\n\nIt must be pointed out, however, that 
 the committee's deliberations were based on the assumption that the Monju 
 project would be continued, and considered only how it would be managed. In 
 the end, nothing about Monju may change except the sign above the door -- 
 exactly the outcome the NRA warned it would not accept.\n\nDoes Monju have 
 a valid place in Japan's energy policy? How much will the reactor cost to 
 operate going forward? These questions go straight to the heart of the 
 Monju project, but they have been and continue to be ignored. The 
 government could be looking to keep Monju going uselessly, and this cannot 
 be allowed.\n\nThe expert committee report specifies prerequisites for a 
 new reactor operator, including bringing in specialists from the industrial 
 and legal sectors to join its management board. The science ministry will 
 apparently decide on the new operator of the Monju reactor by this summer, 
 and submit it to the NRA.\n\nThe report also calls for the appointment of a 
 person with experience running a power plant to a leadership position, and 
 strengthening maintenance and management systems.\n\nHowever, the 
 Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan has already stated that 
 none of its members has any intention of taking over Monju's management. 
 The fast-breeder reactor is quite different from commercial reactors, and 
 requires handling volatile sodium coolant. The expert report admits that 
 JAEA is the only organization in Japan with the expertise to deal with 
 sodium coolant, and says that the committee believes the reactor operator 
 will have to be left to a government-related body or specially licensed 
 company.\n\nPut all this together, and it appears that the new Monju 
 operator will include people from outside the nuclear power industry at the 
 top, but leave on-site operation of the plant in the hands of the current 
 staff.\n\nThe suggestion to bring in outsiders is a repeat of 
 recommendations for past JAEA reforms, so there's nothing new to see 
 there.\n\nThe government has promoted Japan's nuclear fuel cycle policy of 
 extracting plutonium from spent fuel and using this reprocessed fuel again 
 in reactors. The Monju reactor, which burns plutonium, is essential to 
 putting the fuel cycle into effect.\n\nHowever, the Monju reactor has been 
 shut down almost continuously since a 1995 sodium leak. The national 
 government has invested more than 1 trillion yen in the project so far, and 
 it takes about 20 billion yen a year to keep the plant running. Many other 
 rich industrialized nations have given up on fast-breeder reactor 
 development because of its technical and cost hurdles. The fuel cycle 
 project is effectively broken beyond repair.\n\nUnder Japan's basic energy 
 policy, passed by the Cabinet two years ago, Monju had a central role in 
 research and development to solve the country's nuclear waste problem. This 
 R&D can be conducted at other facilities, and there is no reason to prolong 
 Monju's life.\n\nIt's time for the government to decide, not on how Monju 
 will continue, but on how it will be shut down for good.\n\nHanford, Not 
 Fukushima, is the Big Radiological Threat to the West 
 Coast\nhttp://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/29/hanford-not-fukushima-is-the-big-radiological-threat-to-the-west-coast/\nby 
 Robert Jacobs\n\nThere is a dangerous radiological threat to the West Coast 
 of the United States that puts the health of millions of Americans at risk. 
 It includes dangers to public health, dangers to the food supply, and 
 dangers to future generations from long-lived radionuclides, including some 
 of the most toxic material in the world. It is not Fukushima, it is 
 Hanford. While radiation from the Fukushima nuclear meltdowns is reaching 
 the West Coast, carried across the ocean from Japan, the radiation from 
 Hanford is already there, has been there for 70 years, and is in serious 
 risk of catastrophe that could dwarf the effects of Fukushima even on 
 Japan.\nHanford, on the Columbia River in Eastern Washington State, is the 
 site where the United States produced the majority of its plutonium for 
 nuclear weapons during the Cold War. These tens of thousands of American 
 nuclear weapons were built as an end product of the high levels of 
 plutonium production at Hanford. The first three nuclear reactors on Earth 
 were built at Hanford, with a total of nine nuclear power plants being 
 built there eventually. Nuclear power plants operated for ten years in this 
 world before they were ever used to generate electricity. Electricity is a 
 secondary purpose for nuclear power plants, they were designed and built as 
 plutonium manufacturing plants.\nHanford was the first of these plutonium 
 production sites. The two worst radiological disasters (besides nuclear 
 weapon detonations) in the first four decades of the Atomic Age were 
 accidents at the plutonium production sites of the United Kingdom and the 
 Soviet Union, both in 1957. Military plutonium production sites remain 
 among the most contaminated sites on Earth. During the period of operation 
 more than 67 metric tons of plutonium were manufactured at Hanford. Hanford 
 is home to 60% (by volume) of all of the high level radioactive waste 
 stored in the United States. Nearly 80% of the Department of Energy’s 
 inventory of spent nuclear fuel rods are stored just 400 yards away from 
 the Columbia River. (Statistics taken from Physicians for Social 
 Responsibility webpage)\nHere is a very brief review of some of the worst 
 impacts and dangers at the Hanford Site.\nThe Green Run\nIn December 1949 
 the United States deliberately released an immense amount of radiation into 
 populated areas at the Hanford Site during the notorious Green Run. It was 
 the largest intentional release of radiation conducted by the U.S. 
 government. While nuclear testing in Nevada exposed many people to 
 significant amounts of radiation, this was a byproduct of the desire to 
 test weapons. In the Green Run the intention was specifically to release 
 the radiation into the Hanford area. The Green Run was conducted in 
 reaction to the test of the first Soviet nuclear weapon in Kazakhstan 
 several months earlier. The first indications that the Soviets had 
 successfully tested a nuclear weapon came when sensors at Hanford picked up 
 the radiation several days later. It was decided to release radiation 
 “similar” to that of the Soviet test to develop and hone detection 
 equipment and better analysis of the Soviet program.\nAfter the end of 
 World War Two the U.S. method of processing the plutonium from the spent 
 nuclear fuel rods involved “maturing” the rods, or letting them cool 
 for approximately 100 days to allow short-lived nuclear isotopes (like 
 iodine-131) to decay. Kate Brown has a detailed discussion of the decisions 
 that eventually led to extending this maturing period at Hanford during 
 this time in her pivotal book, Plutopia. The U.S. assumed that in their 
 rush to produce nuclear weapons as quickly as possible the Soviets were 
 “short-cooling” their plutonium being manufactured at the Mayak 
 Complex, and thus processing the plutonium before these short-lived 
 radionuclides had decayed. The Green Run was a plan to mimic this and 
 process plutonium that had not cooled for 100 days, but instead had cooled 
 only a few weeks and was, hence, “green.” To increase the ability of 
 the radiation detection equipment in the area, and on the airplanes that 
 participated, the filters at the plutonium processing plants that 
 specifically filtered out iodine-131 were turned off for the 12-hour 
 duration of the Green Run.\nAs bad as this deliberate release of radiation 
 into the downwind communities was, things did not go as planned. The 
 intended amount of iodine-131 to be released was dwarfed by the actual 
 release, which was double what was anticipated. While scientists imagined 
 they would then be tracking a coherent cloud as it moved away from the 
 site, the resulting radiation dispersed throughout a vast area stretching 
 across much of Washington State and into Southern Oregon. Concentrations 
 were found in valleys and lowlands as the radiation distributed 
 irregularly. Internalizing iodine-131 is a direct cause of thyroid 
 cancer.\n\nEPA map of iodine-131 distribution following the Green Run 
 showing both heavy dose area and total distribution\nThe Tank Farms\nFew 
 things pose as great a threat to public health at Hanford than the Tank 
 Farms. The Tank Farms are 177 single and double shelled waste storage tanks 
 sited at two different locations on the Hanford complex. In the early days 
 at Hanford, when plutonium for nuclear weapons was separated from the spent 
 nuclear fuel, the leftover uranium from the process was stored in these 
 tanks. Over the years a wide range of the highest level radioactive and 
 chemical wastes were dumped into these tanks. According to the State of 
 Washington the 177 tanks hold 53 million gallons of the highest level 
 radioactive waste existing in the United States. 67 of the single shelled 
 tanks have leaked over 1 million gallons of this highly radioactive waste 
 which is migrating through the soil and groundwater into the Columbia 
 River. In 2011 the Department of Energy emptied the contents of many of the 
 leaking single shelled tanks into double shelled tanks, however the design 
 of the double shelled tanks was found to be flawed, resulting in further 
 leaks.\n\nA section of the Tank Farms at Hanford.  Photo: D0E.\nDealing 
 with the 53 million gallons of highly radioactive waste is a 
 multi-billion-dollar effort designed to manage the waste by 2050, or 
 roughly 100 years after it was first manufactured. Currently almost nothing 
 has yet been accomplished towards this goal besides the paying out of the 
 contracts to design plans and begin the construction of the 
 “Vitrification Plant” that is intended to encase the waste in glass. In 
 recent years’ numerous whistleblowers have come forward from among 
 Hanford employees to describe the flawed design and safety protocols of the 
 Vit Plant. Most of these whistleblowers have been fired by the contractors 
 running the Hanford cleanup. One, Walter Tamosaitis, the research and 
 technology manager of the Vit Plant, was vindicated and awarded $4.3M to 
 settle his wrongful termination suit, however other whistleblowers have 
 been dismissed from their positions since that award. While the liquid 
 waste has been extracted from the tanks the remaining high level waste in 
 the tanks remains largely untreated.\nHanford employees who work 
 maintaining the Tank Farms have suffered serious and unexplained health 
 problems in recent years. Each year numerous workers have been exposed to 
 “vapors” and have become sick or lost consciousness and required 
 hospitalization. Many have suffered ongoing health problems as a result of 
 these exposures. In 2014 over 40 workers suffered from such exposures 
 including a two-week period in late March that saw 26 workers hospitalized. 
 According to KGW news in Portland, a 1997 study conducted by the Pacific 
 Northwest National Laboratory warned that workers exposed to vapors from 
 specific tanks would have significantly increase risk of cancers and other 
 serious diseases, but the conclusions of this report “were never made 
 public, shared with Hanford workers or members of the federally chartered 
 Hanford Advisory Board.”\nOn 29 September 1957 a tank containing waste 
 similar to the waste in the Hanford Tank Farms exploded at the Mayak 
 plutonium production site in the former Soviet Union, known as the Kyshtym 
 Disaster. The cooling system for one of the tanks at the Mayak site failed 
 and the temperature inside the tank rose eventually causing a chemical 
 explosion that sent a radioactive cloud for over 350 km downwind and 
 heavily contaminated an area near the plant with catastrophic levels of 
 cesium-137 and strontium-90. This was one of the worst radiological 
 disasters in human history at the time, and remained so, along with the 
 fire three weeks later inside a nuclear reactor core at the Windscale 
 facility (now called Sellafield) in Cumbria in the United Kingdom, until 
 the Chernobyl meltdown and explosion in 1987. The Kyshtym Disaster, which a 
 Soviet study concluded resulted directly in 8,000 deaths (not to mention 
 illnesses) was the consequence of an explosion in one tank. At Hanford 
 there are currently 177 such tanks, each containing similar disastrous 
 potential, and located beside one another.\nContaminations and Dangers\nThe 
 EPA has identified between 1,500-1,200 specific sites on the Hanford 
 grounds where toxic or radioactive chemicals have been dumped. The 
 ambiguity of that number speaks volumes about the lack of record keeping 
 and functional data for addressing these problems. If plans for remediation 
 of the waste in the Tank Farms at the Hanford Site are carried out as 
 intended, there remains massive contamination of the soil and groundwater 
 under the site, leeching into the Columbia River and surrounding 
 countryside. That is if things go well. Things could go badly. The Kyshtym 
 Disaster shows the dangers of an explosion in one of the tanks storing 
 waste such as that stored in the 177 tanks at the Hanford Tank Farms. An 
 incident in which multiple tanks experience problems could be catastrophic 
 beyond our imagination. What’s more, there is not effective containment 
 or security at the Tank Farms to face the threats of current times. While 
 the countries around the world worry about the dangers of flying airplanes 
 or drones into nuclear power plants, or of cyber attacks on the power 
 supplies to such plants, those sites have at least some effective 
 containment around the toxic materials they hold. The Tank Farms are open 
 air and unshielded. The amount of deadly radiological materials contained 
 in these tanks is far beyond that contained at any single nuclear site in 
 the United States.\nHanford is Here, Fukushima is There\nThe triple 
 meltdown at Fukushima Daiichi was a horrible disaster that has released 
 massive amounts of radiation into the environment. The daily passage of 
 tons of water through the watershed below the plants where the melted 
 nuclear cores (corium) sit smoldering will continue to release radiation 
 into the ocean for decades to come. The health toll that this will take, 
 especially on the children of Northern Japan is horrifying. Already a much 
 higher than expected incidence of thyroid cancers have been reported in 
 area youth. This is the first of the cancers to present and is the tip of 
 the iceberg of health impacts on those in the area. The release of long 
 lived radionuclides such as cesium-137 and uranium into the ecosystem 
 presents dangers to people all around the world as these particles cycle 
 through the biosphere. But the largest and most tragic impacts of Fukushima 
 will be on people in Japan. The plumes from the explosions of March 2011 
 deposited the bulk of their fallout within a few hundred kilometers of the 
 plants. Radiation from the regular releases of contaminated water into the 
 ocean, and the passage of groundwater across the corium will continue to 
 bring radioactive particles into the Pacific Ocean where they will work 
 their way up the food chain much as the fallout deposited by atmospheric 
 nuclear testing did in the Pacific during the 1940s and 1950s. Some of that 
 radiation is reaching the West Coast of the U.S., and this will continue as 
 long as the site hemorrhages contaminated water into the ocean, which will 
 likely be for some decades. This disaster should not be discounted. But it 
 should also be remembered that it is the people of Japan, and specifically 
 the children of Japan who live in the areas where the fallout plumes 
 deposited that face the direst of these consequences.\nThere is currently a 
 great deal of awareness about the arrival of Fukushima radiation on the 
 West Coast. There are many people who say they will not eat fish from the 
 Pacific Ocean, or eat food from Japan. At the same time, there is no 
 discussion about eating Salmon from the Columbia River, drinking wines from 
 the Columbia Valley, or fruit from the orchards that fill the downwind area 
 around Hanford. The amount of radiation in the Hanford area dwarfs the 
 amount arriving on the West Coast of the United States on a scale that is 
 mindboggling. What is arriving from Fukushima is the result of the 
 meltdowns of three nuclear cores, and it is crossing an ocean. What is 
 stored at Hanford and leeching into the Columbia is resultant from 2/3rds 
 of the high level nuclear waste of the United States, and is from 
 production that began decades before Fukushima was built. This is not just 
 contamination that is arriving today, or this year, it has been saturating 
 the groundwater and ecosystem of the Northwest for more than 70 
 years.\nFurthermore, the impacts from Hanford are not only what may happen, 
 but what has already happened. Hanford downwinders have suffered 
 generations of cancers and other diseases across a wide area of Eastern 
 Washington and beyond. There is a legacy of death and illness that spans 
 generations downwind from Hanford, and the source of those diseases 
 percolates away in the tanks and waste sites that sit along the Columbia 
 River, spreading deeper into the surrounding ecosystem. The radiation from 
 Fukushima may slowly seep across the vast Pacific, while at Hanford we have 
 the threat of a radiological explosion or terrorist act that could release 
 volumes more radiation than was released by Fukushima and deposited in 
 Japan any day of any week, and spread radiation across the West Coast and 
 mountain west.\nBy all means we should be vigilant and monitor the levels 
 of Fukushima radiation that arrives on the West Coast of the United States, 
 while remembering that the most profound victims of Fukushima are children 
 living near the site. But we should turn our attention and concerns to the 
 radioactive wound that seeps radiation into the ecosystem of the American 
 and Canadian West every day and threatens it with a radiological disaster 
 that would dwarf the worst that Fukushima has done even in Japan. Stand up 
 for Hanford whistleblowers. Demand transparency on waste management 
 practices and plans at Hanford. Stand up for the health of Hanford workers 
 who are being exposed to dangerous vapors in their workplace. And demand 
 support and compensation for the downwind families and workers whose health 
 and wellbeing has been devastated by the most radioactive site in the 
 United States.\nJoin the debate on Facebook\nRobert Jacobs is a historian 
 of nuclear technologies and radiation technopolitics at the Hiroshima Peace 
 Institute of Hiroshima City University. @bojacobs.\n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2016/07/07/18788698.php
SUMMARY:Rally-Speak Out Stop Restarting Japan Nuke Plants-Defend Children & Families of Fukushima
LOCATION:Japanese Consulate\n275 Battery St/California St\nSan Francisco
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2016/07/07/18788698.php
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