Fri, 23 Dec 2011 22:17:05 -0700 http://www.japanaddicted.com/ Japan Addicted! en-us http://www.japanaddicted.com/images/logo.jpg http://www.japanaddicted.com/ evil@japanaddicted.com http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5212.phtml The Japanese word "kizuna", meaning bonds or connections between people, has been chosen as Japan's kanji of 2011. The kanji, or Chinese pictorial script, for "kizuna" emerged top of a public poll for the character that best summed up the year. For Japan, 2011 was dominated by the earthquake and tsunami in March. The disasters led to unprecedented numbers of Japanese helping one another. After the tsunami smashed into Japan's north-east coast on 11 March, killing thousands and engulfing entire communities, people's stoicism and their determination to pull together won international praise. In April the then prime minister Naoto Kan thanked the world for its help in a letter entitled "Kizuna - the Bonds of Friendship". And when Japan unexpectedly beat the United States to win the women's football World Cup, "kizuna" forged by the players' teamwork was cited with pride. Half a million people took part in the annual poll for the kanji character, conducted by Japan's Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation. About 60,000 people nominated "kizuna", but the runner-up was much less optimistic: "wazawai" means disaster. For some Japanese, 2011 brought the opposite of "kizuna". A firm that specialised in divorce ceremonies said in July that they had tripled since the tsunami as people reassessed their lives. Fri, 23 Dec 2011 22:17:05 -0700 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5211.phtml Japan's consumer prices have fallen for the first time in four months, as weak domestic demand and deflation continue to weigh on growth. Core consumer prices, which exclude fresh food, slipped 0.1% in October, the statistics bureau said. One of the reasons for the fall is last year's cigarette tax rise falling out of the calculations. The strong yen as well as Europe's debt crisis are hurting the growth outlook for the world's third-largest economy. Yen strength In March, Japan was hit by a devastating earthquake and tsunami that caused much damage in the north-east of the country. The government this week passed an emergency budget of $155bn (£100bn) to try to boost domestic demand, however the effects won't be felt for a few months. Fri, 25 Nov 2011 13:13:30 -0700 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5210.phtml In a contentious move that could make or break his government, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said Friday that Japan would join talks toward an ambitious pan-Pacific free trade pact. The accord would potentially open up new markets for Japanese exporters but enrage the nation’s powerful farmers, who say their livelihoods would be wiped out. Sat, 12 Nov 2011 19:46:13 -0700 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5209.phtml Japan's industrial output and household spending fell in September, raising fresh concerns about the health of its economic recovery. Official data shows that factory output dipped 4% from August, while household spending fell by 1.9% year-on-year. The drop comes amid concerns that a slowdown in key markets such as the US and Europe, coupled with a rising yen, may hurt Japan's recovery. Japan was hit by an earthquake and tsunami earlier this year. "After having rebounded following the March disaster, factory output is likely to stall until the year-end as overseas demand weakens," said Yuichi Kodama, of Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance. Further slowdown? Fri, 28 Oct 2011 04:54:14 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5208.phtml As the daughter of the Japanese Red Army's founder and a Palestinian freedom fighter, May Shigenobu grew up on the run. She kept her identity secret and spent long periods without her mother throughout her childhood, but it was a happy one. She now lives in Japan where she works as a journalist for a broadcaster in the Middle East. "At first, when I was very young we would move house every month or so, especially when I was living with members of the Japanese Red Army. Their Asian features stood out in Middle Eastern society and someone could leak information, intentionally or unintentionally, about us being in the neighbourhood. I did see my mother, but not as much as a normal family. I was with her for about a total of four or five years, but it was all quality time so it was ok. I had a brother and a sister, though we weren't related by blood - they were children of my mother's comrades - we felt like family. Thu, 27 Oct 2011 07:51:57 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5207.phtml In Japanese legend they are known as The Kamikaze -- the divine winds -- a reference to two mighty typhoons placed providentially seven years apart which, in the 13th century, destroyed two separate Mongol invasion fleets so large they were not eclipsed until the D-Day landings of World War II. Marine archaeologists now say they have uncovered the remains of a ship from the second fleet in 1281 -- believed to have comprised 4,400 vessels -- a meter below the seabed, in 25 meters of water off the coast of Nagasaki, Japan. Scientists are hoping they will be able to recreate the complete Yuan Dynasty vessel from Kublai Khan's lost fleet using a 12-meter-long section of keel. The Mongols ruled China from 1271 to 1368. According to Yoshifumi Ikeda, a professor of archaeology at Okinawa's University of the Ryukyus, and head of the research team, the section could go a long way to helping researchers identify all the characteristics of the 20-meter warship. "This discovery was of major importance for our research," Ikeda told a news conference. "We are planning to expand search efforts and find further information that can help us restore the whole ship." Discovered using ultrasound equipment, the research team says it is the first wreck from the period to have an intact hull, the planks of which are still attached to the keel with nails. Scientists say its good state of preservation -- they were even able to establish that the planks were originally painted a whitish-gray -- is due to the fact it has been covered by sand. "I believe we will be able to understand more about shipbuilding skills at the time as well as the actual situation of exchanges in East Asia," Ikeda told reporters in Nagasaki. More than 4,000 artifacts, including ceramic shards, bricks used for ballast, cannonballs and stone anchors have been found in the vicinity of the wreck, linking it to the Yuan Dynasty invasion fleet. Ikeda said there were no immediate plans to salvage the hull and the first step was to conserve the find by covering the sites with nets. The Kamikaze -- perhaps better known as the nickname given to the Japanese suicide pilots of the Pacific War -- were a nation-defining event for Japan and set the limits of Mongol expansion in the east. Historians say the first Chinese attempt to invade Japan in 1274 ended in disaster. Having initially engaged a numerically superior Japanese samurai force at the Battle of Bun'ei in First Battle of Hakata Bay, the Chinese retreated to their fleet of 300 ships and some 500 smaller craft after just one day of battle on land. A typhoon destroyed a third of the fleet that night and the remnants limped back to port in Korea which was then a vassal state of China. Seven years later, Kublai Khan amassed an impressive armada of 4,400 ships carrying 40,000 Korean, Mongol and Chinese troops in a bid to finally subjugate Japan. The Japanese, convinced of a second invasion, had spent the intervening years building strategic seawalls which made it difficult for the Chinese to land. Unable to gain a beachhead after initially taking the island of Iki and Tsushima, the fleet was decimated by a two-day typhoon that hit the Tsushima Straits. It is believed about 80% of the fleet was destroyed and the Khan's troops either drowned at sea or slaughtered on the beaches by samurai. According to a contemporary account cited in the book "Khubilai Khan's lost fleet: In Search of a Legendary Armada," by maritime archaeologist James P. Delgado, the losses were so great that "a person could walk across from one point of land to another on a mass of wreckage". Wed, 26 Oct 2011 00:09:39 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5206.phtml A nuclear plant in Ibaraki Prefecture run by Japan Atomic Power Co. managed to avoid a total power loss during the March 11 earthquake and tsunami thanks to a sea wall it was in the process of building higher, sources said. A government panel probing the meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant is analyzing measures taken by the manager of the Tokai No. 2 atomic plant on the assumption that the absence of the sea wall extension measure would have led to a similar disaster, a source close to the panel said. Japan Atomic Power concluded in 2002 that to prepare the plant in Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture, for potential tsunami, waves as high as 4.86 meters should be expected based on the evaluation technology used by the Japan Society of Civil Engineers, it said. But the Ibaraki Prefectural Government requested that the utility re-evaluate the estimate after its own tsunami projection, made public in October 2007, showed waves in nearby areas could reach 7 meters, the company said. Japan Atomic Power then changed its wave level assumption to 5.7 meters and started work to extend the Tokai plant's 4.9-meter sea wall to 6.1 meters in July 2009 to protect the seawater pumps that cool the emergency diesel generator. The work had almost been finished by September 2010, but other work to fully cover the cable holes in the wall was scheduled to be done around May this year, the company said. The tsunami that hit the Tokai plant on March 11 were 5.3 to 5.4 meters in height, exceeding the company's earlier estimate but coming in around 30 to 40 cm lower than its revised projection. After the tsunami hit, the Tokai plant lost external power just like Fukushima No. 1 did, because the sea wall was overrun, knocking out one of its three seawater pumps. But its reactors succeeded in achieving cold shutdown because the plant's emergency diesel generator was being cooled by the two seawater pumps that survived intact. Tokyo Electric Power Co. projected in 2002 that the maximum height of any tsunami that hit Fukushima No. 1 would be 5.7 meters. It then failed to take any reinforcement measures despite further in-house research in 2006 and later. Although Tepco calculated in 2008 that tsunami higher than 10 meters could hit the nuclear plant — a height close to the actual waves seen on March 11 — it only reported its calculation to the Nuclear Industrial Safety Agency on March 7, 2011. The 5.7-meter sea wall at Fukushima No. 1 was totally overwhelmed. The government panel investigating the Fukushima No. 1 crisis is also probing measures taken at Fukushima No. 2 and the Onagawa nuclear power plant in Miyagi Prefecture run by Tohoku Electric Power Co., the source close to the panel said. The panel is scheduled to compile an interim report on its findings in December. Tue, 25 Oct 2011 08:34:01 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5205.phtml It has been a bloodbath to say the least. Shares of Olympus have plummeted more than 50% over the past seven trading sessions to their lowest level in 13 years, wiping out more than $4.5bn (£2.8bn) of the company's value. Battered and bruised, shareholders of the Japanese camera and medical equipment maker have been waiting for the rot to end, but unfortunately for them, things have only gone from bad to worse. It all started when the company fired its chief executive Michael Woodford for what it called a divergence from the board's management policies. However, Mr Woodford claimed that he was axed for questioning Olympus' payment of $687m as fees to financial advisors during the acquisition of British medical equipment company Gyrus. The fee translates to almost 36% of the $2bn that Olympus paid for the takeover, compared with the industry practise of 1% to 5%. While Olympus has denied any wrongdoing, the plunge in its share price indicates that markets and investors do want much more than just a denial. To make matters worse, there are reports that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation is looking into the payments. As Olympus grapples with the aftermath of the controversy, questions are being asked about the future course of action at the company. Management change The Olympus management have done little to ease shareholder concerns. In fact contradictory statements from the company's top echelons have only compounded the confusion. Last week, Olympus first claimed that it had paid less than $300m as fees to the advisors. However, in a statement on its website the company published payment details, which suggest that the total amount paid was $687m, as claimed by Mr Woodford. Mon, 24 Oct 2011 18:28:20 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5204.phtml Japan is prepared to take action in the foreign exchange market to stem the rising yen currency, according to its finance minister. The remarks by Jun Azumi succeeded in weakening the value of the yen against the US dollar in Monday trading. The yen hit a record high against the dollar in New York on Friday. Mr Azumi's comments came as Japan reported export growth of 2.4 percent in September compared to a year ago, according to the Ministry of Finance. That follows a month of growth in overseas shipments during August. Record high Japan's exports, hard hit by the earthquake and tsunami that struck in March, have been dented by the strength of the yen. A strong yen makes Japanese products more expensive in overseas markets compared to Asian rivals such as China and South Korea. Last week, the yen touched 75.78 against the US dollar, alarming Japan's companies and government officials. "This is an utterly speculative move and not reflecting the economic fundamentals at all. This is regrettable," Mr Azumi said. "If this move becomes excessive, we have to take decisive action. I already instructed my staff on Saturday to be prepared to take action." His comments will be seen as a warning to currency speculators whose actions could be contributing towards the yen's rise. Now, investors are waiting to see if the government will directly intervene in the currency markets again. The last time officials intervened was in August, when they spent a record amount of money trying to weaken the yen. Mon, 24 Oct 2011 18:25:30 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5203.phtml Takeo Hayashida signed on with a citizens’ group to test for radiation near his son’s baseball field in Tokyo after government officials told him they had no plans to check for fallout from the devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Like Japan’s central government, local officials said there was nothing to fear in the capital, 160 miles from the disaster zone. Sat, 15 Oct 2011 11:02:47 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5202.phtml An extraordinarily high level of radiation was detected in one spot in a central Tokyo residential district Thursday, prompting the local government to cordon off the small area, local officials said. Radiation levels were higher in Tokyo's Setagaya ward than in the evacuation area around the badly damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, according to ward Mayor Nobuto Hosaka. "We are shocked to see such high radiation level was detected in our neighborhood. We cannot leave it as is," Hosaka told reporters. But the tsunami-struck Fukushima plant may not be the source of the radiation, Hosaka said later on state television. Officials searching for the cause found "glass bottles in a cardboard box" in the basement of a house in the neighborhood which sent radiation detectors off the charts, he said on NHK. "We suspect these bottles in basement could be the cause of the high radiation reading and we are hastily working to confirm it," he said. Radiation experts are now checking what contaminated the bottles, a Setagaya ward official told CNN, declining to be named in line with policy. They told the local government there are no immediate health hazards. Radiation levels just a few feet from the contaminated spot are normal, Hosaka said. The Tokyo scare comes a day after officials in Yokohama, Japan's second largest city, investigated soil samples after a radioactive substance was found in sediment atop an apartment building, according to news reports. Yokohama is about 155 miles (250 kilometers) from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant. The discovery raised concerns that leaked radiation from three Fukushima reactors that suffered meltdowns after the March earthquake and tsunami may be more widespread than thought, The Japan Times reported Wednesday. The U.S. government issued a travel alert last week, warning Americans in Japan to avoid areas near the stricken reactors. The alert recommends that U.S. citizens stay away from areas within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the nuclear facility. The State Department also admonished Americans to stay away from territory northwest of the plant in a zone that Japan calls the "Deliberate Evacuation Area." The zone includes Iitate-mura, the Yamagiya district of Kawamata-machi, Katsurao-mura, Namie-machi and parts of Minamisoma. Thu, 13 Oct 2011 15:50:50 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5201.phtml A Vancouver restaurant has come up with an interesting solution to the men-can’t-aim problem: Ban men from peeing standing up. Recently, my wife and I had brunch at the Edible Canada bistro on Granville Island. When I went to use the facilities, I was surprised to see just one unisex bathroom with about six private stalls and a communal sink area. Wed, 12 Oct 2011 21:40:29 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5200.phtml In a marketing move clean out of left field, one of Tokyo’s biggest tourist hot spots has summarily ditched its well-known name in favor of what locals are already condemning as a very bland brand of nothingness. The location in question is Shibuya’s Center-Gai shopping street -- it’s the one that stretches from the scramble crossing near Hachiko into the messy, smelly heart of Tokyo's so-called “youth” district. * More on CNNGo: Shibuya's 109 department store draws fashion all-nighters Known for bars, cheap restaurants and the innovative boutiques that drive much of Tokyo fashion, Center-Gai has long been a "must" stop for first-time Tokyo visitors. Typically, tourists step out of Shibuya Station's Hachiko exit and immediately stop to gawp at the endless crowds streaming through the scramble crossing into Center-Gai and neighboring streets. Something’s missing Now, when visitors come to enjoy the sights and sounds of Shibuya's alterna-punks, made-up schoolgirls and generally bizarre fashion victims, they’ll instead be told to seek out Basketball Street. Huh? Wed, 12 Oct 2011 09:48:27 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5199.phtml Even as Japan plans to phase out nuclear power as too risky for domestic use, the government is supporting a new push by Japanese industry to sell nuclear power technology to other countries. Mon, 10 Oct 2011 23:08:54 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5198.phtml Japanese health workers have begun checking more than 300,000 children living near the Fukushima nuclear plant for thyroid abnormalities. Parents have expressed concern about a link between thyroid abnormalities and radiation, citing reports of a rise after Chernobyl in 1986. The Fukushima plant was crippled by the earthquake and tsunami in March which killed 20,000 people. Concerns remain high over the possible effects of any lingering contamination. The tests began after an unofficial survey which found that 10 out of 130 children evacuated from Fukushima had hormonal and other irregularities in the thyroid glands, according to AFP news agency. But those who conducted the survey said they could not establish a link between the irregularities and Japan's nuclear crisis. Chernobyl Health officials hope to test some 360,000 people who were under 18 years old when the nuclear crisis began in March, and provide regular follow-up tests. More than 100 children, whose thyroid glands are more susceptible to radioactive iodine than adults, were checked on Sunday. Their results will not be made public, but if they will receive treatment for any abnormalities. Japanese authorities say there should be no risk to children if they keep out of the 20km evacuation area. But residents remain worried, drawing parallels to Chernobyl disaster in 1986, which appears to show a link between thyroid cancer and radiation. More than 6,000 cases of thyroid cancer have been detected in people who were children or adolescents when exposed to the radioactive fallout after Chernobyl. Japan's government says the recovery and decontamination effort could take years. Sun, 09 Oct 2011 16:50:02 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5197.phtml There is a possibility that "system information" such as network addresses was leaked from Mitsubishi Heavy servers infected with a virus, the defense contractor said in a statement. The "possibility of the virus infection was confirmed in the middle of August," Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. -- the nation's largest defense contractor, according to Japan's Kyodo news agency -- said on its web site Monday. The virus was reported to police, the company said, because "the danger of the information leakage became clear." The company is also investigating the incident, along with an expert team outside the company, the statement said. It is believed the "damage expansion due to the viral infection" was stopped. However, "it was confirmed that there is a possibility that system information in part of our internal computers was leaked in the past," Mitsubishi Heavy said, adding that the information included network addresses. It was unconfirmed, however, that data "relating to our products and techniques" was leaked outside of the company, it said. The firm found that 45 servers and 38 computers were infected with eight types of viruses at 11 facilities in Japan, including its headquarters in Tokyo and shipyards in Nagasaki and Kobe, Kyodo reported Tuesday. "Some of the infected machines were forcibly connected to overseas web sites, leading to the leak of Internet Protocol addresses and other network system information," Kyodo said. Wed, 21 Sep 2011 17:55:52 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5196.phtml Japanese pop band SMAP are in China for a long-awaited concert seen as a rare chance to ease strained ties. The five-member group are performing before a crowd of 40,000 at Beijing's Workers' Stadium. They had been due to visit Shanghai last year but their tour was cancelled after a territorial row flared. A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said she hoped the concert - SMAP's first overseas performance - would boost bilateral friendship. It is the first visit to China by a top Japanese band for almost a decade, the Mainichi newspaper reported. SMAP - a boy band that launched its debut single just over 20 years ago - is one of Japan's best-known groups. Its members, who are now in their late 30s, host a weekly cookery and music show. They have also appeared in numerous television dramas, building fan bases in both South Korea and China. 'National sentiment' Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao issued an invitation to the band in May, after previous plans were shelved. Sun, 18 Sep 2011 19:44:49 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5195.phtml For actor Nicolas Cage, making the new thriller movie "Trespass" hit close to home. Cage, at the Toronto film festival along with director Joel Schumacher promoting the film about a home invasion, said that he has actually lived through the nightmare in real life. "It was two in the morning. I was living in Orange County at the time and was asleep with my wife. My two-year old at the time was in another room. I opened my eyes and there was a naked man wearing my leather jacket eating a Fudgesicle in front of my bed," he told reporters on Wednesday. "I know it sounds funny ... but it was horrifying." A Fudgesicle is a frozen, ice cream-like snack. Cage said the ordeal ended after he talked the man out of the house and police arrived. He did not press charges, as the man had mental problems, but Cage, who now lives in Nassau, Bahamas, said he could not stay in the house after that. In "Trespass," which is scheduled for release in October, thieves con their way into the opulent mansion where Cage's character lives with his unhappy wife (played by Nicole Kidman) and their daughter. The family is held for ransom and the movie follows a path of twists and turns as negotiations with the intruders ensue. Schumacher, who earlier cast Cage in his film "8MM," and Kidman in "Batman Forever," said "Trespass" is also about extremes between the rich and the poor in America. "It's a class warfare movie too, about the haves and the have-nots." The diamond-dealing Cage character and one of the invaders are two versions of the same man, in that they have both "overreached to have their share of what used to be called 'The American Dream,'" Schumacher said. Fri, 16 Sep 2011 09:14:33 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5194.phtml Nine possible North Korean defectors who sailed to Japan were moved to a refugee facility in the southern part of the country Wednesday afternoon, according to government officials. Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujiwara said the nine people would be temporarily held at an immigration facility. Earlier in the day, Fujiwara disputed local reports that they would be sent to South Korea. The small wooden boat carrying nine men, women and children onboard claiming they were from North Korea was spotted off Japan's western coast Tuesday morning. A fisherman saw the boat drifting about 25 km (15 miles) off the coast of Noto peninsula of Ishikawa prefecture and reported it to authorities. It is rare for North Korean defectors to sail to Japan's coast. According to coast guard records, there have been only two other cases. One was in 2006, when four North Koreans floated to northern Japan. The other was in 1987, when a family of 11 drifted to west Japan. Thu, 15 Sep 2011 22:46:40 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5193.phtml Japanese officials moved to control diplomatic damage after an air traffic controller was questioned here for posting secret American flight information on his blog, including the detailed flight plans of Air Force One last November. Sun, 11 Sep 2011 17:00:44 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5192.phtml Working at the weekend in sweltering offices and meager use of electrical devices in a country known for its gadgets: This is the new reality in Japan. Six months after the March 11 earthquake, tsunami and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear meltdown, Japan is still struggling to get back to pre-quake power generation. Across the country energy production is down 7% on last summer; in greater Tokyo power generation has fallen by 20%. To avoid blackouts, the government told big industrial energy consumers to cut their power usage by 15% over the summer. Nearly all companies hit their targets or exceeded them, but it's been tough on everyone. No one knows that better than Nissan Motors' Chief Operating Officer Toshiyuki Shiga, who's had to implement the measures. He talks of the "sacrifices" made by his thousands of employees. Tsunami-hit city fights back from tragedy Sacrifices like starting work at 5:30 in the morning to avoid peak energy hours, working most weekends and taking two days off during the week, setting the thermostat in the office to 28 degrees Celsius (82 degrees Fahrenheit), turning off lights, cutting back on overtime. Nissan easily hit its targets and went some way beyond, but if this is the beginning of the new normal, it won't work says Shiga. "I think this is not sustainable. If mothers and fathers go to the office or factory at the weekend they can't talk to their children. It is such a pity. We cannot continue this working situation." Aftermath of Japan's tsunami nightmare Japan Inc. rallied to the energy saving cause so strongly that the Government was able to lift the energy ban early. But it's not over yet, not by a long shot: It looks like energy shortages could remain for another year at least. Currently 43 of the country's 54 nuclear reactors are offline for safety checks and maintenance. And, as the Fukushima Daiichi plant continues to smolder, there's no appetite to bring them back on line. Plant owner says efforts ahead of schedule In fact by May next year, officials say that all nuclear reactors could be offline as more are closed for annual maintenance. That suggests another sweltering summer for Japan's millions of office workers, and continued weekend work for blue-collar workers. The real threat to corporate Japan, though, is unstable energy supply. If that happens, one Tokyo think tank says it will send Japanese industry offshore with losses of hundreds of thousands of jobs. Exporters are already struggling with the strong yen; the last thing they need is energy uncertainty. Watch Andrew Steven's interview with Japan's 'Mr. Yen' All this puts new Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in a very difficult position. He has to convince a highly skeptical public that nuclear energy is safe and can be used, at least until alternatives to nuclear power are up and running. And with the Fukushima plant not likely to be shut down until the end of the year, that's no easy task. Thu, 08 Sep 2011 23:37:58 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5191.phtml Japanese police have blocked main roads in Tokyo during rush hour in an elaborate earthquake drill. Sun, 04 Sep 2011 23:49:14 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5190.phtml Western Japan struggled Monday in the aftermath of Typhoon Talas, which swept across the area with record rainfall that triggered landslides and flooding, killing at least 22 people and leaving 51 missing, local authorities said. "I have been working for the prefectural office over 40 years, but this is the worst in my memory," said Tsutomu Furukawa, spokesperson of Wakayama Prefecture. Wakayama is one of three prefectures on the mountainous Kii Peninsula, where damage from Typhoon Talas was concentrated as the storm swept across the area on Saturday. Sun, 04 Sep 2011 22:50:10 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5189.phtml Broad areas around the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant could soon be declared uninhabitable, perhaps for decades, after a government survey found radioactive contamination that far exceeded safe levels, several major media outlets said Monday. Sun, 21 Aug 2011 22:10:57 -0600 http://www.japanaddicted.com/Article5188.phtml Japan’s atomic energy specialists are discussing a plan to make the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant a storage site for radioactive waste from the crippled station run by Tokyo Electric Power Co. The Atomic Energy Society of Japan is studying the proposal, which would cost tens of billions of dollars, Muneo Morokuzu, a professor of energy and environmental public policy at the University of Tokyo, said in an interview yesterday. The society makes policy recommendations to the government. “We are involved in intense talks on the cleanup of the Dai-Ichi plant and construction of nuclear waste storage facilities at the site is one option,” said Morokuzu. Radiation leaks from the three reactor meltdowns at Fukushima rank the accident on the same scale as the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. The 20-kilometer exclusion zone around Fukushima has forced the evacuation of 50,000 households, extermination of livestock and disposal of crops, drawing comparisons with the Ukraine plant. Areas up to 30 kilometers from Chernobyl remain “a dead zone,” Mykola Kulinich, Ukraine’s ambassador to Japan, said in Tokyo on April 26, the 25th anniversary of the disaster. Waste Proposal Tokyo Electric shares have plunged 85 percent since the day before the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit the Fukushima plant. The stock today rose 2.2 percent to 322 yen in Tokyo. Local authorities in Fukushima, 220 kilometers (137 miles) north of Tokyo, aren’t aware of a proposal to make the Dai-Ichi station a nuclear waste storage site, said Hisashi Katayose, an official at the prefectural government’s disaster task force. He declined to comment. Building storage for radioactive waste at Fukushima could take at least 10 years, said Morokuzu, one of 50 people on a cleanup panel that includes observers from Tokyo Electric and the Trade Ministry. Tokyo Electric would need five years to complete decontamination of the reactors, which includes removal of hydrogen to prevent explosions, he said. Japan’s three storage facilities for highly radioactive waste are at Rokkasho, at the northern tip of the country’s largest island of Honshu, and a nearby site at Sekinehama. The third site is at Tokaimura in Ibaraki prefecture, near Tokyo. Intermediary Use As the sites are for intermediary use, the nation is still searching for a deep underground storage site for the waste, according to the World Nuclear Association. The selection is due to be completed by 2025 and become operational from 2035, the London-based association says. About 90 percent of the world’s 270,000 tons in used nuclear fuel is stored at reactor sites, mostly in ponds of seven meters deep, such as those exposed at the Fukushima site when hydrogen explosions blew the roofs off reactor buildings. “Intensive discussion is needed before reaching any conclusion on what to do with the Fukushima site,” said Tetsuo Ito, the head of the Atomic Energy Research Institute at Kinki University in western Japan. “This is one that the government should take responsibility for and make the final decision.” In the past two weeks, the utility known as Tepco has said fuel rods in reactors 1, 2 and 3 had almost complete meltdowns. That matches U.S. assessments in the early days of the crisis that indicated damage to the station was more severe than Tepco officials suggested. Melted Rods “Most of the fuel rods melted and damage to the cores is most severe in the No. 1 reactor, followed by the No. 3 and then No. 2,” spokesman Junichi Matsumoto said in Tokyo May 24. The utility on April 17 set out a so-called road map to end the crisis in six to nine months. Tepco said it expects to achieve a sustained drop in radiation levels at the plant within three months, followed by a cold shutdown, where core reactor temperatures fall below 100 degrees Celsius. “We have yet to determine how to deal with the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant site, or how to store reactor parts after decommissioning,” Megumi Iwashita, a spokeswoman for the company said by telephone. “Tepco will determine at the right time taking the government’s advice.” Waste Disposal The disposal of high-level waste is more complicated since it needs to be solidified into borosilicate glass and placed inside heavy stainless steel cylinders about 1.3 meters high, the World Nuclear Association said. The casks are then usually transferred to interim storage sites before a long-term underground repository is built. Besides Japan, Russia, Belgium, China and the U.S. are working on plans to build final storage sites, though progress is slow. Belgium will not begin construction until 2035, according to the association. China expects to select a site by 2020, while France and Russia are still investigating areas. The U.S. plan to build a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, in Nevada, in 2002 was overturned by President Barack Obama, whose administration terminated the project’s funding this year. This leaves the U.S. with the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, which began work in 1999 storing defense-related nuclear waste 2,150 feet below the surface. The facility has a 10,000-year regulatory period, according to the U.S. Department of Energy website. Three Mile Island For cleaning up Fukushima, Japan’s disaster has more similarities to the accident at the Three Mile Island reactor in the U.S. in 1979, not Chernobyl, Morokuzu said. Three Mile Island is in a decommissioning process, while Chernobyl was entombed in concrete and steel. Three Mile Island had a partial meltdown of a reactor, causing the most serious nuclear plant accident in the U.S. Removal of fuel was completed in 1990 and the plant will be decommissioned when the license for an operational reactor at the site expires in 2034. Japan’s efforts to find other places to store high-level nuclear waste included offering 2 trillion yen ($17 billion) over 60 years to the town of Toyo on Shikoku island to accept a facility. The proposal in 2007 was backed by Mayor Yasuoki Tashima in his re-election bid. He lost. Thu, 26 May 2011 17:29:21 -0600