Reports that plutonium had been detected at five locations inside the grounds of the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant set off a flurry of activity on blogs and twitter accounts today. But the truth is that plutonium around the facility was to be expected–and the levels found do not pose a threat to human health.
plutonium
Fukushima: Sick Workers and Cracked Vessels. What’s true?
Each day at the stricken Fukushima power plant seems to bring a new piece of troubling news—today, reports surfaced that three workers at the Fukushima plant had been hospitalized after radiation levels reported at the plant spiked to “10,000 times above normal.” There were also reports that the No. 3 reactor vessel had been damaged, …
MOX: The Fukushima Word of the Day and Why it’s Bad News
With four busted reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi site, engineers and rescue workers have plenty to do just to keep all their plates spinning. But over the past few days, there always seems to be one reactor causing them more headaches than others. Yesterday it was reactor 4, with its coolant pool empty of water and the spent fuel rods …
Japan’s Radiation Exposure: How Serious Is It?
There are few environmental dangers that spook people more than radioactivity. And there is surely no country in the world that comes by that fear more rightly than Japan — which, alone among nations, has felt the pain of a nuclear conflagration first hand. So it’s understandable that the Japanese public is terrified by the danger …