Japan

Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant under state of emergency after quake
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Justin McCurry in Osaka guardian.co.uk, Friday 11 March 2011 14.30 GMT

Thousands of people are being evacuated from the area around a nuclear reactor after its cooling system failed in Japan's devastating earthquake. A state of emergency was declared around the Fukushima No 1 power plant as a precaution, because a cooling system was not working after the quake, officials said. The Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, said there had been no reports of radiation leaks at any of the country's nuclear facilities. Residents within a 2 mile (3km) radius of Tokyo Electric Power's (Tepco) Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant had been told to evacuate, Japan's chief cabinet secretary, Yukio Edano, told a news conference. Kyodo news agency said around 3,000 residents were being moved out. Work had begun on restoring the cooling function at the reactor, Jiji news agency quoted the trade ministry as saying. Tepco confirmed that water levels inside the reactors were falling but it was working to maintain them to avert the exposure of nuclear fuel rods. The company was trying to restore power to its emergency power system so it could add water to the reactors, a Tepco spokesman said. "There is a falling trend (in water levels) but we have not confirmed an exposure of nuclear fuel rods," he said. Tepco had been operating three out of six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant at the time of the quake ± the No 1, No 2 and No 3 units ± all of which were shut down. Reactors core remain hot and still need cooling after they have been shut down.

The spokesman said there were no concerns of a water leak in the other three reactors at the plant, which were closed for planned maintenance. "We launched the measure so we can be fully prepared for the worst scenario," Edano said. "We are using all our might to deal with the situation." Eleven nuclear reactors were automatically shut down in the wider quakeaffected areas of Japan, the government said. Kan said: "Parts of nuclear plants were automatically shut down but we haven't confirmed any effects induced by radioactive materials outside the facilities." A fire broke out in a turbine building and was extinguished at the Tohoku Electricity company's Onagawa nuclear plant in north-east Japan. Smoke was seen coming from the building, which is separate from the plant's reactor. The four nuclear power plants closest to the epicentre had all been safely shut down, the International Atomic Energy Agency said, adding that it was seeking more information and had offered its help to Japan.

The news talks about the preliminary conclusions the experts have reached about the nuclear plant¶s state. They are saying that the adjacent area has not been contaminated but the authorities have preferred, for precaution, to evacuate all the people within a 2 miles radius. The news does not give more details, although it is said that they will check if all the reactors are in good conditions and none has suffered damages dangerous for the health and no radiation have reached the water or the earth.

Japan's earthquake: A wave of death
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Editorial The Guardian, Saturday 12 March 2011

Tsunami is a Japanese word, meaning "harbor wave". Yesterday's earthquake in northern Japan was remarkable in scale and devastation caused ± but it struck a country that experience an earthquake in or around its vicinity every five minutes, and which is home to world-beating expertise on how to minimize the destruction they trigger. The damage toll from yesterday's earthquake is still mounting in Japan, but the international impact may conceivably be even more terrible, depending on how it affects poorer countries. To be clear, the damage caused by one of Japan's biggest quakes in over a century is already huge. National media are talking about a death toll of 1,000, between 200 and 300 of them in the northern port of Sendai alone. Officials yesterday declared a state of emergency at the nuclear plant in Fukushima. Cars, ships, homes and offices were all destroyed or swept away.

The quake struck about 250 miles north of Tokyo, but initial estimates of the potential economic consequences have still been large, with one analyst talking about 1% being knocked off GDP in the short term. The world's most indebted government will probably have to launch a big spending round to make up the damage ± it would not be surprising if Prime Minister Naoto Kan declared a special quake budget. And the Bank of Japan has brought forward its scheduled policy announcement next week, presumably to unveil emergency measures. Ever since Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, Japan has either been in recession, or on the brink of it. This earthquake adds to the problems of an ultra-weak economy. The scenes of devastation yesterday naturally brought to mind the terrible Kobe earthquake of 1995. But that took place nearer a big city and left residents of the world's then second largest economy living in tents for weeks and months. This week's quake may not have such adverse or long-lasting consequences; it is worth noting that Tokyo has so far suffered disruption rather than massive destruction. But what counts now is how far the tsunami spreads, and to which countries.

The blunt rule of natural disasters is that they affect poorer countries far worse than rich ones.

Non-governmental organizations were right yesterday to voice worries about the possible impact on tiny island states such as Tuvalu and Samoa. Similarly, while the first wave that hit Indonesia and the Philippines yesterday seemed to do little damage, second or third waves may obviously be worse. The destruction caused by Japan's earthquake has already been savage; but if the tremors hit poorer countries in a big way the impact may be even worse.

The second news about Japan¶s disaster talks about the damages the tsunami provoked. It says that a lot of people have been affected, lost their homes, cars, ships and offices, and many of them have been evacuated to tents and sport facilities as the nuclear plant Fukushima has been declared in emergency state. The authorities cannot say exactly how many people have died and disappeared, but they estimate more or less 1.000 deceased. There are a lot of cities damaged by the disaster, although Tokio has only disruption. This tsunami and earthquake have destroyed a country which is passing through an important economical crisis, but there is also a huge preoccupation about how many damages will provoke in the adjacent countries and islands.

Japan's

economy

heads

into

freefall

after

earthquake and tsunami
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Tim Webb guardian.co.uk, Sunday 13 March 2011 20.19 GMT

The full extent of the economic impact of Friday's earthquake and tsunami is becoming apparent, with hundreds of factories shut across Japan, warnings of rolling blackouts and predictions from economists that the disaster would push the country into recession.

The Bank of Japan is preparing to pump billions of yen into the economy when it announces an emergency "quake budget" on Monday to prevent the disaster derailing the country's fragile economic recovery.

Toyota and Nissan said they were halting production at all of their 20 factories. Toyota, the world's largest carmaker, evacuated workers from two plants in the worst affected regions and has not been able to reach the sites to inspect the damage. The plants make up to 420,000 small cars each year, mostly for export. Two of Honda's three plants remain closed. Other manufacturers have also reported major damage to their factories, with Kirin Holdings, Fuji Heavy Industries, GlaxoSmithKline and Nestlé among those to halt operations. Sony, the electronics group, has suspended production at eight plants. At one plant, 1,000 workers had to take refuge on the second floor after the tsunami hit. All ports have been closed amid warnings of aftershocks to come. Japan's utilities providers are warning of rolling blackouts across the country in the coming days because they are unable to meet electricity demand. Nuclear power generates about a third of the country's electricity but six reactor units at Fukushima remain offline indefinitely. An estimated 2 million homes are without power and about 1.4 million do not have running water. Equecat, a risk consultancy, estimated over the weekend that the economic losses from this earthquake would total more than $100bn (£62bn).

Analysts said one of the Bank of Japan's priorities was to advance "soft" loans to commercial banks to make sure they do not run out of cash as customers in the affected areas rush to withdraw savings. The central bank is expected to flood money markets with more cash than usual, partly to stop the yen from rising too much. Japanese firms and investors are racing to repatriate their assets, selling dollars and other foreign currencies, to prepare for the cost of rebuilding their domestic economy, which will push up the yen's value. It is feared this will make exports more expensive and choke off the hoped-for, export-led recovery. David Buik at BGC partners said: "The Bank of Japan, I am sure, will be on high alert, doing everything in its power to stop the yen becoming too strong, as well as providing the banking sector with all the liquidity it may require. "Japan's economy is export-led. So with such an inordinately large budget deficit, it will be imperative to get those factories open again." The bank has little scope to cut interest rates, as they are almost at zero. Economists said the bank was likely to hold fire on more drastic action while it assesses the economic impact 0f the disaster. Daiwa Capital Markets, the Japanese-owned bank, said it was likely the economy would be pushed into recession, with exports particularly badly hit. Economists had expected growth of 0.3% this quarter but now expect a second successive quarter of negative growth. The huge cost of rebuilding the affected areas will push up Japan's public debt, which is already the largest among advanced economies. The Nikkei index, which fell 1.7% on Friday, is expected to post large falls when it reopens as the scale of the damage becomes clear. Some analysts warned it could tumble below the psychologically important 10,000 mark, which would represent a 2.7% drop from Friday's close, with one analyst at Toyota Asset Management telling Reuters it could fall below 9,000 soon. Oil prices, which fell by 3% on Friday, are likely to continue falling this week. Japan is the one of the world's largest importers of oil but demand is likely to drop as industrial activity falters. Strategists have been analyzing the economic impact of Japan's last major earthquake, in 1995 near Kobe, for clues.

The Nikkei fell 8% in the first five days after that earthquake but then rose by 5% in the next 10 days. After the initial disruption, the economy grew by more than the trend growth rate at the time for 1995 and 1996.

The news talks about a lot of factories which have been closed because of the damaged suffered, which will provoke the country to enter into a recession. The Bank of Japan is also preparing to make more money in order to avoid the rising of the currency, the yen. Important enterprises, such as Toyota, Nestle, Sony and Nissan have closed their factories and the Japanese providers of electricity are not capable to supply all the requests, so 2 million of homes are without electricity and 1.4 million without running water. All this will provoke Japan to not import oil and the exports will be more expensive.

Japan radiation leaks feared as nuclear experts point to possible cover-up
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John Vidal and Damian Carrington guardian.co.uk, Monday 14 March 2011 21.03 GMT

Nuclear experts have thrown doubt on the accuracy of official information issued about the Fukushima nuclear accident, saying that it followed a pattern of secrecy and cover-ups employed in other nuclear accidents. "It's impossible to get any radiation readings," said John Large, an independent nuclear engineer who has worked for the UK government and been commissioned to report on the accident for Greenpeace International. "The actions of the Japanese government are completely contrary to their words. They have evacuated 180,000 people but say there is no radiation. They are certain to have readings but we are being told nothing." He said a radiation release was suspected "but at the moment it is impossible to know. It was the same at Chernobyl, where they said there was a bit of a problem and only later did the full extent emerge." According to some reports, 17 helicopter crewmen helping in rescue efforts were contaminated with low-level radiation, but Japanese officials declined to comment. The country's government has previously been accused of covering up nuclear accidents and hampering the development of alternative energy.

In a newly released diplomatic cable obtained by WikiLeaks, politician Taro Kono, a high-profile member of Japan's lower house, tells US diplomats that the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry ± the Japanese government department responsible for nuclear energy ± has been "covering up nuclear accidents and obscuring the true costs and problems associated with the nuclear industry".

In 2008, Kono told them: "The ministries were trapped in their policies, as officials inherited policies from people more senior to them, which they could then not challenge." He mentioned the dangers of natural disasters in the context of nuclear waste disposal, citing Japan's "extensive seismic activity, and abundant groundwater,

and [he] questioned if there really was a safe place to store nuclear waste in the 'land of volcanoes'."

"What we are seeing follows a clear pattern of secrecy and denial," said Paul Dorfman, co-secretary to the Committee Examining Radiation Risks from Internal Emitters, a UK government advisory committee disbanded in 2004.

"The Japanese government has always tended to underplay accidents. At the moment the Japanese claims of safety are not to be believed by anyone. The health effects of what has happened so far are imponderable. The reality is we just do not know. There is profound uncertainty about the impact of the accident." The Japanese authorities and nuclear companies have been implicated in a series of cover-ups. In 1995, reports of a sodium leak and fire at Japan's Monju fast breeder reactor were suppressed and employees were gagged. In 2002, the chairman and four executives of Tepco, the company which owns the stricken Fukushima plant, resigned after reports that safety records were falsified.

The news talks about the concealment of the government in relation with all the nuclear disasters which have happened over the years. Experts say that although the government says that the studies made in Fukushima reveal there is no danger of radiations, 180.000 people have been evacuated. They compare Fukushima with Chernobyl and say that the initial tests said there were not any problems, the real damages were later known as bigger than expected. Also, there is said the government has hidden the problems nuclear plants lead and, instead, as not lead on other alternative energies. All over the years the government has hidden problems at the nuclear plants, such as the sodium leak and fire at Japan¶s Monju, which lead to the resignation of one chairman and four executives of Tepco, one of the biggest provider of energy based on nuclear power, mostly because a lot of safety records were falsified.

Another rod to beat the nuclear industry
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The Guardian, Tuesday 15 March 2011 Alexis Rowell, Director

It's hardly a surprise that building nuclear power stations on seismic fault lines, as Japan has done, turns out to be a foolish thing. The Fukushima disaster may mean meltdown or worse, but what it will certainly mean is extra expense (Disaster in Japan, 14 March). Nuclear has always been an expensive white elephant. UK taxpayers subsidise nuclear to the tune of £1bn a year. Half the civil servants at the Department of Energy work on nuclear power, which makes a mockery of energy secretary Chris Huhne's claim that no public money will be spent on new nuclear. A report by the US Union of Concerned Scientists last month said nuclear power in the US had never operated without public subsidies.

The cost of decommissioning old nuclear in the UK is estimated to be at least £73bn. Surely, therefore, anyone wishing to provide new nuclear should have to put that sort of sum into an upfront clean-up fund. But of course they can't possibly afford to. Nuclear power is uninsurable. It's too risky and the potential payouts are too big. The taxpayer will have to pay, as we did to bail out the banks. Only two nuclear power stations are under construction in Western Europe: one in France and one in Finland. The Finnish reactor ± supposed to be the first of a new generation of safe and affordable units ± is being subsidized by the French nuclear industry as a loss leader in the hope that it will spark a new nuclear building boom. The project has been plagued with cost overruns and delays, is under investigation by the Finnish nuclear safety regulator and is probably the single best reason why new nuclear is a mistake.

The news talks about the sums of money which are spent in building and maintaining the nuclear plants. Although many countries have said that nuclear plants have never been paid with public money, the reality is that nuclear plants have never operated without public money and whenever a disaster will happen, taxpayers will have to pay as they did with the banks. Actually, there are two nuclear plants which are

being built, one in Finland and other in France. There have been a lot of problems along the project such as delays and safety regulator. All of these problems leaves to the thought that nuclear energy is a big mistake and must be replaced by other alternative energies.

China suspends approval for nuclear power plants
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Reuters guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 16 March 2011 14.40 GMT

China has suspended approvals for proposed nuclear power plants and is making a comprehensive safety check of its existing ones after Japan's nuclear crisis.

The announcement by the state council, or cabinet, was the clearest sign yet that the crisis at the nuclear plant in north-east Japan would slow China's ambitious nuclear expansion plans, which are by far the world's largest. The state council meeting chaired by the premier, Wen Jiabao, told Chinese residents that they had nothing to fear about radiation drifting from the Fukushima Daiichi plant. But China's own nuclear power plans would come under tougher scrutiny, said the account of the meeting on the government's website.

"We will temporarily suspend approval of nuclear power projects, including those in the preliminary stages of development," the statement said. "We must fully grasp the importance and urgency of nuclear safety, and development of nuclear power must make safety the top priority." The state council called for use of "the most advanced standards" to proceed with a safety assessment of all nuclear plants under construction. "Any hazards must be thoroughly dealt with, and those that do not conform to safety standards must immediately cease construction," the statement said. The state council said it had detected no abnormal levels of radiation in China from Japan. Chinese experts had concluded that wind would scatter any radiation from the crippled Japanese plant over the Pacific, the meeting account said. "This will not affect the health of our public," it said.

China wants nuclear power to play a big role in its plans to cut dependence on coal over the next decade and local governments across the country have been vying for the investment, jobs and kudos that the new plants would bring. China is building about 28 reactors, or roughly 40% of the world's total under construction, and the central government has fast-tracked approvals for nuclear projects in the past two years.

The news says China is thinking in review the nuclear plants, which are the world¶s largest ones. It has been said that Chinese authorities are stopped the construction of several plants in order to review their safety and to check the radiation levels. China is looking for nuclear energy due to replace their reliance on coal and is building 28 reactors, which represent the 40% world¶s total nuclear constructions.

Fukushima workers labor round the clock in effort to avert catastrophe
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Justin McCurry in Osaka guardian.co.uk, Thursday 17 March 2011 21.02 GMT

The population of Japan is with them in spirit and, according to reports, colleagues of the estimated 200 remaining workers at the Fukushima nuclear power plant are ready to work alongside them to avert catastrophe. The limited effectiveness of the water bombing to cool the storage poll for spent fuel rods has re-focused attention on the anonymous technicians, now thought to have been joined by firefighters and soldiers. The few details from relatives suggest no one in this elite team has got ideas about abandoning the work. One reportedly told a colleague from the plant he was prepared to die: it was his job. The wife of one of the "Fukushima 50" told the state broadcaster, NHK, her husband had emailed to say the situation was serious. "He told me to take care of myself because he wouldn't be home for a while." The plant's operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, or Tepco, has been inundated with offers after requesting 20 volunteers to help with making the reactors safe. A 59-year-old, with decades of experience, put himself forward. A woman, thought to be his daughter, wrote on Twitter: "I fought back tears when I heard that my father, who is to retire in six months, had volunteered." She said he had told her that the future of Japan's nuclear power industry rested on Fukushima. He had said, 'I am on a mission'," she added. The workers are operating round the clock, in near-intolerable conditions, threatened by exposure to radiation. Japan's health ministry said the legal limit on radiation exposure would be raised to facilitate time spent at the reactors.

Five Tepco workers have died since the plant was damaged by last Friday's earthquake and tsunami, though none from radiation poisoning. Two are reported missing, while 22 have been injured, some in the plant's hydrogen explosions. On Wednesday, surging radiation levels forced workers to withdraw from the crippled plant for 45 minutes. Their permanent withdrawal will be the first sign that the battle has been lost. The Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, has told them that "retreat is unthinkable". Experts said the workers might be increasing their chances of developing cancer despite the team rota system. The workers can expect to keep their anonymity, so strongly protected by their families in recent days. The fear is that having been exposed to danger they will join tens of thousands of other Japanese whose health has been forever affected by radiation, becoming a modern-day equivalent of the hibakusha, the survivors of the 1945 atomic bombs. "The government and Tepco were saying the volume of leaked radiation is significant, but I think they're taking the situation too lightly," Haruhide Tamamoto, 80, a victim of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima, told Kyodo news agency. "I've suffered from illnesses and other health concerns ever since I was exposed to radiation and I know it's not how the authorities describe it ± I want them to realize that this is a real crisis."

The news talks about the anonymous people who are trying to rescue Fukushima¶s nuclear plant for a disaster. After several intends of cooling the reactors with fresh water, they have been joined by soldiers and firefighters. Their families have said none of the workers has thought on leaving the plant, as they consider that their duty. Also, after the government¶s request of more volunteers, an experienced engineer has offered himself to help, despite his daughter¶s denial. Some workers have died, although not for radiation, but there have been several times where they have had to evacuate the plant because of the radiation levels.

Japan: the many aftershocks
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Editorial The Guardian, Friday 18 March 2011

A week after an earthquake powerful enough to shift the earth's axis by 6.5 inches, shorten the day by 1.6 microseconds, and push Japan two feet into the ground, the country is struggling with multiple crises. Any one of these would test the strongest of nations. Japan has a nuclear crisis, a fuel crisis, 430,000 people homeless, 2 million households without power, 1.4 million without water ± all that running concurrently with the task of recovering the bodies of over 9,000 people still thought to be missing. To say that this is the greatest emergency Japan has faced since the Second World War ± as the Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, said on Monday ± is no exaggeration. Radiation levels above and around the two stricken reactors of the Fukushima Daiichi No 1 nuclear plant have reached such a peak that crews trying to douse one reactor and its spent fuel rod pool were forced back. Increasingly, the ad hoc attempts to cool down the reactors and the pools ± by using high pressure hoses from fire engines and Chinook helicopters dumping water from the air ± appear not to have worked. The latest status of the four reactors at the plant hardly makes reassuring reading. That leaves reconnecting the plant to the grid and restarting the cooling pumps inside as the last line of defence before a major release of radiation.

It is not difficult to make the calculations of population movement that will ensue if large amounts of radioactivity are released into the atmosphere, particularly by one reactor which uses a mixture of uranium and plutonium. About 70,000 people have already been evacuated from a 20km radius around the plant, but double that number, who live within 30km, have been told to stay indoors. This advice has been contradicted by the US and Canadian governments, which have instructed their citizens who live within 80km of the plant to leave. Germany's embassy moved its operations from Tokyo to Osaka. If the Japanese government issued the same instructions to residents within 80km of the plant, you would have a major evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people. Where would they all go?

The perception of danger even in areas with lower radiation levels is enough to stop truck drivers delivering much-needed fuel to the areas devastated by the tsunami from using the Tohoku Expressway. So the road is being bypassed, causing further delays. Precise, real-time information to reassure emergency workers about local radiation levels is turning out to be as important as the supplies of fuel and food that they deliver. The Tohoku Expressway and other key routes should be lined with Geiger counters. Mr Kan initially reacted well to the tsunami by mobilizing 100,000 troops. He learned that lesson from the dithering of a predecessor at the time of the Kobe earthquake ± the last comparable event. Mr Kan swiftly toured the earthquake zone and made a good national address on television.

But he has since been absent from TV screens, letting his cabinet secretary do all the talking. With one crisis in danger of obscuring another coming up behind, Japan needs political leadership as never before. People need reassurance and a constant stream of information on which they can depend. They are getting little of either at the moment. Of all the authorities, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, the operator of the plant, comes off worst. The most dangerous uranium at the plant is not in the reactor cores but in the 11,195 spent fuel rods stored at the site. Why so many? Because it is cheaper to store them on site than to dispose of them, while Japan awaits the opening of a reprocessing plant. Temporary storage pools have become permanent fixtures at power plants. The same is practiced at plants in the US. The nuclear industry's inability to deal safely with its waste is coming back to haunt it.

A week after the Japanese disaster, the country is suffering like in 1945. The earth¶s axis has been moved, there are 430.000 people homeless, 1.4 million waterless, 2 million households without water and the authorities and rescue teams are still looking for more than 9.000 disappeared and probably dead people. Although there have been 70.000 evacuated people from a 20km. radius around the plant, countries like Canada recommend to evacuate the habitants from an 80km. radius. These radiation problems

have caused that a lot of truck drivers deny to continue supplying the affected area and it is surely that all this will affect the nuclear industry.

Japan nuclear plant workers in hospital after radiation exposure
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Justin McCurry in Tokyo The Guardian, Friday 25 March 2011

The dangers facing workers battling to avert disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant were underlined on Thursday when three men were exposed to high levels of radiation after stepping in contaminated water. The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), admitted that the workers had not measured radioactivity levels before beginning work, and that two, who are being treated for radiation burns, were not wearing protective boots. The two more seriously injured men were diagnosed with possible beta ray burns and were due to be taken to a special unit at the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Chiba, east of Tokyo, Japan's nuclear safety agency said. The injuries are similar to regular burns, but can lead to serious complications over a period of several weeks. Tests on the workers, who are all in their 20s and 30s, showed they were exposed to between 170 millisieverts (mSv) and 180 mSv of radiation while laying cable in the basement of the No 3 reactor's turbine building. That is above the usual legal limit of 100 mSv per year for nuclear power workers in Japan, but below a new limit of 250 mSv, introduced soon after the nuclear crisis began to enable them to spend more time inside the crippled facility. The two hospitalized men, employees of a Tepco affiliate, were part of a team of six workers attempting to connect a water pump to the power supply and restart the supply of fresh water in an attempt to cool the reactor. Workers in the first and basement floors of the No 3 reactor's turbine building were ordered to evacuate the area after the accident. Japan's nuclear safety agency said water had probably seeped through their protective clothing, allowing radioactive materials to stick to their skin, as they stood in

a 15cm-deep puddle. The two injured men were wearing shoes, while the third had boots on and so escaped serious injury. Radiation levels on the surface of the puddle were later measured at 400 mSv per hour, while the level in the air reached 200 mSv per hour. The source of the water was not immediately clear. Tepco said no puddle had been spotted in the turbine building the previous day. Fire trucks have been dousing the reactor in recent days in an attempt to cool a storage pool for spent fuel rods. The accident cast doubt on Tepco's ability to properly monitor radioactivity at the site. "This kind of exposure, from water, was unforeseen," the government's chief spokesman, Yukio Edano, told reporters. "Atmospheric radiation levels are monitored constantly, but in this case the workers stepped into water. We are trying to find out exactly what happened so we can ensure it doesn't happen again." Edano said the injuries were "very regrettable", but defended the health ministry's decision to raise the exposure limit for teams of workers soon after the start of the world's worst nuclear power emergency since Chernobyl. "The decision to increase permissible radiation exposure was taken on the advice of experts, who say that workers are able to withstand up to 250 mSv per year before radiation has an effect on their health," Edano said. He conceded that the emergency at Fukushima would lead to a review of Japan's heavy dependence on nuclear power. "It is certain that public confidence in nuclear power plants has greatly changed," Edano told Reuters. "In light of that, we must first end this situation and then study from a zero base." More than 20 workers have been injured at the Fukushima plant, 150 miles north of Tokyo, since it was badly damaged in the 11 March earthquake and tsunami. They include 11 who were hurt when the No 3 reactor building exploded.

To date, 17 have been exposed to radiation exceeding 100 mSv at the plant, though none has been exposed to contamination exceeding the accumulative 250 mSv limit. The condition of the No 3 unit is of particular concern as it contains plutoniumuranium mixed oxide fuel and would release highly toxic plutonium in the event of a meltdown. On Wednesday afternoon, workers were temporarily evacuated from the plant after black smoke was seen rising from the same reactor. The smoke receded after an hour and radiation levels remained unchanged, the safety agency said. The release of radioactive substances from the plant continued to cause anxiety in Tokyo. Wednesday's warning that radioactive iodine levels in the capital's tap water had exceeded levels considered safe for babies prompted a rush of people buying bottled water. The warning was lifted on Thursday after iodine-131 dropped to safe levels, but they were still above the safe upper limit for infants in the neighboring prefectures of Chiba and Saitama. In Tokyo, a city of 13 million people, supermarkets quickly ran out of bottled water; the metropolitan government said it would distribute an extra 240,000 bottles to families with infants. "Customers ask us for water, but there's nothing we can do," Masayoshi Kasahara, a supermarket worker, said. "We have asked for extra deliveries but we don't know when they will arrive.´

The news begins by saying that three workers have been exposed to high radiation levels because they did not counted the radiation levels before beginning to work and either wore protective boots. They have suffered serious burns and had to be moved to the hospital in order to be treated properly. Other workers who were trying to reestablish the fresh water supply and restart reactor number 3 were told to evacuate as

they were exposed to radioactive water which had penetrated their special clothes. Under the threat of contaminated water in Tokyo, dangerous especially for babies, many families have bought a lot of bottled water, while the government has promised to give 240.000 more bottles for families with young children and the supermarkets have run out of products.

Japanese nuclear firm admits error on radiation reading
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Justin McCurry in Tokyo The Guardian, Monday 28 March 2011

Fresh doubt has been cast on the handling of the Fukushima nuclear crisis after officials admitted wildly overstating levels of radiation, prompting an evacuation of the nuclear site damaged by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami. Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) said initial reports of a level 10m times higher than normal in parts of the No 2 reactor were inaccurate, although it could not say by how much. Tepco said at first that the worker who took the measurement, of a pool of water in the reactor's basement turbine building, had fled before taking a second reading. The discovery prompted another evacuation at the site, halting work to pump and store radioactive water that has built up in the turbine buildings of three of the six reactors. Tepco later said the pool of water had been contaminated but the extremely high reading was a mistake. "The number is not credible," spokesman Takashi Kurita said. "We are very sorry." However, later reports on Sunday showed contamination 100,000 times normal in water at reactor No 2, and 1,850 times normal in the nearby sea, the most alarming levels since the crisis began. Evidence of dangerous contamination in reactor No 2 emerged days after three workers were exposed to high levels while repairing the cooling system at the No 3 reactor. Two of the men received suspected beta ray burns after stepping into water. Reports said the workers were due to be discharged from hospital on Monday. One pump is being used to extract radioactive water, and two more will be taken to the site. The US military is sending barges loaded with 500,000 gallons of fresh water to nearby Onahama Bay.

Early this morning a magnitude 6.5 earthquake rocked north Japan, the latest aftershock, and officials warned it would trigger a 50 cm (two ft) tsunami. Two of Fukushima's six reactors are safe, having achieved "cool shutdown", but the other four have yet to be brought under control. Japan's nuclear safety agency, Nisa, said the temperature and pressure inside all six reactors had stabilized. Yukio Edano, the chief government spokesman, said the myriad problems at the plant were no closer to being resolved. "We have restored power and pumped in fresh water, and we are making basic steps towards improvement. But there is still no room for complacency." Modest progress was made on removing contaminated water and stepping up work to cool the reactors with fresh water, rather than corrosive sea water, over the weekend. But Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said the emergency could continue for weeks, or possibly months. Concern over food safety spread to fishing over the weekend when officials said seawater samples taken 20 miles off the coast of Fukushima contained 1,850 times the normal level of radioactivity. Nisa said the tainted seawater posed no risk: "Ocean currents will disperse radiation particles and so it will be very diluted by the time it is consumed by fish and seaweed, and even more by the time they are consumed by humans. There is no need to worry about health risks." US authorities said on Sunday night that low concentrations of radiation in samples of Massachusetts rainwater were probably caused by Fukushima. Nevada, California, Hawaii, Colorado and Washington State have also reported tiny amounts of radiation from the accident but officials said they presented no health risks.

The news talks about a bad measure of the levels of radioactivity which has caused the evacuation of the workers and has caused the stoppage of work. After the correspondent measures, there has been said the level was as normal as expected, high, but not as it was told at the beginning by one of the workers who made the measure one

time before running away. This morning another earthquake was registered and the authorities have said that there could be a tsunami of 50 cm. Although the temperature in two reactors has been stabilized, the other four are still not under control. The fishing activity has been put in danger because the experts have registered 1.850 times the normal levels of radioactivity. There have also been some rains with radiation in US cities, like Nevada, California and Washington State, but the authorities have said there was no danger for the public health.

Fukushima radiation from Japan's stricken plant detected across UK
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Severin Carrell guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 29 March 2011 16.05 BST

Traces of radioactivity believed to come from the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan have been detected across the UK by emergency monitoring stations in Oxfordshire and Glasgow.

The Health Protection Agency has said that "the minutest" levels of radioactive iodine have been detected at its air monitoring stations over the last nine days, but they posed no risk to health. The readings peaked at 300 micro-becquerels per cubic metre but averaged at a barely detectable 11 micro-becquerels over that nine-day period - readings similar to findings by monitoring stations in Switzerland and Germany. The HPA said the dose from breathing in air "was minuscule and would be very much less than the annual background radiation dose". It said it had expected to see these traces as a result of the Fukushima crisis, where four reactors have been seriously damaged and have emitted significant levels of radiation, in one of the world's worst civil nuclear disasters. But the agency warned that radiation levels in the UK could rise. "Levels may rise in the coming days and weeks but they will be significantly below any level that could cause harm to public health," it said in a statement. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa), which oversees radiation monitoring in Scotland, said the levels detected in Glasgow were less than a millionth of normal background levels. The detection of these traces was due to the extremely large volumes of air being tested and their very great sensitivity.

Dr James Gemmill, Sepa's radioactive substances manager, said: "The concentration of iodine detected is extremely low and is not of concern for the public or the environment."

However, Alex Salmond, the first minister of Scotland and a prominent critic of nuclear power, has complained to the HPA about a delay in informing the public that radiation had been detected by the Glasgow monitoring station on Friday. Salmond said the HPA had been expected to release the Glasgow readings on Monday morning.

This had been agreed with Sepa but it did not do so. Sepa officials had then been told it would be disclosed on Tuesday morning, but the HPA statement was released after 1pm. Salmond said he suspected this information was delayed to avoid clashing with the release of a report calling for rapid investment in new nuclear power stations from Oxford's Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, headed by Prof David King, the UK's former chief scientific adviser. Roseanna Cunningham, the Scottish environment minister, is writing to the HPA to protest, Salmond said. "When these things happen, our obligation is to tell people frankly, clearly and concisely as soon as possible. We're extremely angry and suspicious as to why the pre-arranged statement didn't appear," he said. The HPA said there had been no political influence on its decision on when to disclose this information. It had been keeping the situation at Fukushima under close review, and had waited until the Glasgow readings were compared to findings at other air monitoring stations before releasing its findings. It added: "Because of the high volumes of air needed to identify any radioactive materials, measurements normally take place over extended periods of time. HPA instituted this special high volume air sampling to establish what the levels were."

The news begins by saying that radioactivity levels have been registered in UK emergency monitoring stations in Oxfordshire and Glasgow, although they do not represent any danger, as same as in other countries like Switzerland and Germany. The experts have also said there will be an increasing of the radioactive levels, but they will still be lower than the usual ones. Some agency have complained that the results of the

measuring has not been known until several days after, but the Glasgow station said it has waited for some time in order to establish and compare what the levels were.

Japan fears radioactive contamination of marine life
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Ian Sample, science correspondent guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 30 March 2011 18.57 BST

High levels of radiation in the sea off the coast of Fukushima have raised concerns over harm to local marine life and the risk of contaminated fish, shellfish and seaweed entering the food chain.

Tests on seawater near the nuclear power plant showed that levels of radioactive iodine reached 3,355 times the legal limit on Monday, one of several peaks in recent days that have fallen rapidly as radioactive substances decayed and were steadily diluted and dispersed by ocean currents.

Officials are watching levels of iodine-131 in seawater because although it has a half-life of eight days, meaning it is half as radioactive after that time, the substance builds up in seaweed, a common food in the Japanese diet. If consumed, radioactive iodine collects in the thyroid and can cause cancer. The International Atomic Energy Agency said iodine-131 in seawater would "soon be of no concern" presuming there are no further discharges of contaminated water from the power station into the sea. The IAEA added that Japanese authorities have released the first analyses of fish, caught at the port of Choshi, in Chiba prefecture south of Fukushima, which found one of five to be contaminated with a detectable level of caesium-137, a far more persistent radioactive substance, though at a concentration that was far below safety limits for consumption. Many countries, including Britain, have begun radiation testing of fish, shellfish and other fresh produce from Japan or have imposed wider bans on imports from the region. Fisheries are not entering waters within the 20km (12-mile) exclusion zone around Fukushima, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.

The fate of many local seafood and shellfish farms, including scallops, oysters, sea urchins and sea snails, was sealed more than two weeks ago when the tsunami wiped out beds and destroyed fishing vessels and ports around Fukushima. In Iwate prefecture, authorities say the disaster may have wiped out businesses that account for 80% of the revenue of the region's fisheries.

At the Fukushima power plant, engineers continued the arduous task of trying to pump contaminated water from turbine rooms and trenches, which is hampering work to connect the reactor cooling systems to the national grid. Tepco, the power station operator, plans to spray parts of the site with a resin to stop radioactive dust blowing off the site and is considering shrouding the reactor buildings with sheets to reduce radiation being released into the air. Fish and other sea creatures are unlikely to be seriously harmed by the radioactive leaks, even in the most contaminated areas. After the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, fish in three freshwater lakes within the exclusion zone became contaminated with radioactive caesium but showed no obvious health problems, though some fish were born with reproductive abnormalities which may have been caused by radiation, said James Smith, an environmental physicist at Portsmouth University who studied fish in the area. While fish accumulate radioactive contamination, this happens less in the ionrich waters of the oceans than in freshwater lakes. The news beginning saying there have been taken samples of water next to Fukushima and that there was discovered they were 3.355 over the allowed level. This is especially dangerous because although that radioactivity level decreases in eight days, it can remain in the seaweed, an aliment very used in the Japanese kitchen. Also, there were taken fish samples and some countries like UK have closed their borders in order to avoid the entrance of contaminated products.

Japan nuclear plant releases radioactive water into sea
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Jonathan Watts guardian.co.uk, Monday 4 April 2011 13.54 BST

The operator of Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant has started breaking its own regulations by discharging 11,500 tonnes of contaminated water into the Pacific to make space for more highly radioactive liquid.

The release of water that is 100 times the legal limit is an unprecedented breach of operating standards, but it is considered necessary so workers can concentrate on containing more severe leaks. The government justified the action as the lesser of two evils. Recent samples of contaminated seawater from the leak show radiation levels at 4,000 times the legal standard. "We didn't have any other alternatives," the chief cabinet secretary, Yukio Edano, told reporters. "This is a measure we had to take to secure safety." The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric, said it would discharge 10,000 tonnes of water from its waste treatment facility and a further 1,500 tonnes that have collected in pits outside reactors No 5 and No 6. The International Atomic Energy Agency has been notified of the discharge. On a website update, it said the Japanese authorities explained the move was necessary "to have sufficient capacity to store highly contaminated water found in the basement of the Unit 2 turbine building".

Tokyo Electric estimates the potential additional annual dose to a member of the public would be approximately 0.6 millisieverts if they ate seaweed and seafood caught near the plant every day for a year. The annual permissible level for the general public in Japan is one millisievert.

Workers have been battling to control radiation leaks since the magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami crippled the plant's cooling system on 11 March, leading to a partial meltdown of the reactor. Earlier attempts to cool the reactor by hosing water from fire engines and helicopters have left pools of contaminated water and flooded basements, hampering the containment operation and efforts to restart the cooling pumps. Highly radioactive water is seeping from at least one point at reactor No 2, where a 20cm crack has been found in a concrete pit. It is thought to be leaking into an inflow conduit for seawater, but there may be other paths of contamination. Plant workers have started to dye the water a milky white colour so they can trace its route. At the weekend workers tried and failed to plug the crack by using 80kg of highly absorbent polymer (more commonly used in nappies) mixed with shredded newspaper and sawdust. A previous attempt to use concrete had a similar outcome. Edano said the situation must be stabilised as soon as possible because a longterm leak "will have a huge impact on the ocean".Critics of Japan's nuclear industry said the authorities were confronted with a dilemma that was unique in the history of nuclear power: whether to keep cooling the reactors and spent fuel or reduce the water being pumped into the plant, which is overflowing the capacity of the trenches.

"As a result of Tokyo Electric's desperate but failed efforts to cool the reactors, they are about to release perhaps an unprecedented amount of radioactivity into the environment," said Shaun Burnie, a nuclear consultant to Greenpeace Germany. "If the Japanese government were to take a cupful of this water and take it outside their territorial waters it would be illegal under the law of sea dumping convention." As a temporary measure to ease the leak, Japan's nuclear and industrial safety agency has recommended the construction of an undersea silt barrier."A silt fence ensures that mud down deep doesn't seep through," said Hidehiko Nishiyama, Japan's spokesman on nuclear safety. Officials said the situation is unlikely to be under control for several months. Independent analysts warn it might take years.

Giant concrete pumps are being sent to the area from overseas. The government has also asked Tokyo Electric to look into the possibility of covering the plant with sheets pinned to a steel frame. But the more radioactivity that enters the air and water, the harder such countermeasures become. Tokyo Electric has said the plant will never recover and some areas are so contaminated that workers cannot get near them. "I don't know if we can ever enter the No 3 reactor building again," Hikaru Kuroda, the company's chief of nuclear facility management, said on Sunday. The situation dominated a meeting in Vienna of signatories to the convention on nuclear safety, which was supposed to prevent a repeat of the disasters at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl."I know you will agree with me that the crisis at Fukushima Daiichi has enormous implications for nuclear power and confronts all of us with a major challenge," Yukiya Amano, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told participants. "We cannot take a 'business as usual' approach." Although the nuclear threat has yet to claim a life, it has overshadowed the severe humanitarian crisis faced by survivors of the tsunami, which killed 12,157 people and has left 15,496 missing. Hundreds of thousands of people have lost their homes and millions are still affected by shortages of electricity.

In the news there is told that Fukushima authorities had to discharge a huge quantity of contaminated water to the Pacific Ocean in order to release the reactors and focus on the most radioactive one. Although there have been several attempts of releasing the heat of the reactors and there has even been an attempt with 80kg. of polymer, newspaper and sawdust, without the expecting results. Authorities advert that this situation could last for years and that if Japan tries to release the co ntaminated water into the ocean, and that reaches international waters, it would be illegal under the law of sea dumping convention. There are still 15.496 people missing, there have been 12.157 people dead.

Tepco starts pumping nitrogen into Fukushima reactor
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Reuters guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 6 April 2011 20.04 BST

Japan has begun pumping nitrogen gas into a crippled nuclear reactor, refocusing the fight on preventing an explosive buildup of hydrogen gas at Fukushima Daiichi power plant. Workers started injecting nitrogen into the containment vessel of reactor No 1 on Wednesday last night, after a morning breakthrough in stopping highly radioactive water leaking into the sea at another reactor in the six-reactor complex. "It is necessary to inject nitrogen gas into the containment vessel and eliminate the potential for a hydrogen explosion," an official of plant operator Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) told a news briefing. The possibility of another hydrogen explosion like those that ripped through reactors 1 and 3 early in the crisis, spreading high levels of radiation into the air, was "extremely low" he said. But Tepco suspected that the outside casing of the reactor vessel was damaged, said the official. "Under these conditions, if we continue cooling the reactors with water, the hydrogen leaking from the reactor vessel to the containment vessel could accumulate and could reach a point where it could explode," he added. Although engineers succeeded after days of desperate efforts to plug the leak at reactor No 2, they still need to pump 11.5m litres of contaminated water back into the ocean because they have run out of storage space at the facility. The water was used to cool overheated fuel rods. Nuclear experts said the damaged reactors were far from being under control almost a month after they were hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami on 11 March.

The growing concerns of nearby South Korea and China about radioactive fallout from Japan were underscored when China's health ministry reported trace amounts of radioactive iodine in spinach in three Chinese provinces. The two western neighbors of Japan have reportedly complained that they have not been fully informed about Tepco's plans to release radioactive water into the Pacific. "We are instructing the trade and foreign ministries to work better together so that detailed explanations are supplied, especially to neighboring countries," chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano told a news conference. Experts insisted the low-level radioactive water to be pumped into the ocean posed no health hazard to people. "The original amount of radioactivity is very low, and when you dilute this with a huge body of water, the final levels will be even lower than legal limits," said Pradip Deb, senior lecturer in medical radiations at the school of medical sciences, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

The news talks about the attempts of the experts of cooling the reactors, but there are some who think there may be serious damages at the reactors¶ structure. Also, China and South Korea has registered contaminated food, such as spinach and have asked the foreign ministries to collaborate in solving this problem. Pradip Deb, senior lecturer in medical radiations at the school of medical sciences has assured that even though Japan finally releases contaminated water into the ocean, the levels of radioactivity will be lower than even the legal established ones.

Japan's Fukushima plant evacuated after new earthquake
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Justin McCurry in Sendai guardian.co.uk, Thursday 7 April 2011 20.44 BST

Workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant were forced to evacuate on Thursday night after a powerful earthquake shook northeast Japan, almost a month to the day since the region was hit by a quake and tsunami that killed an estimated 28,000 people. Two people were killed in the quake and more than 130 people injured, according to the national police agency. A 79-year-old man died of shock and a woman in her 60s was killed when power was cut to her oxygen tank. Fears that the magnitude 7.1 quake, the strongest since the tsunami, would set off another series of huge waves subsided with the lifting of a tsunami warning about 90 minutes later. The nuclear plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power, said Thursday's earthquake had not caused further damage to the facility, adding that workers battling to cool down overheating reactors had temporarily retreated to an on-site quake-resistant shelter. The latest earthquake caused power outages across a wide area of northern Japan and knocked out several power lines at Onagawa nuclear power station north of Sendai city. One remaining power line continued to supply electricity as normal, and there have been no reports of abnormal radiation levels in the area. The plant's spent fuel pools briefly lost cooling capacity but an emergency diesel generator quickly kicked in. The earthquake struck 30 miles beneath the water off the coast of Sendai, about the same depth and location as the magnitude 9.0 quake on 11 March.

Japan, quake location map from USGS Photograph: Guardian The earthquake hit shortly after 11.30pm local time. The violent shaking lasted about 30 seconds, hurling items on to the floor in the neighborhood near the city's main railway station. In Miyagi prefecture motorways were closed and bullet train services were partially suspended. In Sendai hotel guests and diners filed on to streets, some clutching torches as they began walking home in near-darkness. Sirens from emergency vehicles filled the air, but more than three hours later there were no reports of major damage. Police and the fire service officials said they had received numerous calls about fires and gas leaks. NHK, Japan's public broadcaster, said seven people had been injured, two of them seriously. The earthquake sent the dollar sliding against the yen and wiped out early gains in European stock markets. The International Atomic Energy Agency said progress was being made to stabilize the Fukushima Daiichi plant, where workers have been injecting nitrogen into a reactor to prevent a potentially explosive build-up of hydrogen gas. "The situation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant remains very serious," Denis Flory, head of the IAEA's nuclear safety department, told reporters.

But he added: "There are early signs of recovery in some functions such as electrical power and instrumentation."

The news begins saying that the workers at Fukushima nuclear plant had to be evacuated after another earthquake, one month after the earthquake and tsunami which killed more than 28.000 people. This one has killed two people and other 130 have resulted injured. The nuclear plant¶s operator, Tokyo Electric Power, has said that the workers are still trying to stop the overheating of the reactors, but they had to be also evacuated to an earthquake-resistant area. Although there have been areas which have been affected, there were only registered small damages and some unlit areas. At the Fukushima nuclear plant, the responsible of the nuclear safety department said it was a notorious sign of recovery in the electrical power and also in the instrumentation.

Search for Japan tsunami victims continues
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Justin McCurry in Tokyo guardian.co.uk, Sunday 10 April 2011 15.31 BST

The search is continuing for victims of the tsunami that struck Japan's north-east coast almost a month ago, while officials said they hoped to stop pumping radioactive water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant into the sea.

More than 20,000 Japanese troops and 110 from the US conducted land, sea and air searches for the thousands of victims whose bodies have yet to be recovered. One month since the 11 March disaster, fewer than 13,000 of the estimated 28,000 who died have been found. The likelihood of finding more is fading because many have probably been swept out to sea. A similar search last week recovered only 70 bodies. On a visit to Ishinomaki, where 2,600 of the 163,000 residents were killed and 2,800 are still missing, the Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, vowed to support the city's recovery. About 17,000 people are still living in evacuation centres, while Ishinomaki's fishing industry, which accounts for 40% of the local economy, may never fully recover. "The government will do its best to help you," Kan said. "We will do everything we can to enable you to start fishing again." The operation to stabilize the Fukushima plant, meanwhile, is about to enter its fifth week, with no end in sight to the world's worst nuclear crisis since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Nuclear officials said they hoped to stop pumping contaminated water into the sea amid criticism from neighboring China and South Korea, which have accused Tokyo of incompetence in its handling of the crisis. Engineers said the buildup of radioactive water during recent attempts to cool Fukushima's overheating reactors left them with little choice but to pump it into the ocean, where it quickly dissipates. The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), apologized for the nuclear crisis, which has prompted the evacuation of tens of thousands of people, contaminated local food and water supplies and caused panic as far away as Tokyo, 150 miles to the

south. "I would like to offer my deepest apologies for the concern and trouble we are causing due to the release of radioactive materials into the atmosphere and water," Tepco's vice-president, Sakae Muto, said. Workers have been struggling to dispose of 60,000 tonnes of radioactive water that have built up beneath some of the plant's six reactors. "We cannot say what the outlook is for the next stage," Hidehiko Nishiyama, the deputy director -general of Japan's nuclear and industrial safety agency, said. "As soon as possible, we would like to achieve stable cooling and set a course towards controlling radiation." Nearby radiation levels in the sea have fallen in recent days, but pockets of high radiation have frustrated attempts to repair the reactors' cooling systems. On Thursday, workers had to evacuate the plant after a strong aftershock shook the region.

The news talks about the searching of the bodies from the earthquake which whipped the country almost a month ago. There have been rescued 13.000 bodies from the 28.000 estimated dead people, 70 of whom were recovered last week by the Japanese and US troops. Also, the ending of the Fukushima¶s `problem is not very close, authorities are hoping to stop the contaminated waters, a thing which has been very criticized by China and South Korea, which have harshly criticized Japan for not being capable of handling the crisis. On Thursday the nuclear plant¶s worker had to be evacuated again because of another aftershock.

Japan disaster to send sales of smartphones falling by up to 5%
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Charles Arthur and agencies guardian.co.uk, Monday 11 April 2011 20.02 BST

Smartphone sales could drop by up to 5% this year because the Japanese earthquake in March seriously affected supplies of key parts, industry sources say. Among those affected in the £100bn industry are the world leader Nokia, BlackBerry maker Research in Motion (RIM) and Sony Ericsson. But other companies ± including iPhone maker Apple, as well as Samsung, HTC and China's Huawei ± are understood to have moved quickly after the quake hit to secure supplies from alternative locations in China, Taiwan and Korea, which could give them a substantial advantage as shortages hit rivals over the next three months.

A key element is a chemical for lithium-ion batteries, used in mobile phones, tablets and laptops, for which 70% of the production comes from a Japanese factory, shut by the quake. The phone companies will come under the microscope when they announce first-quarter results, with Apple, Sony Ericsson and Nokia due to announce their figures between 19 and 21 April. The latter two have already said their supply chains could be affected by the after-effects of the quake and tsunami, which shut down several factories in Japan that produce phone cameras, lenses and battery components.

RIM, in its earnings announcement earlier in April, said delivery times for some components were "uncertain". That could have serious implications as it prepares to launch its PlayBook rival to Apple's iPad tablet on 19 April in the US, as well as a number of other handsets later this year. The long-term effects of the quake may only become apparent towards the end of May, when it will become clear whether factories in Japan have been able to restart production successfully. "There is widespread uncertainty about the Japanese

situation« we believe the shortages will start to bite in the third quarter, when we'll get a clearer picture of who is most affected," said Ben Wood, head of research at CCS Insight. Phone vendors usually carry four to five weeks' supply of components, and have an additional six or seven weeks' inventory of finished phones in the sales channel, said Carolina Milanesi, smartphone analyst for the research company Gartner. "If things go back to normal quickly, then the third quarter [of the year] will probably see sales down 3% to 5%, and then the fourth quarter come back strongly," she said. "But if the problems continue and in the third quarter they can't restock, then sales there could be down 5% to 7%, and the year as a whole could be down overall 5%." A critical bottleneck could be the supply of a heat-resistant chemical called polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) ± used as an adhesive in lithium ion batteries for mobile phones and portable computers. Kureha Corp, which makes about 70% of the world's supply, halted production at its factory in Iwaki, Fukushima prefecture, after the disaster. The company has been relying on existing stocks and hopes to restart production at the end of April.

In the news, the journalist talks about the technological consequences of the Japanese disaster. Another new problem is the supplying of mobile parts, which has forced mobile companies such as Nokia, Blackberry, Sony Ericsson or Apple to look for them in other countries like China, Taiwan and Korea. This would change if the Japanese fabrics closed by the tsunami and earthquake will start again their production of technological components. Meanwhile, the companies are taking advantage of the existing stocks and hope to restart in April.

From the news taken from the newspaper The Guardian, we can observe that one month after the disaster which whipped Japan, the Fukushima¶s nuclear plant has not been fixed and there are still a lot of bodies the rescue teams cannot find. Also, there are a lot of problems with the contaminated aliments, water, radioactive rains and supplies of all kinds. It seems that for a long time people will not be able to continue with their lives and recover all they have lost. It will pass a lot of time until the whole country gets back to the normality and become again the powerful nation it was once.

FUKUSHIMA DISASTER: ONE MONTH TRANCING NEWS
RAISA CAMELIA DAZIDOV 2ºA