Radioactive Vapors In Japan

Radioactive Vapors In Japan 'Should Not Be Automatic Concern,' Expert Says

 

Radiation levels outside of one Japan’s nuclear power plants are at eight times the normal level, but it does not pose an immediate threat to nearby residents, a nuclear safety agency said to a Japanese news network.
Following the 8.9-magnitude earthquake and tsunami that devasted parts of Japan Friday, some nuclear power plants automatically shut down as a result of powerful shaking; however, the nuclear reactors will continue to produce heat and need to be electrically cooled.
The government extended its evacuation orders to residents within a 6.2-mile radius of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in northeast Japan. The order was originally only for residents within an approximate two-mile radius.
Kyodo News, a Japanese news network, reports that with radiation levels at about 1,000 times the regular level, it is possible that radioactive steam may spread to other areas of the nuclear plant.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan visited the facility early Saturday. “I want to grasp the situation,” Kan told Japanese reporters.
The Tokyo Electric Power Company released a statement saying, “We have decided to implement measures to reduce the pressure of the reactor containment vessel…in order to fully secure safety.”
Reducing pressure inside the reactors means that the Fukushima nuclear plant would release radioactive vapor into the air.
Amid concerns that a meltdown may happen at the Fukushima plant, a spokesperson at the Washington, D.C.-based Nuclear Energy Institute said “It’s too soon to know” what risk residents near the nuclear plant face.
There is a possibility of a controlled release of radiation, and that should not be an automatic concern for people, said Steve Kerekes, NEI spokesman.
Kerekes said that this nuclear emergency should be kept in context and not sensationalized because there is no sense in scaring people whose country has already been devastated.
He cited a partial meltdown that happened about 30 years ago in Pennsylvania at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station. The partial meltdown released a maximum of 70 millirems of radiation—5,000 millirems is the maximum amount that employees inside nuclear plants can be exposed to.
Numerous studies after the Three Mile Island incident could not identify adverse health effects in the people that were exposed to the leaked radiation, Kerekes said.
He added that people are regularly exposed to radiation throughout the day from sources ranging from the sun to consumer products.
Kerekes said that a radiation leak is not necessarily cause for alarm, rather, it is unusually high radiation levels that should cause alarm.