Radioactive Iodine in Sewer Sludge in Oshu City, Iwate

Oshu City is located 187 kilometers north of Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant.

The city announced the latest survey of radioactive materials in sewer sludge in a sewage treatment center in the city, and it shows iodine-131 being detected in the sludge cake since August 25.

From the city's announcement on September 7 (original in Japanese, I translated the dates, etc.; emphasis is mine):

Collection date	Testing date	I-131	Cs-134	Cs-137	Cs-Total
7/7/2011	7/14/2011	ND	81	100	181
7/21/2011	7/23/2011	ND	71	64	135
7/28/2011	7/30/2011	ND	58	79	137
8/4/2011	8/7/2011	ND	38	76	114
8/11/2011	8/12/2011	ND	33	52	85
8/25/2011	8/27/2011	2,300	47	52	99
8/31/2011	9/2/2011	590	20	57	77
9/6/2011	9/6/2011	480	82	96	178

The city says it has stopped the shipment of sludge cakes from this plant because of the high radioactive iodine concentration detected from the August 25 sample, but that the sludge cakes have been used as fertilizer material because the amount of radioactive cesium has been below the provisional safety limit for composts and manures (400 becquerels/kg).

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Japan's Prefecture Assembly Chairpersons Want Prime Minister Kan to Resign

The National Association of Chairpersons of Prefectural Assemblies held its regular meeting on July 27 and passed the resolution demanding Prime Minister Naoto Kan to resign so that the trust in the government is restored.

Uh huh.

From Jiji Tsushin (7/27/2011):

全国都道府県議会議長会（会長・山本教和三重県議会議長）は２７日の定例総会で、東日本大震災で被災した岩手、宮城、福島３県の議長が共同提案した「菅直人首相の退陣を求める緊急決議」を賛成多数で採択した。

The National Association of Chairpersons of Prefectural Assemblies held its regular meeting on July 27 and passed the resolution by majority demanding Prime Minister Naoto Kan to resign. The resolution was jointly proposed by the chairpersons of the prefectural assemblies in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima which have been hit hard by the March 11 earthquake/tsunami disaster.

　決議では、震災や福島第１原発事故をめぐる首相の言動を「場当たり的な対応、一連の発言や行動は国民の政治に対する信頼を著しく損ねた」などと批判し、早期退陣を求めている。

The resolution criticizes the prime minister over his remarks on the earthquake/tsunami disaster and the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident for his "haphazard response, series of remarks and actions which have greatly impaired the trust of Japanese people in their government" and calls for his early resignation.

Prime Minister Kan shows no sign of resigning any time soon, once he duped the super-naive ex-prime minister Hatoyama and used him to destroy the momentum for the vote of no confidence (which was really set to pass with bi-partisan support). On the contrary, Mr. Kan says he's been so inspired by the win by the Japanese women's soccer team in the World Cup, and that he learned from the team "never to give up".

What's interesting about this mostly ceremonial resolution is that it was jointly proposed by the three prefectures where the national government's money (i.e. Japanese taxpayers' money) will rain in the government's effort to "recover and reconstruct" after the earthquake/tsunami/nuke accident. Fukushima is to become the radiation research capital of the world. Miyagi and Iwate are to become the "food factory" for the rest of Japan, with farming and fishing organized into some corporate structure, with people living in "ecotowns" created by shaving off the top of the mountains so that they are safe from tsunami. A grand vision, and the governors there, particularly the Miyagi governor, are thinking in the similar vein.

But their assembly chairpersons want PM Kan to go. That does not add up, does it? It looks more like another pressure tactic to get more of what they want, which is more money from the national government and sooner.

And if they really think PM Kan and the national government are alone in causing the trust in the government to erode fast in Japan, I don't know what to say.

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1,458 Meat Cows Possibly Contaminated from Radioactive Rice Hay Have Already Been Sold

Now the case of radioactive rice hay and radioactive beef has blown wide open. First it was only a couple, then a few hundreds, then many hundreds, now it is way over thousand and counting.

It looks more and more like the Minamata mercury poisoning, except this time, it's nationwide.

Yomiuri Shinbun (1:33AM JST 7/21/2011):

高濃度の放射性セシウムに汚染された稲わらが肉牛に与えられていた問題で、岩手、秋田、新潟、群馬、静岡、岐阜の６県は２０日、各県内の畜産農家が汚染の疑いのある稲わらを肉牛に与え、６３７頭を出荷していたと発表した。

6 prefectures announced on July 20 that the cattle farmers in their prefectures had shipped the total of 637 meat cows fed with the rice hay suspected of containing radioactive cesium in high concentration. The prefectures are: Iwate, Akita, Niigata, Gunma, Shizuoka, and Gifu.

これで山形、宮城、福島、新潟各県で判明している約８５０頭を含め、汚染された疑いのある稲わらを食べた牛の出荷数は９県で約１４８５頭になった。各県などは牛の流通経路を調べ、残っている肉については放射性物質の検査をする。

850 meat cows in Yamagata, Miyagi, Fukushima, and Niigata have already been found to have eaten the contaminated rice hay. The total number of meat cows in 9 prefectures that were fed with the contaminated rice hay is now 1,485. The prefectures will track the shipment of the cows, and will conduct the test on the unsold meat.

　秋田、群馬、静岡県で与えられていた稲わらは宮城県産で、岩手県では同県産だった。稲わらから高濃度のセシウムが検出されたのは、福島、宮城に次いで３県目。岩手県では、一関市の３戸と隣接する藤沢町の２戸が計１９頭を東京都に出荷。稲わらからは１キロ・グラムあたり最高値で５万７０００ベクレルのセシウムを検出した。水分を含んだ状態に換算すると国の規制値（３００ベクレル）の４３倍に相当する。

The rice hay used in Akita, Gunma, and Shizuoka was harvested in Miyagi Prefecture. In Iwate, it was harvested within the prefecture, making Iwate the third prefecture to have been found with the rice hay with high radioactive cesium. 3 cattle farmers in Ichinoseki City and 2 cattle farmers in adjacent Fujisawa-machi in Iwate Prefecture shipped 19 meat cows to Tokyo. The rice hay in Iwate was found to contain the maximum of 57,000 becquerels/kg. If the hay is reconstituted with water, the amount of radioactive cesium is 43 times as much as the national safety limit (300 becquerels/kg).

Again, the cows didn't eat "reconstituted" rice hay. They ate the dry rice hay.

If Iwate's hay came from Ichinoseki City and its surrounding area, again it matches the radiation contour map made by Yukio Hayakawa, volcanologist at Gunma University. (For his chart, see my post on July 17).

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