(Japan) Playing the numbers game with nuclear fallout

[kristopher]

Playing the numbers game with nuclear fallout
...The same goes for "estimates," which can vary greatly according to the premises on which their calculations are based. I feel this way about the cost estimates of a nuclear plant accident released by the Japan Atomic Energy Commission at the Cabinet Office.
According to the commission, the cost of containing an accident is "no more than 1.2 yen a kilowatt-hour." But it appears the commission made sure to arrive at a conservative estimate. Some experts point out that the damages caused by the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, on which the calculations were based, were underrated considerably.
The commission is suspected of "tweaking" the numbers to defend its claim that nuclear power generation is more cost-effective than thermal and other forms of power generation.
...Their power demand estimates and energy-saving targets this past summer were later found to have been "contrived."...

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/views/vox/AJ2011102815975

Related stories recently in the Japanese news:

Airborne

Fallout levels twice estimate: study
AP NEW YORK — The Fukushima nuclear accident released double the amount of cesium-137 into the atmosphere than the government initially estimated, reaching 40 percent of the total emitted during the Chernobyl disaster, a preliminary report said.
The estimate of much higher levels of cesium-137 comes from a worldwide network of sensors. Report coauthor Andreas Stohl, of the Norwegian Institute for Air Research, said the government estimate came only from data in Japan and didn't include emissions blown out to the Pacific Ocean.
Cesium-137 is considered harmful because it can remain in the environment for decades, releasing cancer-causing radiation. The report did not consider the health implications of the emissions...

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20111029a5.html

Marine

Cesium-137 flow into sea 30 times greater than stated by TEPCO: report

PARIS (Kyodo) -- The amount of radioactive cesium-137 that flowed into the Pacific after the start of Japan's nuclear crisis was probably nearly 30 times the amount stated by Tokyo Electric Power Co. in May, according to a recent report by a French research institute...

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111029p2g00m0dm016000c.html

[Mnemosyne]

1. Thank you, kristpher. It seems to have fallen by the wayside. People just don't

want to understand how extensively we will be effected, sooner or later.