Greetings!

Britain has developed a new imaging system that enables detailed scans INSIDE the melted reactor buildings. Check out the photo with the story, I THINK that hotspot they marked is the top of the reactor refueling lid. It’s still sealed, so there must be corium pretty close to the other side.

Another dribble from TEPCO that anybody paying attention already knew: The technology to clean up Fuku simply does not exist. They’re admitting that the timeline extends out 200 years.

Nagoya University conducted muon scans LAST YEAR that showed that reactor #2 had melted down. Data was never released, I guess they assume everybody already knew it.  I never even saw the notice that they were putting in Muon scanners at that time, all the news was reporting that the muon scanner was going to be aimed at reactor #1 and be done early this year.

They have raised the upper limit of taxpayer money that will probably be needed to cover TEPCO to $9 Trillion yen. They have already given TEPCO over 4 trillion yen. That upper limit is a joke and needs a zero added to it at least.

Banned Japanese produce is showing up mislabeled in Taiwan. What, you thought Japanese business would meekly accept their losses?

The gates for the #3 SFP are damaged. The SFP is still holding water, but that could change rapidly.

Interesting story about the politics behind reactor restarts in Japan and Japan’s general attitude to nuclear power.

Does it scare you that instead of not planting veggies in radioactive soil, they’ve found a chemical that will supposedly absorb most of the cesium? Okay, how about if I tell you that if radiocesium is there, it for sure ain’t the only thing there?

The LHC has another short circuit, which will delay restart by weeks at least. First they gotta warm up the area, then they gotta spend an hour or so fixing the short, then they gotta cool it down again.

If you swim near shore, you are at risk for antibiotic resistant bacteria infection. Yes, our runoffs have now got that bad.

Even get annoyed at those last few bits of ketchup or glue sticking to the sides of the bottle so you can’t ever use them? There’s a new coating for that.

They have confirmed that the wrong kitty litter is the cause of the exploding drum at the WIPP. In defense of those selecting that litter, the report notes that there was a typo. The report doesn’t note that if LLNL hadn’t been playing fast and loose with what they could send to WIPP, the cat litter wouldn’t have mattered.

Meet the Monkey Face Orchid!

Boxturtle (Thought: If we must think outside the box, then why must it be a box?)