Fukushima radiation levels

Kyodo: ‘Massive’ amount of Fukushima data wrong? “Figures can’t be trusted”

NHK: Strontium-90 by ocean at 160,000 times limit — Tepco: Actual levels “exceeded the upper limit of measurement… We are very sorry”

ENENews,

7 February, 2014

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Kyodo, Feb. 7, 2014: TEPCO to review “massive” radiation data due to improper measurement – [TEPCO] said Friday that it will review a “massive” amount of radiation data it has collected at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant because readings may be lower than actual figures due to improper measurement. “We are very sorry, but we found cases in which beta radiation readings turned out to be wrong when the radioactivity concentration of a sample was high,” TEPCO spokesman Masayuki Ono told a press conference. […]

Kyodo/Jiji, Feb. 7, 2014: [TEPCO] said it will re-analyze past water samples because some of the figures can’t be trusted.

NHK, Feb. 7, 2014: TEPCO to review eroneous [sic] radiation data — The operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has decided to review radiation data after finding the initial readings may be much lower than actual figures. [TEPCO] says it has detected a record high 5 million becquerels per liter of radioactive strontium in groundwater collected last July from one of wells close to the ocean. That’s more than 160,000 times the state standard for radioactive wastewater normally released into the sea. [...]

Yomiuri Shinbun translated by EXSKF, Feb. 7, 2014: [...] 5 million Bq/Liter of radioactive strontium was detected from the groundwater sample taken on June 5 [...] about 1,000 times that of the highest density in the groundwater that had been measured so far (5,100 Bq/L). TEPCO didn’t disclose the result of measurement of strontium [...] On February 6, TEPCO explained that they had “underestimated all of the results of high-density all-beta, which [in fact] exceeded the upper limit of measurement.” [...] The company recently switched to a different method of analysis that uses diluted samples [...]

Jiji Press, Feb. 7, 2014: TEPCO May Have Underestimated Radioactive Water Spill Impact [...] Nuclear Regulation Authority may have to revise its provisional assessment of the spill [from a tank in summer last year], now put at Level 3 on the International Nuclear Event Scale of zero to 7, if the actual amount is far larger than has been announced, an official of the NRA Secretariat said. TEPCO’s measurement method is considered unreliable, the official added. [...]