Japan Nuclear MeltDown?

[dee-luded 2,959]

Governments playing with peoples lives.

Unclear Power is dangerous, and politicians use it in the games of Power.

"JAPAN'S top government spokesman Yukio Edano said Sunday that radioactive meltdowns may have occurred in two reactors of the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear plant."Asked in a press conference whether meltdowns had occurred, Edano said "we are acting on the assumption that there is a high possibility that one has occurred" in the plant's number-one reactor.

"As for the number-three reactor, we are acting on the assumption that it is possible," he said.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/meltdowns-may-have-occurred-in-two-reactors-japanese-government/story-e6frf7jx-1226020649922

Edited March 13, 2011 by dee-luded

[H_T 3,049]

Unsure about "Unclear Power", but I know more about Nuclear Power and Japan.

Time to stop Nuke hysteria

The 50 brave workers are mostly at risk.

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Appalling coruptsean.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/special-reports/japan-earthquake-new-explosion-rocks-fukushima-nuclear-power-plant/story-fn7zkbgs-1226022801346

Saving face and killing people?

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http://www.theage.com.au/environment/radioactive-material-leaking-say-power-plant-officials-20110322-1c4nh.html

"{Tokyo Electric says fuel rods at its Fukushima Daiichi power plant have been damaged, releasing five kinds of radioactive material and contaminating seawater nearby.

The acknowledgements from the utility indicate poisons emanating from the plant may be spreading through the air and sea, raising concern over the safety of seafood from the coast of north-eastern Japan and agriculture in the region.

The decay of radioactive fuel rods, composed of uranium and plutonium, was suspected by company officials five days after the March 11 magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami off the main island of Honshu.

Advertisement: Story continues below The disclosures on the spread of radiation were made in a press briefing after midnight Tokyo time and in a press release this morning.

Iodine-131 was detected at 127 times normal levels from sample water taken at 2.30pm yesterday, while caesium-134 levels were 25 times normal and caesium-137 was at 17 times normal, Tepco said on its website.

Workers Evacuated

As the battle to prevent a meltdown entered its 12th day, white smoke or steam could be seen wafting above the damaged reactors.

Tokyo Electric evacuated engineers and halted work after smoke was seen billowing from the No.3 unit, Hitoshi Emukai, a spokesman at the utility, said yesterday. White smoke seen later at the No.2 reactor is most likely steam, said Naoki Tsunoda, another spokesman.

Seventy per cent of the fuel at the No.1 reactor may be damaged, as well as 33 per cent of that of the No.2 unit, Tepco said last Wednesday.}"

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/special-reports/more-radioactive-water-at-japans-stricken-nuclear-power-plant/story-fn7zkbgs-1226029899990

"JAPAN has no choice but to keep pouring water into reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant to limit a huge meltdown, the government says, despite fears it could cause highly radioactive leaks. "We need to avoid the fuel rods from heating up and drying up. Continuing the cooling is unavoidable ... We need to prioritise injecting water," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said.

Firefighters and troops have been hosing sea water and injecting pure water into four of six reactors at the plant after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami on March 11 knocked out cooling systems.

But as a consequence of this emergency measure, radioactive water has been found in the basement of all four reactors' turbine buildings and in underground tunnels linked to them.

Water found in the tunnel linked to the No. 2 reactor showed a radiation reading of more than 1,000 millisieverts per hour, and contained water equivalent to more than two Olympic swimming pools.

Further adding to the concerns, plutonium has been detected in soil at five places at the plant."We are making utmost efforts to keep the fuel rods from heating up while using as little water as possible," Edano said. "But fundamentally we are faced with a situation where we need to remove the water as quickly as possible."

Workers began removing water in the No. 1 reactor's turbine building via a condenser today.

But efforts to remove the leaked water in reactors No. 2 and No. 3 are being hampered by the fact that their condensers are near to brimming.

Earlier, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said his government was in a "state of maximum alert" over the crisis at the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant. "

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Radiation levels soar near Fukushima nuclear plant

RADIATION levels in the sea off Japan's stricken nuclear plant hit their highest reading yet, officials said, amid a struggle to deal with large amounts of radioactive water at the site.

A spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power Co., operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant crippled by a March 11 earthquake and tsunami, said today levels of radioactive iodine-131 were 3,355 times the legal limit in the sea near the plant, according to a reading taken yesterday.

Officials said they did not know what cause the radiation level to rise.

"The figures are rising further. We need to find out as quickly as possible the causes and to stop them from rising any higher," said nuclear safety agency spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama.

The sampling location is 330 metres south of the discharge outlet for four troubled reactors. Officials have said that tidal dispersion means that there is no immediate health threat, and that the iodine degrades relatively quickly.

http://www.heraldsun...6-1226030854699

Edited March 30, 2011 by dee-luded

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"JAPAN'S unfolding nuclear disaster is "much bigger than Chernobyl" ,

and could rewrite the international scale used to measure the severity of atomic accidents, a Russian expert says.

"Chernobyl was a dirty bomb explosion. The next dirty bomb is Fukushima and it will cost much more" in economic and human terms, Natalia Mironova said.

Ms Mironova is thermodynamic engineer who became a leading anti-nuclear activist in Russia in the wake of the accident at the Soviet-built reactor in Ukraine in 1986.

"Fukushima is much bigger than Chernobyl," she said, adding that the Japanese nuclear crisis was likely to eclipse Chernobyl on the seven-point international scale used to rate nuclear disasters.

Chernobyl, which a 2005 report by UN bodies including the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) called "the most severe in the history of the nuclear power industry", was ranked a seven on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES).

But Japan's ongoing crisis, triggered by a massive earthquake and tsunami three weeks ago which took down the main electricity and back-up power supplies needed to power cooling systems at several reactors at Fukushima, could be "even higher" on the INES scale, she said.

"Chernobyl was level seven and it had only one reactor and lasted only two weeks. We have now three weeks (at Fukushima) and we have four reactors which we know are in very dangerous situations," she said.

Japan's nuclear safety agency has maintained its rating of the Fukushima accident at four, while a French watchdog has"

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Japan dumps radioactive water into the Pacific

("Japan started to dump more than 9000 tonnes of low-level radioactive water into the Pacific on Monday as part of emergency operations to stabilise its crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The last-resort measure came after the Bank of Japan said business confidence had plummeted since the earthquake and tsunami hit on March 11, plunging the country into its worst crisis since World War II.

The UN atomic watchdog chief Yukiya Amano, meanwhile, said that the three-week-old nuclear emergency, which Japan has predicted may last for months, meant an end to a "business as usual" approach to nuclear power.

Advertisement: Story continues below His comments appeared borne out when Japan signalled it may weaken its ambitious greenhouse gas cut targets, which are based on a continued heavy reliance on low-carbon atomic power, in light of the disaster.

Japan has battled to prevent full reactor meltdowns at the tsunami-hit plant and poured thousands of tonnes of water on to overheating fuel rods, a stop-gap measure that has created highly radioactive run-off.

To free storage space for that run-off - which has hampered crucial repair work and leaked into the Pacific - operator the Tokyo Electric Power Company [TEPCO] said it would have to get rid of less toxic water.

It insisted the release of the water - the equivalent of more than four Olympic sized swimming pools - would not harm marine life or seafood safety.

But a TEPCO official fought back tears when he announced the step, saying: "We have already caused such pain and nuisance to local residents. We cannot express how sorry we are to have to impose another burden.")

http://www.theage.com.au/environment/japan-dumps-radioactive-water-into-the-pacific-20110405-1cyxc.html

Edited April 5, 2011 by dee-luded

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/japan-quake-moved-sea-bed-24-metres/story-e6frf7jx-1226034940956

Japan quake moved sea bed 24 metres

"THE seabed near the epicentre of the massive earthquake that rocked Japan last month was shifted 24 metres by the tremor, the country's coastguard says. Sensors found that one part of the ocean floor had been stretched to a point 24 metres east-southeast of its position before the 9.0 undersea quake, which triggered a massive tsunami that engulfed large areas of Japan's northeast coast.

The undersea movement is more than four times bigger than any observed on land, where part of the Oshika peninsula in Miyagi prefecture was found to have shifted 5.3 metres.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said in March that the force of the quake moved Honshu - Japan's main island - by 2.4 metres."

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Japan's reactor crisis hits maximum level, equal to Chernobyl

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/strong-earthquake-hits-japan-rocks-tokyo/story-e6frg6so-1226037789064

JAPAN will upgrade the rating of the Fukushima nuclear crisis to the same level as the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in the former Soviet Union. News of the re-rating of the nuclear crisis came as Japan’s main island, Honshu, was battered by another series of strong aftershocks today.

Japan’s chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano confirmed this morning that the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant would be upgraded from a level 5 to a level 7, which is the maximum, on the international scale.

He said the decision was made by the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency and it would announce the details at a press conference.

Earlier today, the nuclear power plant operator said workers discovered a small fire near a reactor building at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex but it was extinguished quickly.

Tokyo Electric Power Company said the fire at a box that contains batteries in a building near the No. 4 reactor was discovered at about 6:38 am on Tuesday morning and was put out seven minutes later.

It wasn't clear whether the fire was related to a magnitude-6.3 earthquake that shook the Tokyo area this morning. The cause of the fire is being investigated.

It’s believed the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency estimated the amount of radioactive material released from the Fukushima plant reached 10,000 terabecquerels per hour for several hours following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

That level of radiation places the Fukushima incident at the maximum rating on the INES scale, developed by the International Atomic Energy Agency, which rates incidents from one to seven.

A composite image shows newly released photos from Japan's Fukushima nuclear reactor in the aftermath of last month's tsunami. Water can be seen near an access road, left, and then flooding the plant. Source: AP

[Rogue 585]

Keep fighting the good fight.

[dee-luded 2,959]

Keep fighting the good fight.

Just keeping a record of Info.

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Radiation leak at second Japanese nuclear plant

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/radiation-leak-at-second-japanese-nuclear-plant/story-e6frf7jx-1226052868010

THE operator of the Tsuruga nuclear power plant in western Japan said today that a "minute" amount of radiation leaked into the environment, Kyodo News reported. A reactor at the plant, 220 miles west of Tokyo, was shut Saturday for an inspection.

Earlier this month, the operator, Japan Atomic Power Co., reported a rise in radiation levels, possibly caused by leaks from fuel rods into cooling water. It said at the time that no radiation was leaked into the environment.

The radiation leak added to concerns over the state of Japan's nuclear industry. Workers at the Fukushima plant were continuing to grapple with the world's worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl, caused by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

The government last week ordered that the Hamaoka plant, located on a major fault line 125 miles west of the capital, be shut pending safety improvements. Its operator, Chubu Electric Power Co, agreed today to the request at a board meeting.

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Melting of reactor 1 fuel 'no surprise'

Experts were not surprised Thursday to find that most, if not all, of the fuel rods in reactor No. 1 at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant had been fully exposed, melted and fell to the bottom of the pressure vessel. Tokyo Electric Power Co. announced the finding Thursday after workers entered the reactor building earlier this month and fixed equipment to monitor the water level in the pressure vessel. The new finding doesn't increase the likelihood of a hydrogen explosion because the temperature in the pressure vessel is still low, experts said.

http://www.youtube.c...player_embedded

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Japan nuclear plant worker dead - report

A WORKER has died at Japan's disaster-stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant as emergency crews worked to prevent a major meltdown, a report says. The male worker, aged in his 60s, was confirmed dead after he was rushed to hospital after falling unconscious at the plant, Jiji Press news agency said.

A spokesman for the plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Co earlier confirmed the worker was in a serious condition but could not immediately confirm his death.

"It was confirmed that he has not been contaminated by radiation," TEPCO spokesman Shotaro Okawara said.

Mr Okawara said the worker, who was not immediately identified, was carrying equipment inside a facility to treat contaminated water being released from the plant's crippled reactors.

The tsunami triggered by the massive magnitude-9.0 seabed quake on March 11 knocked out the plant's water cooling systems, leading fuel rods inside several reactors to partially melt and sparking explosions.

Workers have since doused reactors and fuel rod pools with water to stop them from overheating and releasing far greater amounts of radiation.

TEPCO hopes to bring the plant into stable "cold shutdown" some time between October and January.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/japan-nuclear-plant-worker-dead-report/story-e6frf7jx-1226055809403

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Germany to close all nuclear plants by 2022

Germany today became the first major industrialised power to agree an end to nuclear power in the wake of the disaster in Japan, with a phase-out due to be completed by 2022. Environment Minister Norbert Roettgen announced the decision on Monday by the centre-right coalition, which was prompted by the crisis at Japan's Fukushima plant, calling it "irreversible".

"After long consultations, there is now an agreement by the coalition to end nuclear energy," he told reporters after seven hours of negotiations into the small hours at Chancellor Angela Merkel's offices.

"This decision is consistent, decisive and clear." Germany has 17 nuclear reactors on its soil, eight of which are currently off the electricity grid.

Seven of those offline are the country's oldest nuclear reactors, which the government shut down for three months pending a safety probe after the emergency at Fukushima that began in March.

The eighth is the Kruemmel plant, in northern Germany, which has been mothballed for years due to repeated technical problems.

http://www.theage.com.au/world/germany-to-close-all-nuclear-plants-by-2022-20110530-1fchu.html

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/nuclear-watchdog-slams-japan-reaction/story-fn6s850w-1226077831698

Nuclear watchdog slams Japan reaction

THE UN's atomic watchdog has criticised Japan for failing to implement the agency's convention on dealing with nuclear emergencies. A report to be published Monday at a five-day ministerial conference on nuclear safety said Tokyo should have followed guidelines laid down by the document after the Fukushima plant was crippled by a tsunami following an earthquake.

The convention lays down the rules for cooperation between the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and states that may need help, in the areas of security and communication.

The report, which was drawn up by experts who visited Japan last month, said Tokyo never implemented the convention.

Japan also did not follow IAEA guidelines about tiered safety measures against outside threats, it said.

IAEA safety standards are not binding for member states.

The agency said that Japanese authorities had also failed to implement anti-tsunami measures that were tightened in 2002.The agency said earlier this month that Japan underestimated the hazard posed by tsunamis to nuclear plants, but praised Tokyo's response to the March 11 disaster as "exemplary".

The experts' final report will be made available to the IAEA's 151 member states during the ministerial conference which starts Monday.

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Record high radiation at Japan nuke plant

From: AAP August 01, 2011 11:12PM

TOKYO Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said it had monitored record high radiation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant crippled by the March 11 quake and tsunami. TEPCO said radiation levels reached at least 10 sieverts per hour near the debris left between the number one and number two reactors of the plant at the centre of the ongoing nuclear crisis.

The previous record was three to four sieverts per hour monitored inside the number one reactor on June 3.

"Three plant workers were exposed to a dosage of four millisieverts while they were monitoring radiation," a TEPCO spokeswoman said. "We are still checking the cause of such high levels of radioactivity."

The government and TEPCO say they remain on target to bring the reactors to a safe state of cold shutdown by January at the latest now that a water circulation system has been established.

Efforts to stabilise the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl 25 years ago have continued since a 9.0 magnitude earthquake triggered a tsunami, sparking reactor meltdowns at the plant and spewing radiation into the environment.

The government has said radiation levels around the plant, which lies 220 kilometres from Tokyo, had fallen to "two-millionths" of the peak recorded March 15.

Tens of thousands of people remain evacuated from homes, businesses and farms in a no-go zone around the plant.

http://www.heraldsun...x-1226106280508

Edited August 1, 2011 by dee-luded

[Hatchman 539]

In the Midst of Fukushima: Ahoy There, Nuke-Loving Greens, Welcome to the Real World!

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Japan seals radiation leak

From: AAP August 03, 2011 12:34AM

THE operator of Japan's damaged nuclear power plant says an area where potentially lethal levels of radiation were detected has been sealed. Tokyo Electric Power Co said yesterday radiation exceeded 10 sieverts at two locations near a duct connected to a ventilation stack between two reactor units at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant.

TEPCO says no one has been injured. The area required no immediate work and was closed off.

It also said radiation levels around the complex were not rising. That's a sign the duct wasn't leaking.

TEPCO said melted fuel in the No.1 reactor might have collected inside the duct after leaking from the containment vessel during venting early in the crisis.

The plant was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami March 11.

http://www.heraldsun...x-1226107089633

Edited August 2, 2011 by dee-luded

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Fukushima homes unliveable for years

Justin McCurry

PEOPLE who lived close to the damaged Fukushima nuclear plant are to be told their homes may be uninhabitable for decades.

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan is expected to visit the area at the weekend to tell evacuees they will not be able to return to their homes, even if the operation to stabilise the plant's stricken reactors by January is successful.

Mr Kan's announcement will be the first time officials have publicly recognised that radiation damage to areas near the plant could make them too dangerous to live in for at least a generation.

A government source is quoted in local media as saying the area could be off-limits for ''several decades''. New data has revealed unsafe levels of radiation outside the 20-kilometre exclusion zone, increasing the likeliness that entire towns will remain unfit for habitation.

The exclusion zone was imposed after several explosions at the plant following the earthquake and tsunami in March.

The government had planned to lift the evacuation order and allow 80,000 people back into their homes inside the exclusion zone once the reactors had been brought under control. Several thousand others living in random hot spots outside the zone have also had to relocate.

However, in a report issued last weekend the science ministry projected that radiation accumulated over one year at 22 of 50 tested sites inside the exclusion zone would easily exceed 100 millisieverts, five times higher than the safe level advised by the International Commission on Radiological Protection.

''We can't rule out the possibility that there will be some areas where it will be hard for residents to return to their homes for a long time,'' said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano. ''We are very sorry.''

Mr Edano refused to say which areas were on the no-go list or how long they would remain uninhabitable. He said a decision would be made after more tests.

The government has yet to decide how to compensate the tens of thousands of residents and business owners who will be forced to start new lives elsewhere. The state has hinted that it may buy or rent land from residents in unsafe areas, although it has not ruled out trying to decontaminate them.

Futaba and Okuma, towns about three kilometres from the Fukushima plant, are expected to be among those on the blacklist. The annual cumulative radiation dose in one district of Okuma was estimated at 508 millisieverts, which experts believe is high enough to increase the risk of cancer.

The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power, is working to bring the three crippled reactors and four spent fuel pools to a safe state known as ''cold shutdown'' by mid-January.

Last week the company estimated that leaks from all three reactors had dropped significantly over the past month.

But signs of progress at the plant have been tempered by widespread contamination of soil, trees, roads and farms.

Experts say that while health risks can be lowered by various measures, vulnerable groups such as pregnant women and children should avoid even minimal exposure.

http://images.theage...shima-200x0.jpg

Edited August 24, 2011 by dee-luded

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Japan nuke leak exceeds Hiroshima

JAPAN'S nuclear agency says the amount of radioactive cesium leaked from a tsunami-hit nuclear plant is about equal to 168 of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says the estimate released today was requested by a parliamentary panel. But it said a simple comparison between an instantaneous bomb blast and long-term accidental leak is impossible.The report estimated for each of the 16 isotopes leaked from "Little Boy" and 31 of those detected at the Fukushima plant but didn't provide the total.

NISA has said the radiation leaked from Fukushima was about one-sixth of what the Chernobyl disaster released in 1986.

"Little Boy" was dropped on the Japanese city by the Americans at the end of World War II.

http://www.heraldsun...x-1226123264937

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Fukushima reactor drops below 100C

THE operators of Japan's crippled Fukushima power plant say the temperature of reactor number two has dropped below 100C, the approximate boiling point of fresh water, as the site slowly recovers from the March 11 tsunami.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) said today that the heat of the reactor fell to 99.4C, following that of reactors one and three which dipped below 100C a few weeks ago.

The firm recently introduced more efficient cooling methods at the plant, which houses six reactors, three of which were badly damaged.

The permanent cooldown of the three is essential in order to stabilise the site devastated by the world's worst atomic disaster since Chernobyl.

There were explosions at the reactors after they went into meltdown following the earthquake and tsunami, which hit its cooling systems.

Japan has promised to achieve a cold shutdown of the plant by the year-end.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/world/fukushima-reactor-drops-below-100c/story-e6frf7lf-1226151390491

[Biffen 12,947]

I thought we were here to discuss serious matters .Like football.

Before you reply ,I'm only joking-don't have a meltdown .

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/world/fukushima-nuclear-plant-worker-dies/story-e6frf7lf-1226161675432

Fukushima nuclear plant worker dies

A WORKER hired to help bring the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant under control died suddenly, the third fatality reported among workers at the stricken plant since the March accident, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said it believed the death on Thursday, like the previous two, had nothing to do with exposure to radiation in the plant.

It also said the death did not result from overwork, though the company did not disclose the cause.

TEPCO said a male worker in his 50s became ill during a meeting Wednesday morning, before his shift started. He was taken to a hospital immediately, and died the next morning.

"We can't disclose what was cited as the cause on his death certificate because it would amount to violation of privacy," a TEPCO spokesman said.

Following the accident, set off by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, TEPCO was criticised for insufficient attention to worker conditions, subjecting dozens of workers to dangerous levels of radiation.

In March, six workers were exposed to over 250 millisieverts of radiation - the ceiling set for emergency workers at the plant - including two who sustained suspected radiation burns to their legs after wading through contaminated water without wearing boots.

Safety records improved significantly in recent months - In July, only six workers received doses of between 20 and 50 millisieverts, compared with 1264 who were exposed to at least 20 millisieverts in March.

The two other deaths among Fukushima workers came in May, when a man died of a heart attack, and in August, when a man died of an acute form of leukemia after working for just seven days at the plant.

In both cases, TEPCO said the death was unrelated to the man's work at the plant.

The worker who died this week had worked there since August 8, helping to install a tank used to treat contaminated water.

He spent a total of 46 days at the plant, logging an average three hours a day.

His accumulated dose of radiation exposure was two millisieverts, well below the 250-millisievert ceiling.

A Sept. 9 whole-body scan of the man had shown no excessive exposure, the spokesman said.

TEPCO was still waiting for a test result to see if the worker had experienced more internal exposure since.