BNO NEWS – The Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco), which operates the troubled Fukushima nuclear plant, on Thursday admitted that a nuclear meltdown occurred at the plant.

With the nuclear meltdown, Tepco said the nuclear fuel rods in the reactor are completely exposed, as large amounts of radiation is being released. The water level at the plant’s No. 1 reactor was much lower than thought – as much as 5 meters (16.4 feet) below the nuclear rods – and clearly not high enough to cover the nuclear fuel.

According to reports, several holes were found at the bottom of the nuclear reactor’s pressure vessel, where the melted nuclear fuel now threatens to leak out of.

On a daily basis, Tepco injects almost 200 tons of water into the pressure vessel, but it is highly likely that the water has been constantly leaking from the vessel and containment chamber, eventually flowing under the reactor building.

On Monday, Japan’s Chubu Electric Co. agreed to shut down its Hamaoka nuclear power station in Shizuoka Prefecture, two days after Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan requested to have all operations at the plant’s reactors suspended due to Japan’s science ministry informing that an 8.0-magnitude earthquake is forecast to hit the Tokai region with an 87 percent probability in the coming 30 years, which could affect the nuclear plant.

Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency informed that the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant remains very serious. The core damage for Units 1, 2 and 3 are of 55 percent, 35 percent and 33 percent respectively as of April 27.

The government approved a 4 trillion yen ($48.89 billion) emergency budget to finance the early phase of reconstruction. In addition, the evacuation zone was expanded beyond the initial 20-kilometer (12.4-mile) radius surrounding the damaged plant.

At least 14,294 people were killed, while some 13,000 people remain missing due to devastating earthquake and tsunami. Japanese officials have called it the worst crisis since the end of World War II.

Japan Plant Fuel Melted Partway Through Reactors: Report, National Journal’s Global Security Newswire, April 15, 2011:

[Emphasis Added]

Nuclear fuel has melted in three reactors at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and fallen to the lower sections of their container vessels, raising the specter of overheated material compromising a container and causing a massive radiation release, the Atomic Energy Society of Japan said in a report released on Friday…

Read the report here.

Fuel rod fragments at bottom of vessels, Japan Times, April 15, 2011:

Melted fuel rod fragments have sunk to the bottoms of three reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant and could theoretically burn through the pressure vessels if emergency water-pumping operations are seriously disrupted, the Atomic Energy Society of Japan said Friday.

If too many of the melted fuel fragments puddle at the bottom, they can generate enough concentrated heat to bore a hole in the pressure vessel, which would result in a massive radioactive release to the environment. …

Read the report here.

General Electric, the nation’s largest corporation, had a very good year in 2010.

The company reported worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, and said $5.1 billion of the total came from its operations in the United States.

Its American tax bill? None. In fact, G.E. claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion.

That may be hard to fathom for the millions of American business owners and households now preparing their own returns, but low taxes are nothing new for G.E. The company has been cutting the percentage of its American profits paid to the Internal Revenue Service for years, resulting in a far lower rate than at most multinational companies.

Its extraordinary success is based on an aggressive strategy that mixes fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting that enables it to concentrate its profits offshore. G.E.’s giant tax department, led by a bow-tied former Treasury official named John Samuels, is often referred to as the world’s best tax law firm. Indeed, the company’s slogan “Imagination at Work” fits this department well. The team includes former officials not just from the Treasury, but also from the I.R.S. and virtually all the tax-writing committees in Congress.

While General Electric is one of the most skilled at reducing its tax burden, many other companies have become better at this as well. Although the top corporate tax rate in the United States is 35 percent, one of the highest in the world, companies have been increasingly using a maze of shelters, tax credits and subsidies to pay far less.

In a regulatory filing just a week before the Japanese disaster put a spotlight on the company’s nuclear reactor business, G.E. reported that its tax burden was 7.4 percent of its American profits, about a third of the average reported by other American multinationals. Even those figures are overstated, because they include taxes that will be paid only if the company brings its overseas profits back to the United States. With those profits still offshore, G.E. is effectively getting money back.

Read the full article.

General Electric designed the faulty Fukuchima Nuclear Power Plant!

General Electric was forewarned of the critical engineering flaws in its water-cooled nuclear reactors which are currently in danger of undergoing a catastrophic meltdown in Japan.

Shouldn’t those 14 billion USD be confiscated and donated to cleaning up Japan’s nuclear holocaust?

Chron - Japanese officials say the nuclear fuel rods appear to be melting inside all three of the most troubled nuclear reactors.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Monday: “Although we cannot directly check it, it’s highly likely happening.”

Some experts would consider that a partial meltdown of the reactor. Others, though, reserve that term for times when nuclear fuel melts through a reactor’s innermost chamber but not through the outer containment shell.

Monster and Critics - The fuel rods at one of the quake-stricken nuclear reactors in north-eastern Japan may have partially melted, Kyodo News reported Monday citing Tokyo Electric Power Co officials.

The fuel rods at the reactor 2 of the Fukushima I plant were fully exposed late Monday as the water level of the cooling system dropped, damaged by Friday’s magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami.

Authorities had been trying to keep the core of the reactor cool with sea water after the quake cut the power to the normal cooling systems.

New dramatic video: Tsunami wave spills over seawall, smashes boats, cars

Aerial video from town closest to Japan’s mega-quake epicentre

Japan Earthquake: Helicopter aerial view video of giant tsunami waves

Japan earthquake: CCTV video of tsunami wave hitting Sendai airport

Video of blast at Fukushima nuke plant, radiation leak reported

Fresh footage of huge tsunami waves smashing town in Japan

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.

Read the full article.

If you think everything is about to change for the better, think again:

Washington Feeds New Fear of a Debt Crisis
China Selling U.S. Treasury Bonds At Record Pace
50 Years and NOBODY Has Seen US Government Gold Reserves
RED ALERT: Next Debt Crisis Near!

Video Interview

Gerald Celente on the Annual economic report.

Posted Feb. 16, 2010

Video Interview

Marc Faber talks about total disaster with a collapse of capitalistic system.

Posted February 16, 2010

Paul Farrell at the Wall Street Journal’s Market Watch describes the coming global-debt-bomb explosion:

The Big One is coming soon, bigger than the 2000 dot-com crash and the 2008 subprime credit meltdown combined. A huge market blowout. And as Bloomberg-BusinessWeek predicts: “The results won’t be pretty for investors or elected officials.”

After the global-debt bomb explodes don’t expect a typical bear correction followed by a new bull. Wall Street’s toxic pseudo-capitalism is imploding. Be prepared for a massive meltdown. Yes, already the third major bubble-bust of the 21st century, triggered once again by Wall Street’s out-of-control Fat Cat Bankers. And it’s dead ahead.