“Levels of radioactive iodine in tap water at a water treatment center in downtown Tokyo measured 210 becquerels per liter of iodine-131 — more than twice the recommended limit of 100 becquerels per liter for infants, officials from the Tokyo Water Bureau said at a news conference.”

Tokyo – Tap Water Not Safe for Infants – NYTimes.com

“There’s a lot of discussion of radiation from the Fukushima plants, along with comparisons to Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. Radiation levels are often described as ‘<X> times the normal level’ or ‘<Y>% over the legal limit,’ which can be pretty confusing.

Ellen, a friend of mine who’s a student at Reed and Senior Reactor Operator at the Reed Research Reactor, has been spending the last few days answering questions about radiation dosage virtually nonstop [..]. She suggested a chart might help put different amounts of radiation into perspective, and so with her help, I put one together”

Radiation Chart

Gives perspective on the numbers thrown around in media.

“TerraPower, an Intellectual Ventures spin-off that also boasts Bill Gates as an investor, is working on a new reactor design called a traveling wave reactor that uses fast reactor technology, rather than the light water technology used at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The two biggest advantages of the fast reactor design is that it requires no spent fuel pools and uses cooling systems that require no power to function, meaning the loss of power from the tsunami might not have crippled a fast reactor plant so severely.’”

A New Class of Nuclear Reactors – Slashdot

Sounds promising. Even though I believe in researching alternative non-nuclear power sources it’s not like we’re going to get rid of nuclear power for quite some time.

The world’s natural ecosystems are being degraded at a rate unprecedented in human history, according to a report released today by WWF, the global conservation organization.

Yesterday WWF released this year’s Living Planet Report, read the full report as a PDF here. If you’re to believe everything it doesn’t look all that promising for us…