In Japan nuclear regulators and the regulated are the same people

The commission has no idea what the hell is going on,” he told The Independent. “Bureaucrats leave the government and go to TEPCO. The regulator and the regulated are the same people.”….”The government wanted more nuclear power and steamrollered anyone who got in its way. ..

Murky past of Japan’s troubled nuclear industry revealed, The main nuclear power operator has cut corners over the years – with the government’s knowledge.The Independent, 24 March 11, Daniel Howden reports in Fukushima prefecture, 25 March 2011 “…..TEPCO were told from the start that the primary containment vessels, based on 50-year-old US technology, were too small.

“I was deeply involved 40 years ago and it was clear then that there were basic design problems with the containment vessel. They were too small by volume.”

He says that TEPCO went ahead regardless as it was cheaper and a Mark II improved vessel only came later. Of Fukushima’s six reactors the four that are at risk all use the earlier, cheaper design. “Old power stations like Fukushima were not designed for Japanese earthquakes,” says the retired nuclear engineer. “But these earthquakes shake Japan frequently and the design must pay attention to a big earthquake.”

Mr Tanaka rejected official assurances that the crisis was easing and criticised the lack of official information on how they were attempting to cool the vessels. He said that whatever is said in pubic the government and TEPCO are haunted by a possible “China Syndrome” – the name given to a total meltdown where molten nuclear fuel burns its ways through the protective vessel and falls to the concrete floor of the reactor triggering a huge release of radioactive material……

When the scale of the nuclear crisis became clear, TEPCO was forced to admit to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, that it had repeatedly missed safety checks over the last 10 years and had allowed uranium fuel rods to accumulate at the plant.

The admissions compounded revelations from diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks showing that the IAEA had warned that a strong earthquake would cause “serious problems” and that safety systems were out of date. A US embassy cable quoted an unnamed expert warning that Japan’s “safety guides for seismic safety have only been revised three times in the last 35 years”.

TEPCO’s last president was forced to resign after company documents requested by the government were found to contain more than 200 mistakes. Japan gets one-third of its power needs by operating 55 of the world’s 450 reactors. Its nuclear industry was supposed to have been shaken out of its complacency by the Niigata earthquake that struck the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in 2007.

On that occasion TEPCO initially failed to report the leak, then admitted it was 50 per cent bigger than originally announced. In the aftermath one of Japan’s leading seismologists, Ishibashi Katsuhiko, who coined the term “genpaku shinsai”, or nuclear disaster triggered by earthquake, called Japan’s nuclear technocrats dangerously delusional. He later resigned from the Japan Nuclear Safety Commission saying that the new standards they were drafting were not “sufficient” as they only foresaw a magnitude 7 quake.

The Commission has remained silent since the big one struck on 11 March, says Taro Kono, an influential MP who says Japan’s leading political parties are too cosy with the power utilities. “The commission has no idea what the hell is going on,” he told The Independent. “Bureaucrats leave the government and go to TEPCO. The regulator and the regulated are the same people.”

The power company doesn’t have the ability to handle the crisis, he complains, which is making the fallout worse. Models designed to predict air pollution are being run, says Kono, but the results are not being released to the public.

Tokyo’s Citizens’ Nuclear Information Center, an independent watchdog, has been warning for years that the nuclear plants dotted along Japan’s coast were vulnerable to a tsunami. “They say no one saw it coming but we’ve been telling them repeatedly,” says Philip White, a spokesman for CNIC. “The government wanted more nuclear power and steamrollered anyone who got in its way. TEPCO and the government are not victims of anything other than their own stupidity and irresponsibility.”

But Fukushima was not the “big one” that seismologists were waiting for. That is still due at Hamaoka, a nuclear plant 100 miles southwest of Tokyo where scientists say there is an 87 per cent chance of a magnitude 8 quake in the next 30 years. That’s the one that keeps Mr Tanaka up at night: “The wind always blows west to east from there. The fallout would hit Tokyo directly in about six hours.”

Murky past of Japan’s troubled nuclear industry revealed – Asia, World – The Independent