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Japan Accused of Coercing Fukushima Refugees to Return to Unsafe Homes

Greenpeace charges that pro-nuclear Prime Minister Shinzo Abe cares more about politics than public health

As the Japanese government moves to accelerate the return of Fukushima refugees to their homes, environmental advocacy organization Greenpeace warned Tuesday that radioactive contamination remains “so widespread and at such a high level that” that it will be impossible for people to safely go back.

Four years after an earthquake and tsunami touched off the nuclear meltdown, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is pressing to lift evacuation orders by March 2017 and cut off compensation to victims of the disaster by 2018. The move would allow—and some say force—tens of thousands of refugees to go back to their homes.

The pro-nuclear prime minister says that the move, proposed in June, is aimed at speeding up Fukushima’s “reconstruction.”

Greenpeace, however, warns that such a development would be reckless and dangerous. The organization evaluated radiation contamination in Iitate, a forested 75-square-mile district in the Fukushima prefecture, and found that even after “decontamination,” the radiation level remains at 2uSv/h—or ten times the maximum deemed safe for the public.

“Prime Minister Abe would like the people of Japan to believe that they are decontaminating vast areas of Fukushima to levels safe enough for people to live in,” said Jan Vande Putte, radiation specialist with Greenpeace Belgium, in a press statement. “The reality is that this is a policy doomed to failure. The forests of Iitate are a vast stock of radioactivity that will remain both a direct hazard and source of potential recontamination for hundreds of years. It’s impossible to decontaminate.”

According to Greenpeace, the elimination of compensation would effectively force people back into an environment that is dangerous for their health.

“Stripping nuclear victims of their already inadequate compensation, which may force them to have to return to unsafe, highly radioactive areas for financial reasons, amounts to economic coercion,” said Putte. “Let’s be clear: this is a political decision by the Abe Government, not one based on science, data, or public health.”

Meanwhile, nuclear refugees from Iitate are fighting for adequate compensation through an Alternative Dispute Resolution process. Their lawyer, Yasushi Tadano, said: “The Iitate people’s fate is another of numerous cases in the past where Japan abandoned its people, as with the Ashio mining pollution and Minamata disease. We can not allow this to happen again.”

Residents across Japan have staged protests and filed lawsuits to block nuclear restarts, and polls show that, in the aftermath of the 2011 disaster, a clear majority of the Japanese public opposes nuclear power. In addition, surveys reveal low public confidence in the Japanese government and the Tokyo Electric Power Co.—the company behind the Fukushima Daiichi plant that continues to release radiation into the ecosystem.

Despite public opposition, Abe is aggressively pursuing a return to nuclear power. Earlier this month, Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party revealed that it aims to have 20 percent of the country’s electricity supplied by nuclear power by 2030.

Source: Common Deams

http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/07/21/japan-accused-coercing-fukushima-refugees-return-unsafe-homes

July 21, 2015 Posted by | Japan | , | Leave a comment

Sweaty work for Japan teams scrubbing away Fukushima radiation

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IITATE, Japan – Sweating inside their plastic protection suits, thousands of men toil in Japan’s muggy early summer in a vast effort to scrub radiation from the villages around Fukushima.

The mission is to decontaminate hundreds of square kilometres (miles) that were polluted when reactors went into meltdown after a huge tsunami struck Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March 2011.

No stone is left unturned: diggers scrape away the top layer of earth in fields, school courtyards and around the buildings of villages, while houses, buildings, roads and parking lots are scrubbed clean.

At least 20,000 people – all dressed in the special gloves, masks and boots required for workers in the nuclear industry – are involved in the clean-up, according to the environment ministry.

Some 2.5 million black bags filled with contaminated soil, plants and leaves wait at the sites or in one of the nearly 800 temporary outdoor storage facilities that have been set up across the disaster zone.

The mammoth effort comes as Japan’s government prepares to declare sections of the evacuation zone habitable again.

That will mean evacuees can return to the homes they abandoned more than four years ago. It will also mean, say campaigners, that some people will have no choice but to go back because it will trigger the ending of some compensation payments.

Government-run decontamination efforts are under way in 11 cities where Tokyo says that at present, anyone living there would be exposed to radiation levels of more than 20 millisieverts (mSv) a year.

The globally-accepted norm for radiation absorption is 1 mSv per year, although the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and others say anything up to 20 mSv per year poses no immediate danger to human health.

The settlement of Naraha, which lies just 20 kilometres (12 miles) from the plant, is expected to be declared safe in September.

The government intends to lift many evacuation orders by March 2017, if decontamination progresses as it hopes.

Still, the area immediately surrounding the plant remains uninhabitable, and storage sites meant to last 30 years are being built in the villages closest to the complex.

For now, only residential areas are being cleaned in the short-term, and the worst-hit parts of the countryside are being omitted, a recommendation made by the IAEA.

But that strategy has troubled environmentalists, who fear that could lead to re-contamination as woodlands will act as a radiation reservoir, with pollutants washed out by rains.

In a report on decontamination in Iitate, a heavily forested area that lies northwest of the plant, campaign group Greenpeace says these selective efforts will effectively confine returnees to a relatively small area of their old hometowns.

“The Japanese government plans, if implemented, will create an open-air prison of confinement to ‘cleaned’ houses and roads… and the vast untouched radioactive forests continue to pose a significant risk of recontamination of these ‘decontaminated’ areas to even higher levels,” the report, published Tuesday, says.

Some 39 other municipalities which were not evacuated after the accident, and which have radiation levels deemed safe for humans, are also being decontaminated by local authorities.

Source: Asia One

July 21, 2015 Posted by | Japan | | Leave a comment

Fukushima No. 1 still has 7,000 tons of problematic toxic water to be removed

Some 7,000 tons of radioactive water at risk of leaking into the ground still has to be removed from underground tunnels and other locations at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. is trying to get rid of tainted water from the cable tunnels for reactors 2 and 3. That work is expected to be mostly completed by the end of this month.
As of Monday, such water could still be found in at least 16 such locations at the plant, where three reactors suffered a meltdown after being heavily damaged in the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
According to Tepco, numerous underground tunnels, ducts and pits hold radioactive water, in addition to the reactor and turbine buildings. Some of the water is more radioactive than the contaminated water already in storage tanks.
The highest levels of radioactive substances contained per liter were 990 becquerels of cesium-134 and 3,200 becquerels of cesium-137, more than 60 times higher than the provisional standards for water Tepco may discharge within the plant site.
The tunnels and ducts are not designed to hold water and therefore have a higher risk of leakage than storage tanks.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority has urged Tepco to immediately remove the water in the cable tunnels for reactors 2 and 3 due to extremely high levels of radioactive materials it contains and the high risk of the tainted water leaking into the ocean. These tunnels are located relatively close to the Pacific shoreline.
Levels of radioactive materials in the water in other tunnels and ducts are substantially lower, and such facilities are located away from the ocean. Still, due to the lack of sufficient monitoring, it would be hard to immediately detect a possible leak.
An official of the secretariat of the NRA said, “Tepco needs to tackle the problem of this tainted water, which it has so far failed to address.”

Source: Japan Times
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/07/21/national/fukushima-1-still-7000-tons-problematic-toxic-water-removed/#.Va5V-xNViko

July 21, 2015 Posted by | Japan | | Leave a comment

Tourism association turns to booze created with Fukushima buckwheat. Now on sale.

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Buckwheat-based imitation beer hits shelves in nuclear disaster-affected village

KAWAUCHI, Fukushima Prefecture–A tourism association here has turned to booze created with buckwheat, a local specialty, to breathe life back into a village depleted by the nearby Fukushima nuclear disaster.

At the request of the Kawauchi tourism association, beer brewers in Fukushima Prefecture have developed two types of low-malt imitation beer using buckwheat, which is typically used to make soba noodles.

“I want to encourage residents of the village by developing new local specialty products,” said Shigeru Ide, who heads the tourism body.

The 330-milliliter beverages are each priced at 620 yen ($4.99), including tax, and became available at shops throughout Kawauchi earlier this month.

The Soba Garden imitation beer tastes strong, while Kyo has a light flavor.

Before the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami triggered the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Kawauchi was one of the largest producing centers of buckwheat in the prefecture.

Although evacuation orders have been lifted for most parts of Kawauchi, half of its 2,700 residents still live outside the village as evacuees.

Source: Asahi Shimbun

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/recovery/AJ201507200062

July 21, 2015 Posted by | Japan | | Leave a comment

Tests begin on radiation data publication system

Japan’s nuclear regulators have begun testing a new radiation data-publicizing system for residents near a power plant.

The Nuclear Regulation Authority says it has begun to test-run the system it has developed in an area surrounding the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima Prefecture, western Japan.

Kyushu Electric Power Company aims to bring the plant back online next month.

The new system enables the central government and municipalities to provide their radiation data online for other organizations as well as for local residents during emergencies.

The system will allow users to access a special site on the Authority’s website to obtain such data in the event of a nuclear accident.

In the case of the Sendai plant, the website provides updated figures from 73 observation points within a 30-kilometer radius from the plant, as well as from cars equipped with radiation-monitoring equipment.

Figures are colored in red or yellow when they exceed government standards.

New nuclear emergency guidelines call for the evacuation of residents within a 5- to 30-kilometer radius from a power plant if radiation levels exceed the government limit.

The government reviewed the guidelines following the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident.

The regulators say they will fully launch the system in August after one month of testing. They say they will also set up web sites for other nuclear power plants. 

Source: NHK 

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20150720_04.html

July 21, 2015 Posted by | Japan | , | Leave a comment