In this March 11, 2011 photo provided by Tokyo Electric Power Co., a tsunami is seen just after striking the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant breakwater.
TEPCO staffer testifies execs put off tsunami measures at Fukushima plant
April 11, 2018
TOKYO — A Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) employee testified in court here on April 10 that company executives decided to postpone tsunami prevention measures at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant despite an assessment warning that a massive wave could hit the power station.
Three former TEPCO executives including former Vice President Sakae Muto, 67, are on trial for professional negligence causing death and injury over the Fukushima nuclear crisis triggered by the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami. The TEPCO employee’s statements at the trial’s fifth hearing were in line with the arguments of the court-appointed attorney acting for the prosecution.
Since 2007, the male employee had been part of an internal assessment group tasked with estimating the maximum height of tsunami which could strike the Fukushima No. 1 plant.
The group commissioned a TEPCO-affiliated company to estimate the size of potential tsunami, based on a long-term assessment made by the government’s Headquarters for Earthquake Research Promotion that a massive wave could be generated by a quake in the Japan Trench, including off Fukushima Prefecture. In 2008, the TEPCO subsidiary reported that tsunami as tall as 15.7 meters could hit the plant.
In the trial, the employee stated, “I thought that TEPCO should take the assessment into consideration in taking (earthquake and tsunami) countermeasures, as the assessment was supported by prominent seismologists.” He said he was so confident that the utility would take action that he emailed another working group at the company, “There will definitely be major renovations at the Fukushima No. 1 and other plants.”
When the employee reported the assessment result to Muto, the then vice president gave him instructions that could be interpreted as an order to prepare to build a levee. However, the employee testified that Muto later shifted policy and called for an investigation into whether the long-term tsunami risk assessment is correct rather than taking tsunami countermeasures.
“I thought they (TEPCO) would consider taking tsunami prevention measures, but they changed policy unexpectedly and I lost heart,” the employee told the court.
Along with Muto, former TEPCO President Tsunehisa Katsumata and Vice President Ichiro Takekuro were slapped with mandatory indictments in February 2016 after a decision by the Tokyo No. 5 Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution. Since the trial’s first public hearing, the court-appointed lawyers for the prosecution have claimed that the executives put off tsunami countermeasures even though TEPCO staff tasked with estimating the maximum height of tsunami that could strike the Fukushima plant endeavored to address the threat. The defendants have argued that they did not put off the countermeasures.
(Japanese original by Ebo Ishiyama, City News Department, and Ei Okada, Science & Environment News Department)
The 2011 tsunami damaged pumps at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
TEPCO worker: Boss scrapped tsunami wall for Fukushima plant
April 11, 2018
An employee of Tokyo Electric Power Co. testified in court that his boss abruptly ended preparations in 2008 to build a seawall to protect the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant from a towering tsunami.
“It was unexpected,” the employee said of former TEPCO Vice President Sakae Muto’s instructions during a hearing at the Tokyo District Court on April 10. “I was so disheartened that I have no recollection of what followed afterward at the meeting.”
Muto, 67, was deputy chief of the company’s nuclear power and plant siting division at the time.
He, along with Tsunehisa Katsumata, former TEPCO chairman, and Ichiro Takekuro, former TEPCO vice president, are now standing trial on charges of professional negligence resulting in death and injury over the 2011 nuclear disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 plant.
To prove negligence, prosecutors are trying to show that the top executives could have predicted the size of the tsunami that swamped the plant on March 11, 2011, resulting in the most serious nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
The employee was a member of a team tasked with compiling steps against tsunami at the earthquake countermeasures center that the utility set up in November 2007.
He reported directly to Muto.
According to the employee, TEPCO was considering additional safeguards on the instructions of the then Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency for all nuclear plant operators to review their anti-earthquake measures.
The group weighed its options based on a long-term assessment of the probability of major earthquakes released by the science ministry’s Headquarters for Earthquake Research Promotion in 2002.
The assessment pointed out that Fukushima Prefecture could be hit by a major tsunami.
Some experts were skeptical about the assessment, given that there were no archives showing a towering tsunami ever striking the area.
But the employee told the court, “Members of the group reached a consensus that we should incorporate the long-term assessment” in devising countermeasures.
The group asked a TEPCO subsidiary to conduct a study on the maximum height of a tsunami on the basis of the assessment.
The subsidiary in March 2008 informed the group that a tsunami of “a maximum 15.7 meters” could hit the Fukushima plant.
The group reported that number to Muto in June that year.
Based on Muto’s instructions, the group studied procedures on obtaining a permit to build a seawall to protect the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, according to the employee.
But in July, Muto, without giving an explanation, told the group at a meeting that TEPCO will not adopt the 15.7-meter estimate, the employee said.
He said Muto’s decision stunned group members who had believed the company was moving to reinforce the plant.
The tsunami that caused the triple meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant reached 15.5 meters.
But Muto and the two others on trial have pleaded not guilty, arguing that the 15.7-meter prediction was “nothing more than one estimate.”
Why the TEPCO management dropped the tsunami prediction will be the focus of future hearings.
Prosecutors had initially declined to press charges against the three former executives, citing insufficient evidence. However, a committee for the inquest of prosecution twice concluded that the three should be indicted.
Their trial began in June last year. Lawyers are acting as prosecutors in the case.
(This story was compiled from reports by Mikiharu Sugiura, Takuya Kitazawa and Senior Staff Writer Eisuke Sasaki.)
Everybody’s data site has examined each data collected by citizens all over Eastern Japan making efforts to verify each given data by taking measures over and over again, so as to publish reliable and verified soil contamination measures, thus revealing the country’s real radiation hidden numbers. Http://data.minnanods.net/maps/zoommap/
Korea Appeals WTO Ruling on Imports from Fukushima
April 10, 2018
The government has appealed a World Trade Organization ruling that accused Korea of violating trade regulations by banning imports of seafood from Japan’s Fukushima Prefecture, which was the site of a massive nuclear power plant meltdown in 2011.
“The nuclear fallout persists in Japan, and the ruling is problematic since it’s our job to make sure the food Koreans eat is safe,” a government spokesman said Monday.
In February of this year, the WTO ruled in favor of Japan, which has demanded Korea lift the ban.
Korea banned imports from the region in 2011, just after a massive earthquake there resulted in the nuclear meltdown. Japan sued Korea at the WTO in 2015.
South Korea appeals WTO ruling against import ban on Japanese seafood
April 10, 2018
South Korea has appealed a World Trade Organization ruling against its restrictions on the import of seafood from eight Japanese prefectures following the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.
The government had earlier vowed to fight the ruling to safeguard public health and safety while keeping the ban in place. Seoul announced its appeal on Monday.
In the ruling, announced Feb. 22, the WTO’s dispute settlement panel said the ban was inconsistent with the global trade body’s rules against “arbitrarily or unjustifiably” discriminating against another country, recommending that South Korea take corrective action.
The panel also said a South Korean requirement that Japanese exporters of all marine products submit certificates of inspection if small amounts of radioactive cesium or iodine are detected is an effective barrier to fair trade.
The decision came more than two years after Japan filed a complaint in 2015 over the South Korean ban, claiming it was not based on scientific grounds.
In Tokyo, fisheries minister Ken Saito expressed regret on Tuesday over South Korea’s appeal, telling a news conference it was “extremely regrettable.”
He also said Japan will properly address the matter so that its claims will be accepted by the WTO’s appellate body. In addition, Tokyo will urge Seoul to swiftly lift the ban, Saito said.
Following the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 plant, triggered by a powerful earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011, South Korea initially imposed a partial ban on imports of marine products from the eight prefectures due to fears of radioactive contamination.
In September 2013, Seoul expanded the restrictions to bar all fishery products from the eight prefectures and strengthened import regulations.
The eight prefectures are Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Chiba.
Seven years after a tsunami wiped out the nuclear reactors in Fukushima, causing widespread radiation contamination in a largely agricultural region, the Fukushima prefecture continues to struggle in getting crucial overseas markets to accept its produce.
This is despite a charm offensive that saw japanese foreign minister Taro Kono visiting Hong-Kong last weekend for the first time in 21 years to lobby chief executive Carrie Lam to lift a ban on imports from Fukushima and its surrounding region.
Hong-Kong which accounts for a quarter of Japan’s food export trade, is among the 55 countries that have blocked shipments from Fukushima since the 2011 disaster.
Facing resistance
The trip did not go the way Tokyo planned, with Lam expressing her reluctance to reopen trade.
“She emphasized that it is incumbent upon the government to safeguard public health and hence effective measures must be in place to ensure food safety and to maintain public confidence,” a statement issued by Lam’s office read.
The visit came shortly after South Korea announced it would maintain a blanket ban on imports from north-eastern Japan, even though the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled this as “arbitrary and unjustifiable” discriminatory measures.
Korea’s trade ministry stated in March that it would appeal the WTO decision, which is equivalent to a court ruling.
“Despite this ruling, the current import ban will remain in force, and the government will make its utmost efforts to ensure radiation-contaminated food does not reach the dinner table,” it said in a strongly-worded statement, ahead of a likely appeal.
Radiation safe?
Meanwhile a Fukushima flatfish festival in Bangkok was forced to cancel amid pressure from consumer goods watchdogs over radioactive contamination.
According to japanese officials, food from the affected area is safe, with no radiation having been detected in rice since 2015. In January, a safety panel announced that contamination inspections would be phased out in favor of random spot checks, to bring rice in line with the current procedure for fruits and vegetables.
This position is backed up by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, whose director-general publicly ate sweets made from pears and apples grown in Fukushima at an event in Tokyo last May to publicize the safety of produce in the affected area.
“We don’t see any reason to raise concern about the safety of food,” Jose Graziano Da Silva said at the time.
Just a year after the nuclear incident japanese authorities began adopting the strictest radiation standards of any country in the world by lowering the accepted level of contamination by half.
But persuading prime export markets that Fukushima food is safe is proving to be tremendously difficult.
“An estimated 218.2 billion yen ($2.06 billion) of taxpayers’ money will be needed to cover the interest on loans extended to Tokyo Electric Power Co. to deal with the Fukushima nuclear disaster.”
April 10, 2018
An estimated 218.2 billion yen ($2.06 billion) of taxpayers’ money will be needed to cover the interest on loans extended to Tokyo Electric Power Co. to deal with the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
The Board of Audit said TEPCO will require a maximum of 34 years to pay off loans totaling 13.5 trillion yen that were provided by financial institutions through the government.
The prediction was made based on an interest rate of 0.1 percent, but the rate could rise.
“The financial burden might increase,” a Board of Audit official said.
The government borrows funds from financial institutions and provides them to TEPCO effectively as interest-free loans via the Nuclear Damage Compensation and Decommissioning Facilitation Corp. Through the arrangement, the utility can pay compensation to evacuees of the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant and cover costs for decontamination and other procedures.
The ceiling for those funds was 9 trillion yen in 2013, but the limit was raised to 13.5 trillion yen by 2016.
Profits from TEPCO’s sales of its shares, as well as electricity fees collected by power companies across Japan, will be used to pay back the huge debt. But all interest payments will be covered with taxpayers’ money when the government repays the loans.
The Board of Audit estimates the TEPCO shares will be sold over a period from 19 to 34 years.
If the stock price rises, the loans will be repaid earlier, but a lower share price could lead to a delay in repayment.
During the repayment period, the government will have to pay 143.9 billion yen to 218.2 billion yen in interest, according to the forecast.
Another prediction put the amount of interest between 131.8 billion yen and 202.0 billion yen.
The Board of Audit in 2015 estimated the interest would total 126.4 billion yen.
The No. 4 reactor at Kansai Electric Power Co.’s Oi nuclear plant in Fukui Prefecture is due to be restarted in mid-May.
Kansai Electric Power Co. has started work to load nuclear fuel into reactor 4 at its Oi nuclear plant in Fukui Prefecture.
The operation, which started Sunday, to place 193 uranium fuel assemblies in the reactor is to be completed by Wednesday. Kansai Electric aims to restart the reactor sometime in mid-May.
According to the company, the fuel-loading work started at 10 a.m. using a crane and containers. The operation will continue around the clock.
Reactors 3 and 4 at the Oi plant cleared Nuclear Regulation Authority screenings last year under strict new standards introduced after the March 2011 crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
Preparations have been underway to bring the Oi facility’s reactor 3, which was reactivated March 14, into commercial operations mode. Unless any problems are detected in an NRA inspection, the reactor will start commercial operations as early as Tuesday.
US, British and French forces launched air strikes on chemical weapons sites in Syria. Russia claims that most missiles fired were intercepted by Syrian air defence systems using Soviet-produced hardware. We all hope that this will not escalate, at present it being a targeted attack in response to Syria’s illegal use of chemical weapons.
Syria strikes: The real impact is in Moscow, Analysis by Tim Lister, CNN April 14, 2018 After nearly a week of tension that sometimes verged on the surreal, the US and its allies finally carried out strikes against regime targets in Syria on Friday night. The strikes, more limited than once seemed likely, were designed to deter the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons once and for all.
Their real impact will be on the plummeting relationship between Moscow and the West.
The arguments over what happened in Douma on April 7 and who was responsible have dragged US-Russian relations to their lowest ebb in decades. On both sides, the
(CNN)After nearly a week of tension that sometimes verged on the surreal, the US and its allies finally carried out strikes against regime targets in Syria on Friday night. The strikes, more limited than once seemed likely, were designed to deter the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons once and for all.
Their real impact will be on the plummeting relationship between Moscow and the West.
The arguments over what happened in Douma on April 7 and who was responsible have dragged US-Russian relations to their lowest ebb in decades. On both sides, the As the week progressed, Russian officials veered between insisting there had been no attack, that rebel groups had staged it and ultimately that the United Kingdom had planned it in a conspiracy with Syria’s White Helmets volunteer rescue group……..
The deterrent effect
Syria pledged to give up all its chemical weapons in 2013 under a Russian-mediated deal after a horrendous attack on civilians not far from the site of the last week’s incident. The alternative, threatened by President Obama, was military action.
Either Syria didn’t surrender all of its stocks (the view in France and Germany) or it started producing chemical weapons again.
Chemical weapons have killed a tiny fraction of the more than 400,000 Syrians who have died in the civil war. But to the US and much of the international community, the use of these weapons is especially abhorrent.British Prime Minister Theresa May spoke of the “erosion” of the global ban on chemical weapons, while the senior UN official for disarmament, Thomas Markram, told the Security Council on Monday: “The use of chemical weapons cannot become the status quo, nor can we continue to fail the victims of such weapons.”
That was the Trump Administration’s view when it launched cruise missiles against a Syrian airbase a year ago following the sarin attack on civilians at Khan Sheikhoun. Those strikes were meant as a deterrent; as such they failed. As the International Rescue Committee said this week, the response to Khan Sheikhoun “did not change the calculus of the warring parties nor make Syrian civilians safer.”
The choice this time was a larger deterrent — or be seen as a blowhard. But escalation brings with it risks of a wider conflict, risks the Russians have been keen to proclaim……
A nadir for Washington and Moscow
The greatest impact of these strikes is that they will deepen the visceral hostility that characterizes relations between the US and Russia, now at their lowest ebb in decades……..
Syria: US, British and French forces launch air strikes in response to chemical weapons attack,
US, British and French forces have pounded chemical weapons sites in Syria with air strikes in response to an alleged poison gas attack that killed dozens in the rebel-held town of Douma last week.
Key points:
US, UK and France hit three chemical weapons sites in Syria
US Defence Secretary says strikes were a “one-time shot”
Strikes biggest intervention yet by Western powers against Assad regime
In a televised address to the nation, US President Donald Trump said the three nations had “marshalled their righteous power against barbarism and brutality”.
The strikes were the biggest intervention by Western powers against President Bashar al-Assad in the country’s seven-year-old civil war, which has pitted the US and its allies against Russia.
The Pentagon said the strikes targeted a research centre in Damascus, along with a chemical weapons storage facility and command post west of Homs……
British Prime Minister Theresa May said the strikes were not about intervening in a civil war nor were they about a regime change.
“We cannot allow the use of chemical weapons to become normalised within Syria, on the streets of the UK or anywhere else in our world,” Ms May said…….
BANNG 11th April 2018 ,Professor Andy Blowers, OBE, Chair of the Blackwater Against New Nuclear
Group (BANNG), has been awarded the Alexander and Ilse Melamid Medal theAmerican Geographical Society.
The medal was created to honour ‘those who examine the influence of humans on the natural world.’ It is awarded in
recognition of ‘outstanding work on the dynamic relationship between human culture and natural resources.’
Prof. Deborah Popper, of Princeton University, said that Professor Blowers has been addressing some of the most significant and difficult environmental issues with great thoughtfulness, stamina, and grace. Mike Pasqualetti, Professor of Geographical Sciences, Arizona State University and former winner of the award, commented: ‘I know of no-one more deserving of this recognition.’
Professor Blowers has had a long career as an academic at The Open University, as a County Councillor, as a Government adviser, as anauthor and as a campaigner. He has been published widely and his most recent book, The Legacy of Nuclear Power, adresses communities living with radioactive waste. The medal will be presented at Columbia University, New York, in November. https://www.banng.info/category/news/
Donald Trump ‘to tell Kim Jong-un to scrap nuclear arsenal within year in return for US embassy in Pyongyang’ , Julian Ryall, Tokyo, Nicola Smith, Telegraph UK Taipei
President Donald Trump is expected to demand that Pyongyang abolish its nuclear weapons capability within a year when he sits down for talks with Kim Jong-un, the North Korean dictator, but will offer to open an embassy in the North’s capital and provide humanitarian assistance as an incentive.
The details offer a sense of the rapid pace of progress towards talks although analysts suggest the timetable may be overambitious.
Guardian 11th April 2018, The warm Atlantic current linked to severe and abrupt changes in the
climate in the past is now at its weakest in at least 1,600 years, new research shows.
The findings, based on multiple lines of scientific evidence, throw into question previous predictions that a catastrophic
collapse of the Gulf Stream would take centuries to occur. Such a collapse
would see western Europe suffer far more extreme winters, sea levels rise
fast on the eastern seaboard of the US and would disrupt vital tropical
rains.
Radioactively-hot particles detected in dusts and soils from Northern Japan by combination of gamma spectrometry, autoradiography, and SEM/EDS analysis and implications in radiation risk assessment, Science Direct
India Slashes Plans for New Nuclear Reactors by Two-Thirds, April 11, 2018 The Energy Collective, The Financial Express, one of India’s major newspapers, reports that the Narendra Modi government, which had set the ambitious 63,000 MW nuclear power capacity addition target by the year 2031-32, has cut it to 22,480 MW, or by roughly two thirds.
…….. The drastic reduction in planned construction of new reactors will diminish India’s plans to rely on nuclear energy from 25% of electrical generation to about 8-10%.
…. It appears that India’s long list of nuclear reactors, which at one time it aspired to build, is now in the dust bin. Instead, a much shorter list of 19 units composed of indigenous 700 MW PHWRs and Russian VVERs will be completed for an additional 17 GWE……..
The list of 57 cancelled reactors also includes 700 MW PHWRs and Russian VVERs. In addition it includes future plans for Areva EPRs and Westinghouse AP1000s. Four fast breeder reactors are part of this list which raises questions about India’s policy commitment to its three phase plan for nuclear energy. …….
While the Department of Atomic Energy did not specify the reasons for the change, it is likely that India has come face-to-face with the same reality that other developing nations seeking rapid construction of nuclear power plants. The challenges are the lack of funding, a reliable supply chain that can handle a huge increase in orders, and a trained workforce to build and operate the plants at the planned level of activity.
Modi government cuts nuclear power capacity addition target to one-third, The Narendra Modi government, which had set the ambitious 63,000 MW nuclear power capacity addition target by the year 2031-32, has cut it down to 22,480 MW, a Lok Sabha answer has revealed.Financial Express, By: Pragya Srivastava April 5, 2018 The Narendra Modi government, which had set the ambitious 63,000 MW nuclear power capacity addition target by the year 2031-32, has cut it down to 22,480 MW, a Lok Sabha answer has revealed. “With the completion of the under construction and sanctioned projects, the total nuclear power installed capacity in the country will reach 22480 MW… by the year 2031,” Jitendra Singh, MoS, Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) said……….http://www.financialexpress.com/economy/modi-government-cuts-nuclear-power-capacity-addition-target-to-one-third/1122715/
Chopper will measure radiation ahead of Boston Marathon, With the Boston Marathon around the corner, more security efforts are underway. Metro US News By Statehouse News ServiceApril 11, 2018
A helicopter equipped with radiation-sensing technology will make several low passes over the Boston Marathon route later this week to measure naturally occurring background radiation ahead of the 122nd Boston Marathon next week.
Between Thursday and Sunday, the National Nuclear Security Administration will use the chopper to measure background radiation along the 26.2-mile marathon route and slightly beyond, flying a twin-engine Bell 412 helicopter in a grid pattern at about 150 feet above the ground at speeds of about 80 miles per hour, the agency said.
The NNSA said measuring baseline levels of radiation is “a normal part of security and emergency preparedness for major public events”
According to the United States Government Accountability Office, “the surveys can be used to compare changes in radiation levels to (1) help detect radiological threats in U.S. cities more quickly and (2) measure contamination levels after a radiological attack to assist in and reduce the costs of cleanup efforts.”…….https://www.metro.us/news/local-news/boston/boston-marathon-chopper-radiation
US, British and French forces launched air strikes on chemical weapons sites in Syria. Russia claims that most missiles fired were intercepted by Syrian air defence systems using Soviet-produced hardware. We all hope that this will not escalate, at present it being a targeted attack in response to Syria’s illegal use of chemical weapons.
BANNG 11th April 2018 , Professor Andy Blowers, OBE, Chair of the Blackwater Against New Nuclear
Donald Trump ‘to tell Kim Jong-un to scrap nuclear arsenal within year in return for US embassy in Pyongyang’ , 
Guardian 11th April 2018 , The warm Atlantic current linked to severe and abrupt changes in the
India Slashes Plans for New Nuclear Reactors by Two-Thirds, April 11, 2018 The Energy Collective, The Financial Express, one of India’s major newspapers, reports that the Narendra Modi government, which had set the ambitious 63,000 MW nuclear power capacity addition target by the year 2031-32, has cut it to 22,480 MW, or by roughly two thirds.
A helicopter equipped with radiation-sensing technology will make several low passes over the Boston Marathon route later this week to measure naturally occurring background radiation ahead of the 122nd Boston Marathon next week.
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