Fukushima to host some baseball, softball games at 2020 Olympics
Fukushima Gov. Masao Uchibori (left) shakes hands with Yoshiro Mori, who heads the 2020 Tokyo Olympic organizing committee Wednesday in Tokyo, as the committee approved a plan to host baseball and softball games in the prefecture.
Tokyo 2020 Olympic organizers on Wednesday gave the green light for disaster-affected Fukushima Prefecture to host baseball and softball games.
Three cities — Fukushima, Koriyama and Iwaki — are under consideration to stage part of the competition as the two sports return to the Olympic program after an absence of 12 years.
Riccardo Fraccari, president of the World Baseball Softball Confederation, will visit Japan next week to inspect the venues. The International Olympic Committee will make the final decision when it holds its executive board meeting from Dec. 6 to 8.
“We want to emphasize this as a ‘recovery games’ and we want to work together with everyone to move it forward,” said 2020 executive board member Toshiaki Endo.
“These Olympics and Paralympics are not just for Tokyo but for the whole of Japan. We only have 1,353 days left, so we need everyone to make an effort so we can put on a fantastic event.”
IOC President Thomas Bach floated the idea of hosting baseball and softball games in Fukushima during a visit to Tokyo last month to take part in the World Forum on Sport and Culture.
“I felt that President Bach had a strong feeling toward Fukushima when he came here,” said Fukushima Gov. Masao Uchibori. “The idea of a ‘recovery games’ is once again in the spotlight and people are thinking carefully about how that can be achieved.
“It can show the courage of Fukushima Prefecture and the Tohoku region, and on a wider scale Kumamoto and Tottori — places that are working hard to recover from disaster.”
The Yomiuri Giants professional baseball team occasionally hosts Nippon Professional Baseball games at all three venues. Fukushima Azuma Baseball Stadium and Iwaki Green Stadium both have capacities of 30,000, while the older Koriyama Kaiseizan Baseball Stadium holds 18,200.
Neighboring Miyagi Prefecture is hoping to stage rowing and canoe sprint events as a result of a cost-cutting review currently being undertaken by the IOC, Tokyo Metropolitan Government, Tokyo 2020 organizers and the national government.
“Miyagi Prefecture, Iwate Prefecture and Fukushima Prefecture all suffered a lot of damage from the Great East Japan Earthquake,” said Uchibori.
“These three prefectures have a close bond and always work together. We want to form a movement. We want to show our appreciation to people and get people excited about the Tokyo Olympics. I’d like to consult with my fellow governors.”
Uchibori also said he would like his prefecture to host other Olympic-related events such as training camps and a section of the torch relay.
Baseball and softball were voted back onto the Olympic program as a joint bid at an IOC session in Rio de Janeiro in August ahead of the Summer Games. The format of the competitions has yet to be decided.
Will People Power End Japan’s Nuclear Plans? The Niigata Effect
In Japan, energy policies may not go the way the government and the nuclear industry want, Pablo Figueroa writes.
There was a common concern in the mind of voters during the recent poll to elect a new governor in Japan’s Niigata prefecture: to be in favour of or against restarting nuclear reactors. The triumph of nuclear-cautious Ryuichi Yoneyama shows that people in that area of the country are distrustful of Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the infamous electric utility that owns the Kashiwasaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant.
Currently shut down for inspections, Kashiwasaki-Kariwa is a massive seven-reactor power station and the largest nuclear complex in the world. Across Niigata prefecture, local residents are worried about the safety of the reactors looming in their backyard. And they should be. TEPCO is one of the main parties responsible for the 2011 nuclear catastrophe at Fukushima Daiichi. The company’s systemic falsifying of safety checks, concealment of the true extent of earthquake damages and multiple nuclear incidents at their plants, as well as their proven ineptitude in dealing with the Fukushima crisis (which resulted in the worsening of the nuclear disaster) has been thoroughly documented. TEPCO recklessly put financial profit ahead of public safety, and people know it.
Yoneyama, endorsed by the Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party, defeated Tamio Mori, a construction bureaucrat backed by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The LDP’s pro-nuclear stance has been maintained with an almost blind stubbornness and Japan’s Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, has done his utmost to restart the reactors that went offline for safety checks following the Fukushima debacle.
What shaped the Niigata election was the candidates’ attitudes toward Kashiwasaki-Kariwa: Mori remained ambiguous while Yoneyama pledged not to support restarts without a deeper investigation of the Fukushima disaster and the ability to protect prefectural residents. Most media in Japan portrayed Yoneyama as antinuclear but his stance would be better described as nuclear-cautious. His intention is to build dialogue with the nuclear industry and the central government, rather than spark a confrontation.
Losing the Niigata election is a blow for the LDP since not being able to secure control over the restarting of Kashiwasaki-Kariwa will have implications for the government’s energy policy. At the moment, only two of Japan’s forty-eight operational reactors are connected to the grid, one at the Sendai Nuclear Power Plant in Kagoshima Prefecture and one at the Ikata Nuclear Power Plant in Ehime Prefecture. Previously, two more reactors had been restarted at the Takahama Nuclear Power Plant in Oi Prefecture but were later shut down when a district court issued an injunction ordering Kansai Electric Power Company to halt them. This outcome was perceived as a major victory against the nuclear industry’s unethical policies that dismiss people’s logical fears as unfounded.
Despite claims of improved safety standards, the reactors that are currently functioning still remain a huge public threat. When Unit 3 at the Ikata plant was restarted, the governor of Ehime stated that an accident similar to that in Fukushima will never happen. This claim is based on a safety myth and unnecessarily puts prefectural residents at risk. First, the plant sits just five kilometres off the Median Tectonic Line Fault Zone. This fault line, Japan’s longest, is active and projections estimate that a major quake will strike the island of Shikoku where the plant is located. Furthermore, the so-called emergency evacuation plans are largely smoke and mirrors. Nuclear energy operators make the common mistake – or adopt the typical strategy – of relying on best-case rather than worst-case scenarios. For instance, if a nuclear accident were to occur at Ikata, it is expected that people will flee by boat or car but this does not take into consideration potential bottlenecks, damage to roads, etc. A look at the access routes suggests that almost 5,000 people living on the peninsula west of the plant might become trapped. If that happens, they will be required to stay indoors where they would have no effective means of avoiding exposure to radioactive contamination. In addition, radiation-proof facilities in Ikata town are located underneath landslide-prone areas.
The situation of the Sendai Plant in Kagoshima is comparable. A major earthquake recently hit Kumamoto, an adjacent prefecture, and this was yet another red flag forcing many residents to consider how and where they would escape to should a major nuclear accident take place. The electric utility does not have a proper contingency plan. This severe flaw is a common pattern among nuclear companies and has been repeatedly denounced by groups opposing nuclear restarts.
Where is Japan going in terms of nuclear politics? The country’s leadership is in denial over the ongoing Fukushima catastrophe and the tragic situation of nuclear evacuees, the multiple issues surrounding radioactive contamination of vast expanses of land and the potential spikes in the incidence of thyroid cancer among children in Fukushima. Abe’s claims that Fukushima is ‘under control’ were met with public criticism and widespread scepticism: polls showed that practically nobody believed him. This attitude goes in lockstep with the electric utilities’ assertions that, under more stringent safety regulations, it is ‘safe’ to restart some reactors. None of the arguments employed to convince people of the need for nuclear power hold true: as it is, nuclear power is neither a safe nor a cheap option.
However, the government keeps pushing for a nuclear renaissance, completely disregarding the important lessons that could have been learned from the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe. But there might be a snag in the government’s plans. The ‘Niigata Effect’ may be repeated during prefectural elections next year in Onagawa, Tokai and Hamaoka, where utilities are trying to get reactors back online. The outcome of these elections might delay or impede such processes; municipalities’ might not grant the consent needed for restarts.
Without a proper consideration of the risks involved, transparency, citizen participation, and multiple stakeholder involvement, there is the danger of reproducing the institutional mindset that incubated the Fukushima catastrophe. Japan’s leadership would benefit greatly from addressing these issues rather than trying to sweep them under the rug. What is at stake goes beyond economic profit and political muscle. Irresponsible nuclear policies endanger the wellbeing of present and future generations in Japan and the wider world.
http://www.policyforum.net/will-people-power-put-end-japans-nuclear-plans/
Zero-nuclear policy can lead opposition to victory: Koizumi
Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, center, appears at a Niigata gathering on Nov. 4 with Niigata Governor Ryuichi Yoneyama, right, and Niigata Mayor Akira Shinoda.
NIIGATA–An anti-nuclear stance taken by opposition parties could lift them from their doldrums and defeat the ruling coalition, former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said, pointing to the recent Niigata governor’s election.
“We now know that the ruling parties will lose if the opposition parties back a unified candidate and focus on a nuclear-free energy policy in the campaign,” Koizumi said at a gathering here on Nov. 4. “The effects of this have not yet surfaced but they are huge.”
Koizumi cited the victory by Niigata Governor Ryuichi Yoneyama, who was backed by the opposition Japanese Communist Party, Social Democratic Party and Liberal Party. Running on a plank urging caution about restarting the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant in the prefecture, Yoneyama defeated a candidate supported by the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito.
The former prime minister said Yoneyama’s win should be a wake-up call to both ruling and opposition parties to focus on nuclear energy in the next national election.
“If the opposition parties realize the significance of this, the LDP cannot feel complacent,” Koizumi told reporters at the gathering. “If the opposition parties change, the LDP will also be forced to change.”
However, Koizumi scratched his head at the inability of the largest opposition party, the Democratic Party, to come out clearly against nuclear energy. The party’s major backer, Rengo, the Japanese Trade Union Confederation, includes unions made up of employees of electric power companies.
For that reason, the Democratic Party did not formally support Yoneyama in the Niigata gubernatorial election.
“There are only about half a million votes from labor unions with ties to electric power companies and that support nuclear energy,” Koizumi told reporters. “I wonder why the party does not make the effort to win 5 million or 50 million votes.”
Ministry Devises Crafty Finance Scheme Favoring Nuclear Power
The industry ministry, the supposed champion of electricity market deregulation, is making a move that runs counter to the principles of reform by giving preferential treatment to nuclear power.
A proposal by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry would force new electricity suppliers that have entered the market in response to its liberalization to shoulder part of the costs of decommissioning the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
The plan was submitted to an expert council discussing the issue.
The ministry, which regulates the power industry, has already presented a plan to make such new utilities bear part of the costs of decommissioning aging reactors at other nuclear power plants.
The power market reform, which was expanded this spring to cover retail electricity sales as well, is designed to abolish the regional monopolies of established utilities, thereby encouraging new entries into the market.
It is also aimed at lowering electricity rates by separating the operations of power plants and transmission grids to promote fair competition.
The ministry cannot claim it is working for fair competition if it is now creating rules that force new electricity providers that have nothing to do with any nuclear power plant or the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster to pay part of the decommissioning bills.
In its attempt to get new utilities involved in the financing plan, the ministry is targeting the fees they pay to use the power transmission lines operated by established utilities.
The total cost of decommissioning the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant is estimated at several trillion yen.
The ministry has stressed its intention to protect the public from the huge financial burden. It has promised to make Tokyo Electric Power Co., operator of the Fukushima plant, pay for the work by saving necessary funds through streamlining its operations.
But the ministry has proposed a new system to use the money saved from more efficient power grid operations primarily to cover decommissioning costs.
The current rule requires major utilities to lower the charges they impose on smaller power suppliers using their transmission lines when higher efficiency lifts their profits. But the proposed system would exempt the big power companies from the rule when they spend the money saved on decommissioning reactors.
The ministry seems to be trying to convince the public that this approach would not increase the financial burden on consumers because it doesn’t involve price hikes.
But this idea raises some questions that cannot be overlooked.
The costs of decommissioning reactors are by nature expenses related to power generation. But the ministry’s proposal would transfer part of the expenses to the operations of transmission lines.
As a result, new power suppliers using TEPCO’s transmission cables would have to pay higher fees.
Subscribers to such new utilities would also have to shoulder part of the burden. In particular, the envisioned system would be totally unacceptable for consumers who have switched to new power providers to avoid using electricity generated by nuclear plants.
The ministry appears to be targeting an “easy source” of revenue. The charges on using transmission lines are not highly visible to general consumers.
The ministry’s plan to use power transmission charges as a source of funds to decommission reactors is a crafty scheme to give preferential treatment to nuclear power. Its aim is to ensure nuclear plants will not lose their cost competitiveness against other electricity sources like thermal power generation.
For many years, both the government and established utilities have been emphasizing that atomic energy is a low-cost source of electricity.
They are grossly irresponsible and insincere if they are trying to impose part of the inevitable cost burden of decommissioning reactors on competitors.
The ministry should rethink the idea from the viewpoint of the basic principles of market deregulation.
Swelling Decommissioning Costs, Who’s Gonna Pay
The 2016 road report points to inflated decommissioning costs.
Three reactor meltdowns to be decommissioned, an unprecedented task in the world.
It’s a long journey, to continue to record the series “The road to decommissioning”.
Five years and half years have passed since the disaster at the Tepco’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, among the many technical difficulties, the removal of nuclear fuel remains a challenge.
As the disaster costs keep on rising more than expected, it is becoming extremely difficult to to finance them under the current system.
Not just the increase in labor costs and technology development costs, and the cost of decontamination to enable the residents return, but also the compensation costs, all are significant. Therefore the current « system » to finance those costs has hit a wall.
TEPCO recently complained of the severity of the burden, it seeked from the country a policy to provide additional support. Who is to pay.
God only knows how much those costs will swell, and whose burden will they be.
The overall picture of the disaster costs is already hard to visualize, the sustainable “road to decommissioning” even more.
Foreigners Hired at Fukushima Nuke Plant Under Suspected Illegal Contracts
Dressed in protective suits, foreign workers who were engaged in the construction of tanks to hold radioactively contaminated water at the tsunami-hit Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant pose in this photo taken sometime around May 2014.
About seven foreign nationals worked at the disaster-stricken Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant in 2014 under suspected illegal contracts, sources close to the matter have revealed to the Mainichi Shimbun.
It was reported that the workers — mostly Brazilians — did not receive sufficient guidance on radiation protection as ordered by law before they engaged in work to contain radioactive water at the plant. It is the first time that a post-disaster labor issue involving foreign workers at the plant has come to light.
At the time, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) was pressed to deal with contaminated water emanating from the 2011 nuclear disaster and put in an order for the construction of welded storage tanks with a major contractor. This work was sub-subcontracted to a Tokyo-based welding company. The welding company’s president explained that it “couldn’t fill the spots with a sufficient number of Japanese workers,” so about seven foreign welders were hastily assembled for the job.
Roney Tsuyoshi Ishikawa, 43, a Japanese-Brazilian welder, and other sources told the Mainichi that Ishikawa received the order to build the tanks from the welding firm for 2 million yen per tank. He made contracts with individual foreign nationals and placed welding orders. Ishikawa left the construction site before the job was finished, and the welding company and other parties thereafter gave instructions to the remaining workers.
The Employment Security Act and other regulations ban “disguised contracts” in which workers are given work without official employment or are made to work under the instruction of parties other than those who place the original orders, thereby obscuring the party responsible for safety management.
The president of the welding company told the Mainichi, “As non-regular employees were prohibited from entering the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, I reported to the (first-tier) contractor that they (the foreign workers) were regular employees. It is more efficient to get the work done under contracts.”
According to Ishikawa and others, the foreigners worked at the plant sometime between March and May 2014. Many of those workers were unable to sufficiently read or write in Japanese.
Workers at nuclear facilities normally receive advance guidance on nuclear fuel and radiation and need to pass relevant exams. The exams and textbooks are written in Japanese, but some of the foreign workers in question passed the tests after Ishikawa, who is fluent in Japanese, gave them the right answers by their side.
“There was a tacit understanding amid the rush to combat the contaminated water,” Ishikawa said.
TEPCO refused to reveal the labor situation involving individual foreign laborers when the Mainichi Shimbun reached out for comment, but said it has given guidance to foreign workers “by using English textbooks and having the employer assign interpreters.”
http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20161107/p2a/00m/0na/011000c
Monju scrapping would mean disposing of 760 tons of radioactive sodium, MOX fuel
About 760 tons of radioactive sodium remain in the piping and other equipment of the trouble-prone Monju prototype fast-breeder nuclear reactor, which may be ordered decommissioned, Jiji Press learned Sunday.
It has not been decided how to dispose of the radioactive sodium, said sources at the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, the operator of Monju. If the government decides to scrap the reactor, sodium disposal is expected to be a difficult challenge.
Sodium is used as a coolant at Monju, while water is used at conventional nuclear reactors. Sodium is a tricky chemical element that burns intensely if it comes into contact with air or water.
According to the agency, the Monju reactor has some 1,670 tons of sodium. Radioactive substances are contained in 760 tons of the total as it circulates inside the reactor vessel.
The Monju reactor needs to be drained of the sodium if it is to be demolished.
Radioactive and chemically active sodium has to be sealed in containers. There is no precedent of radioactive sodium disposal in Japan.
“We plan to consider the method of disposal if a decision is made to decommission it (Monju),” an official said.
Monju, located in Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture, is a core facility in Japan’s nuclear fuel cycle policy as the reactor produces more plutonium than it consumes.
More than ¥1 trillion, mostly from state budgets, has been invested in Monju. But the 280,000-kw reactor has operated for only 250 days since it reached criticality, a self-sustained nuclear fission chain reaction, for the first time in April 1994, due to a raft of problems, including maintenance flaws, a sodium leak and fire and attempted coverup.
In November 2015, the Nuclear Regulation Authority advised the government to replace the operator of Monju. The government is carrying out a thorough review of the Monju project, including the possibility of decommissioning the reactor.
The disposal of mixed-oxide, or MOX, fuel used at Monju is another significant issue. The amount of MOX fuel, a blend of uranium and plutonium recycled from spent nuclear fuel, that needs to be disposed of is estimated at 21 tons, but Japan is not equipped to carry out disposal.
One option is to consign the disposal to a foreign country and receive the return of uranium and plutonium after the processing, along with radioactive waste.
But the agency’s cost estimate of ¥300 billion for decommissioning Monju does not include the expense of the overseas entrustment of MOX fuel disposal.
The agency aims to entrust France with the disposal of some 64 tons of MOX fuel that has been used at its Fugen advanced converter reactor, but no contract has been concluded. The Fugen reactor, also in Tsuruga, is slated to be decommissioned.
Spent MOX fuel contains larger amounts of highly toxic radioactive substances than spent uranium from conventional reactors.
The disposal of radioactive sodium and MOX fuel at Monju is emerging as additional difficult challenges for the government at a time when the final disposal site has not been decided for high-level radioactive waste from nuclear plants across Japan.
Fukushima : A Symbol of Hope and Resilience in the Face of Adversity
This photo can be a symbol of hope and resilience in the face of adversity: it’s a Morning Glory, growing along the base of prefab house in a temporary evacuation centre in Miharu, Fukushima.
Special credit & thanks to Lis Fields
Fukushima Car Wash Septic Tanks Contain Highly Radioactive Sludge
Highly radioactive sludge is turning up in septic tanks at car washes in Fukushima Prefecture, and the readings are as much as seven times higher than the government’s limit, auto industry officials say.
While the government-set limit is 8,000 becquerels per kilogram, some of the sludge is giving off 57,400 becquerels per kg, a document obtained by Kyodo News says.
The source of the radioactivity is believed to be ash and soot that stuck to vehicles shortly after the triple core meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in March 2011, the officials said Saturday.
Fukushima Prefecture has some 1,700 auto maintenance facilities where a growing number of septic tanks are reaching capacity, they said, adding that the amount of tainted sludge accumulated from washing cars likely weighs several thousands of tons.
To the prevent the septic tanks from overflowing, some of the maintenance facilities are manually scooping up the mud, which has prompted industry groups to warn authorities about the health hazards workers face, the officials said.
The Japan Automobile Dealers Association, Japan Automobile Service Promotion Association and Japan Light Motor Vehicle and Motorcycle Association have been urging the central government and Tokyo Electric Power Co., which manages the defunct Fukushima No. 1 plant, to address the issue.
But their calls for action have not been heeded, the Environment Ministry and the utility admitted.
The issue has failed to gain attention until now in part because the decontamination law only requires that companies report on radiation levels in sewage sludge and incinerated ash, not other waste products.
Although the companies that install the septic tanks know about the radiation problem, they couldn’t go public about it for fear of losing customers.
Kunikazu Noguchi, associate professor of radiation protection studies at Nihon University in Tokyo, said all tainted sludge should have been designated as radioactive waste and disposed of by the central government, instead of being kept in septic tanks.
“The fact that the government failed to act on this problem for 5½ years shows its negligence,” Noguchi said. “To remove sludge that contains nearly 60,000 becquerels of radioactive material per kilogram, you need to do so with extra caution, in line with guidelines set by the Environment Ministry.”
Taiwan Minister Says Import Ban not a Bargaining Chip
Minister of Health and Welfare Lin Tzou-yien (林奏延) yesterday told lawmakers that the ministry would not risk the health of Taiwanese by lifting a ban on food imports from five Japanese prefectures near the stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.
Lin made the remarks at a meeting of the legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee yesterday morning, which was to review the ministry’s general budget for next year.
Amid reports that Council of Agriculture Deputy Minister Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) last week asked the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus about the possibility of lifting the ban on agricultural products from the five prefectures — just days before the first round of the Taiwan-Japan Maritime Affairs Cooperation Dialogue Mechanism in Tokyo on Monday — Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) asked the minister if it was true the government planned to lift the ban as part of a trade-off.
Food and Drug Administration Director-General Chiang Yu-mei (姜郁美) said that the council report to the DPP caucus was only to explain risks and that it has implemented strict food import controls at borders to help ensure food safety.
She said all food imports from Japan not from the five prefectures — Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Chiba — must have a certificate of origin and a certificate proving they are free of radioactive contamination, adding that the agency would publish a products company name, if radiation readings were above legal tolerances.
“At present, we have no plans to lift the ban,” Lin said. “The ministry takes protecting the people’s health as its most important duty.”
After Chiang twice asked Lin to confirm that the government would not use lifting the ban as a negotiation tool in its talks with Japan on maritime affairs, Lin said that it would not.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2016/11/03/2003658479
Japan’s New Utilities Object to Footing Part of Fukushima Bill
TOKYO — Japanese independent power providers are up in arms over a government proposal to have them shoulder some costs related to the fallout of the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, including compensating victims and decommissioning old reactors.
“Why should we have to pick up compensation costs for Tepco’s accident?” fumed a top official at a company selling electricity in the Tokyo area, referring to Fukushima Daiichi operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. Holdings.
Given the narrow profit margins involved in power retailing, new suppliers will likely pass these costs on to customers. More than half a year on from the full liberalization of Japan’s electricity retail market, just 3% or so of households have switched to independent power providers from big regional utilities that had monopolized the market. Some observers worry that forcing newcomers to take on some of the nuclear costs could further slow the glacial pace of the market expansion by taking away their price advantage.
The charges will likely be collected by adding them onto fees for using the regional utilities’ transmission infrastructure. “We won’t have any choice but to raise rates,” sighed an executive at a major independent power supplier.
Many people chose to make the jump from regional utilities as a protest against nuclear power. “It’d be tough to get customers to accept” covering nuclear-related costs, Tokyo Gas President Michiaki Hirose told reporters in October. Tokyo Gas is the largest of the new players with more than 500,000 service contracts.
Sure enough, Tokyo-area suppliers have heard complaints from such customers arguing that having independent providers cover decommissioning expenses would render their decision to switch pointless. “We’ve gotten questions from customers about whether we’re going to pay” these costs, said the head of an independent power company that focuses on renewable energy.
The government aims to scrap aging nuclear reactors while bringing newer facilities back online. One of the major new power providers acknowledges that it would be impossible to maintain nuclear power generation without support from the whole country.
But the new suppliers are demanding to know the details of Tepco’s compensation costs before they pay up. Many also argue that regional utilities should be forced to provide some cheap nuclear power to the electricity wholesale market so they will also feel pain if newcomers are forced to contribute funds.
Destroyed N°1 Nuclear Reactor Building Exposed at Fukushima Daiichi
Video shot from a Kyodo News airplane on Nov. 4, 2016, shows the destroyed No. 1 reactor building at the disaster-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, after the removal of 16 of 18 panels covering the building. Tokyo Electric Power Co. plans to dismantle the remaining two panels the following week to complete the panel removal work that started in July 2015 as part of decommissioning the plant.
Fukushima Consequences of Radiation on Wildlife
By Pierre Fetet (translation by Hervé Courtois)
Source : http://www.fukushima-blog.com/2016/09/fukushima-consequences-de-la-radioactivite-sur-la-faune.html
Scientific studies conducted following the Fukushima disaster revealed little by little the consequences of radioactivity on the living and particularly on wildlife. Although published, they are nevertheless rarely circulated. This is why I would like to put a spotlight on some of them and publicize various observations which we do not hear much about, to counter the silly optimism to always relativize the consequences of low doses on life. Any dose of radiation, however small it be, has effects on the living: the ionizing radiation breaks the DNA molecules.
The birds
The feathers of birds take radioactive dust released into the atmosphere continuously by the wind. They therefore suffer permanent external irradiation.
We can see this dust by placing a contaminated bird on a radio-sensitive paper for a month. Here is an example with a bird picked in Iitate in December 2011.
Autoradiography also allows to highlight that the birds also undergo internal contamination.
Autoradiography of a bird revealing radioactive contamination in the plumage and stomach (Source Morizumi)
Yasuo HORI has also reported that some swallows Fukushima undergo depigmentation, as had already been found in Chernobyl. The Wild Bird Society of Japan also noted that the tail feathers of some Japanese swallows were not uniform.
It must be said that nests of swallows up to 1.4 million becquerels of radioactive cesium per kilogram (Bq / kg) have been found in the towns of Okuma and Namie. The nests of chickadees, were not better: 1.3 million Bq / kg.
Left: Swallow from Minamisoma (Fukushima Prefecture) – Right: deformed tail of a swallow from Kakuda (Miyagi Prefecture)
According to studies conducted by Tim Mousseau (University of South Carolina), the population of fifteen bird species living in contaminated areas of Fukushima prefecture decreases with time, with a 30% survival rate.
Another research focused on a falcon species returning in the same nest every year was also conducted by a team of scientists led by Naoki Murase (Nagoya University) at a distance of 100 to 120 km from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. The interest of this study is that raptors are at the top of a food chain and concentrate radionuclides accumulated by their prey. The authors have shown that the reproductive capacity of the bird was related to radiation measured directly under the nest : radioactivity affects the germline of the bird. The ability of birds to leave the nest fell from 79 to 55% in 2012 and 50% in 2013.
Another study finally published in 2015 by ASN and the Anders Møller laboratory (CNRS), focused on the total dose – internal and external – of birds.
It showed that 90% of the 57 species studied had been chronically exposed to radioactivity dose rate possibly affecting their reproduction.
Simplified representation of the level change of maximum exposure of adult birds (in dose rate) for 57 species of the bird community observed on 300 sites and four years of study. Compared to the range of variation (in blue) ambient dose rate measured on the sites and ranges (red) corresponding to various effects in birds published by the ICRP (2008) (Source IRSN)
So there are three factors that affect living organisms in contaminated areas: the ambient radiation (the dose that is received by being next to a radioactive object), the external contamination (radioactive dust that sticks to the skin, hair, feathers), and internal contamination (radionuclides ingested or trapped in organs).
The butterflies
The first scientific evidence of damage to a living organism by radioactive contamination due to the disaster of Fukushima Daiichi was delivered by the team of researcher Chiyo Nohara (University of Okinawa).
The study highlighted the physiological and genetic damage of a common butterfly of Japan, the maha zizeeria. In May 2011, some show relatively slight abnormalities. But the first female offspring of the first generation showed more serious defects, inherited by the second generation. Adult butterflies collected in September 2011, then showed more severe abnormalities than those collected in May: abortive hatching, infertility, size reduction, slow growth, high mortality and morphological abnormalities (Atrophied wings, curved or in excess number, malformed antennae, bumpy eyes, discolored).
Representative anomalies of butterflies fed contaminated leaves. (Source: Hiyama et al)
Aphids
In 2014, Shin-ichi Akimoto (Hokkaido University) found that about 10% of certain insects, such as aphids, have malformations in Fukushima. But their survival and their reproduction remain possible.
Sorini aphid T. From Fukushima. (A) normal morphology, (B) Level 3 malformation of the abdomen (Source: S. Akimoto)
The cows
The phenomenon of white patches (depigmentation) on the observed swallows in Fukushima and Chernobyl is also found on the cows of Masami Yoshizawa, at the Farm of Hope in Namie, a town located 14 km from the destroyed plant .
A cow of Masami Yoshizawa was brought to Tokyo in 2014 to the government for diagnosis (AFP Photo)
Horses
The biologist Hayato Minamoto reported the carnage suffered by Tokuei Hosokawa, an Iitate farmer who lost a hundred horses in two years. Iitate had suffered the brunt of the radioactive cloud from the Fukushima Daiichi plant in March-April 2011.
Iitate horses
Monkeys
Between April 2012 and March 2013, researchers led by Shin-ichi Hayama (Japan University of Life Sciences and Veterinary Sciences) analyzed the blood of 61 Japanese monkeys living in a forest 70 km from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The total concentration of cesium in monkeys muscles was between 78 and 1778 Bq / kg. Blood tests in these animals revealed a small quantity of white blood cells and red blood cells, which could make them more vulnerable. The decrease of blood cells was directly proportional to the concentration of cesium in the muscles, which suggests a dose-response correlation. Researchers estimate that exposure to radioactive materials contributed to hematological changes in Fukushima monkeys.
Drawing by Julien Loïs
Provisional Conclusion
The consequences of radioactivity on animals are visible to anyone who will bother to observe what happens. In this article, I focused on some animals only (there would be other cases to develop: the population decline of the cicadas, the increased cataract of rodents, etc.). Scientists could conduct similar studies on this strange animal that is man, but it would not be politically correct.
Yet this has already been done, in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Chernobyl. For example, studies conducted between 1993 and 1998 on Ukrainian children permitted to observe a drop of blood cells, which was related to the exposure of each child to cesium depending on the place of residence. And yet, in Tokyo, from 2011 to 2014, Dr. Mita observed that white blood cells, especially neutrophils, decreased in children under 10 years old. (Which prompted him to move and to ask his patients to leave Tokyo). But no, do not say anything, and do not look into such matter.
In Japan, the denial of the danger is a must. The only mention of a nosebleed in a manga can cause a national affair and censorship … To speak of the negative consequences of the nuclear disaster at Fukushima Daiichi is not accepted.
You must rebuild, you must forget, you must think about the future. Institutionally, only one study is accepted, the monitoring of thyroids of children in Fukushima. That study is the screen that hides the forest of lies.
And yet, despite 131 thyroid cancers confirmed in June 2016, the official Japanese scientists refuse to see them as caused by radioactivity.
Pierre Fetet
To read more:
1) Scientific studies cited in this article
The biological impacts of the Fukushima nuclear accident on the pale grass blue butterfly, A. Hiyama, C. Nohara, S. Kinjo, W. Taira, S. Gima, A. Tanahara, J.-M. Otaki, 2012
Low blood cell counts in wild Japanese monkeys after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, K. Ochiai, S. Hayama, S. Nakiri, S. Nakanishi, N. Ishii, T. Uno, T. Kato, F. Konno, Y. Kawamoto, S. Tsuchida, T. Omi, 2014
Morphological abnormalities in gall-forming aphids in a radiation-contaminated area near Fukushima Daiichi: selective impact of fallout?, S. Akimoto, 2014
Effects of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident on goshawk reproduction, K. Murase, J. Murase, R. Horie, K. End, 2015
Radiological dose reconstruction for birds reconciles outcomes of Fukushima with knowledge of dose-effect relationships, J. Garnier-Laplace, K. Beaugelin-Seiller, C. Della-Vedova, J.-M. Métivier, C. Ritz, T. A. Mousseau, A. P. Møller, 2015
Cumulative effects of radioactivity from Fukushima on the abundance and biodiversity of birds, A. P. Møller, I. Nishiumi & T. A. Mousseau, 2015
2) Articles and file
Tchernobyl, une histoire pas si naturelle que ça (Pierre Fetet)
Non, Tchernobyl n’est pas devenu une réserve naturelle (Timothy Mousseau)
A Fukushima, les souris sont aveugles et les oiseaux ne chantent plus (Anne-Laure Barral)
Japan’s renewed nuclear fuel recycling dream faces obstacles
After finally acknowledging the failure of its fast-breeder reactor, Japan plans to continue pursuing nuclear fuel recycling in a French project, but this program also faces an unclear future.
Jean-Marie Carrere, manager of the Advanced Sodium Technological Reactor for Industrial Demonstration (ASTRID) program, said the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) will decide in 2019 on whether to build the fast demonstration reactor.
The decision, he said, will be based on the results of 1 billion euros (about 115 billion yen) in research and development.
Carrere told Japanese reporters in Marcoule, southern France, on Oct. 14 that the CEA has no intention to scrap the ASTRID project, and that it was looking forward to Japan’s financial contributions.
But he did suggest the ASTRID project would require many changes following Japan’s decision to decommission the Monju prototype fast-breeder reactor in Fukui Prefecture.
The CEA, lacking a fast reactor in operation in France, had planned to conduct some of its fuel-burning experiments at Monju.
Carrere indicated the CEA could possibly seek a partnership with Russia, which has a fast reactor the size of Monju.
The money-losing, problem-plagued Monju reactor was one of the pillars of Japan’s efforts to create a nuclear fuel recycling program. The plan was to reprocess spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium, which would be burned in nuclear reactors.
Fast-breeder reactors, such as Monju, are supposed to produce more plutonium than they burn.
According to Carrere, the concept for ASTRID has been completed, and it is now in its preliminary design phase. If the decision is made to build the reactor, the goal would be to put it into operation around 2030, he said.
The fast reactor is expected to generate 600 megawatts of electricity.
Relevant Cabinet members have discussed Japan’s direction in this field in a “committee for fast reactor development.”
Some expect joint research in the ASTRID project would allow Japan to keep alive its fast reactor research and maintain its nuclear fuel recycling policy, even if Monju is scrapped.
However, a senior science ministry official said in September that Japan could end up serving as a cash cow for the French project.
http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201611020001.html
Russia, Japan Team Up to Study How Radiation Affects the Next Generation’s DNA
Russia and Japan are set to team up to become leaders in transgenerational healthcare research, to help prevent the effects of nuclear catastrophes being passed genetically from one generation to the next indefinitely.
Both Russia and Japan have a stake in this research, given that both countries are still dealing with radiation exposure via the events in Nagasaki, Hiroshima, Fukushima and Chernobyl. “This research is extremely important in relation to future generations we are responsible for,” said Nomura Taisei, Radiation Biology and Medical Genetics Department Head at National Institute for Biomedical Research at Osaka University.
The professor was at the 15th Congress on Innovation Technologies in Pediatrics and Pediatric Surgery which was held in Moscow from October 25-27, making a report on trasngenerational healthcare. His report shines a light on how exposure to radiation is passed down through generations via DNA mutation.
When DNA is damaged, the consequences for future generations are serious.Birth abnormalities, developmental disorders, a weakened immune system, higher cancer risks, and numerous physical and mental disorders are all the result of these gene mutations passed down to future generations. While the effects of radiation exposure passing between generations has so far not been widely studied in humans, the effects on experimental animal subjects is more widely understood.
Professor Nomura’s experiments on mice proved that genetic effects of radiation exposure can cause genetic defects into the 58th generation. The problem is that Japan has very little data on radiation exposure on humans.
This is where Russia can help, through opening up their database on three tree generations of people: those who were exposed after the Chernobyl disaster, those who were exposed prenatally, and those whose parents were exposed before impregnation. Thus Russia and Japan can now conduct joint comparative research of the effects of radiation on animals and on humans applying the latest technologies.
The Head of Children’s Scientific and Practical Center of Radiation Protection, Larisa Naleva told Sputnik Japan about the importance of this Russian-Japanese research project.
“We assume that the phenomenon of radiation-induced genetic instability has significant effects not only on the health of exposed people but also on the health of their children, first of all, resulting in an increased cancer risk. We have already detected an increase of morbidity in the second generation of exposed people’s descendants and now we are studying the third generation. Today in Russia there are about 135 thousand children who have been exposed or are exposed to radiation to some extent,” said Naleva. By using Japan’s expertise, Naleva hopes that the health risk for subsequent generations of those who were exposed to radiation can be reduced. “And that is the goal of our collaboration with our Japanese colleagues,” she said.
https://sputniknews.com/society/201611021046998030-russia-japan-radiation-dna/
1 This Month
26 April – Chernobyl: Inside the Meltdown airs on National Geographic on Sunday 26th April from 4pm
29 April – Nuclear Expert Webinar #1 – Radiation Impacts on Families with Mary Olson and Cindy Folkers
- 12:15 PM MT – 1:45 PM MT
- Location: Virtual – REGISTER TODAY
4 May -West Suburban Peace Coalition to discuss Iran war at May Educational Forum
Monday, May 4, 7:00 – 8:00 PM Central Standard Time
Title: : How Trump’s Narrative Tries to Shape the Reality of the War on Iran.
Contact Walt Zlotow, zlotow@hotmail.com 630 442 3045 for further information
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
Pine Ridge Uranium is the real threat, not Tehran- Tell Burgum: Stop the Extraction.
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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