More Evacuees Sue Govt, TEPCO over Fukushima N-Accident
Fukushima, Dec. 12 (Jiji Press)–A group of 295 people, mainly nuclear disaster evacuees, on Monday joined lawsuits against the Japanese government and Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. over the Mach 2011 meltdowns at TEPCO’s Fukushima No. 1 power plant.
Filing their suit with Fukushima District Court, the plaintiffs, many of whom were evacuees in and outside Fukushima Prefecture, demanded that the government and TEPCO pay compensation and restore conditions before the nuclear accident.
The group, made up of men and women from minors to 89 years old, said they were forced to evacuate and deprived of their peaceful lives because of the accident at the power plant in the northeastern Japan prefecture.
The team joined those who filed similar suits against the government and TEPCO in March 2013, raising the total number of plaintiffs to some 4,200.
At a news conference after the latest suit was filed, plaintiff Akemi Eda, who evacuated from the Fukushima Prefecture town of Namie, noted recent incidents in which children evacuated from the prefecture due to the accident have been bullied at schools.
Fukushima faces wall to hosting Olympic baseball
LAUSANNE, Switzerland – The world governing body for baseball and softball is calling on the organizing committee of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics to secure “a second stadium in the metropolitan area,” and is making it a prerequisite for the body to approve a plan to hold some games for the additional event in Fukushima Prefecture, it has been learned.
The organizing committee is finding it difficult to accept the idea of setting up “a second stadium” and negotiations are bound to reach a deadlock. The decision to make Fukushima an Olympic venue may have to wait until next spring or later.
The request from the World Baseball Softball Confederation was made known in a letter sent to the Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Yoshiro Mori, the president of the organizing committee, revealed the content of the letter in an interview with The Yomiuri Shimbun on Wednesday. Mori is attending a board meeting of the International Olympic Committee held in Lausanne, Switzerland.
The IOC board approved of the plan to make Yokohama Stadium in the city of Yokohama the main venue for the additional event, but the decision on Fukushima was deferred.
According to Mori, the letter stated that the three possible venues in the prefecture – stadiums in the cities of Fukushima, Iwaki and Koriyama – were worthy candidates, but also set two conditions in order for the WBSC to approve the plan: to upgrade the stadium to be decided such as by turfing the infield and to secure a second stadium in the metropolitan area.
The IOC currently has plans to divide the six participating national teams into two groups for the preliminary round, so that eight to 10 games will be held in total including the final. The WBSC, on the other hand, intends to make the qualifying games a round robin of all six teams, which would likely increase the total number of games to from 17 to 19. With this in mind, the world body is hoping to add a second stadium to the event, such as Seibu Prince Dome in Tokorozawa, Saitama Prefecture, or Zozo Marine Stadium in Chiba.
Mori made it clear after the IOC board meeting that he would oppose the idea of a second stadium in the metropolitan area. He explained that the organizing committee has an understanding with the IOC that hosting an Olympic event in a disaster area should be considered separately as part of ongoing restoration efforts. “We have reconfirmed with the IOC that the principle of one venue still stands,” he said.
Financial concerns are another reason for opposing the second stadium plan. A senior official of the organizing committee said, “The budget will likely swell, and therefore, it would be difficult [to accept the idea].”
Mori had discussions with IOC President Thomas Bach at a luncheon on Wednesday. The IOC side informally told Mori that it backs the idea of hosting events in Fukushima and also that it will hear from the WBSC about the matter. The Japan side intends to continue negotiations with the WBSC while working in tandem with the IOC, and hopes to reach a conclusion at an IOC board meeting to be held next spring or later.
Deferring the decision to host the event in Fukushima will likely hinder preparations for the event, such as modifying the stadium and securing operation fees, and may put unwanted pressure on the disaster area.
The IOC board meeting on Wednesday came to a conclusion on the venues of five other additional events, including karate and surfing.
According to the decision, karate will be held at Nippon Budokan in Chiyoda Ward, Tokyo, while skateboarding and sport climbing will take place in the Odaiba and Aomi districts in Koto Ward, Tokyo. Tsurigasaki Beach in Ichinomiya, Chiba Prefecture, is the venue for surfing.
The organizing committee informed the board of its plan to cap the total cost of holding the Games at 2 trillion yen ($17.5 billion) and promoted Japan’s efforts to cut down costs.
An Option Discussed For Fukushima Contaminated Water: Evaporation
The person in charge of decommissioning the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has revealed a possible new way to deal with the radioactive water stored there: just let it evaporate.
“The amount of radioactive water at the plant continues to increase. We need to find a way to reduce it,” says Naohiro Masuda, president of the Fukushima Daiichi Decommissioning Company.
Masuda and his team of 6,000 workers have struggled with the problem of contaminated water. Workers must constantly inject water into the crippled reactors to cool molten debris and then pump it out. Groundwater flowing into the reactor buildings adds to the problem.
Executives with the plant’s operator, TEPCO, have said they will continue storing the water on site. Masuda says evaporation is one of the options being discussed.
“Diluting the contaminated water and discharging it into the ocean has been discussed. But another option is evaporating the water. This method was used following the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in the US,” he says.
Masuda says the task force of the government is discussing the methods. Masuda’s engineers and workers use purification equipment to remove most of the radioactive substance, but they can’t remove it all. Local fishermen strongly oppose releasing water directly into the ocean. The evaporation method could be an acceptable alternative for them, although some experts say its environmental consequences are unclear.
Handling contaminated water is just one aspect of the highly complex decommissioning process. Masuda believes that he’ll need to rely on the international community for support.
“We’ll be cooperating mainly with the United States, Britain, France, and Russia. We’re already getting help from people at nuclear-related facilities in these counties. We’re learning how to decommission and shut down facilities and deal with contaminated soil,” he says.
Abe Sees Fukushima Progress!!!
Radiation risks are being swept under the rug. That restoration plan voluntarily chooses to ignore the risks for people to be living in a contaminated environment, not differentiating between the external and internal exposures and their sure harmful consequences to people health. Not to mention the ongoing incineration of contaminated waste in the Fukushima Prefecture 19 municipal incinerators, continuously redistributing radioactive nanoparticles into the environment. All done in the name of economic reconstruction!
Cabinet to approve Fukushima restoration plan
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has visited Fukushima Prefecture to inspect the progress of restoration following the 2011 nuclear accident.
Abe visited a machinery parts manufacturer in Minamisoma City on Saturday.
The government and Fukushima Prefecture have been working to create a cluster of robotics’ companies in the city.
The president of the manufacturer told the prime minister that he hopes the robotics industry will help revitalize the local economy.
Abe responded that the state-of-the-art robot testing facilities that had been built in the city should attract companies from around the world, and that he wants the region to develop around them.
Abe later visited the town of Kawamata, where an evacuation order is expected to be lifted next March.
He ate fermented natto soybeans manufactured in the town using local products.
Abe told reporters after the inspection that his government intends to help people from areas where the evacuation order will be lifted with housing and rebuilding their lives.
He also said his cabinet will approve a plan before the end of the month to accelerate Fukushima’s restoration. He said it includes partial governmental funding for decontamination in non-entry zones.
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20161210_23/
Tsunami-swept Section of Joban Line, Northeastern Japan Reopens
A Joban Line train travels further inland on Dec. 10 after operations resumed along that section for the first time in five years and nine months.
Tsunami-swept section of Joban Line finally running again
A massive project to move a section of track of the JR Joban Line from coastal areas, which involved building three new stations, is finally up and running nearly six years after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami disaster.
Operations for the new route further inland resumed Dec. 10.
The section that is back in business runs from Hamayoshida Station in Watari, Miyagi Prefecture, to Soma Station in Soma, Fukushima Prefecture.
The latest work means that all coastal sections traversing hard-hit Miyagi Prefecture are again connected by the lines operated by East Japan Railway Co.
However, parts of coastal sections in Iwate and Fukushima prefectures still remain impassable. Those sections will not be back in operation until 2020.
The new route involved moving a section covering 14.6 kilometers as much as 1.1 km inland, building three stations and constructing elevated tracks. The total cost came to 40 billion yen ($350 million).
When the tsunami struck the coast of the Tohoku region in northeast Japan, Joban Line trains were in operation. While one train was mangled beyond repair and stations were also destroyed, all passengers and train employees managed to flee to safety.
The writer Maru Ayase, 30, was a passenger on a train that departed Sendai and was headed for Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, on the day of the disaster.
The train she was on was delayed and forced to stop at Shinchi Station in Fukushima Prefecture when the magnitude-9.0 Great East Japan Earthquake struck.
Ayase recalled that the train car swung violently and she experienced whiplash. The woman sitting next to her grabbed on to her. The unnerving swaying seemed to last for 10 minutes.
Ayase and the woman sitting next to her decided to leg it to the next town. Walking along a road about a kilometer from the coast, Ayase saw a huge wave approaching and panicked.
Running for her life toward higher ground, Ayase managed to reach safety. Two young police officers who happened to be on the same train guided the 40 or so other passengers to a town government building further inland.
The driver and other workers on the train evacuated to a bridge over the rail lines at Shinchi Station.
The tsunami that struck the train cars and demolished the train station left only the bridge standing.
Recalling that day, Ayase said, “I feel a certain loneliness when I think that I was there to see Shinchi Station as it existed before the tsunami.”
http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201612100046.html
East Japan Railway line suspended since 2011 tsunami partially reopens
SENDAI (Kyodo) — A 23-kilometer section of East Japan Railway Co.’s Joban Line reopened Saturday five years and nine months after the March 2011 quake and tsunami.
The reopened section runs between Soma Station in Soma, Fukushima Prefecture, and Hamayoshida Station in Watari, Miyagi Prefecture, both in Tohoku in Japan’s northeast, the region hardest hit by the disaster.
There are six stations on the section. Following severe damage from tsunami, three of the six — Shinchi, Yamashita and Sakamoto stations — were moved inland by up to 1.1 km.
“This station is a symbol of recovery. I pray that many people visit this place,” said Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as he attended an opening ceremony for the new Shinchi station.
At 6 a.m. the first train to Sendai departed from Yamashita station in Yamamoto, Miyagi Prefecture.
“I become overwhelmed by emotion when I think about the roads after the quake. I celebrate the start of the first train,” Yamamoto Mayor Toshio Saito said at the ceremony.
“I want to go to Sendai for shopping,” said Tamaki Fujikawa, 12, who was at Yamashita Station with her mother and younger sister to see the train off.
Of the whole Joban Line, chiefly running along the Pacific coasts to connect Tokyo and Miyagi Prefecture, only a section in Fukushima Prefecture between Tatsuta Station in the town of Naraha and Odaka Station in Minamisoma, remains suspended.
The government hopes to enable the resumption of services between Tomioka and Namie stations, the section running closest to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station that suffered meltdowns in the disaster, by the spring of 2020 after reopening other sections in 2017.
“I hope that the interrupted services restart soon,” said Yutaka Sugano, a resident of the town of Shinchi, 69, who was aboard the train going to Sendai.
http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20161210/p2g/00m/0dm/063000c
Local people attend the reopening ceremony for the new station in Shinchi, Fukushima Prefecture, on Saturday. The station on the Joban Line is on a section of line hardest hit by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
Section of East Japan Railways’ Joban Line, suspended since 2011 quake, partially reopens
SENDAI – A 23-km-long section of East Japan Railway Co.’s Joban Line reopened Saturday, some five years and nine months after the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami struck.
The reopened section runs between Soma Station in Soma, Fukushima Prefecture, and Hamayoshida Station in Watari, Miyagi Prefecture, both in Tohoku, the region hardest hit by the disaster.
There are six stations on the section. Following severe damage from the tsunami, three of the six — Shinchi, Yamashita and Sakamoto stations — were moved inland by up to 1.1 km.
“This station is a symbol of recovery. I pray that many people visit this place,” said Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as he attended an opening ceremony for the new Shinchi Station.
At 6 a.m. the first train to Sendai departed from Yamashita Station in Yamamoto, Miyagi Prefecture.
“I become overwhelmed by emotion when I think about the roads after the quake. I celebrate the start of the first train,” Yamamoto Mayor Toshio Saito said at the ceremony.
“I want to go to Sendai for shopping,” said Tamaki Fujikawa, 12, who was at Yamashita Station with her mother and younger sister to see the train off.
Of the whole Joban Line, chiefly running along the Pacific coast to connect Tokyo and Miyagi Prefecture, only a section in Fukushima Prefecture between Tatsuta Station in the town of Naraha and Odaka Station in Minamisoma, remains suspended.
The government hopes to enable the resumption of services between Tomioka and Namie stations, the section running closest to the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power station that suffered meltdowns in the disaster, by the spring of 2020 after reopening other sections next year.
“I hope that the interrupted services restart soon,” said Yutaka Sugano, a resident of the town of Shinchi, 69, who was aboard the train going to Sendai.
Fukushima’s Radiation Detected on Oregon’s Shores
That Fukushima’s radiation was detected on Oregon shores by Woods Hole chemical oceanographer Ken Buesseler thru its crowdfunded, citizen-science seawater sampling project and officially admitted is one thing, however a lot is still left unsaid or unknown regarding its possible biological effects on the marine ecosystem, as for lack of fundings or political will too few studies are being made.
Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Bill to Double to $188 Billion
Mitsubishi Heavy, Japan Nuclear Fuel to invest in France’s Areva
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. is reportedly making final arrangements to invest tens of billions of yen in French atomic energy company Areva jointly with Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. and Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd. are making final arrangements to invest tens of billions of yen in atomic energy company Areva, which is being bailed out by the French government, sources close to the matter said Thursday.
Through the investment, the heavy machinery manufacturer and the spent-fuel reprocessing firm hope to improve technical cooperation with Areva on decommissioning reactors and reprocessing nuclear fuel.
Areva has been reeling from weak global demand since the 2011 Fukushima disaster triggered a slump in the nuclear power industry.
Areva is being bailed out by the French government, which has been asking Mitsubishi Heavy to invest since last year.
MHI President Shunichi Miyanaga had said that investing in Areva, which has expertise in decommissioning procedures and fuel reprocessing, would benefit Japan as it faces the prospect of decommissioning more aging nuclear reactors amid high public concern over nuclear safety.
A major Chinese nuclear power company is also considering investing in the state-owned group.
Mitsubishi Heavy is also planning to invest in Areva’s plant-building arm in hopes of winning orders to build nuclear power plants in emerging economies where demand is growing.
The heavy machinery maker and Areva are already involved in a joint venture to develop nuclear plants with advanced reactors.
Fukushima radiation has reached U.S. shores
Sendai Reactor Back Online
Workers in the control room restart reactor 1 at Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s Sendai nuclear plant in Kagoshima Prefecture Thursday night
Sendai reactor goes back online
Operators have powered on a nuclear reactor at a plant in western Japan on Thursday night after 2 months of inspections.
Officials at Kyushu Electric Power Company say workers have begun pulling control rods out of the Number One reactor at their Sendai plant in Kagoshima Prefecture.
The reactor has been offline since October. Before that, it operated for 14 months as the first reactor in the country to go online under new regulations following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.
The utility says it found no abnormalities during its regular and special inspections.
The special checks were added at the request of Kagoshima Governor Satoshi Mitazono, who took office in July. He asked the utility to see if strong earthquakes that occurred at nearby Kumamoto Prefecture in April had affected the plant.
Officials say they expect the reactor to reach criticality on Friday and begin transmitting electricity to the grid on Sunday. They also expect the plant to resume commercial operations in early January.
A group opposing the restart held a rally on Thursday outside the facility. Group leader Yoshitaka Mukohara said a proposed prefectural panel should first give a judgment before the reactor is brought online.
Governor Mitazono had promised to set up an expert panel to look into the reactor’s safety, but it has yet to be launched. Mukohara urged the governor to stick to his position.
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20161208_30/
Kyushu Electric fires up Kagoshima reactor after governor gives OK
FUKUOKA – Kyushu Electric Power Co. restarted a nuclear reactor in Kagoshima Prefecture on Thursday after the prefectural governor, who is opposed to nuclear power, effectively permitted the move last week.
Reactor No. 1 at the Sendai nuclear power complex is one of five reactors to have been reactivated under stricter safety regulations adopted in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima reactor meltdowns. Following resumption in August 2015, its operation had been suspended for a regular checkup since Oct. 6.
The utility pulled out control rods from the reactor at around 9:30 p.m. The reactor is expected to achieve criticality by Friday morning and to start power generation from Sunday. Commercial operation is set to resume from Jan. 6.
Kyushu Electric on Tuesday notified Kagoshima Gov. Satoshi Mitazono of the planned restart of the reactor and was not requested to suspend it this time, it said.
Mitazono, who was elected in July on an anti-nuclear platform, asked the utility in August and September to immediately suspend operation of the plant. Reactor No. 1 came to a halt in October for a regular checkup.
The Sendai complex’s reactor No. 2 is scheduled to be suspended for regular checks from Dec. 16 to Feb. 27.
Mitazono had told the prefectural assembly earlier this month that he had no legal power to decide whether to restart the reactor, paving the way for the latest move.
On Thursday, however, Mitazono said that he will take “strong action, regardless of the reactor’s operation,” if an experts’ committee, which he plans to set up to examine safety at the plant, finds any safety problems.
Some 30 local residents and anti-nuclear group members gathered in front of the Sendai plant Thursday morning to protest the reactivation.
Kyushu Electric Restarts Sendai Nuclear Reactor
Loan ceiling for TEPCO to be raised
Reclaimed Land for Okinawa US Base Filled With Fukushima Radioactive Waste?
Japan to increase loan to Fukushima operator Tepco to $123 billion
Question to ask: why call this a loan when the law, like USA Price Anderson Act, limits nuclear power co from liability and puts the govt on the hook for everything beyond that?
Answer: I’d say most likely simple propaganda. That’s the taxpayers TRILLIONS that’s going to a ‘forever’ nuclear power plant black hole. That money will never be paid back to govt. The only thing I can imagine is that the Govt reneges on the agreement and socializes utilities in Japan. Because either the corporation nor govt can survive unless they do that…. or they can play fictionalized accounting for public.
What do you think?
Japan will increase an interest-free loan to the operator of the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, Tokyo Electric Power, by more than a third to 14 trillion yen ($123 billion), a source familiar with the matter said on Thursday.
Spiraling costs from the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986 are threatening the viability of the utility known as Tepco and hampering its ability to clean up its wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
The increase in the loan from 9 trillion yen is to cover the costs for compensation and decontamination areas around the plant, according to the source, who is not authorized to speak to the media.
Three reactors melted down at the plant after a magnitude 9 earthquake in March 2011, which sparked a tsunami that devastated a large section of Japan’s northeastern coastline.
More than 15,000 people were killed in the natural disaster, which also caused a loss of power and cooling at the Fukushima station.
Explosions in the wake of the reactor meltdowns led to a massive release of radiation that prompted the evacuation of 160,000 people from areas around the plant, many of whom will never be able to return.
The disaster is likely to cost 22.6 trillion yen ($199 billion), more than double an earlier government estimate.
Costs for decommissioning the wrecked reactors will be covered by a separate arrangement from the loan, according to the Nikkei newspaper, which earlier reported the increase in the loan for Tepco.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-fukushima-support-idUSKBN13X00G?il=0
Japanese nuclear industry’s history of corruption
“Kikawada once said that building a nuclear plant is like doing a deal with the devil,”
Tepco ‘Deal With Devil’ Signals End to Japan’s Postwar Era, Business Week, October
21, 2011, “…..Tepco in 2002 admitted it had falsified maintenance reports at nuclear plants for more than two decades. Chairman Hiroshi Araki and President Nobuya Minami resigned to take responsibility.
Faked Records
In 2007, the utility said it hadn’t come entirely clean five years earlier and admitted to concealing at least six emergency stoppages at Dai-Ichi and a “critical” reaction at the plant’s No. 3 unit that lasted seven hours.
Kansai Electric, Chubu Electric Power Co., Tohoku Electric Power Co. and Hokuriku Electric Power Co. have also said they faked safety records. “Accidents, mishaps, lies, duplicities — the postwar landscape of Japan’s nuclear power development is filled with fiascoes,” the University of Toronto’s Donnelly said.
Amid the accidents and fake safety reports, the underlying premise that resource-poor Japan had to rely on nuclear power was rarely questioned by the government, industry or the country’s bureaucrats……
The majority of opinion surveys show Japan’s public now opposes nuclear power. Sixty percent of respondents to a Mainichi newspaper poll published on Sept. 20 said they favor phasing out atomic energy…..
“The nuclear industry is a very Japanese bureaucracy in nature, similar to the Japanese army during World War II,” said Tetsunari Iida, executive director at the Tokyo-based Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies and a former nuclear industry official. “They don’t listen to anybody.”
Fukushima has ruptured the usual consensus within Japanese industry. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-10-21/tepco-deal-with-devil-signals-end-to-japan-s-postwar-era.html
1 This Month
19 November – Webinar – The Reality of Reprocessing
Time: 11:00 AM Pacific Time (US & Canada) / 2:00 PM Eastern / 7:00 PM UK / 8:00 PM CET
Register for the Zoom Event Here
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
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