Corrosion of Fukushima’s melted nuclear cores is releasing more plutonium
Study: Water helps dissolve Fukushima’s melted nuclear cores, accelerates 
corrosion — Plutonium concentrates on outer edge of fuel — Poses “a much longer environmental threat” than initial releases — Transport of nuclear material into environment to continue for many years if not isolated http://enenews.com/study-water-helps-dissolve-fukushimas-melted-nuclear-cores-accelerates-corrosion-plutonium-concentrates-outer-edge-fuel-poses-longer-environmental-threat-initial-releases-transport-nuclear-ma?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29
‘Nuclear Fuel in a Reactor Accident’ — Peter Burns, Rodney Ewing, Alexandra Navrotsky, 2012: Seawater was injected into the three active reactors […] large amounts of salt may have deposited in the reactor cores. […] Nonuniform burn-up in a fuel pellet gives higher concentrations of 239Pu near the pellet edge […] the major potential pathway for continued release of radionuclides is through flowing water. […] Many radionuclides form aqueous complexes that are soluble in water. Furthermore, water promotes dissolution of the rod/fuel matrix, which releases radionuclides [that] pose a much longer environmental hazard […] The radiolytic breakdown of water creates oxidants (e.g., hydrogen peroxide) that can accelerate the oxidative corrosion of fuel […] If the water is alkaline, soluble nanoscale uranyl peroxo cage clusters are likely to form and persist in solution. […] there is no reliable way of predicting dissolution rates of damaged fuel in water under the conditions of a nuclear accident, especially one like Fukushima Daiichi in which fuel is exposed to hot or boiling seawater […] an understanding of the factors that determine radionuclide release is central to taking appropriate and timely action in order to minimize impacts on the environment and human health. […] Water that interacts with damaged fuel will transport radionuclides that present both short-term and longer-term environmental risk […] potentially continuing for many years if the damaged fuel is not adequately isolated […]
AAAS Science Podcast interview with Peter Burns about study:[…] it’s the interaction of the water and the air with that that is going to control the release of radioactivity to the environment […] what’s different about Fukushima relative to the earlier events is the vast quantities of water that were pumped into the reactor cores […] that created a whole new release pathway for radionuclides out of the reactors into the environment. We don’t know how much radioactivity was released through the water flow, and we don’t know very much about how the water interacted with the fuel and other structure materials. […] we need to take very seriously the development of knowledge about how […] melted nuclear fuel […] interacts with the environment, especially water that we might use in an emergency to cool it. Studies that have been done to date really haven’t looked at the longer-term interactions of water and the atmosphere with these damaged materials. […] as it interacts with water or whatever over time – [fuel] has a potential to release radionuclides that have much longer half-lives and they pose a much longer environmental threat.
Fukushima: High radioactivity stops workers from fixing dangerous structure
Japanese Journalist: Workers “very worried” about deformed 400 ft. structure falling on Fukushima reactor buildings and causing another crisis — Immediate repairs needed yet “can’t do anything” due to extreme radiation levels — Staff told to “constantly watch it” — One of site’s most dangerous places http://enenews.com/japan-journalist-workers-very-worried-about-deformed-400-ft-structure-falling-on-fukushima-reactor-buildings-needs-immediate-repair-yet-they-cant-do-anything-about-it-due-to-extr?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29 3 May 14
Fukushima Voice, May 28, 2014: Mako Oshidori in Düsseldorf “The Hidden Truth about Fukushima” […] The lecture, given in Japanese [on March 8, 2014] and translated into English.
Moderator: My name is Mariko. Welcome to a lecture by Mako Oshidori. […] A huge earthquake, followed by tsunami and the nuclear accident, has become an unprecedented disaster for the Japanese as well as the rest of the world. Moreover, this accident is not only out of control but continues to be in critical state. […]
Mako Oshidori: I am actually a journalist with the highest attendance rate at the TEPCO press conference. […] in 2013 when the Japanese central government decided to begin to restart nuclear power plants, the government placed a watch on me […] a piece of paper was distributed with a list of names […] such as the former prime minister Naoto Kan […] A researcher who was given the list and told not to approach anybody on it was friendly with me and told me the list included my name. Soon after that a mysterious man began to follow me. […]
Deformed ‘Stack’ Near Units 1 & 2
- Oshidori: I would like to talk about the current status of Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. This is a chimney called a “stack” […] one of the places that I consider the most dangerous. It is 120 m tall. In December 2013, it was discovered the highest radiation level, 25 Sv/h, at the bottom of the stack. […] humans cannot go near it. The problem gets worse. TEPCO discovered deformities on 4 sides at 60 of the 120 meter height […] Some are totally severed. Ordinarily, this should be immediately repaired, but the bottom of the stack is 25 Sv/h […] they can’t do anything about it. What TEPCO is doing about this is they have appointed workers to constantly watch it. […] Workers on site are very worried about whether it would fall onto the reactor buildings. If it ever fell on Unit 1 or 2, all the workers would have to evacuate […] and it could lead to a severe accident necessitating evacuation […]
Another nuclear hazard in Japan – 110 active volcanoes
‘Ring of Fire’ volcano risk the last obstacle for Japan nuclear plants BY MARI SAITO AND KENTARO HAMADA TOKYO Tue Jun 3, 2014 (Reuters) – In the three years since the Fukushima disaster, Japan’s utilities have pledged $15 billion to harden their nuclear plants against earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes and terrorist attacks.
But as Japan’s nuclear safety regulator prepares to rule on whether the first of the country’s 48 idled reactors is ready to be come back online, the post-Fukushima debate about how safe is safe enough has turned to a final risk: volcanoes.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) has already said the chance of volcanic activity during the lifespan of Kyushu Electric Power’s nuclear plant at Sendai was negligible, suggesting it will give it the green light. The plant, some 1,000 km (600 miles) south of Tokyo, lies in a region of active volcanic sites.
Critics, including some scientists who were consulted by the NRA, say that shows regulators are turning a blind eye to the kind of unlikely but potentially devastating chain of events that pushed the Fukushima Daiichi plant into a triple meltdown in 2011 when a tsunami crashed into the facility.
The debate has played out in several months of public hearings in Tokyo by the NRA and could weigh on the last hurdle for restarting nuclear plants – the opinion of local residents – at a time when the costs of keeping reactors shut are mounting……..
Critics say the NRA safety review overestimates the power of science to predict future volcanic eruptions.
Japan lies on the “Ring of Fire”, a horseshoe-shaped band of fault lines and volcanoes circling the edges of the Pacific Ocean. Japan itself is home to 110 active volcanoes.
Sendai, at the southern end of the island of Kyushu, is 50 km (31 miles) from Sakurajima, an active volcano. Five giant calderas, crater-like depressions formed by past eruptions, are also in the region, the closest one just 40 km (25 miles) from the Sendai plant.
“No-one believes that volcanic risks have been adequately discussed,” said Setsuya Nakada, a professor of volcanology at the University of Tokyo, who advised officials when they were forming regulatory guidelines for monitoring volcanoes……..
As soon as the NRA clears the Sendai nuclear plant for restart, local townships closest to the facility will hold public hearings. The government has said it will defer to the prefecture and the host city to make the final decision. http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/06/04/us-japan-nuclear-volcano-idUSKBN0EE2BF20140604
Record levels of strontium on basements of Fukushima nuclear reactors
Strontium reaches 500 Billion Bq/m³ in basements at Fukushima — Record levels reported at 5 locations near ocean — U.S. Senior Scientist: “We see strontium becoming more of concern… food chain will have to be studied more carefully” http://enenews.com/strontium-reaches-500-billion-bqm3-in-basements-at-fukushima-record-levels-reported-at-5-locations-near-ocean-u-s-expert-we-see-strontium-becoming-more-of-concern-food-chain-will-have-to?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29
JIJI PRESS,May 29, 2014: [TEPCO] said Thursday that it plans to improve a cesium adsorption system […] to enable it to remove strontium. The move is aimed at reducing risks when radioactive water leaks from storage tanks […] TEPCO plans to begin test operation of the improved SARRY system at the end of August. Highly radioactive water [is] accumulating in the basements of the No.1 to No. 4 reactor buildings [with] strontium levels standing at 40 million to 500 million becquerels per liter [500 billion becquerels per metric ton (Bq/m³)].
Results Published May 28, 2014 (Bq/liter):KUSP, May 30, 2014: [Ken Buesseler, Senior scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution] doesn’t worry about cesium-containing fish swimming across the ocean and appearing in other fisheries. The situation is different for strontium-90 […] Strontium behaves like calcium, and it can replace calcium in your bones. “Instead of [cesium’s] 50 days, think of more like 500 days, a couple of years, before it would be released back through natural processes,” he says. […] In the ocean near the power plant, levels of strontium-90 have grown since the accident. But Buesseler says he hasn’t seen alarming numbers for strontium in fish yet. “Down the road, as we see strontium becoming more of concern, that isotope in the food chain will have to be studied more carefully,” he says. Buesseler hopes to monitor strontium levels in the ocean and seafloor near Japan in the future. Should that strontium move across the Pacific Ocean, it will take three years for it to reach the West Coast of the United States.
At Fukushima nuclear emergency, safety inspectors were the first to flee
Nuclear safety inspectors first to flee stricken Fukushima plant June 03, 2014 Asahi Shimbun, By SHINICHI SEKINE/ Staff Writer Safety inspectors with the government’s nuclear watchdog body were the first to flee when disaster struck the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in March 2011.
The exodus of Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) officials compromised communications between the government and plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. at a critical juncture.
This unexpected turn of events shows that the government itself was not sure what role it should play in the nuclear crisis.
The plant manager, Masao Yoshida, who died last year of esophageal cancer, was questioned by the government’s Investigation Committee on the Accident at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Stations several months after the accident. The Asahi Shimbun obtained a copy of his testimony.
According to his testimony, on March 15, 2011, four days after the Fukushima plant was hit by the magnitude-9.0 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, 90 percent of the workers in the plant withdrew to the Fukushima No. 2 nuclear power plant some 10 kilometers away, ignoring Yoshida’s order to remain in and around the compound of the No. 1 facility.
Before that, however, NISA inspectors fled the site immediately after the accident even though they should have stayed to assess what steps were needed to deal with the accident. They went to makeshift government headquarters set up about five kilometers from the No. 1 plant.
On March 15, the makeshift facility was transferred to Fukushima city, some 50 kilometers away. With all government safety inspectors absent from the No. 1 nuclear power plant, the government had no direct means to grasp what was happening there. As a result, it was forced to depend entirely on TEPCO for information.
But channels of communication between the government and TEPCO did not go smoothly. This chaotic situation prompted the prime minister, Naoto Kan, to go to TEPCO’s head office in Tokyo. That was the catalyst for the government and TEPCO to jointly set up headquarters in Tokyo, 230 kilometers away, to deal with the nuclear accident.
The government’s investigation committee’s reports based on Yoshida’s recall of the events highlight the withdrawal of the No. 1 plant’s workers to the No. 2 plant even though the government’s safety inspectors were the first to flee……..http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201406030026
Amid serious doubts, the Fukushima ice wall construction starts
Japan builds underground ice wall at Fukushima nuclear plant http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-02/japan-builds-fukushima-underground-ice-wall/5495358 Japan has started work on an underground ice wall at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, freezing the soil under broken reactors to slow the build-up of radioactive water. The wall is intended to block groundwater from nearby hillsides that has been flowing under the plant and mixing with polluted water already there.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority, the national watchdog, last week authorised construction of the ice wall at Fukushima Daiichi, owned and operated by Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO).
“We started construction of the frozen earth wall this afternoon,” a TEPCO official told a news conference in Tokyo on Monday.
The government-funded scheme will see 1,550 pipes laid deep in the soil through which refrigerant will be piped to create the 1.5-kilometre frozen wall that will stem the inflow of groundwater.
“We plan to end all the construction work in March 2015 before starting trial operations,” the company official said, adding that the ice wall could be fully operational several months after construction was completed.
The ice wall is the latest in a series of clean-up operations being carried out after the worst nuclear disaster in a generation, in which three reactors went into meltdown.
The idea of freezing a section of soil, which was proposed for Fukushima last year, has previously been used to build tunnels near watercourses.
However, scientists point out that it has not been done on this scale before nor for the proposed length of time.
Coping with the huge – and growing – amount of water at the tsunami-damaged plant is proving to be one of the biggest challenges for TEPCO.
As well as all the water used to keep broken reactors cool, the utility must also deal with water that makes its way along subterranean watercourses from mountainsides to the sea. Last month TEPCO began a bypass system that diverts groundwater into the sea to try to reduce the volume of contaminated water.
Full decommissioning of the plant at Fukushima is expected to take several decades.
An area around the site remains out of bounds, and experts warn that some settlements may have to be abandoned because of high levels of radiation following the March 2011 accident.
A cry for help on behalf of Fukushima’s children subjected to radiation
Official in Fukushima: “Please Please HELP US!” — Hot particles of melted fuel are inhaled by children everyday — We are forced to have it in our bodies — “Please let all people in the world know the life we are living” http://enenews.com/official-in-fukushima-please-please-help-us-hot-particles-of-melted-fuel-are-inhaled-by-children-everyday-we-are-forced-to-have-it-in-our-bodies-please-let-all-people-in-the-world-kno?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29
Excerpts from Oyama Koichi of the Minamisoma City Council, May 13, 2014 — Translation byDissensus Japan, May 25, 2014:
- I want to shout for all the people in this world: “Please Please HELP US!”
- The cause substance have been found. This is an aggregate of radionuclides which starts with Uranium [in] a nuclear reactor at more than 5000°C.
- This mixed metal contains four different substances, α・β・γ and also have the possibility to radiate neutron ray.
- No creature on earth never knew this substance.
- We are forced to have those strong substances inside our body without knowing where it exactly stays.
- To say that “Cesium has got the same system as potassium and it will be discharged from the body” is just a lie! […]
- We are all manipulated by the words “radiation” and “radiation doze” without knowing the real identity of radiation source. We are not told the real facts of being irradiated […]
- They only compare radiation doze and natural potassium contained in bananas and manipulated people as if it was a scientific study. I really want the scholars patronized by the government to be punished by the rancorous of all children on this earth. […]
- The informations say that hot particles were diffused and flied in all directions in Japan. The particles from hell is flying in the air and people don’t protect themselves anymore three years after the nuclear accident and children are aspirating those horrible particles everyday!!!
- PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE HELP US! Please let all people in the world to know the life we are living since the accident, everyday and today.
Fukushima radiation has caused genetic deformities in generations of butterflies
Japan Scientist: We gave butterflies food from Fukushima… then, they died; Deformities get worse with each generation — TV: “Truly horrifying… it doesn’t really even look like a butterfly anymore” (PHOTOS & VIDEO) http://enenews.com/japan-scientist-butterflies-fed-leaves-fukushima-died-deformities-worse-generation-tv-doesnt-look-like-butterfly-anymore-especially-scary-photos-video?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29
Vice on HBO, Season 2 Episode 10, May 24, 2014 (at 5:30 in):
- Dr. Joji Otaki, lead researcher, University of Ryukyus: We collected houseplant leaves from Fukushima, and those leaves are given to [butterfly] larvae collected from Okinawa… Those larvae aresupposed to be healthy. But they ate contaminated food from Fukushima. Then we see what happens.
- Vikram Ghandi, Vice: What happened?
- Otaki: They died.
- Ghandi: Dr. Otaki’s experiments have shown the truly horrifying effects contaminated food can have on living organisms.
- Otaki: You can see wrinkled wings.
- Ghandi: It doesn’t really even look like a butterfly anymore.
- Otaki: We found that mortality rate and abnormality rate of the 2nd generation is much higher — even worse in the 3rd generation.
- Ghandi: The evidence contaminated food has increasingly worse effects over the course of generations is especially scary since one of Fukushima’s primary industries is agriculture.
- Kazuya Tarukawa, farmer in Sukagawa 50 miles from Fukushima Daiichi: We had been growing produce that measured 3,000 [Bq/kg] without even knowing it. Selling such produce to the markets made me feel severely guilty.
- Ghandi: His father was consumed with guilt.
- Tarukawa: He hung himself from the tree.
Every day over 75 tons of highly radioactive liquid leaking at Fukushima
Official: Breach at Fukushima reactor blamed on saltwater corrosion — Over 75 tons of highly radioactive liquid flowing out everyday (PHOTOS & VIDEO) http://enenews.com/official-breach-at-fukushima-reactor-blamed-on-saltwater-corrosion-over-75-tons-of-highly-radioactive-liquid-flowing-out-everyday-photos-video?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29
Kyodo News, May 28, 2014: [Tepco] has identified the location of a leak at the bottom of the container in the No. 1 reactor […] water was leaking from a joint in a pipe […] The metal bellow joint is likely to have been corroded [“destruction of materials from chemical reaction“] by seawater [the Tepco official said.] The official denied the possibility that the leakage was caused because the earthquake damaged equipment. He said the company will continue to investigate if there are other areas of leakage nearby.
Jiji Press, May 28, 2014: Tepco said it had confirmed water was leaking from a pipe in the reactor containment vessel inside the plant’s No. 1 reactor building. The utility used a camera-mounted remote-controlled robot […] water was leaking from the vessel’s bottom near the pipe, at a rate of up to 3.2 tons per hour [76.8 tons/day]. In the No. 1 to No. 3 reactor buildings, highly contaminated water leaking from the vessels has amassed, preventing work to remove nuclear fuel.
NHK,May 27, 2014: The water is leaking from a point on a pipe leading to the containment vessel. An image taken by a robot probe shows a black area on the brown pipe. The leak point is above a donut-shaped unit called a suppression chamber where a robotic investigation detected flows of contaminated water last November. The chamber is in the lower part of the containment vessel. […] A contaminated water leak has also been found in the containment vessel of the Number 3 reactor. Officials say they will now investigate the suppression chamber and other parts of the Number 2 reactor.
Watch footage of the Unit 1 suppression chamber survey published on May 28 here
Japan about to extract the teeth from its Nuclear safety Watchdog?
The government should not be allowed to make the nuclear watchdog toothless by nominating experts who are convenient to it and the industry.
EDITORIAL: Nuclear watchdog must not be made toothless –The Asahi Shimbun, May 29 Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has a habit of trying to promote policy changes through political appointments. His administration seems to have employed this political ploy to achieve its goals in the area of nuclear safety inspections.
This is the only possible way to put proposed replacements for two outgoing commissioners of the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) into perspective. Continue reading
Japan’s Abe govt determined to bring back nuclear, but the impediments are strong
Abe and Kepco Push Nuclear Restart The government and nuclear companies maneuver to restart Japan’s reactors, as nearby cities dig in. The Diplomat, By Clint Richards May 29, 2014 As The Diplomat noted last week, Japan’s nuclear energy providers are struggling to remain profitable with all the country’s nuclear reactors currently offline. The government is highly aware of its struggling nuclear power sector, and the threat of another summer where Japan’s energy grid is stretched to the limit, and energy imports soar. With both of these problems in mind, three news items highlight the direction both the government and nuclear companies may take to avoid another summer energy crunch.
The Fukui District Court ruling would allow people living within 250 km of the plant the right to sue to have the plant closed. According to a separate Japan Times article, “The entire Kansai region, most of Chubu, including Nagoya, much of Chugoku, including Hiroshima, and roughly a third of Shikoku lies within 250 km of the Oi plant.”
Despite strong local opposition, Abe’s government is determined to bring back online as many nuclear reactors as logistically possible. On Wednesday, an NRA official told AFP that Abe’s government wants to replace two of five commissioners serving on the NRA when their terms expire. One of the commissioners Abe reportedly most wants to replace is Kunihiko Shimizu, who has been criticized for saying that at least two reactors sit on active fault lines………
Local governments and their constituencies are determined to keep the tragedy of Fukushima as far from their own doorstep as possible. The inability of Tepco to adequately address the continued problems at the Daiichi power plant only further reinforces the fear of people who live near existing reactors. Despite Abe’s insistence, local populations are likely to keep the number of reactors that come back online much lower than the government wants, at least in the near future, as long as the central government and energy providers give them veto power. http://thediplomat.com/2014/05/abe-and-kepco-push-nuclear-restart/
Pro nuclear expert replaces safety conscious seismic expert on Japan’s Nuclear Safety Agency
Pro-nuclear expert replacing NRA commissioner who raised flag on quake risk THE ASAHI SHIMBUN 29 May 14, http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/politics/AJ201405280023 Replacements for two outgoing commissioners of the Nuclear Regulation Authority suggest the Abe administration will find it easier to gain approval for restarts of the nation’s nuclear reactors.Few people in government circles and the nuclear industry will be sorry to see Kunihiko Shimazaki go. His successor is expected to more quickly give the green light to reactivate nuclear power plants.
Shimazaki, who is 68 and a professor of seismology, proved to be a thorn in the side of electric power companies with his calls for a reassessment of the force with which seismic waves and tsunami could pummel nuclear plants being considered for restarts. Kenzo Oshima, 71, a former undersecretary-general at the United Nations, is also stepping down. Both men are leaving because their terms expire in September.
Continued cover-up of health effects of Fukushima radiation
Cancer Expert in Fukushima: “There has undoubtedly been radiation poisoning, people shouldn’t be living here”; Officials only focus is covering up crisis — TV: On playground, we found radiation levels 2,000% higher than displayed by gov’t monitoring post (VIDEO) http://enenews.com/cancer-expert-fukushima-undoubtedly-radiation-poisoning-people-be-living-officials-only-focused-covering-crisis-tv-playground-found-radiation-levels-2000-higher-nearby-govt-monitoring-post-displaye
Fukushima VICE
Vice on HBO, Season 2 Episode 10, May 24, 2014 (at 3:45 in):
Dr. Masamichi Nishio, MD, Hokkaido Cancer Center radiologist who was examining children at elementary school 40 miles from Fukushima Daiichi: There has undoubtedly been radiation poisoning, so people should not be living here. But the government will not say that out loud. All they wanted to do was cover-up what had been done. There is a lot of secrecy. […]
Kayoko Hashimoto, Fukushima resident: The figures don’t add up. They don’t match what the government is saying.
Vikram Ghandi, Vice: The whole concept of these stationary Geiger counters becomes suspect when only a few feet away the readings are twice as high. And when you move even further away, those government monitors start feeling completely irrelevant. Over here by the edge of the school… Whoa. Sh*t. So the reading is now 3.5 [microSv/hr]. That level is 20 times higher than the monitoring post around the corner — on the playground, at an elementary school.
Vikram Gandh’s ‘Debrief’, May 24, 2014:
Shane Smith, Vice: Vikram Gandhi went to Fukushima, where levels of radiation have been drastically downplayed by the Japanese government. […]
Ghandi: Our Geiger counter was reading measurements up to 900 times the measurements we found in Tokyo.
Tepco’s hopes that a giant ice wall will solve radiation leak problem
Japan building giant ice wall at Fukushima after all as TEPCO gets go ahead RT May 28, 2014 Japan’s nuclear authority will allow Fukushima’s nuclear power plant operator, TEPCO, to build an underground ice wall isolating radioactive water build-up. This is despite earlier concerns that the wall might cause the ground to sink.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) no longer has reservations about the 32 billion yen (US$314 million) government-funded project, in which a giant “wall of ice” is to be built around the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant’s four reactors, Kyodo news agency reported.
The plan, which involves 1.5 kilometers of pipes with coolant powerful enough to make the earth around it freeze, earlier raised concerns that it could cause trouble by making the ground near the reactors less stable.
TEPCO officials have, however, persuaded NRA experts that the ground around the ice wall may sink only up to 16 mm, posing no threat to its stability.
“I think we have been able to confirm today the scale of ground sinking, which is what we have most feared as side effects of building the wall,” NRA Commissioner Toyoshi Fuketa told Kyodo.
While accepting the operator’s explanation, the NRA still has issues to discuss with TEPCO, which include ways to accurately measure the level of radioactive water accumulating inside the reactor buildings. The issue of contaminated groundwater seeping through the ground and into the ocean has for years been one of the major problems faced by TEPCO. ……
Public trust at a low ebb in Japan, as staff of Nuclear Regulation Agency changes
TEPCO public trust remains low as Japan shuffles nuclear watchdog http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/tepco-public-trust/1125884.html The Japanese government announced it will replace two of its five officials on the Nuclear Regulation Authority, while the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) is still grappling with low public trust. TOKYO: Japan’s government has announced it will replace two of its five members on the Nuclear Regulation Authority which determines if a nuclear plant is ready for a restart.
Speculation is rising that the government is removing the seismic expert responsible for actually beefing up the requirements for nuclear plants. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) is eager to spread the message that the Kashiwazaki Kariwa (KK), one of the world’s largest nuclear plants, is ready to be restarted after having been offline since the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear plant disaster.
Nuclear Reform Monitoring Committee deputy chair Lady Barbara Judge, who was the former chair of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, supports an energy mix that includes nuclear power even in Japan where the risk of a massive earthquake is high.
In Japan, many continue to oppose the restart of nuclear power plants. There are lawsuits taking place all over Japan not only against nuclear power plants but also uranium-related facilities. In May, a local court ruled for the first time against the restart of Oi nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture.
“In a lawsuit to stop the Oi nuclear plant, the historic ruling was based on the fact that the risk cannot be controlled by humans” said Tamotsu Sugenami, secretariat of the Takagi Fund for Citizen Science.
“Immediately, those who support nuclear energy began a campaign stating that zero risk is an old way of thinking. We cannot tolerate this.”
Aside from the technical safety concerns, public trust in TEPCO also remains low. “They (TEPCO) put little films on their websites on what’s going on,” said Lady Judge.
“They’re trying to explain to the public what they’re doing inside of walls of power plants which is new. And that’s more important than anything in terms of regaining public trust.”
TEPCO is aware of its reputation problem but there is also the issue of compensation.
Co-author of the book “It’s necessary to dissolve TEPCO for the revival of the Japanese economy” Hideaki Takemura claims the government has bankrolled TEPCO with the banks pumping in some 2 trillion yen to salvage the company.
He said: “There has been no compensation from (TEPCO’s) own pocket. It’s using the government money to compensate the victims and deal with the accident. There is no company as irresponsible as that.”
There are clearly many questions in Japan’s ongoing nuclear debate but there is no question that the Abe government is as keen as ever to get the country’s nuclear power plants back online.
1 This Month
Read the Public Inquiry Report, the Commissioners’ report, Surrendering Australia: The AUKUS Deception is available to download for free at aukuspublicinquiry.com. Or just watch the replay of the National Press Club Luncheon.
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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