This Fukushima catastrophe is not over… We should continue to be very worried.
Nuclear Expert: We should be very worried about ongoing catastrophe at Fukushima… “Complete failure” of ice wall built to contain extremely radioactive water… Plutonium is flowing into Pacific, will for many years to come — Strontium in ocean hits record level, huge increase reported since April (VIDEO)http://enenews.com/nuclear-expert-be-very-worried-about-ongoing-catastrophe-fukushima-plutonium-flowing-pacific-will-many-years-wall-built-contain-extremely-radioactive-water-complete-failure-strontium-90-ocean-hits?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ENENews+%28Energy+News%29Excerpts from presentation by Arnie Gundersen, Fairewinds Chief Engineer, Jul 16, 2015 (emphasis added):
- Are the meltdowns at Fukushima Daiichi over?… This catastrophe is not over… We should continue to be very worried.
- 3 of the nuclear cores at Fukushima Daiichi are in direct contact with groundwater. Nuclear power designers and engineers never anticipated that possibility.
- Fukushima Daiichi Units No. 1, No. 2, and No. 3 were destroyed… allowing holes and cracks to form… We know for sure that the Fukushima Daiichi containments are full of holes that allow groundwater to come in direct contact with each nuclear core.
- Groundwater is still leaking in and leaking out, at a rate of at least 300 tons per day… more than 1,500 days have passed… 23,000-tanker truckloads of radioactive waterhave already leaked into the Pacific Ocean. Worse yet, there is no end in sight.
- As Fairewinds anticipated, the ‘ice wall’ is a complete failure.
- Cesium, strontium and plutonium from Fukushima Daiichi will continue to bleed into the Pacific Ocean for decades because the groundwater flow is unmitigated.
- Japan’s press looks on silently due to the real threat and constraints of the government’s secrecy act… The true human, financial, and environmental costs of this nuclear power catastrophe are not publicized and discussed.
TEPCO reported on July 17 that Strontium-90 concentrations in the ocean outside Fukushima Units 3 and 4 are at record highs. Levels have spiked around 1,000% in 3 months.
Sr-90 measured between Unit 3 & 4intake channel
- July 17 report: 1,500 Bq/L*
- April 23 report: 150 Bq/L
Sr-90 measured at Unit 4 screen
- July 17 report: 1,500 Bq/L*
- April 23 report: 120 Bq/L
* According to TEPCO’s July 17 report, the total level of all beta ray emitters (which includes Sr-90) was 1,200 Bq/L — yet the levels reported for Sr-90 were 1,500 Bq/L. When a similar occurrence happened last year, Asahi reported: “Strontium levels exceeded the all-beta readings in some instances, leading the utility to decide they were ‘wrong’.” TEPCO’s corrected data revealed much higher levels.
Worrying future for Fukushima’s nuclear refugees, induced to return home
The woodlands of Iitate are “acting as a long lasting reservoir for radiocesium and as a large source for future recontamination in the environment beyond the forest,”
“You cannot work on a farm, you cannot grow rice, and you cannot pick wild plants either,”
Japan nuclear refugees face dilemma over returning home, Channel News Asia
Many residents have been unable to return to their home towns following the Fukushima nuclear disaster. Even what that changes, there will still be lingering concerns about safety. 21 Jul 2015 NARAHA, Japan: More than four years since Satoru Yamauchi abandoned his noodle restaurant to escape radiation spreading from the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, the Japanese government is almost ready to declare it safe to go home.
But, like many of the displaced, he’s not sure if he wants to.
“I want my old life back, but I don’t think it’s possible here,” he told AFP on a recent visit to the dusty “soba” buckwheat noodle restaurant in Nahara that he ran for more than two decades………
UNFIT FOR HABITATION
Activists say despite government assurances, many areas still show highly-elevated levels of contamination, and many are unfit for habitation.
They say that for people who abandoned now-almost-worthless — but still mortgaged — homes, allowing TEPCO to stop payments amounts to forcing them to return.
Environmental campaign group Greenpeace has carried out a study of radiation contamination in Iitate, a heavily-forested 200-square-kilometre (75 square miles) district that sits around 40 kilometres northwest of the crippled plant also being eyed for resettlement. Continue reading
India’s Mayapuri residents concerned about ionising radiation in scrap machinery
Mayapuri haunted by radiation fears of 2010, Mohit Sharma, Hindustan Times, New Delhi Jul 21, 2015
Fear of a radiation leak is haunting businessmen and residents of Mayapuri, who claim that that authorities have failed to keep a check on the large scale dismantling of machines that go on in the area.
RK Gupta, the general secretary of the Mayapuri-Rewariline industrial welfare association says that while the content of scrap, vehicles and other items brought for dismantling are dubious and remain unverified, open dismantling of machines poses the danger of a repeat of radiation incident that occurred in the area five years ago………http://www.hindustantimes.com/newdelhi/mayapuri-haunted-by-radiation-fears-of-2010/article1-1371431.aspx
Japan Accused of Coercing Fukushima Refugees to Return to Unsafe Homes
Greenpeace charges that pro-nuclear Prime Minister Shinzo Abe cares more about politics than public health
As the Japanese government moves to accelerate the return of Fukushima refugees to their homes, environmental advocacy organization Greenpeace warned Tuesday that radioactive contamination remains “so widespread and at such a high level that” that it will be impossible for people to safely go back.
Four years after an earthquake and tsunami touched off the nuclear meltdown, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is pressing to lift evacuation orders by March 2017 and cut off compensation to victims of the disaster by 2018. The move would allow—and some say force—tens of thousands of refugees to go back to their homes.
The pro-nuclear prime minister says that the move, proposed in June, is aimed at speeding up Fukushima’s “reconstruction.”
Greenpeace, however, warns that such a development would be reckless and dangerous. The organization evaluated radiation contamination in Iitate, a forested 75-square-mile district in the Fukushima prefecture, and found that even after “decontamination,” the radiation level remains at 2uSv/h—or ten times the maximum deemed safe for the public.
“Prime Minister Abe would like the people of Japan to believe that they are decontaminating vast areas of Fukushima to levels safe enough for people to live in,” said Jan Vande Putte, radiation specialist with Greenpeace Belgium, in a press statement. “The reality is that this is a policy doomed to failure. The forests of Iitate are a vast stock of radioactivity that will remain both a direct hazard and source of potential recontamination for hundreds of years. It’s impossible to decontaminate.”
According to Greenpeace, the elimination of compensation would effectively force people back into an environment that is dangerous for their health.
“Stripping nuclear victims of their already inadequate compensation, which may force them to have to return to unsafe, highly radioactive areas for financial reasons, amounts to economic coercion,” said Putte. “Let’s be clear: this is a political decision by the Abe Government, not one based on science, data, or public health.”
Meanwhile, nuclear refugees from Iitate are fighting for adequate compensation through an Alternative Dispute Resolution process. Their lawyer, Yasushi Tadano, said: “The Iitate people’s fate is another of numerous cases in the past where Japan abandoned its people, as with the Ashio mining pollution and Minamata disease. We can not allow this to happen again.”
Residents across Japan have staged protests and filed lawsuits to block nuclear restarts, and polls show that, in the aftermath of the 2011 disaster, a clear majority of the Japanese public opposes nuclear power. In addition, surveys reveal low public confidence in the Japanese government and the Tokyo Electric Power Co.—the company behind the Fukushima Daiichi plant that continues to release radiation into the ecosystem.
Despite public opposition, Abe is aggressively pursuing a return to nuclear power. Earlier this month, Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party revealed that it aims to have 20 percent of the country’s electricity supplied by nuclear power by 2030.
Source: Common Deams
Sweaty work for Japan teams scrubbing away Fukushima radiation
IITATE, Japan – Sweating inside their plastic protection suits, thousands of men toil in Japan’s muggy early summer in a vast effort to scrub radiation from the villages around Fukushima.
The mission is to decontaminate hundreds of square kilometres (miles) that were polluted when reactors went into meltdown after a huge tsunami struck Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March 2011.
No stone is left unturned: diggers scrape away the top layer of earth in fields, school courtyards and around the buildings of villages, while houses, buildings, roads and parking lots are scrubbed clean.
At least 20,000 people – all dressed in the special gloves, masks and boots required for workers in the nuclear industry – are involved in the clean-up, according to the environment ministry.
Some 2.5 million black bags filled with contaminated soil, plants and leaves wait at the sites or in one of the nearly 800 temporary outdoor storage facilities that have been set up across the disaster zone.
The mammoth effort comes as Japan’s government prepares to declare sections of the evacuation zone habitable again.
That will mean evacuees can return to the homes they abandoned more than four years ago. It will also mean, say campaigners, that some people will have no choice but to go back because it will trigger the ending of some compensation payments.
Government-run decontamination efforts are under way in 11 cities where Tokyo says that at present, anyone living there would be exposed to radiation levels of more than 20 millisieverts (mSv) a year.
The globally-accepted norm for radiation absorption is 1 mSv per year, although the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and others say anything up to 20 mSv per year poses no immediate danger to human health.
The settlement of Naraha, which lies just 20 kilometres (12 miles) from the plant, is expected to be declared safe in September.
The government intends to lift many evacuation orders by March 2017, if decontamination progresses as it hopes.
Still, the area immediately surrounding the plant remains uninhabitable, and storage sites meant to last 30 years are being built in the villages closest to the complex.
For now, only residential areas are being cleaned in the short-term, and the worst-hit parts of the countryside are being omitted, a recommendation made by the IAEA.
But that strategy has troubled environmentalists, who fear that could lead to re-contamination as woodlands will act as a radiation reservoir, with pollutants washed out by rains.
In a report on decontamination in Iitate, a heavily forested area that lies northwest of the plant, campaign group Greenpeace says these selective efforts will effectively confine returnees to a relatively small area of their old hometowns.
“The Japanese government plans, if implemented, will create an open-air prison of confinement to ‘cleaned’ houses and roads… and the vast untouched radioactive forests continue to pose a significant risk of recontamination of these ‘decontaminated’ areas to even higher levels,” the report, published Tuesday, says.
Some 39 other municipalities which were not evacuated after the accident, and which have radiation levels deemed safe for humans, are also being decontaminated by local authorities.
Source: Asia One
Fukushima No. 1 still has 7,000 tons of problematic toxic water to be removed
Some 7,000 tons of radioactive water at risk of leaking into the ground still has to be removed from underground tunnels and other locations at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. is trying to get rid of tainted water from the cable tunnels for reactors 2 and 3. That work is expected to be mostly completed by the end of this month.
As of Monday, such water could still be found in at least 16 such locations at the plant, where three reactors suffered a meltdown after being heavily damaged in the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
According to Tepco, numerous underground tunnels, ducts and pits hold radioactive water, in addition to the reactor and turbine buildings. Some of the water is more radioactive than the contaminated water already in storage tanks.
The highest levels of radioactive substances contained per liter were 990 becquerels of cesium-134 and 3,200 becquerels of cesium-137, more than 60 times higher than the provisional standards for water Tepco may discharge within the plant site.
The tunnels and ducts are not designed to hold water and therefore have a higher risk of leakage than storage tanks.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority has urged Tepco to immediately remove the water in the cable tunnels for reactors 2 and 3 due to extremely high levels of radioactive materials it contains and the high risk of the tainted water leaking into the ocean. These tunnels are located relatively close to the Pacific shoreline.
Levels of radioactive materials in the water in other tunnels and ducts are substantially lower, and such facilities are located away from the ocean. Still, due to the lack of sufficient monitoring, it would be hard to immediately detect a possible leak.
An official of the secretariat of the NRA said, “Tepco needs to tackle the problem of this tainted water, which it has so far failed to address.”
Source: Japan Times
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/07/21/national/fukushima-1-still-7000-tons-problematic-toxic-water-removed/#.Va5V-xNViko
Tourism association turns to booze created with Fukushima buckwheat. Now on sale.
Buckwheat-based imitation beer hits shelves in nuclear disaster-affected village
KAWAUCHI, Fukushima Prefecture–A tourism association here has turned to booze created with buckwheat, a local specialty, to breathe life back into a village depleted by the nearby Fukushima nuclear disaster.
At the request of the Kawauchi tourism association, beer brewers in Fukushima Prefecture have developed two types of low-malt imitation beer using buckwheat, which is typically used to make soba noodles.
“I want to encourage residents of the village by developing new local specialty products,” said Shigeru Ide, who heads the tourism body.
The 330-milliliter beverages are each priced at 620 yen ($4.99), including tax, and became available at shops throughout Kawauchi earlier this month.
The Soba Garden imitation beer tastes strong, while Kyo has a light flavor.
Before the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami triggered the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Kawauchi was one of the largest producing centers of buckwheat in the prefecture.
Although evacuation orders have been lifted for most parts of Kawauchi, half of its 2,700 residents still live outside the village as evacuees.
Source: Asahi Shimbun
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/recovery/AJ201507200062
Tests begin on radiation data publication system
Japan’s nuclear regulators have begun testing a new radiation data-publicizing system for residents near a power plant.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority says it has begun to test-run the system it has developed in an area surrounding the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima Prefecture, western Japan.
Kyushu Electric Power Company aims to bring the plant back online next month.
The new system enables the central government and municipalities to provide their radiation data online for other organizations as well as for local residents during emergencies.
The system will allow users to access a special site on the Authority’s website to obtain such data in the event of a nuclear accident.
In the case of the Sendai plant, the website provides updated figures from 73 observation points within a 30-kilometer radius from the plant, as well as from cars equipped with radiation-monitoring equipment.
Figures are colored in red or yellow when they exceed government standards.
New nuclear emergency guidelines call for the evacuation of residents within a 5- to 30-kilometer radius from a power plant if radiation levels exceed the government limit.
The government reviewed the guidelines following the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident.
The regulators say they will fully launch the system in August after one month of testing. They say they will also set up web sites for other nuclear power plants.
Source: NHK
http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20150720_04.html
Japan’s agricultural industries affected by radiation levels
Green tea plantations were first highlighted as suffering from potential radiation contamination last month following the results of sample tests in Kanagawa prefecture. The authorities discovered around 570 becquerels of caesium per kilogram in leaves grown in the city of Minamiashigara – compared to the legal limit of 500 – and started a recall of tea products.
Tea leaves are the latest agricultural products in Japan to be affected by problems surrounding the still-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
From milk to spinach, a raft of items have fallen under the spotlight due to radiation fears although Japanese authorities have assured the public and its export nations that it is strictly regulating products.
While it seems that areas around the nuclear crisis will never recover, tens of thousands of farmers have lost their livelihood due to soil contamination and food safety fears.
Just another serious blow on the global food supply that seems to be diminishing. Source: natural society http://planetsave.com/2012/06/12/japan-green-tea-exports-banned-due-to-high-radiation-levels/
Danger for China, in planning inland nuclear facilities
Drought and earthquakes pose “enormous risk” to China’s nuclear plans, China Dialogue Wang Yi’nan 27.02.2013
China’s nuclear industry is shifting inland, away from the crowded coast. It’s a risky move, argues Wang Yi’nan When the Fukushima nuclear disaster struck, China was building new nuclear power capacity at a rate unprecedented in world history: 40% of all reactors planned or under construction were in China. Targets for installed nuclear generation capacity by 2020 were raised repeatedly – from 40 gigawatts in 2007 to 80 gigawatts in 2010.
Preparations were also under way for more than 20 inland nuclear power plants. The 41-plus gigawatts of capacity already completed or under construction lies along China’s seaboard. Space is running out.
But Fukushima sent shockwaves through the nuclear industry. In China, focus shifted from the speed and scale of expansion to questions of safety and quality. The government placed a moratorium on approvals for new nuclear plants, which lasted for more than a year, a period during which debate on what to do raged – over safety, scale of expansion, technology, site locations and, most crucially, whether or not the process of considering applications to build new inland nuclear power plants should be restarted.
China’s nuclear moratorium may have been lifted, but those arguments continue today……..China’s realities warn against inland nuclear development.
Figures from the China Earthquake Administration’s Institute of Geology show that, since 1900, China has been hit by almost 800 earthquakes of magnitude six or above, causing destruction in all regions except Guizhou, Zhejiang and Hong Kong. Despite having only 7% of the world’s landmass, China – where three tectonic plates meet – gets more than a third of all strong continental earthquakes.
Moreover, China’s per-head freshwater resources are only one quarter of the global average. Inland nuclear power plants require a failsafe, 100% reliable and never-ending supply of water for cooling. Even if a reactor stops operating it still requires water to carry off heat. If the water dries up, we could see a Fukushima-style disaster, with terrible consequences: radioactive pollutants released into nearby rivers and lakes, affecting the safety of water on which hundreds of millions rely.
In June last year, Reuters covered a report by European and US scientists on the vulnerabilities of nuclear and thermal power to climate change. According to the report, “under climate change, a lack of water for cooling is severely restricting generating capacity at nuclear power plants in the EU and US. In the summer seasons of 2003 to 2009, many inland nuclear power plants were forced to shut down due to a lack of cooling water.”
The authors predicted that “due to a lack of water for cooling, between 2030 and 2060 nuclear and thermal generating capacity will drop 4-16% in the US, and 6-19% in the EU,” and went on to stress that “opting to build nuclear and other thermal power plants by the sea is an effective and important strategy to cope with climate change.”
China is densely populated and prone to both drought and earthquakes, making the development of inland nuclear power inadvisable. It has also long sought to emulate the EU and US, regions which have now realised the outlook for inland nuclear power is bleak. China should not make the same mistake………
Safety standards still not being met
Moreover, there are still limits to China’s ability to run nuclear power plants.
During the State Council’s safety audit of 41 reactors in operation or under construction, some plants and fuel recycling facilities were found not to meet new safety standards for flood and earthquake resilience, while some plants did not have procedures for preventing or mitigating major accidents. Others had not evaluated tsunami risks and responses.
The Taishan Nuclear Power Plant has no guidelines for managing a major accident, for example. The Taishan No.2 reactor, Ling’Ao and Tianwan Nuclear Power Plants have procedures only for certain types of major accident……..
China has better and more realistic options to relieve energy shortages and cut emissions. These include more efficient use of resources including coal; the promotion of energy-saving techniques such as the use of energy performance contracting(where energy savings from new buildings systems pay for the cost of a building renewal project) a tool which, if used in China as it is in the EU, would save the equivalent of several Three Gorges Dams’ worth of energy.
Comprehensive clean-energy solutions, incorporating solar power, wind power, bioenergy, pumped-storage hydropower and natural gas peak power plants, can provide China with the clean, reliable and efficient energy it needs for a new type of industrialisation.
China’s development must be built on genuinely safe, reliable, clean and efficient energy. Blindly opting for nuclear power in response to energy shortages and emissions pressures is to drink from a poisoned chalice. https://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/5746-Drought-and-earthquakes-pose-enormous-risk-to-China-s-nuclear-plans
White lungs on Fukushima’s dead dolphins indicates radiation poisoning
Each dolphins lungs were white, which is according to scientists, an indication of loss of blood to the organs – a symptom of radiation poisoning.
The translated article comes from EneNews:
Apr 11, 2015 (emphasis added):
Google Translate: Ibaraki Prefecture… for a large amount of dolphin which was launched on the shore… the National Science Museum… investigated… researchers rushed from national museums and university laboratory, about 30 people were the anatomy of the 17 animals in the field. [According to Yuko Tajima] who led the investigation.
“the lungs of most of the 17… was pure white ischemic state, visceral signs of overall clean and disease and infections were observed”… Lungs white state, that has never seen before.
Fukushima Diary, Apr 12, 2015: According to National Science Museum, most of the inspected 17 dolphins had their lungs in ischaemia state… The chief of the researching team stated “Most of the lungs looked entirely white”… internal organs were generally clean without any symptoms of disease or infection, but most of the lungs were in ischaemia state. She said “I have never seen such a state”.
Wikipedia: Ischemia is a vascular disease involving an interruption in the arterial blood supply to a tissue, organ, or extremity that, if untreated, can lead to tissue death.
Many reports have been published on the links between ischemia and radiation exposure:
“It has been shown that the ionizing radiation in small doses under certain conditions can be considered as one of starting mechanisms of… IHD [ischemic heart disease].” -Source
“Radiation risks on non-cancer effects has been revealed in the [Chernobyl] liquidators… Recently, the statistically significant dose risk of ischemic heart disease… was published.” -Source……….http://www.neonnettle.com/sphere/366-dead-dolphins-in-fukushima-stranding-found-with-white-radiated-lungs
Highest Strontium-90 density detected in seawater of Fukushima plant port / 1,500,000 Bq/m3
From Tepco’s report published on 7/17/2015, Strontium-90 density in seawater of Fukushima plant port became the highest since they started measuring.
The sampling location was between water intake of Reactor 3 and 4, and also screen of Reactor 4, which are in front of Reactor 3 & 4.
The samples were collected on 6/1/2015. This analysis result has not been published for over a month.
1,500,000 Bq/m3 of Strontium-90 was detected from both of the samples.
The previous highest reading was 1,000,000 Bq/m3, which was detected at the same sampling location on 5/4/2015.
http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/fukushima-np/f1/smp/2015/images/2tb-east_15071701-j.pdf
Source: Fukushima Diary
Highest Strontium-90 density detected in seawater of Fukushima plant port / 1,500,000 Bq/m3
Transfer of radiation-tainted soil from Fukushima Prefecture school starts
TANAGURA, FUKUSHIMA PREF. – The Environment Ministry on Saturday started work to transport radiation-tainted soil and other waste from an elementary school in Fukushima Prefecture, home to Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant damaged in the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, to an interim storage site in the same prefecture on a trial basis.
The ministry plans to finish the work before the end of August while schoolchildren are taking their summer holidays, officials said. A total of 1,500 cu. meters of soil and other tainted items from decontamination work are kept at Yashirogawa elementary school in the town of Tanagura.
This marks the first transportation of tainted soil from a Fukushima school to the interim storage site that straddles the towns of Okuma and Futaba.
Trial work to move polluted soil will begin also at four other Fukushima elementary schools soon. The amount of contaminated waste at the four schools in the city of Koriyama and the town of Asakawa totals about 1,500 cu. meters.
According to the Fukushima Prefectural Government, a total of 316,400 cu. meters of tainted soil is being stored at 1,173 locations in the prefecture, including schools and kindergartens, as of the end of March. The amount to be transferred to the interim storage site during fiscal 2015, which ends March 31, will be limited, prefectural officials said.
Decontamination at Yashirogawa elementary school was conducted from January to June this year. Soil and other waste from the cleanup work is kept mainly in sacks.
On Saturday, some 20 workers were engaged in the transportation work. The school is about 150 km from the interim storage site.
The prefecture launched the experimental transportation program in March. About 43,000 cu. meters of waste from 43 cities, towns and villages will be transferred to the storage site within fiscal 2015. The work has been completed in six municipalities, including Okuma and Futaba.
Source : Japan Times
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/07/19/national/science-health/transfer-of-radiation-tainted-soil-from-fukushima-prefecture-school-starts/#.Vavnv_mFSM9
Fukushima Daiichi Decommissioning: Follow The Money
Are the meltdowns at Fukushima Daiichi over? The answer is no. In Fairewinds’ latest video, Chief Engineer and nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen updates viewers on what’s going on at the Japanese nuclear meltdown site, Fukushima Daiichi. As the Japanese government and utility owner Tokyo Electric Power Company push for the quick decommissioning and dismantling of this man-made disaster, the press and scientists need to ask, “Why is the Ukrainian government waiting at least 100 years to attempt to decommission Chernobyl, while the Japanese Government and TEPCO claim that Fukushima Daiichi will be decommissioned and dismantled during the next 30 years?”
Like so many big government + big business controversies, the answer has nothing to do with science, and everything to do with politics and money. To understand Fukushima Daiichi, you need to follow the money.
Source: Fairewinds
Fukushima delegation to Switzerland, to learn about transition plan from nuclear to renewable energy
Fukushima team studies Swiss nuclear experience By swissinfo.ch, with reporting by Fumi Kashimada , 16 July 15
A Japanese delegation from Fukushima, site of a nuclear disaster in March 2011, has visited Switzerland to discuss energy policies, technologies and the development of renewable forms of energy.
“Almost five years after the explosions in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, 110,000 people still can’t return to live in their homes,” Masao Uchibori, mayor of the prefecture of Fukushima since November, toldswissinfo.ch in Solothurn.
“The inhabitants of zones with raised levels of radioactivity can’t lead a normal life.”
While most foreign reports on Fukushima focus on the reconstruction of the destroyed power plant, Uchibori points out that “time hasn’t stood still in Fukushima – we’ve made progress on rebuilding the infrastructure”.
Uchibori said the prefecture of Fukushima had set itself the ambitious target of getting 100% of its energy from renewable sources by 2040. To that end, the delegation is interested in Switzerland’s experiences in withdrawing from nuclear power. ……..
“The most important thing is that no nuclear power station accident happens ever again – it doesn’t matter whether it’s in Japan or another country. Countries should cooperate so that the world isn’t dependent on nuclear power.” http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/nuclear-safety_fukushima-delegation-studies-swiss-nuclear-experience/41552346
1 This Month
of the week– Nuclear Reactor Information Task Force
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
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