Fukushima - the continuing saga

[onebyone]

Tokyo (CNN)Cleaning up Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which suffered catastrophic meltdowns afteran earthquake and tsunami hit in 2011, may take up to 40 years.

The crippled nuclear reactor is now stable but the decommissioning process is making slow progress, says the plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Co, better known as TEPCO.

"If I may put this in terms of mountain climbing, we've just passed the first station on a mountain of 10 stations," said Akira Ono, head of the Fukushima plant.

It's almost five years since the earthquake and the tsunami it triggered killed more than 15,000 people and destroyed coastal towns on March 11, 2011.

TEPCO has attracted fierce criticism for its handling of the disaster.

A worker takes notes in front of storage tanks for radioactive water at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant on February 10.

Biggest challenge

The biggest obstacle to closing down the plant permanently is removing all the melted nuclear fuel debris from three reactors, Ono told reporters after a press tour of the plant this week.

But TEPCO says it is in the dark about the current state of the debris.

Hydrogen gas explosions and nuclear meltdowns released lethal levels of radiation in 2011.

Eerie footage from inside Fukushima's nuclear plant 01:17

Though radiation levels have fallen, they still prevent workers from accessing the reactor buildings, making it hard to survey the condition of the destroyed facilities and molten fuel debris.

What to do with the large volume of contaminated water now stored at the plant is another problem.

Around 300 to 400 tons of contaminated water is generated every day as groundwater flows into the plant filled with radioactive debris.

To contain the tainted water, TEPCO pumps up the water and stores it in tanks, adding a new tank every three to four days. There are 1,000 tanks today containing 750,000 tons of contaminated water.

Japan fires up second reactor since Fukushima disaster amid widespread opposition

Living in limbo near Fukushima 01:58

However, decontamination elsewhere on the premises is making headway. Workers now only need dust masks for a large part of the plant.

For outsiders, this appears to be only small progress. But it makes a huge difference for workers who used to wear full masks for outside clean-up and construction work.

Last year in October, Japan confirmed the first case of cancer in a Fukushima worker.

While agreeing to cover the worker's treatment costs, the government stopped short of recognizing the scientific link between the cancer and his work.

Photojournalists document the human cost: Rebuilding lives after Fukushima

Japan: Fukushima clean-up 'may take 40 years' - CNN.com

 

[ahojunk]

I hope the nuclear industry in other countries have taken a good note of the Fukushima nuclear accident and learn from it. They should make sure all their current and future reactors are as safe as they can be. They should invest adequate money in boosting the safety and not scrimp on the budget if it impacts on safety.

If only Tepco had spent a little bit more on safety, Fukushima would not be a mess as it is now. The costs of the clean-up far outweigh the savings on safety. Not only has Tepco damaged its reputation, but the entire reputation of Japan is also impacted.

 

[ahojunk]

I hope the Fukushima chief is right and I wish him good luck in the clean-up!

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Fukushima Daiichi plant chief confident new disaster won't threaten clean-up
FEB. 12, 2016 - 06:57AM JST

Fukushima chief Akira Ono, center, speaks to reporters during a media tour of TEPCO's tsunami-crippled nuclear power plant in Okuma, on Wednesday.

FUKUSHIMA — The chief of Japan’s shuttered Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant warned Wednesday that the biggest risk the crippled facility faces is another major earthquake and tsunami—though insisted the chaos of nearly five years ago won’t be repeated.

On March 11, 2011, a magnitude 9.0 undersea earthquake off Japan’s northeastern coast sparked a massive tsunami that swamped cooling systems and triggered reactor meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, run by operator Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO).

Radiation spread over a wide area and forced tens of thousands of people from their homes—many of whom will likely never return—in the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl in 1986.

Now with the fifth anniversary of the disaster approaching next month, TEPCO opened up the facility to journalists on Wednesday to provide an update on the clean-up process, which is expected to take decades.

“If a major earthquake hits and then a tsunami comes again, that would be the most tense moment for us,” Akira Ono, head of the plant, told reporters when asked what would be the greatest risk to the plant.

TEPCO has been blamed for a delay in securing power to cool fuel in the reactors that triggered meltdowns and subsequent hydrogen explosions that spewed radiation over the area and forced residents to flee.

“But we will not fall into similar confusion like before,” Ono said, explaining that energy levels at the plant are much lower than those after the accident, while the company has carried out disaster drills to prepare.

He also said the firm had built temporary coastal barriers that can block waves of up to 15 meters, matching levels of the 2011 tsunami.

Some 8,000 workers, ranging from nuclear experts to civil engineers, are still battling daily to control the meltdown-hit reactors as their decommissioning process is still in the initial stage.

Some progress has been made as massive wreckage, including overturned vehicles, were removed and workers are no longer required to wear full-face masks in many areas of the site.

In a newly built rest station inside the facility, workers can have hot meals and check their radiation exposure levels through state-of-art whole-body counters.

But the scar of the catastrophe is still visible in other areas as steel frames gnarled by the hydrogen explosions can be seen at the plant’s No. 3 reactor, where radiation levels are still extremely high.

About 1,000 huge tanks for storing contaminated cooling water occupy large parts of the site.

And more tanks will be needed as massive amounts of groundwater flows into the reactors everyday and mixes with the cooling water.

Ono, the plant chief, says the reactors are now stable but need to be kept cool to prevent them running out of control again.

TEPCO estimates that it is likely to take up to four decades to completely clean up the site, but some experts warn the unprecedented decommissioning may be delayed further.

“I feel like we have just climbed over the first stage of a mountain,” Ono said, using a colloquial Japanese expression meaning that only 10% of the journey is finished.

 

[onebyone]

Trash bags containing radioactive soil, leaves and debris from decontamination are dumped near a hill in Fukushima.Photo: Reuters
Tokuo Hayakawa carries a dosimeter around with him at his 600-year-old temple in Naraha, the first town in the Fukushima “exclusion zone” to fully reopen since Japan’s March 2011 catastrophe. Badges declaring “No to nuclear power” adorn his black Buddhist robe.

Hayakawa is one of the few residents to return to this agricultural town since it beganwelcoming back nuclear refugees five months ago.

The town, at the edge of a 20-kilometer (12.5-mile) evacuation zone around the crippled Fukushima Daiichi plant, was supposed to be a model of reconstruction.

Five years ago, one of the biggest earthquakes in history shook the country’s northeast. The 10-meter (33-foot) tsunami it spawned smashed into the power plant on the Fukushima coastline, triggering a meltdown and forcing nearby towns to evacuate. The disaster killed over 19,000 people across Japan and caused an estimated 16.9 trillion yen ($150 billion) in damages.

Only 440 of Naraha’s pre-disaster population 8,042 have returned — nearly 70 percent of them over 60.

“This region will definitely go extinct,” said the 76-year-old Hayakawa.

He says he can’t grow food because he fears the rice paddies are still contaminated. Large plastic bags filled with radioactive topsoil and detritus dot the abandoned fields.

With few rituals to perform at the temple, Hayakawa devotes his energies to campaigning against nuclear power in Japan. Its 54 reactors supplied over 30 percent of the nation’s energy needs before the disaster.

Today, only three units are back in operation after a long shutdown following the nuclear meltdown in Fukushima. Others are looking to restart.

“I can’t tell my grandson to be my heir,” said Hayakawa, pointing at a photo of his now-teenage grandson entering the temple in a full protective suit after the disaster. “Reviving this town is impossible,” he said. “I came back to see it to its death.”

That is bound to disappoint Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Rebuilding Naraha and other towns in the devastated northeast, he says, is crucial to reviving Japan.

Tokyo pledged 26.3 trillion ($232 billion) over five years to rebuild the disaster area and will allocate another 6 trillion for the next five years.

Vanishing town
Modal Trigger

A 63-year-old local politician who has served the town for 15 years speaks during an interview from her home in Naraha, Fukushima.Photo: Reuters
The town’s future depends on young people returning, residents say. But only 12 below the age of 30 have returned as worries about radiation linger.

Radiation levels in Naraha ranged from 0.07 to 0.49 microsieverts per hour in January, or 0.61-4.3 millisieverts per year. That compares with the government’s goal of 1 millisievert a year and the 3 millisieverts a year the average person in the United States is exposed to annually from natural background radiation.

The significant drop in atmospheric radiation allowed the government to lift the evacuation order last Sept. 5 — “the clock that had been stopped began ticking again,” Japan’s Reconstruction Agency said on its website.

“It is hoped that the reconstruction of Naraha would be a model case for residents returning to fully evacuated towns,” the agency statement said.

Prime Minister Abe visited the town a month after that and repeated one of his favorite slogans: “Without reconstruction of Fukushima, there’s no reconstruction of Japan’s northeast. Without the reconstruction of the northeast, there’s no revival of Japan.”

But with few people coming back, there is little meaning in what the reconstruction department in Naraha does, said one town hall official who requested anonymity. “I don’t know why (Abe) came,” he said.

Back at his Buddhist temple, part of which he has turned into an office for his anti-nuclear campaign, Hayakawa called the idea that Naraha could be a model of reconstruction “a big fat lie.”

“There’s no reconstructing and no returning to how it used to be before (March 11). The government knows this, too. A ‘model case’? That’s just words.”

Fukushima is still a desolate wasteland | New York Post

 

[onebyone]

A member of the media, wearing a protective suit and a mask, looks at the No. 3 reactor building at Tokyo Electric Power Co's (TEPCO) tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan.TORU HANAI/FILES/REUTERS
TECH & SCIENCE


(Reuters) - The robots sent in to find highly radioactive fuel at Fukushima's nuclear reactors have “died”: a subterranean "ice wall" around the crippled plant meant to stop groundwater from becoming contaminated has yet to be finished. And authorities still don’t how to dispose of highly radioactive water stored in an ever mounting number of tanks around the site.

Five years ago, one of the worst earthquakes in history triggered a 10-meter high tsunami that crashed into the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station causing multiple meltdowns. Nearly 19,000 people were killed or left missing and 160,000 lost their homes and livelihoods.

Today, the radiation at the Fukushima plant is still so powerful it has proven impossible to get into its bowels to find and remove the extremely dangerous blobs of melted fuel rods.

Try Newsweek for only $1.25 per week

The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), has made some progress, such as removing hundreds of spent fuel roads in one damaged building. But the technology needed to establish the location of the melted fuel rods in the other three reactors at the plant has not been developed.

“It is extremely difficult to access the inside of the nuclear plant," Naohiro Masuda, Tepco's head of decommissioning said in an interview. "The biggest obstacle is the radiation.”

The fuel rods melted through their containment vessels in the reactors, and no one knows exactly where they are now. This part of the plant is so dangerous to humans, Tepco has been developing robots, which can swim under water and negotiate obstacles in damaged tunnels and piping to search for the melted fuel rods.

But as soon as they get close to the reactors, the radiation destroys their wiring and renders them useless, causing long delays, Masuda said.

Each robot has to be custom-built for each building. “It takes two years to develop a single-function robot,” Masuda said.

IRRADIATED WATER

Tepco, which was fiercely criticized for its handling of the disaster, says conditions at the Fukushima power station, site of the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in Ukraine 30 years ago, have improved dramatically. Radiation levels in many places at the site are now as low as those in Tokyo.

More than 8,000 workers are at the plant at any one time, according to officials on a recent tour. Traffic is constant as they spread across the site, removing debris, building storage tanks, laying piping and preparing to dismantle parts of the plant.

Much of the work involves pumping a steady torrent of water into the wrecked and highly radiated reactors to cool them down. Afterward, the radiated water is then pumped out of the plant and stored in tanks that are proliferating around the site.

What to do with the nearly million tonnes of radioactive water is one of the biggest challenges, said Akiro Ono, the site manager. Ono said he is “deeply worried” the storage tanks will leak radioactive water in the sea - as they have done several times before - prompting strong criticism for the government.

The utility has so far failed to get the backing of local fishermen to release water it has treated into the ocean.

Ono estimates that Tepco has completed around 10 percent of the work to clear the site up - the decommissioning process could take 30 to 40 years. But until the company locates the fuel, it won’t be able to assess progress and final costs, experts say.

The much touted use of X-ray like muon rays has yielded little information about the location of the melted fuel and the last robot inserted into one of the reactors sent only grainy images before breaking down.

ICE WALL

Tepco is building the world’s biggest ice wall to keep groundwater from flowing into the basements of the damaged reactors and getting contaminated.

First suggested in 2013 and strongly backed by the government, the wall was completed in February, after months of delays and questions surrounding its effectiveness. Later this year, Tepco plans to pump water into the wall - which looks a bit like the piping behind a refrigerator - to start the freezing process.

Stopping the ground water intrusion into the plant is critical, said Artie Gunderson, a former nuclear engineer.

“The reactors continue to bleed radiation into the ground water and thence into the Pacific Ocean,” Gunderson said. "When Tepco finally stops the groundwater, that will be the end of the beginning.”

While he would not rule out the possibility that small amounts of radiation are reaching the ocean, Masuda, the head of decommissioning, said the leaks have ended after the company built a wall along the shoreline near the reactors whose depth goes to below the seabed.

“I am not about to say that it is absolutely zero, but because of this wall the amount of release has dramatically dropped,” he said.
http://www.newsweek.com/robots-sent-fukushima-have-died-435332

 

[onebyone]

Robots Are the Future of Fukushima
Robot that monitors Fukushima reactor no. 1.

Source: Hitachi Ltd.

• 
  
  • Stricken prefecture sees revitalization on `Innovation Coast'
  • Local government hopes to foster renewable energy industry

Japan is spending more than $1 billion to relaunch the area around the wrecked Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant as the country’s “Innovation Coast.”

The region is trying to capitalize on technology developed in the five years spent cleaning up the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl, including Hitachi Ltd. and Toshiba Corp. robots that slither like snakes or cruise through radioactive water like speed boats to investigate the flooded reactors. Japan’s Fukushima prefecture -- like Beirut or post-bankruptcy Detroit -- is ripe to develop a strong tech community, according to Samhir Vasdev, an innovation consultant at the World Bank.

“To lead the future from Fukushima, we must overcome our failures,” Fukushima Governor Masao Uchibori said at the Foreign Press Center in Tokyo last month. “Creating new industries will attract new people, which will be vital to revitalizing the region.”

Public and private investment in “Innovation Coast” projects has topped 150 billion yen ($1.3 billion), according to data compiled by federal and local governments. The March 2011 nuclear accident and its fallout is estimated to ultimately cost 11 trillion yen.

The local government plans to invest nearly 200 billion yen over the year to March 2017 to revamp old industries and promote new ones. Japan is working with Germany and Denmark to collaborate on renewable energy and aims to to attract talent with cutting-edge facilities for research in robotics, nuclear safety and radiation medical science.

And in order to foster an interest in robotics among the younger generation, Fukushima’s government is promoting “Robot Festa,” a trade show of the latest toys next to the machines being used to work inside the ruined reactors.

The need to work at Fukushima site -- an environment still lethal to humans -- has proved a catalyst to attract funding and robot development in Japan, said Keiji Nagatani, a professor of robotics at Tohoku University whose robots were among the first to enter the wrecked buildings.

Struggling Robots

Much more will need to be invested in robots for the cleanup, according to Barry Lennox, a professor at the University of Manchester, who’s part of a group developing a submersible robot that will be able to operate inside the reactor.

“The very latest robots struggle with what might seem basic tasks -- walking up to a door, possibly over rubble, opening the door and walking through it,” he said by e-mail. “Research must be completed to design robots that can adapt to their surroundings.”

With the goal of being powered 100 percent by renewables by 2040, Fukushima has moved away from nuclear and carbon-emitting energy. Since the meltdown, the prefecture has become host to the world’s biggest offshore wind turbine. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced plans for the prefecture to produce hydrogen fuel cells to power 10,000 vehicles a year in time for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.

Homegrown Tech

Tokyo-based companies have accounted for most of the more than two dozen robots that have plumbed the depths of Fukushima’s reactor buildings. With work on the nuclear facility expected to drag on after federal reconstruction aid runs out in 2021, the local government is trying to spur homegrown robot development.

“We are concerned about what happens after federal funding ends in five years, because when it comes to a nuclear power plant disaster, it isn’t solved that quickly,” Uchibori, the prefecture’s governor, told reporters at the Tokyo briefing.

The success of Fukushima’s efforts may ultimately depend on whether people can be enticed to the area. About 7 percent of Fukushima prefecture remains uninhabitable because of radiation still leaking from Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s reactor. About 100,000 people have left the prefecture since March 2011 -- the biggest decline for any region since the massive earthquake and tsunami.

If Fukushima can attract talent, then it has a good shot at becoming a tech hub, Satoshi Tadokoro, a professor at the International Research Institute of Disaster Sciences in Tohoku University, said by e-mail.

“If not, they cannot be, even if heavily funded,” he said.

Robots Are the Future of Fukushima - Bloomberg Business

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Face of Fukushima Slams Japan's Nuclear Stance

The passing of five years shows as vegetation and the elements begin to take their toll on homes and businesses inside the deserted exclusion zone close to the devastated Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
Photographer: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

• 
  
  • Former Japanese government spokesman Edano speaks in interview
  • Edano has deep reservations over Abe's restart policy

In his trademark blue jumpsuit, the bleary-eyed chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano became the government’s face of the Fukushima nuclear crisis as he faced the press every few hours. Five years later, he has stern words for Japan’s atomic watchdog, the plant’s operator and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s nuclear restart policy.

Edano, secretary general of the now-opposition Democratic Party of Japan, refutes claims by the current administration that the Nuclear Regulation Authority is imposing the world’s most stringent safety standards in the earthquake-prone nation.

Yukio Edano Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg

“The government’s explanation is mistaken,” the 51-year-old said in an interview last week at his Tokyo office. “The regulations have not won international recognition as the world’s toughest.”

The NRA was set up in 2012by Edano’s party to replace a predecessor criticized for ignoring warnings before the Fukushima disaster and having cozy ties with operators. The NRA judges whether facilities meet safety guidelines for restart, and is viewed by the International Atomic Energy Agency as demonstrating independence and transparency.

The regulatory body regards its regulation as “one of the most stringent standards in the world,” and from time to time, has been inaccurately quoted and criticized as if we were saying it was "the most," NRA spokesman Go Kobayashi said in an e-mail.

Edano’s comments come just weeks after three former executives of plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. were indicted for professional negligence over the disaster, which prosecutors say led to the death of more than 40 people during the evacuation. The indictments are the first time a court will examine whether the failure to prevent the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl constituted a crime.

Tepco Admission

Last month, Tepco said that it knew of meltdowns at the Fukushima reactors in the days after the March 11, 2011 disaster -- something it refused to acknowledge for about two months after the accident, triggering speculation about a cover-up.

Edano said that on March 14 -- three days later -- he thought the possibility of a meltdown was very high. “While we amateurs took action based on that hypothesis, Tepco -- who are supposed to be the professionals -- kept on saying ‘things are not yet clear,’” he said. "It was we amateurs who were right."

Edano speaks at a news conference in March 2011
Photographer: Haruyoshi Yamaguchi/Bloomberg

Regarding Tepco’s announcement that it was aware of the meltdown, Edano said it was better to be late than “continuing to hide” this information. “It’s a problem if Tepco doesn’t take responsibility like it should.”

Tepco spokesman Yukako Handa said by e-mail that the company will investigate the sequence of events and causes of why it couldn’t declare the nuclear core meltdown.

Work Ethic

Edano was born in Tochigi Prefecture, which borders Fukushima; his alma mater is the University of Tohoku in Sendai, a coastal city devastated by the tsunami. His role during the crisis was a combination of deputy prime minister and chief of staff, holding an average of five televised briefings a day in the weeks after the 9.0 earthquake and enormous tsunami hit northeastern Japan.

Getting about two hours sleep a night, he patiently provided details on radiation levels, evacuation orders, power rationing and recovery efforts. He was praised on social media for his work ethic, with some pleading with him to get more sleep.

Restart Goal

The Abe administration goal is to have nuclear power make up as much as 22 percent of the nation’s energy needs by 2030. A total of about 30 to 33 reactors of Japan’s operable 43 reactors will have to be restarted to meet the target, according to Syusaku Nishikawa, a Tokyo-based analyst at Daiwa Securities Co.

While four reactors have restarted so far under post-Fukushima safety rules, one had to be shut down days after it resumed operation in February stemming from issues that still haven’t been resolved. Additionally, Hokuriku Electric Power Co.’s Shika No. 1 nuclear reactor was found to be located over an active fault, according to a report released earlier this month from an NRA panel of researchers.

Edano said he had deep reservations about the government’s restart plan.

“As things stand I strongly question whether evacuation plans can be said to be sufficient,” he said. “The government isn’t getting involved, the government isn’t taking responsibility.”

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters in Tokyo on Tuesday that Edano’s criticism of the plan was “way off the mark.” He said that safety was the top priority and there were no problems whatsoever with the evacuation plan.

A Kyodo News survey over the weekend showed that about two-thirds of local government leaders across Japan wanted the government to reduce its reliance on nuclear power, or scrap it completely.

Burden of Duty

Still, Edano said he felt it was his duty to serve the public at time of crisis, giving press conferences even when he had no new information to provide. He continues to feel that burden.

“Even though five years have passed, people are still living in temporary housing, and many are living a long way from the hometowns they want to return to,” he said. “Even though we are now in opposition, I always feel a heavy responsibility as part of the administration at the time.”

Asked whether he had kept any of the jumpsuits, Edano said: “They are government property. I can’t even take one as souvenir.”

Face of Fukushima Slams Japan's Nuclear Stance - Bloomberg Business

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Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Q&A: 5 Years Down, 40 More to Go

• 
  
  • Tepco continues search for melted fuel at bottom of reactors
  • Once fuel is located, development of removal system begins

Five years after the triple meltdown at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant north of Tokyo, decommissioning and cleanup continue. The following is a short question and answer on the situation at the site of the worst atomic disaster since Chernobyl.

What is the current state?

Tepco, as the utility is known, continues to search for the fuel that melted through the bottom of the three reactor chambers after the March 11, 2011, earthquake and tsunami knocked out the facility’s cooling system. Due to the dangerously high radiation levels in the reactor buildings, humans can’t enter. While the company has used cosmic ray photographs and computer models to estimate the approximate location, advanced robots must be used to find it.

Water management is another pressing issue. About 150 metric tons of water -- less than the amount of water in one lane of an Olympic-sized swimming pool -- flow into the reactor building daily from the nearby hills. The water mixes with the melted fuel, becomes contaminated and is pumped into tanks on the site. Tepco will begin operating a frozen soil barrier surrounding the wrecked buildings to keep out water after the Nuclear Regulation Authority endorsed its plan last week.

How do they get the melted fuel out?

Once robots developed by Hitachi Ltd. and Toshiba Corp. locate the melted fuel, planning can begin to remove it. Leading the development of the removal system is the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, a group of 18 Japanese companies and organizations formed in 2013 to support Fukushima’s decommissioning.

Depending on the location of the melted fuel, a robotic arm and crane system could retrieve the melted fuel debris through the roof of the reactor or through the side, according to Hirofumi Kinoshita, chief project manager for Hitachi’s Fukushima nuclear business department.

This approach would be drastically different than what was done at Chernobyl, which was buried in a concrete sarcophagus with no attempt to remove the fuel.

How much will the Fukushima disaster cost?
The nuclear accident and its fallout will ultimately cost more than 11 trillion yen ($97.3 billion), according to a study by Japanese college professors including Kenichi Oshima, a professor of economics at Ritsumeikan University.

Tepco has spent 444.2 billion yen decommissioning reactors 1 to 4 as of December, according to company spokeswoman Yukako Handa. Water management and reactor stabilization will cost more than 1 trillion yen in the 10-year period ending March 2025, according to Tepco.

What happens next?

Tepco will remove used fuel rods -- which are separate from the melted fuel -- that remain in containment pools of water in the top floors of reactors No. 1, 2 and 3 where they were stored before the accident. Tepco will begin removing the spent rods in the No. 3 reactor within about two years with a robotic claw system. Removal in the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors won’t begin until 2020 at the earliest.

The entire decommissioning process, including finding and removing the melted fuel at the bottom of the reactors, will take another 30 years to 40 years, according to Tepco.

What has changed?

A new nuclear regulatory body, known as the Nuclear Regulation Authority, was established in 2012 to replace a predecessor criticized for ignoring warnings before the Fukushima disaster and having cozy ties with operators. The NRA judges whether facilities meet safety guidelines for restart.

All of Japan’s nuclear reactors were eventually shut for safety checks following the Fukushima disaster. While four of the nation’s 43 operable reactors have restarted so far under post-Fukushima safety rules, a local court has subsequently issued an injunction preventing two of the recently restarted reactors from operating because of safety concerns.

The government still sees nuclear energy playing an important part in its energy mix and has set a target for atomic energy to make up a quarter of its electricity supply by 2030.

Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Q&A: 5 Years Down, 40 More to Go - Bloomberg Business

 

[onebyone]

Source: Reuters - Fri, 11 Mar 2016 03:02 GMT
Author: Reuters


A Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) employee, wearing a protective suit and a mask, walks in front of the No. 1 reactor building at TEPCO's tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan February 10, 2016. REUTERS/Toru Hanai





By Aaron Sheldrick and Minami Funakoshi

March 10 (Reuters) - The robots sent in to find highly radioactive fuel at Fukushima's nuclear reactors have "died"; a subterranean "ice wall" around the crippled plant meant to stop groundwater from becoming contaminated has yet to be finished. And authorities still don't know how to dispose of highly radioactive water stored in an ever mounting number of tanks around the site.

Five years ago, one of the worst earthquakes in history triggered a 10-metre high tsunami that crashed into the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station causing multiple meltdowns. Nearly 19,000 people were killed or left missing and 160,000 lost their homes and livelihoods.

Today, the radiation at the Fukushima plant is still so powerful it has proven impossible to get into its bowels to find and remove the extremely dangerous blobs of melted fuel rods.

The plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) , has made some progress, such as removing hundreds of spent fuel roads in one damaged building. But the technology needed to establish the location of the melted fuel rods in the other three reactors at the plant has not been developed.

"It is extremely difficult to access the inside of the nuclear plant," Naohiro Masuda, Tepco's head of decommissioning said in an interview. "The biggest obstacle is the radiation."

The fuel rods melted through their containment vessels in the reactors, and no one knows exactly where they are now. This part of the plant is so dangerous to humans, Tepco has been developing robots, which can swim under water and negotiate obstacles in damaged tunnels and piping to search for the melted fuel rods.

But as soon as they get close to the reactors, the radiation destroys their wiring and renders them useless, causing long delays, Masuda said.

Each robot has to be custom-built for each building."It takes two years to develop a single-function robot," Masuda said.

IRRADIATED WATER

Tepco, which was fiercely criticised for its handling of the disaster, says conditions at the Fukushima power station, site of the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in Ukraine 30 years ago, have improved dramatically. Radiation levels in many places at the site are now as low as those in Tokyo.

More than 8,000 workers are at the plant at any one time, according to officials on a recent tour. Traffic is constant as they spread across the site, removing debris, building storage tanks, laying piping and preparing to dismantle parts of the plant.

Much of the work involves pumping a steady torrent of water into the wrecked and highly radiated reactors to cool them down. Afterward, the radiated water is then pumped out of the plant and stored in tanks that are proliferating around the site.

What to do with the nearly million tonnes of radioactive water is one of the biggest challenges, said Akira Ono, the site manager. Ono said he is "deeply worried" the storage tanks will leak radioactive water in the sea - as they have done several times before - prompting strong criticism for the government.

The utility has so far failed to get the backing of local fishermen to release water it has treated into the ocean.

Ono estimates that Tepco has completed around 10 percent of the work to clear the site up - the decommissioning process could take 30 to 40 years. But until the company locates the fuel, it won't be able to assess progress and final costs, experts say.

The much touted use of X-ray like muon rays has yielded little information about the location of the melted fuel and the last robot inserted into one of the reactors sent only grainy images before breaking down.

ICE WALL

Tepco is building the world's biggest ice wall to keep groundwater from flowing into the basements of the damaged reactors and getting contaminated.

First suggested in 2013 and strongly backed by the government, the wall was completed in February, after months of delays and questions surrounding its effectiveness. Later this year, Tepco plans to pump water into the wall - which looks a bit like the piping behind a refrigerator - to start the freezing process.

Stopping the ground water intrusion into the plant is critical, said Arnie Gundersen, a former nuclear engineer.

"The reactors continue to bleed radiation into the ground water and thence into the Pacific Ocean," Gundersen said. "When Tepco finally stops the groundwater, that will be the end of the beginning."

While he would not rule out the possibility that small amounts of radiation are reaching the ocean, Masuda, the head of decommissioning, said the leaks have ended after the company built a wall along the shoreline near the reactors whose depth goes to below the seabed.

"I am not about to say that it is absolutely zero, but because of this wall the amount of release has dramatically dropped," he said.

(Reporting by Aaron Sheldrick and Minami Funakoshi Editing by Bill Tarran


Fukushima's ground zero: No place for man or robot

 

[HttpError]

I was reading somewhere this incident has caused $100 billion of lose, many countries are abandoning their nuclear reactors and turning to green energy, I think we all should look that way, nuclear energy is very costly and has tremendous negative impacts.

 

[muhammadali233]

I was reading somewhere this incident has caused $100 billion of lose, many countries are abandoning their nuclear reactors and turning to green energy, I think we all should look that way, nuclear energy is very costly and has tremendous negative impacts.

apart from natural mishaps and toxic waste,it is the greenist as it ever gets no fumes not contributing to global warming so it a good alternative but is risky

 

[xunzi]

I was reading somewhere this incident has caused $100 billion of lose, many countries are abandoning their nuclear reactors and turning to green energy, I think we all should look that way, nuclear energy is very costly and has tremendous negative impacts.

Green energy sounds good on paper but if you are trying to industrialize and develop, you can never rely on renewable energy alone. Beside the positive outweigh the negative aspect of nuclear energy. Think of the break off of nuclear energy. It is a lot more advance and safer now than the one happened in Fukushima which used old design.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

I was reading somewhere this incident has caused $100 billion of lose, many countries are abandoning their nuclear reactors and turning to green energy, I think we all should look that way, nuclear energy is very costly and has tremendous negative impacts.

The US built many nuclear power plants until this happened in 1979:
Three Mile Island accident - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

New plants have been a rarity since...waiting for fusion.

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

The Japanese Tsunami perhaps would be the greatest Natural Disaster I would see in my life time

Earth quake and then a tsunami followed by a Nuclear disaster

Just imagine what kind of damage is being done at Sea life contaminated for 30-70 years

Still the tragic events that day remain engraved in memory the loss of life it was a very tragic day

 

[ahojunk]

There are hidden costs with nuclear power.
One is nuclear accidents such as Fukushima and another one is spent fuel disposal.
If countries have not learnt from Chernobyl, let's hope they will learn from Fukushima.
Make the damn thing as safe as possible, or don't use it.

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Woman breaks silence among Fukushima thyroid cancer patients
By YURI KAGEYAMA
June 7, 2016 3:43 AM

KORIYAMA, Japan (AP) — She's 21, has thyroid cancer, and wants people in her prefecture in northeastern Japan to get screened for it. That statement might not seem provocative, but her prefecture is Fukushima, and of the 173 young people with confirmed or suspected cases since the 2011 nuclear meltdowns there, she is the first to speak out.

That near-silence highlights the fear Fukushima thyroid-cancer patients have about being the "nail that sticks out," and thus gets hammered.

The thyroid-cancer rate in the northern Japanese prefecture is many times higher than what is generally found, particularly among children, but the Japanese government says more cases are popping up because of rigorous screening, not the radiation that spewed from Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant.

To be seen as challenging that view carries consequences in this rigidly harmony-oriented society. Even just having cancer that might be related to radiation carries a stigma in the only country to be hit with atomic bombs.

"There aren't many people like me who will openly speak out," said the young woman, who requested anonymity because of fears about harassment. "That's why I'm speaking out so others can feel the same. I can speak out because I'm the kind of person who believes things will be OK."

She has a quick disarming smile and silky black hair. She wears flip-flops. She speaks passionately about her new job as a nursery school teacher. But she also has deep fears: Will she be able to get married? Will her children be healthy?

She suffers from the only disease that the medical community, including the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation, has acknowledged is clearly related to the radioactive iodine that spewed into the surrounding areas after the only nuclear disaster worse than Fukushima's, the 1986 explosion and fire at Chernobyl, Ukraine.

Though international reviews of Fukushima have predicted that cancer rates will not rise as a result of the meltdowns there, some researchers believe the prefecture's high thyroid-cancer rate is related to the accident.

The government has ordered medical testing of the 380,000 people who were 18 years or under and in Fukushima prefecture at the time of the March 2011 tsunami and quake that sank three reactors into meltdowns. About 38 percent have yet to be screened, and the number is a whopping 75 percent for those who are now between the ages of 18 and 21.

The young woman said she came forward because she wants to help other patients, especially children, who may be afraid and confused. She doesn't know whether her sickness was caused by the nuclear accident, but plans to get checked for other possible sicknesses, such as uterine cancer, just to be safe.

"I want everyone, all the children, to go to the hospital and get screened. They think it's too much trouble, and there are no risks, and they don't go," the woman said in a recent interview in Fukushima. "My cancer was detected early, and I learned that was important."

Thyroid cancer is among the most curable cancers, though some patients need medication for the rest of their lives, and all need regular checkups.

The young woman had one cancerous thyroid removed, and does not need medication except for painkillers. But she has become prone to hormonal imbalance and gets tired more easily. She used to be a star athlete, and snowboarding remains a hobby.

A barely discernible tiny scar is on her neck, like a pale kiss mark or scratch. She was hospitalized for nearly two weeks, but she was itching to get out. It really hurt then, but there is no pain now, she said with a smile.

"My ability to bounce right back is my trademark," she said. "I'm always able to keep going."

She was mainly worried about her parents, especially her mother, who cried when she found out her daughter had cancer. Her two older siblings also were screened but were fine.

Many Japanese have deep fears about genetic abnormalities caused by radiation. Many, especially older people, assume all cancers are fatal, and even the young woman did herself until her doctors explained her sickness to her.

The young woman said her former boyfriend's family had expressed reservations about their relationship because of her sickness. She has a new boyfriend now, a member of Japan's military, and he understands about her sickness, she said happily.

A support group for thyroid cancer patients was set up earlier this year. The group, which includes lawyers and medical doctors, has refused all media requests for interviews with the handful of families that have joined, saying that kind of attention may be dangerous.

When the group held a news conference in Tokyo in March, it connected by live video feed with two fathers with children with thyroid cancer, but their faces were not shown, to disguise their identities. They criticized the treatment their children received and said they're not certain the government is right in saying the cancer and the nuclear meltdowns are unrelated.

Hiroyuki Kawai, a lawyer who also advises the group, believes patients should file Japan's equivalent of a class-action lawsuit, demanding compensation, but he acknowledged more time will be needed for any legal action.

"The patients are divided. They need to unite, and they need to talk with each other," he told AP in a recent interview.

The committee of doctors and other experts carrying out the screening of youngsters in Fukushima for thyroid cancer periodically update the numbers of cases found, and they have been steadily climbing.

In a news conference this week, they stuck to the view the cases weren't related to radiation. Most disturbing was a cancer found in a child who was just 5 years old in 2011, the youngest case found so far. But the experts brushed it off, saying one wasn't a significant number.

"It is hard to think there is any relationship," with radiation, said Hokuto Hoshi, a medical doctor who heads the committee.

Shinsyuu Hida, a photographer from Fukushima and an adviser to the patients' group, said fears are great not only about speaking out but also about cancer and radiation.

He said that when a little girl who lives in Fukushima once asked him if she would ever be able to get married, because of the stigma attached to radiation, he was lost for an answer and wept afterward.

"They feel alone. They can't even tell their relatives," Hida said of the patients. "They feel they can't tell anyone. They felt they were not allowed to ask questions."

The woman who spoke to AP also expressed her views on video for a film in the works by independent American filmmaker Ian Thomas Ash.

She counts herself lucky. About 18,000 people were killed in the tsunami, and many more lost their homes to the natural disaster and the subsequent nuclear accident, but her family's home was unscathed.

When asked how she feels about nuclear power, she replied quietly that Japan doesn't need nuclear plants. Without them, she added, maybe she would not have gotten sick.

___

Ash's video interview:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpmdZYCRIZfvTtTE1sbY3ynaGsfDYmNWn

___

Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at https://twitter.com/yurikageyama

Her work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/content/yuri-kageyama

 

[AndrewJin]

Though thyroid cancer is the most curable one, it is still cancer and subsequent hormone abnormality will have a huge impact on patients after surgical removal. Hard day for Japanese, hope they can recover soon. And the Japanese government should be shamed of itself.

 

[ahojunk]

My concern is the Abe government is sweeping the safety issues under the carpet. It's rather reckless in restarting the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima prefecture which is in the Kumamoto quake zone.

I understand this has impact on Japan's electricity power supply, but this is a case of politics over economics and safety. It may end up costing Japan more.

Following the recent Kumamoto earthquake, Kyushu Electric Power Co. said it found no abnormalities in its Sendai nuclear plant but said it is further looking into any possible damage.

Shikoku Electric Power Co. said its Ikata nuclear plant, which is currently idled, sustained no damage from the Kumamoto earthquake.

Prior to the Fukushima tsunami/earthquake, TEPCO was touting its nuclear plant safety record. Nuclear power proponents in other parts of the world were constantly harping on the safety record in Japan too, lol.

I don't have an issue with nuclear power generation, just make sure they are situated in an earthquake free zone and upgrade the technology and make it super safe before commissioning.