Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) - May 16, 2012
1. Purpose of Soundness Inspection
In response to the concern that Unit 4 spent fuel pool may collapse,
we have provided the explanations below to prove its soundness.
We will continue our regular inspection 4 times a year to ensure
soundness until the fuel is removed.
submitted by Samuel Bendett
bloomberg.com - by Jared Diamond - April 25, 2012
Japan’s economic problems are serious and getting worse. Foremost among them is the crushing burden of government debt.
Japan’s ratio of government debt to gross domestic product, currently about 2.28, is by far the highest in the industrial world, almost double that of even Greece and Italy, and steadily growing. Already, the combined costs of interest on that debt and social security are approximately equal to total government tax revenue.
yomiuri.co.jp - March 28, 2012
The water level in the containment vessel of the No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is only about 60 centimeters deep, far shallower than previously assumed levels of about four meters, according to Tokyo Electric Power Co.
The lower-than-expected water level was discovered for the first time when the power utility used an industrial endoscope to check the crippled reactor's interior on Monday, TEPCO said.
According to some experts, it is possible that nuclear fuel that melted through the reactor's pressure vessel and accumulated on the bottom of the containment vessel in the aftermath of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami may not be completely covered in the water.
TEPCO said the water temperature in the vessel remained relatively low within a range of 48.5 C to 50 C. The discovery of the unexpectedly shallow water level will not affect TEPCO's judgment that the reactor is in a state of "cold shutdown."
submitted by Samuel Bendett
Homeland Security News Wire - March 13, 2012
Before 11 March 2011, Japan was held up as a paragon for preparedness; they had a national readiness plan, regular disaster drills, and strong civic engagement; the Fukushima disaster exposed a disturbing reality: search and rescue efforts were delayed, shelters ill-equipped, and supply chains broken; worst of all, there was confusion about who was managing the nuclear accident — the power company TEPCO or the Japanese government; information, when forthcoming, was sometimes contradictory
Sunday marked the 1-year anniversary of the Fukushima disaster, and experts at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University took stock of disaster response, nuclear fears, and lessons learned.
Before 11 March 2011, Japan was held up as a paragon for preparedness. They had a national readiness plan, regular disaster drills, and strong civic engagement. In the face of an unprecedented 9.0 earthquake, massive tsunami, and a nuclear accident at the Fukushima-Daiichi power plant, however, the country experienced a host of challenges — many that continue to be felt.
submitted by Samuel Bendett
Homeland Security News Wire - March 12, 2012
A year after the Fukushima disaster all but two of Japan’s fifty-four nuclear reactors remain shut down, in a country where nuclear power once supplied nearly 30 percent of the electricity; the Japanese government is awarding an initial $13 billion in contracts to begin decontamination and rehabilitation of the more than 8,000-square-mile region most exposed to radioactive fallout
A year after the crisis at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, scientists and engineers remain largely in the dark when it comes to fundamental knowledge about how nuclear fuels behave under extreme conditions, according to a University of Michigan nuclear waste expert and his colleagues.
In a review article in this week’s edition of the journal Science, U-M’s Rodney Ewing and two colleagues call for an ambitious, long-term national research program to study how nuclear fuels behave under the extreme conditions present during core-melt events like those that occurred at Fukushima following the 11 March, 2011, magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami.
A woman prays in front of a relative's grave, who was killed during last year's earthquake and tsunami, in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, on Saturday.
msnbc.com - March 10, 2012
With a minute of silence, tolling bells and prayers, Japan will on Sunday mark the first anniversary of an earthquake and tsunami that killed thousands and set off a nuclear crisis that shattered public trust in atomic power and the nation's leaders.
A year after the magnitude 9 earthquake unleashed a wall of water that hit Japan's northeastern coast, killing nearly 16,000 and leaving nearly 3,300 unaccounted for, the country is still grappling with the human, economic and political costs.
Local spinach on sale at a farmers cooperative in Nihonmatsu, Fukushima prefecture, where many still shun regional produce, March 7, 2012.
submitted by Samuel Bendett
voanews.com - by Steve Herman - March 9, 2012
Scientists from the former Soviet Union have arrived in Japan's Fukushima prefecture to advise locals on farmland decontamination.
One of Japan's most valued agricultural regions, the area was irradiated when three nuclear power plant reactors melted down in the wake of last year's earthquake and tsunami on the country's northeastern coast.
According to Japanese officials, 81,000 hectares of farmland are contaminated at a level above 5,000 becquerels per kilogram, the limit at which rice, by government decrees, cannot be planted.
submitted by Luis Kun
by Steven Cherry - spectrum.ieee.org - March 6, 2012
On the somber first anniversary, Japan still has a lot of work ahead.
This is part of IEEE Spectrum's ongoing coverage of Japan's earthquake and nuclear emergency. For more details on how Fukushima Dai-1's nuclear reactors work and what has gone wrong so far, see our explainer and our timeline.
Steven Cherry: Hi, this is Steven Cherry for IEEE Spectrum’s “Techwise Conversations.”
submitted by Robert G. Ross
Center for Biosecurity of UPMC
MARCH 7, 2012—Baltimore, MD—In a report released today, researchers at the Center for Biosecurity of UPMC assess offsite policies and plans that can be put in place to reduce the exposure of the public to radiation in the event of a nuclear power plant accident.
Even amidst the devastation following the earthquake and tsunami in Japan last year that killed more than 20,000 people, it was the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that led the country’s Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, to fear for “the very existence of the Japanese nation.”
While such low-probability, high-consequence releases have been rare in the history of existing nuclear power plants, the growing number of plants worldwide increases the likelihood that such releases will occur in the future. Accidents far smaller in scale than the one in Fukushima could have major societal consequences.
submitted by Samuel Bendett
submitted by Samuel Bendett
How do you keep a town together when it's no longer habitable? A year after a tsunami crippled the Fukushima nuclear power plant, evacuees from nearby Namie are struggling to do just that. The Wall Street Journal - by Yuka Hayashi - March 2, 2012
Tokai No2 Power Station
by Lucas W. Hixson - enformable.com - February 29, 2012
At 7:30 am local time March 1st, a magnitude 5 earthquake hit 68 miles from TOKYO, Japan. After the earthquake, alarms sounded from the nuclear fuel processing plants and Tokai 2 nuclear power plant in Tokai-mura, Ibaraki Prefecture.
The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety announced that so far, the damage has not been confirmed in any of the facilities. The alarm in the reprocessing facility was located within the building housing nuclear waste.
The alarms at the plant were reported to have stemmed from sensors in the reactor pool that measure the movement of water from earthquakes.
First, there is great value in a systems approach as a heuristic for understanding interlocked social-ecological-technological processes, and in analysis across multiple scales. Yet we need to move beyond both systems as portrayed in resilience thinking, and the focus on actors in work on vulnerability, to analyse networks and relationships, as well as to attend to the diverse framings, narratives, imaginations and discourses that different actors bring to bear.
For More:
http://resilienturbanism.tumblr.com/post/7573475902/reframing-resilience
There are many definitions of resilience from simple deterministic views of resilience anchored in Newtonian mechanics to far more dynamic views of resilience from a systems perspective, including insights from quantum mechanics and the sciences of complexity. One baseline perspective of resilience sees it in terms of the viability of socio-ecological systems as the foundation for sustainability. For those that are ready to look beyond resilience as the ability to return to the "normal state" before a disaster, take a look at:
Press Conference - Former Fukushima Plant Worker
(Raw video from inside the Fukushima plant near the end of the video.)
submitted by Linton Wells
Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS)
Reactors Monitor - (Click on image)
by Mitsuru Obe and Tom Fowler - The Wall Street Journal November 30, 2011
TOKYO—Japan's tsunami-stricken nuclear-power complex came closer to a catastrophic meltdown than previously indicated by its operator—who on Wednesday described how one reactor's molten nuclear core likely burned through its primary containment chamber and then ate as far as three-quarters of the way through the concrete in a secondary vessel.
The assessment—offered by Japan's government and Tokyo Electric Power Co., the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex—marked Japan's most sobering reckoning to date of the nuclear disaster sparked by the country's March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
Sunday, Nov 13, 2011
The public and private sectors signed a joint statement of intent at Apec to strengthen regional disaster risk reduction and resilience, following US Secretary of State's High-Level Policy Dialogue on Disaster Resiliency yesterday.
The Asia-Pacific Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilient Collaboration joint statement, which was signed by nine organisations at the Sheraton Waikiki, intends to use public private partnership as means to help save lives, ensure economic vitality, and enhance human well-being across the region.
The members also urged more organisations from Apec members to get on-board with their effort to reduce disaster risks and increase resilience in the the Asia-Pacific region.
The IAEA has received new information regarding the detection of xenon-133 and xenon-135 gases on 1 November inside the Primary Containment Vessel (PCV) of Fukushima Daiichi Unit 2.
Based on further analysis, Japanese authorities have concluded that the xenon concentrations are not due to a criticality event but rather from the spontaneous fission of curium-242 and 244. (Spontaneous fission is a form of radioactive decay that does not involve chain reactions and is characteristic of very heavy isotopes. Spontaneous fission occurs in low levels in all nuclear reactors.)
This conclusion is based on three key factors outlined and discussed in the report:
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
By KAZUAKI NAGATA and MIZUHO AOKI - The Japan Times - November 3, 2011
Tepco claims level in gas too small to affect shutdown effort
Although the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said there have been no drastic changes in the reactor's temperature and pressure level, and the reactor itself is stable overall, the discovery may mean the goal of Tepco and the government to achieve cold shutdown of all three crippled reactors by the end of the year may not be possible.
Nov. 02, 2011 - 03:00PM JST ( 38 ) TOKYO — The operator of Japan’s tsunami-crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant said Wednesday it feared nuclear fission had resumed inside one of the reactors. Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said it had begun injecting water and boric acid into No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, which began leaking radiation after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. “We cannot rule out the possibility of a small nuclear fission reaction,” TEPCO spokesman Hiroki Kawamata said, adding that the injection was a precautionary measure. He said there was no fresh danger at the plant, as the reactor’s temperature and pressure, as well as radiation levels at monitoring posts, showed no substantial changes. Fission is the process by which an operating nuclear reactor produces power. The reactor automatically shut down in the wake of the disaster but nuclear fuel is believed to have melted through its container onto the bottom of the outer vessel when the tsunami knocked out the plant’s cooling systems. The injection was ordered after preliminary analysis of gas samples from the reactor building showed the possible presence of xenon 133 and xenon 135, byproducts of a nuclear reaction. The two substances have short half-lives—five days for xenon 133 and just nine hours for xenon 135—indicating that any nuclear fission was a recent phenomenon.
by Eric Talmadge - Associated Press (AP) - msnbc.com - November 1, 2011
An aerial photo taken by a small unmanned drone and released by AIR PHOTO SERVICE, damaged Unit 3, left, and Unit 4 of the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant are seen in Okuma, Fukushima prefecture, northeastern Japan on March 24, 2011. (AP / AIR PHOTO SERVICE)
Gas from inside the reactor indicated the presence of radioactive xenon, which could be the byproduct of unexpected nuclear fission. Boric acid was being injected through a cooling pipe as a countermeasure because it can counteract nuclear reactions.
Emerging insights from adaptive and community-based resource management suggest that building resilience into both human and ecological systems is an effective way to cope with environmental change characterized by future surprises or unknowable risks. In this paper, originally published in Ecology and Society, authors Emma Tompkins argue that these emerging insights have implications for policies and strategies for responding to climate change. The authors review perspectives on collective action for natural resource management to inform understanding of climate response capacity. They demonstrate the importance of social learning, specifically in relation to the acceptance of strategies that build social and ecological resilience. Societies and communities dependent on natural resources need to enhance their capacity to adapt to the impacts of future climate change, particularly when such impacts could lie outside their experienced coping range. This argument is illustrated by an example of present-day collective action for community-based coastal management in Trinidad and Tobago.
A range of major forces are set to cause profound changes in natural and human environments across the world over the next 50 or so years. Besides climate change, examples include the growth of mega-cities, land degradation and the profound consequences of an increasing global population which is consuming ever more natural resources.
The newly released UK Government Office for Science, Foresight Group project report Migration and Global Environmental Change has looked at how these global drivers could affect the volume and patterns of human migration out to 2030 and on to 2060; and, importantly, the decisions that need to be taken today by policy makers at national and international levels to find a resilient response to these future challenges.
By Hiroko Tabuchi - The New York Times - October 14, 2011
Toshiyuki Hattori, who runs a sewage plant in Tokyo, surrounded by sacks of radioactive sludge. Kazuhiro Yokozeki for The New York Times
TOKYO — Takeo Hayashida signed on with a citizens’ group to test for radiation near his son’s baseball field in Tokyo after government officials told him they had no plans to check for fallout from the devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Like Japan’s central government, local officials said there was nothing to fear in the capital, 160 miles from the disaster zone.
Then came the test result: the level of radioactive cesium in a patch of dirt just yards from where his 11-year-old son, Koshiro, played baseball was equal to those in some contaminated areas around Chernobyl.
The patch of ground was one of more than 20 spots in and around the nation’s capital that the citizens’ group, and the respected nuclear research center they worked with, found were contaminated with potentially harmful levels of radioactive cesium.
Radiation in Japan
"Recently the government said it needed to clear about 2,419 square kilometres of contaminated soil—an area larger than greater Tokyo—that received an annual radiation dose of at least five millisieverts, or over 0.5 microsieverts an hour. That covered an area far beyond the official 30km restriction zone."
The Economist | Asia | Oct 8th 2011 | IITATE |
CREST the hill into the village of Iitate, and the reading on a radiation dosimeter surges eightfold—even with the car windows shut. “Don’t worry, I’ve been coming here for months and I’m still alive,” chuckles Chohei Sato, chief of the village council, as he rolls down the window and inhales cheerfully. He pulls off the road, gets out of the car and buries the dosimeter in the grass. The reading doubles again.
The Mainichi Daily News - October 12, 2011
Workers decontaminate radiation from the roof of Yasawa Kindergarten in Minami-Soma, about 12 miles (20 kilometers) away from the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear facility, in Fukushima prefecture, northeastern Japan, Thursday, Aug. 18, 2011. Photo - Associated Press (AP)
As the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Plant drags on, worries are growing particularly among Fukushima Prefecture residents over drawn-out and in some cases apparently futile nuclear decontamination operations.
The unease is especially strong in areas in and around mountains that must be repeatedly decontaminated, as every rainfall brings a new batch of radioactive substance-contaminated leaves and soil washing down from the hills. Since some 70 percent of Fukushima Prefecture is mountainous, such instances of regular recontamination could occur over a broad area, while the same effect has also been observed in some undeveloped areas of cities.
by Eric Talmadge - Associated Press - boston.com - October 9, 2011
A boy is taken by his mother to Fukushima Medical University Hospital for a thyroid test in Fukushima, northern Japan, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2011. Local doctors began a long-term survey of children for thyroid abnormalities, a problem associated with radiation exposure. Officials hope to test some 360,000 people who were under the age of 18 when the nuclear crisis began in March, and then provide follow-ups throughout their lifetimes. Japanese on the board reads: a thyroid test entrance. (AP Photo/Kyodo News)
TOKYO—Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in the Japanese city of Fukushima on Sunday to observe the massive decontamination effort following the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.
Local doctors also began a long-term survey of children for thyroid abnormalities, a problem associated with radiation exposure. Officials hope to test some 360,000 people who were under the age of 18 when the nuclear crisis began in March, and then provide follow-ups throughout their lifetimes.
The Daily Yomiuri - September 20, 2011
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI) has come under cyber-attack by unidentified hackers who are believed to have stolen confidential data from defense- and nuclear power-related facilities run by the major machinery maker, sources familiar with the case said.
About 80 servers and computers at MHI factories, including those used to build state-of-the-art submarines, missiles and nuclear power plants, have been infected with computer viruses, according to the sources.
"We are investigating all the facts of the case," an MHI spokesman said.
The servers and computers in question were apparently penetrated from outside the company, and there are indications that some confidential information has been stolen from the machines.
MHI reported the incident to police after concluding that its servers and computers had been targeted by what are known as spear attacks, the sources said.
The latest revelation is the first of its kind to be made in connection with cyber-attack on the nation's defense industry, according to observers.
