January 15, 2015

Jan 15, 2015 | Fukushima Accident Updates

  • Futaba accepts Tokyo’s rural radioactive waste plan. Okuma agreed to the plan last month. The government wants to build a sixteen square kilometer facility between the two F. Daiichi host communities to store contaminated soil and other debris for no more than 30 years. The mayor of Futaba announced the decision on Tuesday in Iwaki City, where most of the town’s evacuated residents are living. Not all residents agree with the decision, citing distrust of Tokyo’s promise to move the material elsewhere after thirty years. Mayor Shiro Izawa explained that acceptance of the plan is an unavoidable part of post-accident recovery. Land purchase negotiations and creation of transportation safety arrangements are continuing. On Wednesday, the government allocated about $700 million for the facility, land purchases, and research for fiscal 2015. The budget allocation for 2014 was $1 billion, but inability to purchase the property has resulted in carry-over from last-year’s budget.  http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/nuclear.html — http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/01/14/national/futaba-accept-radioactive-soil-storage-facilities/#.VLZfHaMcQdU
  • Four utilities have decided to scrap five nuke units once they get local approval. The four units are located in three Prefectures – Fukui, Shimane, and Saga – and each assembly will be instructed on the decommissioning plans next month. The host communities will also be briefed. It is national policy to seek local understanding before making any decisions that could financially impact the host communities. All five units will have been licensed for the post-Fukushima 40-year limit by the end of 2015. They are all relatively small-output units and the owning companies feel that upgrades to meet new regulations makes them economically non-viable with only a 20 year possibility on further operation. Two other units that have reached to 40 year licensing limit, Takahama #1 & #2, are not going to be voluntarily decommissioned because they have much larger outputs and the costs of meeting regulatory upgrades can be recovered in 20 years. Tokyo estimates the decommissioning costs will be about $200 million per unit. To avoid significant financial adversity, the government is creating accounting measures to mitigate the losses. Specifically, the costs will be charged to each affected utility’s customers and spread out over a ten year period. Under current guidelines, the costs would have to be dealt with during the first year after the permanent shutdown of each unit is decided. http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0001852229 — http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20150114_36.html
  • A citizens group has filed their second criminal complaint against former Tokyo safety officials and ex-Tepco executives. Their first complaint was against Former Tepco chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata and others for not taking adequate accident protective measures. The new suit also names eight others besides Katsumata, including former government nuke safety official Yoshinori Moriyama of the defunct Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency. The plaintiffs include Fukushima residents as well as others from outside the prefecture. The complaint was filed with the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office accusing the nine of responsibility for the public being exposed to radiation. The Prosecutors Office is currently reinvestigating the first case which was dismissed last year, but ordered to be reopened by a citizen’s judicial panel. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/01/13/national/crime-legal/group-files-fresh-complaint-over-fukushima-nuclear-disaster/#.VLVRrqMcQdU –- http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2015/01/331188.html
  • Sendai District Court has ruled on the tsunami-deaths suit we reported on January 8. The court has ordered Joban Yamamoto driving school to pay nearly $19 million in compensation to the relatives of a driving instructor and 25 students who died in the 3/11/11 tsunami. Presiding Judge Kenji Takamiya said the driving school knew of a possible tsunami because some instructors at the school had heard the evacuation warning. The suit charged that school officials told the students to remain in the facility after the quake, but were not told to evacuate to higher ground. That order came nearly an hour later when the first indication of the tsunami hit the city shoreline. The suit claimed the tsunami was warned by local fire companies and the news media, but the company took no action to protect the students and instructor. This is the second time a court has awarded damages to grieving relatives of people killed in the tsunami. In September of 2013, Hiyori Kindergarten in Ishinomaki was ordered to pay nearly $1.8 million to the parents of four children who died. http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0001851278