April 16, 2015

Apr 16, 2015 | Fukushima Accident Updates

  • A Fukui Prefecture court issues its second anti-restart injunction in a year. The order is effective immediately. The latest decision, invoked Tuesday, involves Takahama units 3&4, currently expected to be two of the first nukes to restart, perhaps this summer. The panel of judges handing down the ruling was headed by Justice Hideaki Higuchi, who is regarded as a maverick by the Japanese judiciary. Higuchi led the Fukui panel that issued a similar injunction against the restart of Oi units 3&4 last May. Of the dozen or so similar cases tried to date, only Higuchi’s court has found in favor of the antinuclear plaintiffs. Nine local residents from Fukui Prefecture submitted the claim citing allegations such as the Kansai Electric Co. underestimating earthquake magnitude, unreliable safety equipment at the station, and failure to meet Japan’s new safety regulations. The plaintiff’s argue that the reactors “pose a concrete risk of harming personal rights”. Not to be outdone by claimant rhetoric, Judge Higuchi’s panel said that the new regulations are lax and cannot provide absolute assurance of safety even if they are met. In fact, Higuchi went so far as to say, “The standards lack rationality.” Most of Japan’s Press says this is a severe blow the PM Abe’s desire to get nukes restarted and reduce the nation’s extreme use of imported fossil fuels, which has caused the worst trade deficit in the island nation’s history. It is believed the injunction will probably delay restarts at Takahama, regardless of whether or not the decision will stand up to appeals. http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0002081116 — http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/court-issues-injunction-to-halt-restart-of-takahama-reactors — http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20150414_37.html
  • The Fukui court order has been widely criticized as being irrational and non-scientific. It has become clear to the Japanese Press that presiding Judge Higuchi has rammed his personal “zero risk” agenda through the Fukui court. Former Tokyo high court judge and current Chou Law School Professor Jun Masuda says, “It seems the judge has already had the idea of demanding absolute safety from the beginning. Judges are not experts on nuclear power plants, so it is imperative that they humbly pay attention to scientific knowledge. I doubt the presiding judge took that into consideration.” Japan News (Yomiuri Shimbun) adds that during the case’s examination period, the panel of judges was twice asked by Kansai Electric Company to solicit the written opinions of experts. Both times, the request was rejected. Clearly, Higuchi and his judicial cronies have no interest in educating themselves concerning nuclear safety. Japan News concludes, “We have no choice but to call it an irrational decision,” and, “Such a stance seeking zero risk is unrealistic.” The News also points out that the Takahama injunction flies in the face of Japan’s 1992 Supreme Court decision that the question of nuclear safety is too scientific, technical and comprehensive to be decided by anyone other than actual experts. Even the decidedly antinuclear Mainichi Shimbun said, “It would be too excessive if the restart of any nuclear plant were disapproved to pursue zero risk.” In addition, many Press outlets say the lack of credibility displayed by the Fukui court could undermine public trust in the judicial system across Japan. Adding to the cacophony of criticism, the Nuclear Regulatory Authority Chairman, Shunichi Tanaka, took exception to Higuchi’s unfounded attack on the agency’s safety standards, saying the court injunction “contained a number of factual errors,” and “I take the injunction as an indication that our work has not been fully understood.” http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0002082892 — http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0002083023 — http://mainichi.jp/english/english/perspectives/news/20150415p2a00m0na003000c.html — http://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2015041500718 (Comment – this writer cannot believe that Judge Higuchi seriously believes the injunction will stop restarts. In my honest, unexpurgated opinion, this is merely a delay tactic by an antinuclear-friendly judge. I believe Higuchi has done his historical antinuclear homework and found that similar judicial tactics have been successful in delaying nuclear power plant operations since Three Mile Island in 1979. The injunction is not an example of ignorance or stupidity. It is a cold, calculated move that will reverberate throughout Japan. Using the Fukui decision as a model, we can expect similar judicial maneuvers with many, if not most, future attempts to restart nukes)
  • Not to take the setback lying down, Kansai Electric Company appealed the court’s decision the day after it was handed down. Japan News says, “It is reasonable that KEPCO objected to the court decision.” However, the wording of the injunction makes it virtually impossible to restart Takahama units 3&4 before an appeals decision is rendered. Regardless of the outcome of the appeal, the injunction will set back the resumption of operations many months, if not a full year. http://www.jaif.or.jp/en/kansai-electric-appeals-district-court-decision-halting-operation-of-takahama-3-and-4/
  • A second shape-shifting robot entered F. Daiichi unit #1 on Wednesday. The robot is a twin to the one that became stuck during its inspection on last Friday. The second device will follow a different path in order to cover locations other than those already inspected. The first probe collected valuable images in the vessel along with temperature and radiation data, thus the second one is expected to provide a considerable amount of new information. Tepco pointed out that the first robot’s monitoring equipment successfully operated for two days in the high radiation environment inside the unit #1 containment, so it should not be a problem for the second one.  http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20150415p2g00m0dm076000c.html — http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/nuclear.html Tepco’s detailed Press handout can be found here, including radiation levels along the new path being considerably lower than the first robot’s path… http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/handouts/2015/images/handouts_150416_01-e.pdf  The first pictures taken by the second robot can be found here… http://photo.tepco.co.jp/en/date/2015/201504-e/150416-01e.html
  • Fukushima-phobia is extended to Great Britain. The Independent (UK) reports that “Food produced around the Fukushima nuclear disaster site could be making its way on to British shelves because of loopholes in safety rules,” and that some suspicious products have “already been exported from Japan under the cover of false labelling by fraudsters.” Further, “This raises the prospect of mildly carcinogenic ingredients entering the food system.” The decidedly fear-mongering report even goes so far as to attach a picture of a tsunami-spawned fire at what appears to be a Japanese oil refinery, with the sub-text of “The Fukushima disaster in March 2011 released radiation to the atmosphere – even outside the food-production exclusion zone”. (Deplorable!) A similar scare was raised in Taiwan at the end of March. The Independent cites on a food-safety consultant, Alastair Marke, as supposed proof for their scare-mongering. Marke said, “I suspect what has happened in Taiwan might well have already happened in the UK. Intermediary supply chain middlemen can buy food in bulk and package and label as they like – before shipping them to the UK.” It is important to note that the Independent failed to mention that no fruits, vegetables, rice, or meats from Fukushima Prefecture have exceeded Japan’s ridiculously low limit of 100 Becquerels per kilogram for two consecutive years.  http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/food-from-fukushima-could-be-hitting-britains-shelves-through-legal-safety-loophole-10174298.html — http://www.fukushimaminponews.com/news.html?id=496
  • Fukushima InFORM, the Canadian Pacific coast monitoring network, has posted its most recent newsletter. It covers their latest monitoring results, including the first shore-detected Fukushima Cesium on Vancouver Island. http://www.icontact-archive.com/gkR_CVldWco6A5tPY8T0FsclY7IdmIeQ#.VS1r0GIMNik.wordpress
  • Average exposures for rural decontamination workers have been very safe. More than 26,000 people have participated in the prefecture-wide effort between 2011 and 2014. Their average measured exposure was about 0.5 millisieverts per year, which is 1% of Japan’s limit for workers. One cohort comprising 14.6% of the workers got slightly more than 1 mSv in 2013. Regardless, no-one exceeded the 50 mSv national limit for workers. http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/nuclear.html [Comment – NHK says 1 mSv per year is the limit for the general public, but this is not correct. The decontamination goal is to reduce annual exposure to below 1 mSv/yr in addition to natural background (~1.5 mSv/yr average across Japan). This goal is not “the annual permissible level for the general public.”] True to its antinuclear form, Japan Times focuses on the exceptions as the most “newsworthy” aspect of the government’s report. The headline reads “Fukushima decontamination workers got up to 13.9 millisieverts of radiation.” This seems to be the highest recorded exposure for a single worker. The number of workers that exceeded 10 msv in a year was 34…about 0.1% of the entire cohort. In fact, the main body of the Times article focuses on the sub-cohorts that had exposures approaching or exceeding the 1 mSv/yr decontamination goal. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/04/16/national/science-health/fukushima-decontamination-workers-got-up-to-13-9-millisieverts-of-radiation/#.VS-lY6McQdU