August 20, 2015

Aug 20, 2015 | Fukushima Accident Updates

  • 25% of Okuma and Futaba landowners will sell their property for rural debris storage. Many say their willingness is due to the possibility that radiation levels will never be low enough to return to their plots. Out of 2,365 landowners of the 16km2 parcel Tokyo wants for the rural radioactive material storage facility, 850 have been contacted and 570 of them agreed to cooperate with land evaluation surveys. 300 of the surveys have been completed, but only five sales contracts have been closed due to a shortage of Environment Ministry employees tasked with the job. One ministry official says it will take “more than 10 years to secure all the land needed.” http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201508200044
  • Tepco announces upgrades to prevent minor rainwater run-off to the Pacific. Earlier this year, a drainage ditch’s radiation monitor showed elevated levels during a rainstorm, and records showed smaller increases had occurred several times over the preceding year. Wild out-cries came from Japan’s numerically-large radiophobic demographic, the local fishermen screamed bloody murder, and the Japanese Press descended on it like sharks in a feeding frenzy. Tepco barricaded the ditch outlet to the sea and installed eight pumps to divert run-off to the multi-barricaded inner port. All was well until July 16. An unusually heavy downpour over-filled the ditch and exceeded the pumping capacity of the diversion system. For 4 minutes, the ditch spilled some of its detectibly radioactive contents to the sea. The combined Cesium-134/137 level was 830 Becquerels per liter, and the beta-emitting activity was 1,100 Bq/l. The very next day, the levels dropped to 24 Bq/l for Cs-134/137 and 39 Bq/l for beta activity, both of which are well below Japan’s standards and the WHO limits for drinking water. No measurable increases in seawater activity could be found due to the brief over-flow. Regardless, the socio-political response to this inconsequential event has spurred Tepco to spend a lot of money and reconfigure the ditch so that it overflows into the barricaded inner port. Work on the reconfiguration is expected to be finished in March, 2016. http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/2015/1257823_6844.html
  • Tepco will add 20,000 new radiation data points to their existing website disclosures. Currently, the annual number of points is around 50,000. This will swell the total to about 70,000 per year. The new policy should demonstrate the company’s commitment to full transparency with the public. The Nuclear Reform Monitoring Committee, an independent oversight group, says this is a positive step on the part of Tepco. http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/2015/1258071_6844.html  Tepco’s current data points can be found here – http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/f1/smp/index-e.html  The listing of the new data points is currently in Japanese only, but may be found here – http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/f1/smp/index-e.html
  • The most recent testing of fish species caught outside the Fukushima Daiichi port is encouraging. Of the 95 caught, 11 were one km off-shore, 13 were 2km off-shore, 26 were 3km off-shore, six were 4km off-shore, 21 were at 10 km, six were at 15km, and 13 were at 18km. None of the fish contained more than the Japanese limit for marketing, which is 100 Becquerels per kilogram of combined Cesium isotopes. The highest was 45 Bq/kg in the muscle of an angel shark, taken at 2km from F. Daiichi. Only seven of the 95 contained detectible Cs-134, the “fingerprint” isotope for Fukushima-sourced contamination, and all of them were taken within 3 kilometers. All 40 caught at or beyond 10 kilometers showed no detectible Cs-134, and 25 of them showed no detectible Cs-137 either. Two of those with detectible Cs-137 taken from >10km had activity at 11 Bq/kg, while the rest were below 10 Bq/kg. http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/f1/smp/index-e.html
  • Japan will take South Korea’s import ban to the World Health Organization. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga has been trying to negotiate with South Korea for many weeks, but to no avail. The timetable for friendly negotiations expired today (Thursday) so Suga will move on to the next stage and bring the complaint to WHO. He told the Press, “The South Korean government should respond sincerely based on WTO rules and should quickly abolish the restriction without waiting for a decision by the WTO.” S. Korea banned imports of some food fish soon after the Fukushima accident, but expanded it to all fish products in September of 2013. In remains in vogue despite there being no Japanese fish exports in excess of proscribed limits. http://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2015082000480
  • Japan’s business community welcomes the Sendai unit #1 restart. Japan Business Federation Chairman Sadayuki Sakakibara welcomed the restart of the Sendai-1 Nuclear Power Plant as a major step forward. He said nuclear is an important energy producer “not only from the viewpoints of energy security and economy, but also as a measure to combat global warming.” Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry Chairman Akio Mimura thanked local municipalities and chambers of commerce for their efforts to make the restart happen. He stated that it would “contribute to stabilizing supply and demand in summer, when electricity use climbs, primarily due to the use of air conditioning.” He added that the experiences during the process will be shared with all other nukes moving toward restart, which will help everyone. Japan Association of Corporate Executives Chairman Yoshimitsu Kobayashi praised the restart of as a step toward stabilizing Japan’s energy structure. He urged Tokyo to “make maximum use of its experience gained in the examinations so far, in order to improve their efficiency and reinforce the system toward the steady restart of those NPPs whose safety is confirmed.” http://www.jaif.or.jp/en/industrial-groups-welcome-sendai-1-startup-as-major-step-toward-restarting-japans-other-reactors/
  • Japan’s business community welcomes the Sendai unit #1 restart. Minoru Kobayashi, 63, president of the Iitate Denryoku power company said, “Everyone knows what’s going on in Fukushima. Will they restart their nuclear reactors anyway? From a Fukushima perspective, I want to change the current situation of putting the economy first.” A former Iitate rancher, Kobayashi now heads a solar energy firm producing a peak output of about 50 kilowatts. Yauemon Sato, president of a sake brewery, created the Aizu Electric Power Co. using only renewable generation. When asked about the Sendai restart, he said, “The nuclear disaster robbed the people of Iitate of their everyday lives. We don’t need nuclear plants anymore.” He added that those who approved the restart in Kagoshima Prefecture may have ignored the Fukushima accident, “If they made the decision while pretending not to have seen the Fukushima disaster that is a tragedy.” Yuji Onuma of Futaba town started a solar power company last year which produces a peak output of 220,000 kilowatts in Ibaraki and Tochigi Prefectures. His gripe is that there is no satisfactory solution for used nuclear fuel disposal. He adds, “In an instant, the nuclear plant disaster destroyed the nature and work of people that had taken many years to produce. There was no bright future for nuclear energy.” http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20150818p2a00m0na019000c.html