Thu, Mar 01, 2012 page5

• Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant still fragile after a year

  • AP, Okuma, Japan
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  Japan’s tsunami-hit Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant remains fragile nearly a year after it suffered multiple meltdowns, its chief said on Tuesday, with makeshift equipment — some mended with tape — keeping crucial systems running.

  An independent report, meanwhile, revealed that the government downplayed the full danger in the days after the March 11 disaster and secretly considered evacuating Tokyo.

  Journalists given a tour of the plant on Tuesday saw crumpled trucks and equipment still lying on the ground. A power pylon that collapsed in the tsunami, cutting electricity to the plant’s vital cooling system and setting off the crisis, remained a mangled mess.

  Officials said the worst is over, but the plant remains vulnerable.

  “I have to admit that it’s still rather fragile,” said plant chief Takeshi Takahashi, who took the job in December after his predecessor resigned due to health reasons. “Even though the plant has achieved what we call ‘cold shutdown conditions,’ it still causes problems that must be improved.”

  The government announced in December that three melted reactors at the plant had basically stabilized and that radiation releases had dropped. It still will take decades to fully decommission the plant and it must be kept stable until then.

  The operators have installed multiple backup power supplies, a cooling system and equipment to process massive amounts of contaminated water that leaked from the damaged reactors, but the equipment that serves as the lifeline of the cooling system is shockingly feeble-looking. Plastic hoses cracked by freezing temperatures have been mended with tape. A set of three pumps sits on the back of a pickup truck.

  Along with the pumps, the plant now has 1,000 tanks to store more than 160,000 tonnes of contaminated water.

  Radiation levels in the Unit 1 reactor have fallen, allowing workers to repair some damage to the reactor building, but the Unit 3 reactor, whose roof was blown off by a hydrogen explosion, resembles an ashtray filled with a heap of cigarette butts.

  A dosimeter recorded the highest radiation reading outside Unit 3 during Tuesday’s tour — 1.5 millisieverts per hour. That is a major improvement from last year, when up to 10 sieverts per hour were registered near Unit 1 and Unit 2.

  Exposure to more than 1,000 millisieverts, or 1 sievert, can cause radiation sickness, including nausea and an elevated risk of cancer.

  Tuesday’s tour came as an independent group released a report saying the government withheld information about the full danger of the disaster from its own people and from the US.

  The report by the private Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation delivers a scathing view of how leaders played down the risks of the reactor meltdowns, while holding secret discussions of a worst-case scenario in which massive radiation releases would require the evacuation of a much wider region, including Tokyo.

  The report paints a picture of confusion during the days immediately after the accident. It says US-Japan relations were put at risk because of US frustration and skepticism over the scattered information provided by Japan.
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