TEPCO seeks permission to dump groundwater from Fukushima plant into ocean

NATIONAL MAY. 14, 2013 – 07:00AM JST ( 23 )

TOKYO —

Officials from Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) on Monday met with a Fukushima fisheries cooperative to seek its members’ permission to dump groundwater from the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the ocean.

The contaminated water storage has been a problem since early in the accident. TEPCO officials acknowledged last month that a lack of storage space has become a “crisis.” TEPCO has promised to speed up building more reliable steel tanks and eventually empty the underground tanks.

Runoff from the three reactors melted in the aftermath of the March 2011 quake-tsunami and a steady inflow of groundwater seeping into the basement of their damaged buildings produce about 400 tons of contaminated water daily at the plant.

TEPCO says 280,000 tons of contaminated water has been stored in tanks on the plant, and the amount would double within a few years.

At Monday’s meeting, TEPCO officials outlined their plan to the fishermen’s cooperative in which it hopes to divert groundwater into the ocean, TV Asahi reported. TEPCO said only water with low radioactivity would be dumped.

A spokesman for the fishermen was quoted by TV Asahi as saying it would be difficult to give approval to such a plan but added that the cooperative will study the plan.

TEPCO also needs the central government’s approval to implement such a plan.

Japan Today/AP

126 U.S. military members to sue TEPCO

NATIONAL MAR. 16, 2013 – 06:36AM JST ( 35 )

Former U.S. Navy Quartermaster Jaime Plym discusses her health issues stemming from radiation exposure while serving on the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier during aid and rescue missionsfollowing Japan’s devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami, at a news conference in New York.REUTERS

WASHINGTON —

U.S. service members are suing the Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) for more than $2 billion on grounds the utility lied about the dangers of helping clean up the nuclear disaster that struck two years ago.

The case was first filed by nine plaintiffs in December but has now expanded to 26, and another 100 are in the process of joining the suit, said Stars and Stripes newspaper.

The new complaint was filed last Tuesday in U.S. District Court in California, a day after the two year anniversary of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster that hit the eastern coast of Japan. It left nearly 15,881 people dead and 2,668 others still unaccounted for.

The plaintiffs include active duty and retired shore-based Marines, shore-based dependents and sailors from ships that operated in the disaster area.

The newspaper said peers of the plaintiffs complain the latter are seeking an easy payoff and that the Pentagon insists the radiation they were exposed to did not pose a major health risk.

The plaintiffs says they have suffered a number of ailments that they say are linked to their exposure, including headaches, difficulty concentrating, rectal bleeding, thyroid problems, cancer, tumors and gynecological bleeding.

© 2013 AFP

Panel says there was no cover-up at Fukushima nuclear plant

By MARI YAMAGUCHI

NATIONAL MAR. 14, 2013 – 07:16AM JST ( 23 )

The No. 1 reactor reactor building, left, and No. 2 of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are seen through a bus window.AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye

TOKYO —

An independent panel said Wednesday that the operator of Japan’s tsunami-crippled nuclear plant misinformed investigators and blocked an inspection of key equipment last year, but that it was not part of a cover-up.

The case involves a parliamentary probe of equipment at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant’s No. 1 reactor. An investigator said he and his fellow team members had to scrap an inspection of the reactor’s emergency cooling equipment, accusing plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co, or TEPCO, of falsely stating that the building was dark and too dangerous.

The equipment — called an isolation condenser, which can function without electricity — is at the center of a major controversy, with some experts suspecting that its failure might have been caused by the magnitude-9.0 earthquake on March 11, 2011, and not by the subsequent tsunami, as has been widely thought. The disasters destroyed power and cooling systems at the plant, causing multiple meltdowns, including at the No. 1 reactor.

The parliamentary investigators eventually released a report on the No. 1 reactor that refers to possible earthquake damage to the equipment, and if proved would shake the current anti-quake measures at nuclear facilities nationwide, experts say.

After the scandal caused an outcry from lawmakers and the public, TEPCO commissioned a panel last month to look into the matter. TEPCO, which had quickly ruled out quake damage to the plant’s key safety equipment, was accused of blocking the investigation to hide unfavorable evidence.

On Wednesday, the panel said it attributed the problem to a TEPCO official’s misunderstanding of the situation at the No. 1 reactor, and said the company was not trying to hide the equipment from the inspectors. The panel also said top TEPCO officials were not involved.

“The explanation he provided did include false information. That, as a result, caused the parliamentary investigation team to give up part of its inspection, and we find it unforgivable,” said Yasuhisa Tanaka, a lawyer who headed the TEPCO-commissioned panel. “The company also should have made better preparations and explanations to accommodate the investigation team.”

TEPCO said it takes the panel’s findings seriously and apologized for the mishandling, but denied any cover-up. The company has been criticized for its reluctance to acknowledge its responsibility in the crisis, and set up an internal reform committee last year.

“We don’t have anything to hide,” TEPCO said in a statement, promising to fully cooperate with further investigations at the No. 1 reactor, including an inspection tour, though radiation levels in the reactor building remain high. The parliamentary investigators have inspected other parts of the plant.

Mitsuhiko Tanaka, a nuclear engineer who was part of the investigation team, came forward last month after seeing a video of the No. 1 reactor building that he said showed that it was well lit.

The TEPCO official who turned away the investigators also insisted that the building was badly damaged, with highly contaminated debris scattered around, and said a visitor could fall through a hole in the floor in the dark, Tanaka said. TEPCO also refused to provide escorts for the investigators if they insisted on entering the No. 1 reactor.

“They ridiculed the parliamentary investigation,” Tanaka told a news conference last month.

Opposition lawmaker Kiyomi Tsujimoto told a recent parliamentary session that TEPCO’s interference not only undermined the investigation but also threatened Japan’s nuclear safety.

“If a quake really caused the (equipment’s) failure, it’s a problem that would affect Japan’s entire nuclear safety, including a resumption of reactors,” Tsujimoto said.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is scrapping the previous government’s plan to phase out nuclear energy by the 2030s, and has said he will restart reactors that meet new, stricter safety standards taking effect in July.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

____________________________________

 

Comment: Why can TEPCO claim that there was no cover-up, while the building was lit, isolation condenser leaking (of force fed water meant to cool reactor chamber by the fire brigades, as NHK reported recently in its Special Program), refusing escort, and even ridiculing the parliamental investigation team?

Former TEPCO chief questioned on suspicion of negligence

CRIME JAN. 25, 2013 – 06:53AM JST ( 1 )

Former TEPCO Chairman Tsunehisa KatsumataAFP

TOKYO —

Japanese prosecutors have questioned the former head of the operator of the Fukushima nuclear power plant on suspicion of negligence over the nuclear crisis, local media reported Thursday.

Tsunehisa Katsumata, who was Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) chairman when the plant was crippled by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, was questioned on a “voluntary basis,” news agencies, dailies and TV networks said.

Investigators in Fukushima and Tokyo were acting on a criminal complaint filed last year by a group of citizens against about 40 people including Katsumata and former TEPCO President Masataka Shimizu, the reports said.

Critics say Katsumata and other TEPCO executives failed to take measures after the company estimated in 2008 that the plant was vulnerable to a tsunami higher than 15 meters, the reports said.

TEPCO was reportedly prepared only for waves six meters high.

The complaint said the accused were responsible for causing evacuees to die and for many evacuees to suffer injuries through exposure to radiation.

Katsumata, 72, served as TEPCO president between 2002 and 2008 and as its chairman between 2008 and 2012. He left its board in June last year.

The prosecutors are expected to decide in a few months whether to file criminal charges against Katsumata and the others.

But many prosecutors believe it will be difficult to establish any causal relationship between the nuclear disaster and the deaths and injuries among evacuees, Kyodo News said.

They also question whether it was reasonably possible for TEPCO executives to predict the unprecedented scale of the tsunami.

A 9.0-magnitude tremor struck off Japan’s northeast coast, triggering monster waves that surged ashore at heights of up to 40 meters.

The double disaster killed nearly 19,000 people and crippled the Fukushima plant’s cooling systems, sparking reactor meltdowns and radiation leaks.

Tens of thousands of people have been evacuated from around the plant.

Under Japan’s penal code a conviction for professional negligence resulting in death or injuries could result in imprisonment for up to five years or a fine of one million yen, Kyodo said.

© 2013 AFP

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TEPCO tries to find somewhere to store contaminated water

By Mari Yamaguchi

NATIONAL OCT. 28, 2012 – 06:35AM JST ( 23 )

This December 2011 file photo released by Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) shows radioactive water leaked from a building with a purification device placed inside at the tsunami-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.AP/TEPCO

TOKYO —

Japan’s crippled nuclear power plant is struggling to find space to store tens of thousands of tons of highly contaminated water used to cool the broken reactors, the manager of the water treatmentteam said.

About 200,000 tons of radioactive water—enough to fill more than 50 Olympic-sized swimming pools—are being stored in hundreds of gigantic tanks built around the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Operator Tokyo Electric Power Co has already chopped down trees to make room for more tanks and predicts the volume of water will more than triple within three years.

“It’s a pressing issue because our land is limited and we would eventually run out of storage space,” the water-treatment manager, Yuichi Okamura, told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview this week.

TEPCO is close to running a new treatment system that could make the water safe enough to release into the ocean. But in the meantime, its tanks are filling up—mostly because leaks in reactor facilities are allowing ground water pour in.

Outside experts worry that if contaminated water is released, there will be lasting impact on the environment. And they fear that because of the reactor leaks and water flowing from one part of the plant to another, that may already be happening.

Nuclear engineer and college lecturer Masashi Goto said the contaminated water buildup poses a long-term health and environmental threat. He worries that the radioactive water in the basements may already be getting into the underground water system, where it could reach far beyond the plant, possibly the ocean or public water supplies.

“You never know where it’s leaking out and once it’s out, you can never put it back in place,” he said. “It’s just outrageous and shows how big a disaster this is.”

The concerns are less severe than the nightmare scenario TEPCO faced in the weeks after the March 11, 2011, earthquake and tsunami knocked out power and cooling systems at the plant, leading to explosions and meltdowns of three reactor cores. The plant released radiation into the surrounding air, soil and ocean and displaced more than 100,000 residents who are uncertain when—or if—they will be able to return to their homes.

Dumping massive amounts of water into the melting reactors was the only way to avoid an even bigger catastrophe.

Okamura remembers frantically trying to find a way to get water to spent fuel pools located on the highest floor of the 50-meter-high reactor buildings. Without water, the spent fuel likely would have overheated and melted, sending radioactive smoke for miles and affecting possibly millions of people.

“The water would keep evaporating, and the pools would have dried up if we had left them alone,” he said. “That would have been the end of it.”

Attempts to dump water from helicopters were ineffective. Spraying water from firetrucks into the pools didn’t work either. Okamura then helped bring in a huge, German-made concrete-making pump with a remote-controlled arm that was long enough to spray water into the fuel pools.

The plan worked—just in time, Okamura said.

Those measures and others helped bring the plant under tenuous control, but it will take decades to clean up the radioactive material. And those desperate steps created another huge headache for the utility: What to do with all that radioactive water that leaked out of the damaged reactors and collected in the basements of reactor buildings and nearby facilities.

Some of the water ran into the ocean, raising concerns about contamination of marine life and seafood. Waters within a 20-kilometer zone are still off-limits, and high levels of contamination have been found in seabed sediment and fish tested in the area.

Okamura was tasked with setting up a treatment system that would make the water clean enough for reuse as a coolant, and was also aimed at reducing health risks for workers and environmental damage.

At first, the utility shunted the tainted water into existing storage tanks near the reactors. Meanwhile, Okamura’s 55-member team scrambled to get a treatment unit up and running within three months of the accident—a project that would normally take about two years, he said.

“Accomplishing that was a miracle,” he said, adding that a cheer went up from his men when the first unit started working.

Using that equipment, TEPCO was able to circulate reprocessed water back into the reactor cores. But even though the reactors now are being cooled exclusively with recycled water, the volume of contaminated water is still increasing, mostly because ground water is seeping through cracks into the reactor and turbine basements.

Next month, Okamura’s group plans to flip the switch on new purifying equipment using Toshiba Corp. technology that is supposedly able to decontaminate the water by removing strontium and other nuclides, potentially below detectable levels, he said.

TEPCO claims the treated water from this new system is clean enough to be potentially released into the ocean, although it hasn’t said whether it would do that. Doing so would require the permission of authorities and local consent and would also likely trigger harsh criticism at home and abroad.

To deal with the excess tainted water, the utility has channeled it to more than 300 huge storage tanks placed around the plant. The utility has plans to install storage tanks for up to 700,000 tons—or about three more years’ worth—f contaminated water. If that maxes out, it could build additional space for roughly two more years’ worth of storage, said Mayumi Yoshida, a company spokeswoman.

But those forecasts hinge on plans to detect and plug holes in the damaged reactors to minimize leaks over the next two years. The utility also plans to take steps to keep ground water from seeping into the reactor basements.

Both are tasks that TEPCO is still not sure how to accomplish: Those areas remain so highly radioactive that it is unclear how humans or even robots could work there.

There’s also a risk the storage tanks and the jury-rigged pipe system connecting them could be damaged if the area is struck by another earthquake or tsunami.

Goto, the nuclear engineer, believes it will take far longer than TEPCO’s goal of two years to repair all the holes in the reactors. The plant also would have to deal with contaminated water until all the melted fuel and other debris is removed from the reactor—a process that will easily take more than a decade.

He said TEPCO’s roadmap for dealing with the problem is “wishful thinking.”

“The longer it takes, the more contaminated water they get,” he said.

Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

 

TEPCO ADMITS FUKUSHIMA CRISIS COULD HAVE BEEN AVOIDED

 

By Mari Yamaguchi

NATIONAL OCT. 13, 2012 – 02:15PM JST ( 41 )

 

TOKYO —

The utility behind Japan’s nuclear disaster acknowledged for the first time Friday that it could have avoided the crisis.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said in a statement that it had known safety improvements were needed before last year’s tsunami triggered three meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, but it had feared the political, economic and legal consequences of implementing them.

“When looking back on the accident, the problem was that preparations were not made in advance,” TEPCO’s internal reform task force, led by company President Naomi Hirose, said in the statement. “Could necessary measures have been taken with previous tsunami evaluations? It was possible to take action” by adopting more extensive safety measures, the task force said.

The task force said TEPCO had feared efforts to better protect nuclear facilities from severe accidents such as tsunamis would trigger anti-nuclear sentiment, interfere with operations or increase litigation risks. TEPCO could have mitigated the impact of the accident if it had diversified power and cooling systems by paying closer attention to international standards and recommendations, the statement said. TEPCO also should have trained employees with practical crisis management skills rather than conduct obligatory drills as a formality, it said.

The admissions mark a major reversal for the utility, which had defended its preparedness and crisis management since the March 2011 tsunami. The disaster knocked out power to the Fukushima plant, leading to the meltdowns, which forced massive evacuations and will take decades to clean up.

The statement was released after TEPCO held its first internal reform committee meeting, led by former U.S. nuclear regulatory chief Dale Klein. His five-member committee oversees the task force’s reform plans.

“It’s very important for TEPCO to recognize the needs to reform and the committee is very anxious to facilitate the reform necessary for TEPCO to become a world-class company,” Klein told a news conference. “The committee’s goal is to ensure that TEPCO develops practices and procedures so an accident like this will never happen again.”

The reform plans aim to use the lessons learned at TEPCO’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in northern Japan. The cash-strapped utility wants to restart that plant, but TEPCO officials denied the reform plans are aimed at improving public image to gain support for the plant’s resumption.

“The reforms are intended to improve our safety culture, and we have no intention to link it to a possibility of resuming the (Kashiwazaki-Kariwa) plant,” said Takafumi Anegawa, the TEPCO official in charge of nuclear asset management. “We don’t have any preconditions for our reforms.”

The Fukushima Daiichi plant has been substantially stabilized but is still running on makeshift equipment as workers continue their work to decommission the four damaged reactors, which could take several decades.

Additional safety measures have been installed at nuclear power plants nationwide since the accident under the government’s instructions, including enhancing seawalls, adding backup power and cooling water sources, and developing better crisis management training. But plant operators will be required to take further steps as a new nuclear regulatory authority launched in September steps up safety requirements.

Investigative reports compiled by the government and the parliament panels said collusion between the company and government regulators allowed lax supervision and allowed TEPCO to continue lagging behind in safety steps.

Despite records indicating a major tsunami had once hit off Japan’s northern coast, TEPCO took the most optimistic view of the risk and insisted that its 5.7-meter-high seawall was good enough. The tsunami that struck Fukushima Dai-ichi was more than twice that height.

The company had said in its own accident probe report in June that the tsunami could not be anticipated and that the company did the best it could to bring the critically damaged plant under control, although there were shortfalls that they had to review. TEPCO bitterly criticized what it said was excessive interference from the government and the prime minister’s office.

TEPCO’s Anegawa said the task force plans to compile by the end of the year recommendations “that would have saved us from the accident if we turn the clock back.”

Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

Kan slams TEPCO over nuclear crisis video footage

By Mari Yamaguchi

POLITICS AUG. 09, 2012 – 03:00PM JST ( 28 )

 

Former Prime Minister Naoto Kan speaks during a press conference at the Japan National Press Club in Tokyo on Wednesday.AP

 

TOKYO —

Former Prime Minister Naoto Kan criticized the tsunami-hit nuclear plant’s operator Wednesday for heavily editing the limited video coverage it released of the disaster, including a portion in which his emotional speech to utility executives and workers was silenced.

Naoto Kan called for Tokyo Electric Power Co to release all of its video coverage, beyond the first five days. Two-thirds of the 150 hours of videos it released Monday are without sound, including one segment showing Kan’s visit to the utility’s headquarters on March 15 last year, four days after a tsunami critically damaged three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant.

Many people’s faces, except for the plant chief and top executives in Tokyo, are obscured in the videos and frequent beeps mask voices and other sound. From that coverage, TEPCO made a 90-minute video of selected clips and made it available for download.

The release only covers the first five days of the crisis, starting hours after the magnitude-9 earthquake hit on March 11 until midnight on March 15, when the plant was getting out of control, and confusion and fear of catastrophe reigned.

TEPCO spokesman Takashi Kurita said the released footage, which mainly involved video conferences, was the only footage available due to confidentiality and privacy concerns. The recordings were not intended for public viewing and the release was an exception to address public interest.

TEPCO, now under state control, initially refused to release the videos at all but was ordered to do so. It denied any cover-up, saying the Tokyo head office failed to record at times and that backups provided only images. TEPCO said they blurred workers’ faces to hide their identity for privacy reasons and fear of harassment.

It’s not known how many hours of coverage might exist beyond the first five days it released.

In the footage of Kan at the utility headquarters, he is shown from behind, gesturing and giving what appeared to be emotional and chastising speech for about 20 minutes. He said Wednesday he only tried to boost morale in the dangerous mission.

“It’s so unnatural. TEPCO says there is no sound, but they have said all kinds of things about my visit there, which makes it even more suspicious,” he said. “There must be the sound somewhere.”

The content of TEPCO’s video conference is crucial evidence, “equivalent to communication between a pilot and a control tower in an airplane accident,” Kan said.

The video also revealed that plant officials freaked out about the pools that contained spent nuclear fuel, beyond the one known to be a concern. They feared the pools could dry out without a cooling system or water supply, which would heat and melt the nuclear material. Massive radiation leaks directly into the air could have resulted because the pools are not protected by containment chambers. TEPCO officials even discussed dropping chunks of ice or spray water through a broken ceiling from a helicopter to cool them urgently.

Previously, government and TEPCO officials had only spoken of a pool at the Unit 4 reactor as being a concern because it was damaged by a hydrogen gas explosion in the reactor building.

Then-plant chief Masao Yoshida and other top executives thought at least five of the seven pools at the plant were in trouble, although they later said none of the rods was exposed.

“We have a problem,” Yoshida told TEPCO’s Tokyo office. “The pool at No. 1 unit is now exposed, with part of its building blown off in an explosion, and steam is reportedly coming out. We can’t leave it like that, but we have no water source and I’m out of ideas.” The temperature of that pool was also rising, and he and other officials agreed that other pools were probably in similar conditions.

Days later, a defense helicopters splashed water from a bucket as it flew over one of the reactors and firefighters were mobilized to spray water from fire hose.

Kan has later acknowledged he considered a worst-case scenario involving damage to all six reactors at the plant and another four at nearby Dai-ni plant and their fuel storage pools. A scenario made by a nuclear expert at Kan’s request suggested the need for an evacuation of 30 million people in and around Tokyo.

TEPCO officials have said that Kan yelled at the executives and workers with harsh words. TEPCO officials alleged Kan was upset because he misunderstood company executives were trying to abandon the plant.

“I said you’re not withdrawing,” Kan said Wednesday. “We were on a cliff-edge situation” that could have led to a catastrophe threatening the entire nation. He said he was struggling amid the absence of information from the plant, communication and reliable experts he could turn to, particularly the first few days.

His visit at TEPCO marked the beginning of a joint command center in the TEPCO headquarters, largely improving communication and other problems. Kan said he still thinks it was the right move.

The videos did show TEPCO executives discussed a possible withdrawal, but it was unclear whether they were considering a partial pullout. Kan and his ministers agreed that ex-TEPCO president Masataka Shimizu indicated full withdrawal, but it remains a mystery and findings by the government, parliament and private investigations had different conclusions.

Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Fukushima nuclear plant workers face stigma, threats

By Malcolm Foster

NATIONAL AUG. 06, 2012 – 03:10PM JST ( 47 )

 

Contract workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant get off a bus in Iwaki-Yumoto, Fukushima Prefecture.AP

 

TOKYO —

A growing number of Japanese workers who are risking their health to shut down the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are suffering from depression, anxiety about the future and a loss of motivation, say two doctors who visit them regularly.

But their psychological problems are driven less by fears about developing cancer from radiation exposure and more by something immediate and personal: Discrimination from the very community they tried to protect, says Jun Shigemura, who heads a volunteer team of about ten psychiatrists and psychologists from the National Defense Medical College who meet with Tokyo Electric Power Co nuclear plant employees.

They tell therapists they have been harangued by residents displaced in Japan’s nuclear disaster and threatened with signs on their doors telling them to leave. Some of their children have been taunted at school, and prospective landlords have turned them away.

“They have become targets of people’s anger,” Shigemura told The Associated Press.

TEPCO workers—in their readily identifiable blue uniforms—were once considered to be among the elite in this rural area 230 kilometers north of Tokyo. But after the March 11, 2011, earthquake and tsunami set off meltdowns at the Fukushima plant, residents came to view them as “perpetrators,” Shigemura said.

Many TEPCO families in the area now hide their link to the company for fear of criticism, local doctors and psychiatrists say.

Shigemura likens the workers’ experience to that of U.S. Vietnam veterans returning home to hostility in the 1960s and early ‘70s.

“They both worked for (the good of) their countries, but they got a backlash,” he said.

About a dozen nuclear workers approached by the AP declined to be interviewed for this report. Except in rare cases, TEPCO has repeatedly declined requests to interview workers, and the workers themselves have shunned virtually all media attention, so these doctors’ accounts provide an unusual glimpse into their lives.

One former TEPCO employee who lived in the town of Tomioka, inside the 20-kilometer exclusion zone around the plant, told journalists during a rare visit to the Fukushima plant in February that she was frequently harassed by evacuees among the 100,000 displaced by the disaster.

“Many people who want to go home are getting frustrated and they often yell at me, ‘How are you going to make it up to us?’” said Saori Kanesaki, a former visitor guide at the Fukushima plant.

More than a half-century ago, many Japanese survivors of the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were stigmatized due to fears about their exposure to radiation. But the Fukushima disaster has thrown up a completely new kind of discrimination because of the workers’ links to TEPCO, a company widely despised throughout Japan for its mishandling of the disaster.

Some 3,000 TEPCO employees and other contractors continue to labor daily at the plant in one of the world’s riskiest jobs—keeping three melted-down reactor cores as well as spent fuel pools cool through a makeshift system of water pipes.

They face a long haul: Removing the fuel and completely shutting down the plant could take 40 years.

Worries about radiation exposure aren’t overwhelmingly prevalent among the TEPCO workers, both doctors say, although some workers are concerned, especially those with higher exposure counts. During the crisis, authorities raised the maximum radiation exposure limit to 250 millisieverts from 100 millisieverts. Six TEPCO workers surpassed that level, and were removed from work at the plant. That exposure level was lowered again in December to 50 millisieverts, with an exception allowing up to 100 millisieverts in emergencies.

In addition to the discrimination, the TEPCO nuclear workers, who are specially trained, are anxious that they will be transferred to a completely different kind of job, such as clerical work, if they should surpass the exposure limit, the doctors say.

“More than health risk, they are worried about social risk and employment risk,” said Takeshi Tanigawa, an epidemiologist with Ehime University’s medical school who visited the plant after the disaster and was the one of the first to report its harsh working conditions, which have since improved. He has been back 15 times since, and Shigemura later volunteered to join him.

The two doctors report that they are not aware of any case of radiation sickness or radiation burns among the workers, who undergo regular checks for radiation levels in their bodies.

A brief report on their experience visiting the Fukushima plant soon after the disaster that highlights the discrimination workers faced was published in Wednesday’s issue of The American Journal of Psychiatry.

The Japanese public and press, meanwhile, has offered the workers little praise, unlike the Western media, which during the height of the crisis portrayed the remaining band of workers at the plant as the heroic “Fukushima 50.” The domestic press instead emphasized how the dangers faced by the workers reflected the risks of nuclear power.

Culture helps explain some of these dynamics, including the strong Japanese sense of duty and group responsibility.

“People believe the workers share in the responsibility” for the disaster even though they didn’t cause it, Tanigawa said.

Disaster psychiatry is not well-developed in Japan. The 1995 Kobe earthquake brought growing awareness of the psychological trauma of disasters, but specialists in the field remain rare.

Research from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster suggests that mental health problems will persist for years.

Eighteen years after that crisis, Chernobyl clean-up workers experienced higher rates of depression, anxiety disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, headaches and suicidal thoughts than the general population, according to a 2008 study in the journal Psychological Medicine.

Many TEPCO workers now live in a temporary barracks at a soccer stadium called J-Village, several kilometers south of the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Workers at J-Village approached by a journalist refused to talk, and other contractors said they would get in trouble with the utility if they did.

Environment Minister Goshi Hosono, who is also in charge of nuclear crisis management, has made a point of thanking the workers during visits to the Fukushima plant, and children from around Japan have sent drawings and words of encouragement. But the workers have told the doctors that in restricted areas around the plant, former neighbors have shouted, thrown bottles and shoved them during their brief visits home to retrieve belongings.

Such discrimination weighs heavily on the workers, said Shigemura.

“Showing appreciation to the workers is an urgent need. It’s totally lacking,” Shigemura said, adding that he believes stigmatization is a key factor in influencing the workers’ psychological distress.

A growing number of the workers tell the visiting psychiatrists of sagging motivation and hopelessness, and Shigemura warned that such attitudes could lead to “misconduct or human error or sabotage.” He also said the workers are drinking more alcohol and smoking more.

His team started to receive some research funding from the Health Ministry in April.

Shigemura predicts that the rate of post-traumatic stress disorder among Fukushima workers 2-3 years after the disaster will surpass the rate among 9/11 rescue and recovery workers, which a 2007 study in The American Journal of Psychiatry said was 12.4%.

TEPCO says it is considering hiring a full-time psychiatrist to help meet the mental health needs of workers at the plant, but that there are a shortage of such experts, particularly in the Fukushima region.

“The public’s trust in TEPCO has declined, so we will work to improve that,” said Yuji Ohya, an official with the company’s health and safety department. “Hopefully as that improves, it will boost the workers’ spirits.”

Associated Press writer Mari Yamaguchi contributed to this report.

Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

TEPCO video shows tensions as Fukushima crisis unfolds

NATIONAL AUG. 07, 2012 – 06:25AM JST ( 22 )

TOKYO —

Video footage released Monday shows the head of the Fukushima nuclear power plant shouting “We have a big problem, a big problem!” as a reactor exploded after last year’s quake-tsunami disaster.

The footage was among 150 hours of video conferencing recorded during the first days of the nuclear disaster reluctantly released by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) which operated the plant.

The images showed tense exchanges as company officials struggled with the unfolding disaster after the deadly tsunami on March 11, 2011 damaged emergency power for cooling systems at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which went through meltdowns and explosions.

Among the most tense footage recorded was on March 14 when the building covering the number three reactor exploded due to a build-up of hydrogen.

Plant chief Masao Yoshida is heard urgently reporting the blast to his bosses at TEPCO’s Tokyo headquarters, more than 200 kilometers away.

“The head office, the head office! We have a big problem, a big problem!” Yoshida suddenly shouts during a teleconference.

“The number three reactor, it’s perhaps water steam, there was an explosion! 11:01 am!” he says, his voice cracking.

A calm male voice from the TEPCO headquarters responds: “11:01 am. Acknowledged. An emergency communication.”

“Those out in the field have to pull back, pull back!” says another male voice from the headquarters.

TEPCO reluctantly released about 150 hours of video covering March 11 through 15, 2011 more than a year after the accident under pressure from Industry Minister Yukio Edano.

Then-Prime Minister Naoto Kan was also seen rushing to TEPCO headquarters to vent his anger over the utility’s clumsy handling of the crisis.

TEPCO had refused to release the footage, saying it was for internal use only, despite demands from journalists and outside experts who said it should be released for the public to analyze exactly how the accident was handled.

Of the video released, about 50 hours had sound while the rest did not.

The names and faces of TEPCO workers were blurred to protect their privacy and safety as the firm had come under serious public criticism, TEPCO said.

TEPCO is letting accredited journalists to view the footage at its headquarters until September 7 but has banned them from recording it, except for taking notes.

The utility handed out 90 minutes of selected video clips from the total footage.

© 2012 AFP

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Comment: Why can’t they deliver all the footage with sound (former prime minister Kan demanded sound also). One portion revealed that TEPCO wanted to pull all employees out of the disaster site (even though the Diet Inspection Report denied it).

Fukushima Report Blasts TEPCO’s On-Going Failures

Published on Monday, July 23, 2012 by Common Dreams

“I now understand what people are worried the most about is the vulnerability of the No 4 spent fuel pool”

- Common Dreams staff

The operator of Japan’s crippled nuclear power plant is still stumbling in its handling of the disaster 16 months later, by dragging its feet in investigations and trying to understate the true damage at the complex, investigators said Monday.

Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s (TEPCO) tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant reactor building number 4 is seen in Fukushima prefecture, in this aerial view photo, July 18, 2012. REUTERS/KyodoThe Japanese government-appointed inquiry into the 3 Fukushima nuclear reactor meltdowns has raised doubts about whether other atomic plants are prepared for disasters despite new safety rules, and delivered a damning assessment of the regulators and the station’s operator.

The report, the second this month about the disaster, could be seized upon by Japan’s growing anti-nuclear movement after the restart of two reactors, and as the government readies a new energy policy due out next month.

The panel suggested post-Fukushima safety steps taken at other nuclear plants may not be enough to cope with a big, complex catastrophe caused by both human error and natural causes in a “disaster-prone nation” like Japan, which suffers from earthquakes, tsunami, floods and volcanoes.

“We understand that immediate safety measures are being further detailed and will materialize in the future. But we strongly urge the people concerned to make continued efforts to take really effective steps,” said the panel, chaired by the University of Tokyo engineering professor Yotaro Hatamura.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, and regulators failed to plan for a massive natural disaster, the panel said, blaming them for being lulled by the same “safety myth” blasted by a parliament-appointed team of experts earlier this month.

“Both the government and companies should establish a new philosophy of disaster prevention that requires safety and disaster measures against any massive accident and disaster … regardless of event probability,” the report said.

“The Fukushima crisis occurred because people didn’t take the impact of natural disasters so seriously,” Hatamura told a news conference.

“Even though there were new findings [about the risk of a tsunami], TEPCO couldn’t see it because people are blind to what they don’t want to see.”

The decision by the prime minister, Yoshihiko Noda, to restart Kansai Electric Power Co’s two reactors this month has energized the country’s growing anti-nuclear movement, withmore than 100,000 taking to the streets in Tokyo a week ago.

All of Japan’s 50 reactors were shut down for safety checks after Fukushima. Critics say the two restarted reactors do not meet all the government’s safety criteria announced this April.

Hatamura also said that because of time restrictions his panel was unable to address the concerns of residents, and the international community, who questioned whether the damaged reactors and the pool of used nuclear fuel at the No 4 reactor could withstand another earthquake.

“I now understand what people are worried the most about is the vulnerability of the No 4 spent fuel pool. I wish we had started an investigation on it much earlier,” Hatamura said.

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The damaged No. 4 reactor building stands at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okuma, Fukushima prefecture, Japan, Saturday, May 26, 2012. Japanese Environment and Nuclear Minister Goshi Hosono, accompanied by the media, has visited the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant to inspect a reactor building and its spent fuel pool at the center of safety concerns. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Pool)

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