Human error
June 10, 2011
More radiation-tainted water could be dumped into the Pacific from a second Japanese nuclear plant, the Japanese government said Wednesday. Operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) was considering releasing the contaminated water from its Fukushima II Daini plant, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency NISA said. The plant was safely shut down even though it was hit by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. But the tsunami brought in seawater, some of which became contaminated later. The amount of the contaminated water at the plant is estimated at 3,000 tons. It contains radioactive substances such as manganese-54, cobalt-58 and cobalt-60, believed to stem from corroded pipes, Jiji Press reported.
According to the newest report from the NISA, the meltdown at the Fukushima I power plant set in just five hours after the coast was devastated by the tsunami on March 3. None of the backup systems for cooling kicked in. The fuel rods melted onto the floor of the compression chamber, damaging it and possibly sinking further through to the bottom of the security containment chamber. At least that is what the Japanese government is saying. In a report to the International Atomic Agency, it said such a scenario could not be ruled out. It is assumed that something similar happened later in reactor blocks two and three.
Outdated guidelines
In the past, there have been and there still are guidelines in place that deal with extreme situations like complete electricity failure. But Haruki Madarame, Head Supervisor of the Japanese nuclear power plants admitted not too long ago on a television interview, "I hadn’t really paid attention to that bit about a 100 percent internal and external electricity blackout.”
To add to that, the guideline on such an extreme case of electricity failure had not been updated or reevaluated in the past 20 years. "The Japanese nuclear experts live in their own little world and have not managed to discuss problems and possible situations without having a reason for it. That is a big setback,” says Haruki Madarame, adding, “Some people believe that the natural disasters were responsible for the meltdown. But I personally believe that human error played a larger role.”
Human error
Now Japanese authorities are scrambling to improve safety precautions in their other 54 nuclear reactors. But if human error is responsible for the disaster, then the question remains whether any nuclear power plant will ever be foolproof.
However, engineers in Fukushima are concerned with more practical questions at the moment. For example, where to with all that highly radioactive water? A TEPCO spokesperson explains where to: "We will be able to decontaminate 1,200 tons of water per day. We will start with the decontamination on June 15th.”
Report to IAEA
TEPCO plans on using special filters to separate the radioactive particles from the water that is now being used to keep the fuel rods from overheating and which is also escaping into the ecosystem though cracks in the reactors. Due to the extremely high levels of radiation in and around the reactors, it will take months to get a stable cooling system up and running in reactors 1, 2 and 3. And it will take years more to rid the entire plant of radiation. Furthermore, it is still not clear what they should do with the radioactive material that has already been collected and sealed in containers.
In its letter to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Japanese government has again stated that supervising bodies should be independent. "If we don’t start looking at the disaster from an organizational and structural perspective, then we will never get to the heart of the problem,“ says Yotaru Hatamura. The former head of the prestigious Tokyo University is now the leading an expert committee that has been given the task of looking into and investigating the atomic disaster and exposing mistakes made by the Japanese government, TEPCO and the Japanese nuclear agency NISA. A second report is expected by the end of this year.
Author: Peter Kujath / Sarah Berning / dpa
Editor: Manasi Gopalakrishnan