Fukushima

Huge leak of tritium feared in Fukushima

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Friday that an estimated 20 trillion to 40 trillion becquerels of tritium from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant may have flowed into the Pacific Ocean since May 2011.

Japan Times,

3 August, 2013

The utility reported the estimate Friday to the Nuclear Regulation Authority after recently admitting that toxic water from the emergency cooling system set up after the nuclear crisis began on March 11, 2011, is leaking into the sea.

Nevertheless, Tepco said the size of the release is roughly in the allowed range of 22 trillion becquerels a year but acknowledged it didn’t take place in a controlled manner. Tritium has a half-life of about 12 years.

Since it doesn’t know when the leak began, the utility has assumed the beginning was in May 2011, after it attempted to stop the toxic water from entering the ocean when it was discovered in April 2011.

The constant injection of water that is needed to keep the damaged reactors cool after the core meltdowns of March 2011 are generating a new radiation crisis at the plant that officials appear unable to solve without tainting the ocean and marine life.

Japan prepares for possible big earthquake

The Japanese government has warned that the country may be hit by an earthquake more damaging than the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, which killed 19,000 people and crippled the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Channel NewsAsia,

31 July, 2013

TOKYO: Earthquakes frequently rock Japan and sometimes trigger fearful tsunamis.

The Japanese government has warned that the country may be hit by an earthquake more damaging than the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, which killed 19,000 people and crippled the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Channel NewsAsia visited one of Japan's foremost quake and tsunami research centres to find out what's being done to protect Japan from such a worst case scenario.

A nine-metre scroll is a stark reminder of the 1855 earthquake which rocked the city of Edo, now known as Tokyo, hard. The 6.9-magnitude quake was followed by fire, and killed some 10,000 people.

Many major quakes and tsunamis have hit parts of Japan since.

And since the 1995 Kobe earthquake which killed more than 6,000 people, the government has set aside a huge budget to predict earthquakes.

But experts today admit quakes cannot be accurately predicted.

Still, that's not stopping them from collecting data to better understand the earth's movements.

Mr Atsushi Tanaka, Director of Centre for Integrated Disaster Information Research at the University of Tokyo, said: "By installing many underwater seismometers, we can deliver more research reports, and collect data. We will continue to accumulate data."

Researchers are also expanding their sphere of work to provide more holistic information about the impact of quakes.

Mr Tanaka added: "The research arena is expanding little by little. What's in demand, economics, engineering, people in fields which were not previously involved are now being brought in to do research. And based on them, I believe policy decisions and consensus from residents can be attained more smoothly."

The Japanese government predicts a 9-magnitude earthquake in the Nankai trough, in the southern Pacific side of the main Honshu island.

The government plans to come up with an action plan, a mid-term report as early as the end of July and it wants to write up plans for reconstruction.

Another concern in the event of another big one is a subsequent tsunami.

Professor Yoshimitsu Tajima, Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Tokyo, said: "The source of the quake is very close to the coast. Therefore, we don't have much lead time."

Mr Tajima is also exploring how tsunami walls can help, even though many of those along the coast of Tohoku were destroyed by the tsunami two years ago.

Professor Tajima added: "Now we are looking at how seawalls can reduce inundation or risk of fatalities, and at the same time once tsunami starts to overflow, we also need to think of mitigation strategy against disasters. In that sense not only constructions of sea wall, we have to also look at how inundation flow behaves. Then based on that, we can made design of entire city near the coast."

Various cities and towns are preparing for the worst case scenario, which the government believes could kill up to 320,000 people and bring economic damage of more than US$2.2 trillion.