Fukushima Management and Government Performance

NUCENG

The more I reflect on this there are problems. First the discussion quotes a worker who only worked until the earthquake and tsunami. This may not be accurate for current practice due to all the flack TEPCO took over the lack of dosimetry right after the accident.

Second They quote a politician and a year-old study by a "watchdog" group. Wouldn't be a bad idea to question potential bias there!

Third, they quote the author of "The Lie of Nuclear Power." Obvioulsly an objective commentor (NOT).

They quote Kim Kearfott of the University of Michigan who does have good credentials, but only on how they recruit workers, not about training or use of dosimetry.

Finally they quote Kristin Shrader-Frechette of Notre Dame. She is a strident anti-nuclear critic as a part of her advocacy for "Environmental Justice."

All in all, I rate this article as about a 2 out of 10 for believability.

NUCENG

Source:

http://www.gainesville.com/article/2...12140576?tc=ar

It appears they will use the term "stability" vs. "cold shutdown." IMHO, That is a much more accurate description.

W7VOA

I am looking to do a telephone interview for our radio newscasts (and web site) with a nuclear engineer about the Japanese prime minister's announcement (which will occur in a few hours) that Fukushima-1 has achieved "conditions" akin to a "cold shutdown." If anyone is available, please PM me.

-- Steve Herman
VOA Northeast Asia Bureau Chief
Twitter @w7voa

W7VOA

We've got someone. Thanks.

zapperzero

http://www.asyura2.com/11/genpatu19/msg/378.html

Apparently NISA has decided to let TEPCO off the hook for any past, present or future releases of contaminated water into the ocean, reason cited being "emergency".

How can this be?

link via ex-skf

NUCENG

It is consistent with the earlier decision that TEPCO does not own, nor is responsible, for land contamination. I don't think anyone on this forum found that to be proper. And at least for me, this is the same. What are they going to be held responsible for? Will the next release be that the government wants evacuees to refund their compensation back to TEPCO? This is getting a little bit BIZARRE!

zapperzero

Umm.. that was just TEPCO's contention in court - it was rejected by the judge.

It is similar indeed and gives us a clue as to the earlier incident you mention - the brazen attitude from TEPCO seems now grounded in previous experience with toothless industry regulators - a run-of-the-mill judge proved to be less inclined to... accommodate.

It will also have international consequences I think - China has been making noises about Cesium ending up in "their" water already.

dontdomaths

Enjoying the great conversations on this issue on pf.

Just signed up to say your colourful narrative is not "historical fact".

Caniche

Cheers for the colourful bit ,which fact do you refute? Espionage;forced labour or slavery?

dontdomaths

Thanks for not taking it as a troll attempt :)

I'm not refuting the specifics actually. Factually, feudalism can always be stretched to slavery, at some stage someone is going to be forced work. Yes there were prisoners and they might have been put to work and not paid. Espionage is common if not inherent function of all governments, after all not all of their activities can be overt. Obviously some of the most famous images of spys have been ninjas..

However- I'm arguing against this sort of simplicity. Summarily picking a few historical points in summary doesn't equate to "historical fact" in the way you were representing because it's neither balanced or encompassing. It's a coloured narrative because it's highlighting what suits to paint a certain characteristic to explain aspects of contemporary work practices.

This is of course only my opinion but since there were no other disenting views, and NUCENG seemed to be debating with you having accepted your point I thought I'd chime in.

I think the answer is simpler, and not racially or culturally based. People need money. You'll find the same thing happens in every country.

If that point doesn't make sense perhaps an inversion might demonstrate the point- Are you American? If so do you draw the same parallels to contemporary work practice in the US because America was in many ways built on slavery, espionage and forced labour? Probably not- because this too would be 3 things that are factual but not characteristic of the US (well apart from the slavery which as I understand it is something that culturally is still an issue).

gmax137

You left out the genocide of the previous indigenous cultures.

Actually I'm agreeing with your point, I think it's well taken

tsutsuji

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/genpatsu-...508/index.html A 17 year old boy was employed for 6 days at Fukushima Daiichi in April 2011, installing pipes, in violation of the law banning workers younger than 18 in nuclear power plants, and received a 1.92 mSv dose. This was found on 7 May 2012 by checking this worker's identity and age. Among the 23,000 who have worked at Daiichi since the accident, the identity of 6000 of them has not been confirmed yet, and more workers younger than 18 might be found among them.

tsutsuji

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/genpatsu-...516/index.html [from Tepco's press conference on 15 May 2012] At a study meeting in 2006, 2 years after the Sumatra tsunami, gathering the NISA, power companies and other participants, it was said that if a 14 m tsunami strikes Fukushima Daiichi, water would enter buildings through doors and service entrances and "there is a possibility that electric power supply equipments lose function". The NISA issued instructions such as making the seawater pumps watertight, and Tepco took this and other countermeasures but did not study countermeasures against water flowing into the buildings. Tepco comments that "as there was no certain evaluation that tsunamis higher than 10 m would strike, it was not followed by a study of countermeasures". Calculated estimates of tsunamis around 10 m high were also obtained during the three years that preceded the accident. It is becoming clear that several opportunities to revise countermeasures against tsunamis were missed.

http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/fukushima-...20516_05-j.pdf documents from the 2006 study meeting

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120516a5.html "NISA, Tepco knew in '06 of Fukushima tsunami threat"

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/n...na007000c.html "TEPCO was warned of possible power loss from tsunami at nuclear plants in 2006"

tsutsuji

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/22600907 Video of Tepco's press conference, 15 May 2012
http://genpatsu-watch.blogspot.com/2...125151800.html Transcript of Tepco's press conference, 15 May 2012

Matsumoto:

The next item: there have been news reports today of yesterday's Diet's investigation committee session, suspecting for example that although we had been warned by the NISA in Heisei 18 (2006) of the risk of tsunami-caused full loss of electric power, Tepco did not take the necessary countermeasures.

On this matter, let me narrate the factual relationships that we checked. As, retrospectively, not being prepared enough resulted in a major accident caused by this tsunami, we present our sincere apologies, but let me explain the situation at that time.

First of all, from January to July 2006, the NISA and JNES organised a floods study group. It was attended by the Federation of Electric Power and by electric power companies including Tepco in quality of observers.

That study group examined questions such as the vulnerability of the design of nuclear power plants in the United States against internal inundations, or the accident where a seawater pump at an Indian nuclear power plant was inundated due to the Indian Ocean off the coast of Sumatra tsunami.

Then, this brings us to October 2006, the NISA held a preliminary meeting on the planning of earthquake resistance back-checks to be imposed on the Federation of Electric Power, and during that meeting, the NISA presented instructions on how to deal with tsunamis.

It was said that the Society of Civil Engineers' method being conservative enough, there is no problem in using that method. However, concerning tsunamis, as we are dealing with a natural phenomenon, one must think that phenomenons beyond design basis are possible, and in the case the design basis is exceeded, emergency seawater pumps lose function, resulting in core damage, so we received a demand to take concrete countermeasures at the plants where the margin against tsunamis is small.

Later, this brings us to April 2007, the Federation of Electric Power replied to the aforementioned NISA's requests, and we at Tepco submitted a report mentioning that according to the Society of Civil Engineers' method, the margin of Fukushima Daiichi's emergency seawater pumps against tsunamis is extremely small and saying that we will take voluntary countermeasures.

Concretely, we reported that we would study the watertighting of motors and electric operated equipments. At that time we did not receive additional instructions from the NISA, but in continuation, from that time on, both we and the NISA were aware that it was necessary to make a probabilistic evaluation of tsunami heights and to study the tsunami hazard.

The factual relationships being as I explained, at that time at the floods study group we did not study only the emergency seawater pumps but also an hypothesis where the buildings' site is inundated.

Of course, if the buildings' site is inundated, water flows in through entrances, and the electric supply equipments located inside the buildings get inundated and lose function. Well, in some sense it is an obvious result, and it does not constitute a new knowledge of a new risk that would have been pointed out by the NISA.

For us, it was an obvious awareness that we were holding. The study contained in that report consisted in examining what happens if a tsunami exceeds the buildings' ground level, regardless whether it is possible with a real tsunami or regardless the probability of such an event.

Concerning the elevation of the plant, we performed the study in accordance with the Society of Civil Engineer's tsunami evaluation method, and both the NISA and we evaluated that the approach with this evaluation guideline was conservative enough. For that reason, with this result of tsunami height evaluation[1], we thought at that time that safety was being secured.

However, at that time in October 2006, a protective wall was surrounding the motors of the emergency seawater pumps located at an elevation of 4 m at Fukushima Daiichi, but as the margin against the design basis tsunami of 5.7 m was small, we received a demand from the NISA to take concrete countermeasures, and we began to study the watertighting of the electric operated equipments.

As a result, we do not confirm the news reports that say that we received a written instruction from the NISA or that the NISA requested that we take countermeasures against the risk of full loss of AC electric power resulting from an inundation of the buildings. That's all from me for today.

[1]The evaluation according to the Society of Civil Engineer's method is O.P. + 5.6 m for Fukushima Daiichi unit 5, according to the last column of the table at the bottom of http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/fukushima-...20516_05-j.pdf page 3/3.

zapperzero

Way to dig one's own grave, there.

tsutsuji

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/22621594 Video of Tepco's press conference, 16 May 2012
http://genpatsu-watch.blogspot.com/2...-1880bqkg.html Transcript of Tepco's press conference, 16 May 2012

Matsumoto:

Next item: we have distributed to you a series of documents [ http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/fukushima-...20516_05-j.pdf ]. One of them is about the floods working group and the situation of the response to it, and the other one consists in an A3 colour copy entitled "Results of the studies of the external flood working group".

Yesterday we explained the factual relationships in answer to the news reports that followed the suspicions at the day before yesterday's Diet investigation committee session, such as the suspicion that we did not take enough countermeasures against the flood situation in 2006 (Heisei 18). But that was an oral explanation, and today we can provide this explanation as a document.

In combination, as the NISA allowed us to do so, we can provide you with the last documents that we received at the floods working group.

First, please have a look at the A4 document. The floods working group was held from January to July 2006 by the NISA and JNES and it was about topics such as the vulnerability problems of nuclear power plants in the United States, or the flooding of seawater pumps at a nuclear power plant in India during the off the coast of Sumatra tsunami of that time. The Federation of electric power and the the power companies attended as observers.

The next paragraph is about the situation of the studies at the working group. The assumption was a flooding of 1 m above ground for an unlimited time. As a consequence, needless to say, when the grounds and the buildings are flooded, the result obtained is that water flows in through building entrances, and electric power supply equipments lose function.

However, this was not based on probabilities or on the possibility of occurence of such a tsunami in real life. Our opinion is that this was nothing more than a check of consequences performed as a study. The result of the study is provided in the A3 document for Fukushima Daiichi unit 5 and Tohoku Electric's Tomari units 1 and 2 as representative cases.

In the conditions of the study, it is noted for Fukushima Daiichi unit 5 that the water intake area, near the water intake is at an elevation of O.P. 4.5 m, and that the level, above that, of each service building, of the turbine building and the reactor building is O.P. 13 m.

In Table 1, as I previously said, when a 1 m above ground tsunami is assumed (for Fukushima Daiichi unit 5, that makes an O.P. 14 m assumed tsunami) the seawater pumps, the reactor building, the turbine building and the service buildings each receive an an x-mark [used to indicate an incorrect answer in a test, etc.].

Also, for Tomari units 1 and 2, as you can see, as the ground floor is at 10 m, adding 1 m makes a T.P. 11 m tsunami, and the situation is that the recirculation pump buildings, the reactor buildings, and the turbine buildings etc. receive an x-mark.

In the right half of the page we attached the pictures made at the time of the study concerning the facts checked at Fukushima Daiichi unit 5 and Tomari unit 1.

On the back of the page, it is about an examination of the situation in the case water actually enters into the buildings. Both at Fukushima Daiichi unit 5 and at Tomari units 1 and 2, in the case buildings are flooded, if water enters through the service doors for large equipments, those areas get flooded.

Results obtained for each electric power company have been summarized in Table 2 in the bottom right part of the page under the title "Consequences on outdoor equipments of a grounds level + 1 m, beyond expectation tsunami". The results marked with ※ are those of bad consequences on electric supply equipments in the case of a tsunami unlimited in time at Tomari units 1 and 2, Onagawa unit 2, Fukushima Daiichi unit 5 and Hamaoka unit 4.

Let's go back to the A4 sheet. Such a floods working group was organized, and when, in October 2006, the NISA held a preliminary meeting on the planning of earthquake resistance back-checks, it was said that for tsunamis, being conservative enough, the Society of Civil Engineer's method was OK.

First there was a talk about the Society of Civil Engineer's method. However, after that, we received a request to study concrete countermeasures for the plants where the margin against tsunamis, high waves and backwashes is small, because when the level obtained by the Society of Civil Engineer's method is exceeded, the emergency seawater pumps that are located in low locations lose function and cause core damage. Also, at that time, the Federation of electric power was orally told to additionally transmit this request to each company's top ranking management.

At Tepco, as it was requested by the NISA, this information was shared up to the head of the Nuclear Power & Plant Siting Division. However our understanding was that this request concerned the flooding of emergency seawater pumps, and not the flooding of the buildings or the measures that could have prevented the different consequences of the present [11 March 2011] tsunami.

Now the last paragraph: All the tsunami heights were to be evaluated using the Society of Civil Engineer's method, this was to be reflected in the earthquake resistance back-checks and it was approved by the NISA.

As a consequence, in application of the Society of Civil Engineer's method, we conducted a conservative evaluation, and at that time we thought that the nuclear power plant's safety was being secured.

Also, the above being explained, the opinions of the Headquarters for Earthquake Research Promotion [ http://www.jishin.go.jp/main/index-e.html ] and the publications about the Jogan earthquake were concurring on the necessity of a new wave source model, and we worked on responses such as a revision of the Society of Civil Engineer's method in parallel with the study of the watertighting of emergency seawater pumps.

This was the explanations provided yesterday summarized again today in the form of documents. Thank you.

Yamanote

Right.

Thanks tsutsuji-san for translating!
Nature doesn't care about man-made papers and what Tepco thought or not. They can discuss this forth and back - it is too late now, they saved the money for making the plant tsunami-proof and now they have to face the consequences. And hiding behind papers doesn't even fix a single problem.