Update on nuke plant damaged by earthquake
It's now being reported that the scale of the water leak is larger than was first said, and that some drums of nuclear waste also spilled. Somehow I am not reassured by repeated protestations from company spokespeople that there has been "no harm" from the leaks.
Today's Wall Street Journal:
While the quake had triggered a leak of water with radioactive material Monday at world's largest nuclear power plant at Kashiwazaki city, near the epicenter, officials said it caused no harm to the environment. On Tuesday, however, officials were investigating a possible second leak, saying about 100 drums containing low-level nuclear waste fell at the plant during the quake and were found a day later, some of the lids open, said Masahide Ichikawa, an official with the local government in Niigata prefecture.A spokesman at Tokyo Electric Power Co., which runs the plant, said the company was still trying to determine whether any hazardous material had spilled but said there was no effect outside the plant. "We have no information at this time that there is any effect on the outside environment," Tepco spokesman Manabu Takeyama said.
Another leak at the Kashiwazaki power plant would sow further doubts about the safety of Japan's nuclear power plants, which have suffered a string of accidents and coverups amid deep concerns they are vulnerable in earthquakes. Monday's quake initially triggered a small fire at an electrical transformer in the sprawling plant. But it was announced only 12 hours later that the temblor also caused a leak of water containing radioactive material.
Officials said the water leak was harmless and well below safety standards, but the delay in notifying the public spurred concern among antinuclear activists and triggered criticism from top officials.
"They raised the alert too late. I have sent stern instructions that such alerts must be raised seriously and swiftly," Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters in Tokyo. "Those involved should repent their actions."
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2007/07/18 23:32:16
Quake-Nuclear Plants
Quake adequacy checks on reactors to take until end of 2010
TOKYO, July 18 Kyodo - The seismic adequacy of nuclear reactors across Japan is being reviewed under a new government guideline but it will take until the end of 2010 to finish the checks despite the revelation that Monday's powerful earthquake was stronger than the level for which a plant in Kashiwazaki, Niigata Prefecture, was designed, power companies said Wednesday.
While Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant was designed to resist horizontal acceleration of up to 273 gals at the bottom layer of its No. 1 reactor, the seismometer there measured up to 680 gals in Monday's magnitude-6.8 quake, according to the utility.
As power companies in Japan largely operate with shared specifications, it is feared that other nuclear plants could suffer problems similar to those at Tokyo Electric's plant in Niigata if they experience an earthquake on a similar scale.
Although Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Akira Amari said Tuesday that he wants utilities to expedite assessments of reactors' quake resistance, officials at the firms said existing timetables for the assessments through December 2010 would not be changed unless the government issues an order.
The ministry's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has tried to play down the minister's remarks in light of the difficulties in speeding up the assessments. The agency is planning to consider whether to issue a new order for the ongoing process of assessment after receiving an analysis of data on Monday's quake from Tokyo Electric.
While Hokkaido Electric Power Co. has finished its drilling survey for the two reactors at its Tomari plant and is due to submit a report to the government next year, Chugoku Electric Power Co. is slated to finish a review of the No. 3 reactor at its Shimane plant in December 2010.
Kyushu Electric Power Co. plans to report the results of reviews into its Genkai plant in Fukuoka Prefecture and its Sendai plant in Kagoshima Prefecture in 2009, and Kansai Electric Power Co. also plans to report its findings on its three plants in Fukui Prefecture in 2009.
The government's quake resistance guideline for nuclear plants, updated last year for the first time in a quarter of a century, toughened requirements for reactors and required that they be able to resist earthquakes stemming from unknown faults in their vicinity.
The revision of the guideline, first formulated in 1981, was triggered by the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake that killed more than 6,000 people in Kobe, Hyogo Prefecture, and its vicinity.
At the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, Monday's quake caused about 100 drums containing low-level radioactive waste to topple over, dislodging some of their lids, while water containing radioactive materials also leaked into the Sea of Japan and a minor blaze occurred at an electric transformer outside one of the reactors.
The fault line that caused the quake may extend to beneath the plant, an analysis of aftershock data by the Japan Meteorological Agency showed Wednesday.
==Kyodo
Posted by: Tetsu | July 18, 2007 6:33 PM