Evacuation orders lifted in three “difficult-to-return” zones
Electricity procurement: Many local governments go back to big utilities and abandon new power producers
Contaminated water, ALPS committee report emphasizes benefits of discharge into Pacific Ocean
Lymph node metastasis in 72% of thyroid cancers, invasive in 47%: Experts call for long-term studies
Radiation along the Olympic torch relay route
Ikata nuclear power plant No. 3 reactor: Court injunction suspends operation
Financial assistance approved to restart Tokai Daini Nuclear Power Plant
Kansai Electric’s nuclear bribery scandal
Three former TEPCO executives acquitted of criminal negligence
Ministerial ordinance to reuse low-level contaminated soil enters into force in April 2020
Evacuation orders lifted in three “difficult-to-return” zones: Yonomori, Ono, Futaba train station vicinity
Before opening of the JR Joban train line on March 14, 2020, evacuation orders were gradually lifted starting March 4 in the vicinity of three train stations that had been designated as difficult-to-return zones (due to radiation levels after the nuclear accident): Yonomori Station (Tomioka), Ono Station (Okuma), and Futaba Station (Futaba). This was the first time evacuation orders were lifted in Futaba since the nuclear accident, and the first time for any difficult-to-return zone. The area represents just a small portion of the total area of difficult-to-return zones, and the actual return of residents is not expected to happen here soon.
The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported that when officials made the decision to lift the evacuation orders, it had not actually been confirmed that the air exposure doses in a part of Okuma were actually below the level required for lifting evacuation orders (i.e., 3.8 microseiverts per hour). The government states that it was able to confirm the level was below 3.8 microseiverts per hour, but this level was based on calculation using the government calculation of 20 milliseiverts per year, and that would mean that it was significantly higher than the maximum levels permitted for public exposure (1 millisievert per year) and for radiation control areas (5 millisieverts per year).
Electricity procurement: Many local governments go back to big utilities and abandon new power producers
Four years have passed since April 2016 when the Japanese electricity market entered a new era of electricity liberalization due to market reform. One aspect was the introduction of “new power producers” (previously referred to as Power Producers and Suppliers, or PPS, which do not include monopolistic power utilities like TEPCO and in many cases use renewable energy). The Power Shift campaign, with FoE Japan as secretariat, has encouraged electricity users to shift to these renewable energy sources.
In June and July 2019, the Power Shift Steering Committee, Hitotsubashi University’s Natural Resources and Economics Project, Asahi Shimbun newspaper, and Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies (ISEP) conducted a survey of electricity procurement status and policies regarding the main government buildings and facilities of 47 prefectures, 20 major cities (“ordinance designated cities,” with populations of 500,000+ and special designation by government ordinance), and selected municipalities (particularly those that have municipally-sponsored new power producers).
The survey found that among the 67 local governments studied (47 prefectures and 20 major cities), 36 (i.e., more than half) had returned to the big power utilities like TEPCO for their electricity procurement, after briefly having contracts with new power producers. Hokkaido, Kanagawa, Nagano, Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Osaka, and Fukuoka were among the prefectures that procured from new power producers briefly after the Fukushima nuclear accident but then went back to the major utilities. As one example, Kanagawa Prefecture procured 90% of its electricity for prefectural facilities from new power producers in fiscal 2013, but by 2019 it had shifted to TEPCO Energy Partner Inc. to procure electricity for all 394 of its facilities, including the main prefectural office building. Meanwhile, there is a growing trend nationwide for municipalities to establish their own municipally-sponsored new power producers. For example, in Yamagata Prefecture, most municipalities that have already established their own power producers are procuring the electricity for their main government buildings through voluntary contracts with those producers.
Contaminated water, ALPS committee report emphasizes benefits of discharge into Pacific Ocean
As the volume of contaminated water treated by the so-called Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) and stored at the TEPCO Daiichi nuclear plant continues to grow, a subcommittee was established by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) to discuss how to deal with this water.
The subcommittee issued its report on February 10, 2020, stating that release into the ocean and evaporation into the atmosphere are two “viable options,” emphasizing that ocean release was more reliable in terms of monitoring radioactive substances. The government says that it will seek comments from local stakeholders before determining its policy to deal with the water.
The subcommittee issued that report without having given any serious consideration to a number of proposals from the Citizens’ Commission on Nuclear Energy, which has several technical experts as members. Those proposals included long-term storage in large tanks on land (which the commission said is safer and can store more volume per unit of area) and solidification with mortar.
Lymph node metastasis in 72% of thyroid cancers, invasive in 47%: Experts call for long-term studies
Prof. Shinichi Suzuki of Fukushima Medical University spoke at an international symposium in Fukushima City on February 3, 2020. He has been performing most of the surgeries for people who were 18 years old or younger at the time of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident and diagnosed with thyroid cancer via the Fukushima Health Management Survey.
He reported that of the 180 cases of surgery for thyroid cancer from 2012 to 2018, 72% were found to have lymph node metastasis and 47% were invasive, but that very low-risk cases where follow-up observation was recommended were not included in those numbers.
It was also revealed that 6% of the patients had a relapse after surgery and required repeat surgery. The male-to-female ratio for those 180 individuals was 1:1.7 (this includes 1:1.4 for the second round of surgery, and 1:0.7 for the third round), and while the male-to-female ratio for thyroid cancer is typically 1:7 or 1:8 (weighted heavily toward females), this study found the ratio of males to be greater than females.
Prof. Suzuki emphasized the need for long-term studies. The Fukushima Health Management Survey, found that 231 people had or were suspected of having thyroid cancer, and 172 underwent surgery (as reported by the prefecture as of October 2019). Even though the Review Committee found this to be tens of orders of magnitude higher than the number of cases that would be estimated from thyroid cancer morbidity statistics, paradoxically it also stated that “It is difficult to consider these numbers to be due to the (nuclear) accident.”
Radiation along the Olympic torch relay route
High radiation levels were observed near the “J Village” soccer facility in Fukushima Prefecture, which is intended to be the starting point for the Olympic torch relay for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020. Greenpeace Japan took readings of radioactivity levels from October to November 2019 between a forested area and a parking lot owned by Naraha Town adjacent to J Village, finding 71 microsieverts per hour at ground level and 1.7 microsieverts per hour one meter above the ground. After being notified of these findings, Japan’s Ministry of the Environment confirmed similar numbers.
Later, when Fukushima Prefecture took readings along the torch relay route and roadside, the maximum values were 0.46 microsieverts per hour on the roadway (Koriyama City) and 0.77 microsieverts per hour beside the road (Iitate Village). This is much more than the public exposure limit of 1 millisievert per year (0.11 microsieverts per hour, or 0.23 microsieverts per hour based on national government calculations and decontamination standard). The average of the monitoring sites was highest in Iitate Village, and the average dose at 404 sites was 0.25 microsieverts. The readings at about half the sites were above 0.23 microsieverts per hour.
According to surveys by Radioactivity Monitoring Center for Citizens (Chikurinsha) and the Fukushima Daiichi Area Environmental Radiation Monitoring Project along the torch relay route and 69 nearby sites, readings exceeded 0.23 microsieverts at 62% of all survey sites. One site in Iitate had an extremely high level of soil contamination, at 2.14 million Bq/m2. Other locations showed high soil contamination levels, exceeding 1 million Bq/m2 at three sites in Okuma Town, three in Iitate Village, and one in Kawauchi Village.
Chikurinsha’s vice-chair Kazumasa Aoki commented: “People also live along the torch relay route. Fukushima Prefecture says that if a person spends four hours in Iitate Village (which had the highest readings along the route) they will only get 0.0033 millisieverts of exposure, and they claim that this is no problem. But that means 6.57 millisieverts per year for residents, which is more than six times the safe public exposure limit.”
Ikata nuclear power plant No. 3 reactor: Court injunction suspends operation
On January 17, 2020, the Hiroshima High Court (presiding judge Kazutake Mori) handed down a ruling ordering the halt of Shikoku Electric Power Co.’s Reactor No. 3 at the Ikata Nuclear Power Plant (Ehime Prefecture, the only nuclear plant on the island of Shikoku) due to real risks to life and limb of residents in the event of an earthquake or volcanic eruption. This was in response to a request for an injunction filed by residents from an island in Yamaguchi Prefecture within 50 km of the plant. The ruling overturned a March 2019 decision by the Iwakuni branch of the Yamaguchi District Court that had dismissed the residents’ concerns and ruled that the plant could continue operating, stating among other things that there was a low likelihood of a large eruption during the reactor’s operating life.
The judge found that the possible presence of an active seismic fault near the Ikata nuclear plant could not be denied, saying, “The fault’s proximity to the nuclear plant is recognized to be less than 2 km, but Shikoku Electric Power did not investigate sufficiently, and I have to say that there were errors and omissions in the Nuclear Regulation Authority’s process that found no problems exist.” As for the safety of volcanic eruptions, the judge found that the NRA review had underestimated the impacts of volcanic ash in the event of an eruption at Mount Aso.
Reactor 3 is currently halted for regular inspections and cannot restart even after they are completed unless the latest ruling is overturned in court.
The Ikata nuclear plant has had serious troubles, including an incident when all power was lost temporarily during operation when a control rod was mistakenly removed from the reactor and cooling for a pool of spent nuclear fuel failed for 43 minutes. Shikoku Electric Power Co. originally stated that it would not immediately appeal the ruling, but on February 19, 2020, it filed a petition in the same high court challenging the injunction and requesting that it be overturned.
Financial assistance approved to restart Tokai Daini Nuclear Power Plant
In October 2019, TEPCO announced that it would provide financial assistance to the Japan Atomic Power Company for its Tokai Daini Nuclear Power Plant (Tochigi Prefecture). TEPCO’s assistance is expected at about 220 billion yen. Tohoku Electric Power Co., Chubu Electric Power Co., Hokuriku Electric Power Co., and Kansai Electric Power Co. are also expected to participate, bringing the total financial assistance to 350 billion yen. TEPCO and Tohoku Electric Power Co. will reportedly provide financial assistance as well as loan guarantees.
The entire nuclear power industry was drawn into this assistance scheme because Japan Atomic Power Co. does not have the financial resources to pay for safety upgrades that must be completed before it can restart the Tokai Daini plant.
Meanwhile, TEPCO itself does not have the capacity to pay for victim compensation and plant decommissioning after its Fukushima nuclear plant accident, so the government has injected a mountain of public funds and electricity revenues. TEPCO is not in any position to provide financial assistance to other companies. TEPCO asserts that it will make a profit by buying electricity from the Tokai Daini Nuclear Power Plant so that it can make its compensation payments. But electricity from the Tokai Daini nuclear plant will be expensive, considering the financial predicament facing Japan Atomic Power and the fact that none of its other nuclear plants have any clear prospect of operating. Essentially, this scheme defies economic logic in an attempt to rescue Japan’s Nuclear Power Co. and maintain the government’s policy of supporting nuclear power.
Kansai Electric’s nuclear bribery scandal
In September 2019, Kyodo News scooped a story that 20 Kansai Electric Power Co. executives had received the equivalent of 360 million yen in cash and gifts over more than a decade from Eiji Moriyama (deceased) former deputy mayor of Takahama town (Fukui Prefecture in central Japan). This town happens to be the site of Kansai Electric’s Takahama nuclear plant complex.
Besides the gifts, it was found that in 91 of 121 contracts between Kansai Electric and Yoshida Kaihatsu (a construction company for which Mr. Moriyama acted as an advisor), Moriyama had received information on approximate budget numbers and other strategic information prior bidding. Plus, over a period of six years Yoshida Kaihatsu had received orders from the town of Takahama for a total of 12 projects that received national government subsidies intended for regions that host power supply projects. The contracts were worth 1.1 billion yen. It was also revealed that Moriyama had successfully lobbied Kansai Electric executives to convince Obayashi Construction to not to bid for construction of nuclear-related facilities on which work began in September 1996 in Mihama, Fukui, and instead give the contract to a competitor, the general contractor Kumagai Gumi.
Taken into that Kansai Electric had doled money out in areas that host nuclear power plants like Takahama Town and Fukui Prefecture, the issue of this scandal is the “nuclear power money” circulated back to the Kansai Electric. On December 13, a citizens’ group called Kanden no Genpatsu Mane Fusei Kanryū o Kokuhatsu Suru Kai (Citizens’ Group to Condemn Kansai Electric’s Nuclear Power Money Scandal) filed a formal complaint with the Osaka District Public Prosecutor’s Office accusing the Kansai Electric officials of bribery and specified breaches of the Companies Act. A total of 3,272 people from all over Japan participated in that legal action.
Three former TEPCO executives acquitted of criminal negligence
In September 2019, the Tokyo District Court acquitted three former TEPCO executives of professional negligence resulting in death and injury in connection with the March 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The three executives—former chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata 79, and former vice-presidents Ichiro Takekuro, 73, and Sakae Muto, 69—were forced to stand trial alleged negligence in not adequately preparing for a large tsunami, resulting in 44 deaths. In this decision, the court found the former executives not criminally responsibility for the unprecedented nuclear disaster.
The crux of the lawsuit was whether or not a tsunami more than 10 meters in elevation could have been foreseen. The three defendants claimed that they could not have foreseen the large tsunami.
During the trial it came to light that in June 2008, a TEPCO engineering group on tsunami countermeasures had advised Muto when he was vice president that measures should be taken to withstand a tsunami of up to 15.7 meters in height, based on a long-term assessment by the national government’s Headquarters for Earthquake Research Promotion. However, Muto instructed personnel to have the Japan Society of Civil Engineers examine the tsunami assessment, leaving concrete measures for some future date. The trial also revealed that TEPCO had to invest significantly in seismic upgrades after the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant had shut down due to the Niigataken Chuetsu-oki Earthquake in 2007, and those were putting a strain on corporate finances.
The legal defense denied that there had been any negligence, saying there was no concrete basis for the long-term assessment and asserting that an accident could not have been avoided even if countermeasures had been taken.
Responding to the court decision that essentially echoed the defendants’ claims, Shozaburo Ishida, one of the court-appointed lawyers acting a prosecutor, criticized the court ruling, saying it was aligned with the national government’s nuclear policy.
Ruiko Muto, head of the group that filed the criminal complaint against the executives, expressed outrage over the ruling: “This ruling has blurred the responsibilities of those individuals who should be the most responsible, and obstructs the learning of lessons that could have changed society to prevent the recurrence of such an accident ever again…. There was so much evidence and testimony. How could the court acquit them?”
Ministerial ordinance to reuse low-level contaminated soil enters into force in April 2020
Years ago an advisory committee of the Ministry of the Environment drafted a policy to use some of the 14 million cubic meters of soil and waste arising from nuclear decontamination work in Fukushima Prefecture. If this material has radioactivity levels at or below 8,000 Bq/kg, after shielding and other preparations to prevent scattering and runoff of the low-level radioactive material, it would be used in applications such as fill for roads, railways, coastal disaster prevention forests, and embankments for coastal levees, as the middle and final covering layers for waste disposal sites, as fill for land development and reclamation of water areas, and as fill to raise the elevation of farmland.
To promote the reuse of this low-level radioactive soil (which the government refers to as “decontaminated soil”), in January 2020 the Ministry of the Environment invited public comments on a draft ministerial ordinance to revise a portion of regulations for enforcement of the so-called Act on Special Measures concerning the Handling of Environment Pollution by Radioactive Materials. It is expected to enter into force in April 2020.