Antinuclear

On Tuesday, TEPCO said of its stricken Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima prefecture that cooling operations were stopped at its No. 4 reactor unit’s spent fuel pool, due to workers damaging an electrical cable.

TEPCO said that workers damaged the cable while they were drilling near electrical equipment, causing an alert and the shut down of cooling operations at the No. 4 spent fuel pool, as well as the halting of an ongoing operation to remove hundreds of spent nuclear fuel rods from the pool.

The operator of the plant also said Tuesday a fire was triggered by the damage to the cable, although workers were able to extinguish this, the utility said.

Though the Japanese government on Jan. 15 announced injecting 4 trillion yen (38.3 billion US dollars) in additional state backing to help the ailing utility deal with a string of mishaps at its facilities as it works towards decommissioning its stricken, yet volatile reactors, the problems continue, much to the consternation of Tanaka.

On Feb. 13. samples of water TEPCO tested contained radioactive cesium at records not seen at the Fukushima plant since the 2011 disaster.

The operator said there was a new leak at the site of a well located just 50 meters from the adjacent Pacific Ocean and confirmed that the levels of cesium found in its groundwater samples were as high as 54,000 becquerels per liter of cesium 137, and 22,000 becquerels per liter of cesium 134.

The levels of cesium detected were 600 times higher than the government regulation for contaminated wastewater allowed to be released into the ocean, with the samples testing 30,000 times higher for cesium 137, compared to samples taken just a week earlier.

As the utility was rebuked by domestic and international nuclear regulators and the wider international community for once again falsely measuring radiation levels, Tanaka lambasted TEPCO.

“Something like this cannot happen. This data is what becomes the basis of various decisions, so they must do their utmost to avoid mistakes in measuring radiation,” Tanaka told a news conference, after the latest gaffe came to light.

TEPCO, despite its ongoing safety problems as highlighted by Tanaka Wednesday, plans to re-start the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, its biggest nuclear facility, this summer, much to the dismay and concern of the local and international community who believe more stringent tests need to be conducted……

TEPCO has stated,…that it had only successfully removed around 9 percent of more than 1,500 unused and spent fuel assemblies in the wrecked reactor building’s storage pool. http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/844980.shtml#.Uw-nDONdV9U