Japan Times,31 August, 2013
Refusal of foreign nuke help questioned
(Japan under increasing pressure to accept outside nuclear help)
by Eric Johnston
Staff Writer
OSAKA – Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, just back from a trip to the Middle
East and Africa, where he promoted Japanese nuclear technology, faces
mounting international criticism that his administration is not taking
the Fukushima crisis seriously and growing calls both at home and
abroad for long-term global assistance.
Since Tokyo Electric Power Co. admitted on July 22, the day after Abe’s
Liberal Democratic Party won a landslide Upper House victory, that
radioactive groundwater was reaching the Pacific from the Fukushima No.
1 plant, international media attention has been intense.
Reporters, commentators and a wide range of experts have speculated on
worst-case scenarios and warned that the leaks demonstrated the massive
problems still to be resolved in dismantling the crippled plant.
For many abroad, the latest revelations only demonstrate yet again that
the crisis is too big for either Tepco or the government to handle, and
that consulting international experts has to mean going outside Japan’s
“nuclear power village” or the International Atomic Energy Agency,
which, they note, also has a mandate to promote nuclear power.
“Expertise in the areas of hydrology, reactors and civil engineering is
needed. But the issue is not whether it’s domestic or international.
What is needed is nonvested-interest expertise, not the IAEA, Areva
(the French nuclear conglomerate) or (companies like) Bechtel.
Contractors should come later after deciding what needs to be done,”
said nuclear opponent Aileen Mioko Smith of the Kyoto-based group Green
Action.
Japan recently announced it would seek Russian assistance and advice
regarding the recent leaks. Mycle Schneider, a Paris-based energy and
nuclear policy consultant who opposes nuclear power, said he welcomes
the decision but added that it carries its own problems.
“First, there are too many political and economic biases involved.
Second, the complexity of the challenges are such that Japan should
make sure it reaches out to the most competent individuals in water
management, spent-fuel handling and storage, waste disposal, building
integrity and radiation protection,” he said.
Last year, Schneider offered a detailed proposal for an international
task force for Fukushima. While noting three basic challenges,
including site stabilization, protection from radiation and ensuring
food safety, his proposal focused only on assistance for stabilizing
the reactors.
His proposed task force would be led by two people, one Japanese and
the other non-Japanese. There would be a core group of a dozen experts
working full time on the project for a minimum of two years. At least
half would have no links to the nuclear industry.
Charles Ferguson, president of the Washington-based Federation of
American Scientists, agrees Japan should include more experts from
other countries. He added that while there is a need to be concerned
about the water leaks, it was also important to keep matters in
perspective.
“We need to recognize that although 300 tons of contaminated water
sounds very serious, it’s only about 80,000 gallons, which is much less
than the 660,250 gallons used in an Olympic-sized swimming pool. Once
this contaminated water has gotten past the plant, there’s a
substantial dilution of the contamination,” Ferguson said.
“Nonetheless, there are concerns fish caught near the stricken nuclear
reactor plant could ingest strontium-90 or cesium-137. Monitoring of
fish in the surrounding waters needs to be continued. There are many
scientific experts in countries like Russia and Norway who have
experience in examining marine life in radioactive-contaminated waters.”
Ferguson said the role of his organization has been to collaborate with
the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation and the Sasakawa Peace
Foundation in forming the U.S.-Japan Nuclear Working Group, which
published its recommendations about Fukushima earlier this year.
“The U.S. has a special role to play in supplementing Japanese
decommissioning and decontamination expertise, given the long American
experience in radiological remediation and the unique level of trust
and interoperability between the American and Japanese governments and
nuclear industries,” the report says.
Japan’s reluctance to engage the international community more broadly
on Fukushima is the subject of much conjecture. Numerous critics say it
is because Tepco and the pro-nuclear LDP are concerned that admitting
the problem will make restarting other reactors more difficult.
And many who oppose the Tokyo Olympic bid charge that nobody in the
government or the media wants to draw international attention to
Fukushima and risk giving the International Olympic Committee an excuse
to reject the Japanese bid.
Former Ambassador to Switzerland Mitsuhei Murata, who has written to
Abe and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon calling for more
international involvement in Fukushima and protesting the Olympic bid,
sees these reasons as valid.
“The nuclear dictatorship in Japan persists. There’s an international
strategy to consider that Fukushima did not happen. Japan’s media seems
to be fulfilling its duty in a way that does not indispose the strong
nuclear dictatorship, and has succeeded in creating a ‘business as
usual’ atmosphere,” Murata said.
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