Plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, found a leak through a broken plastic joint in a French-made facility on early Wednesday afternoon, forcing a shutdown for more than a day.

As of late Thursday afternoon, Tokyo Electric has not finished replacing the damaged polyvinyl chloride joint. The PVC joint, which was the cause of earlier leaks, is thought to be structurally too weak.

The company says the latest shutdown does not affect its operation to pump coolant into the reactors.
The system is designed to filter radioactive wastewater pooled in the basement of reactor buildings, and then sent the cleaned water back into the reactors as coolant.

A series of troubles since the start of operations in June has resulted in operation rates of only about 73 percent during the past week, far below the targeted 90.

Tokyo Electric considers the system critical in meeting its target of putting in place a stable reactor cooling system by July 17th. The date would mark the end of phase one in a timetable it has set for bringing the reactors under control.
Thursday, July 14, 2011 19:26 +0900 (JST)"

"Toshiba develops nuclear decontamination system - http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/14_30.html
Japanese electronics maker Toshiba has developed a system to decontaminate radioactive wastewater at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant from early August.

The system, nicknamed Sarry, was shown to media at a plant in Yokohama on Thursday. It consists of a series of 14 tanks, each 1.4 meters wide and 3.6 meters high.

Minerals put inside the tanks are to absorb radioactive cesium and strontium and reduce levels of radioactivity in contaminated water by a factor of about one million.

A decontamination system in place at the Fukushima plant since June has been accident-prone and running at 73 percent capacity, far below the target of 90 percent.
The new equipment is expected to be used in parallel with or as a supplement to the existing one.

A Toshiba official says the firm made the new system simpler than the existing one by studying problems it developed.
Thursday, July 14, 2011 19:26 +0900 (JST)"


Nelle's comments: In looking for information on the decontamination system on the net, I stumbled on the following Japanese blogger's comment (dated June 10) which seems very relevant to the developments today. Note there are links in the original article to Japanese-language press stories on the $200M yen/ton paid to Areva and the "cheaper and much more reliable" technology already in existence in Japan.

"AREVA's Decontamination System A Joke! - http://onioni2.blogspot.com/2011/06/i-tweet-3-arevas-decontamination-system.html
Friday, June 10, 2011

 

"The world biggest nuclear company AREVA (headquarter in France and affiliated with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries) has been revealed their crooked businesses by European scholars and Greenpeace [See the Forbes article link from yesterday for verification—Nelle]. They lend their decontamination system to the Fukushima Daiichi plant charging ridiculous 200,000,000 yen per 1 ton of contaminated water (yes, per a ton)!! There is acheaper and much more reliable technology already existed in Japan. I can't stand that a nuclear company makes more profits from nuclear accidents! If the government has such money, it must be used to victims and survivors at the 311 disaster and evacuees in Fukushima. The government should cancel the agreement with AREVA immediately."

I also found this story on the Ex-SKF blog which discusses the lack of technical support from Areva in setting up and running the system. As an aside, since my son installs and runs complicated control systems, I have heard many stories of how important technical support and technical operations manuals are to proper operation of any system. The following comments could explain the continuing problems with the Areva system. Further, this problem of technical support would certainly be alleviated by Toshiba handling the decontamination system, wouldn't it?

http://ex-skf.blogspot.com/2011/07/fukushima-drawings-of-arevas.html

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

"Fukushima: Drawings of AREVA's Decontamination System Written in Italian and French, Details Unavailable due to National or Corporate Security says an anonymous worker at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant. There are many who think it's almost a miracle that the entire system works at all.

The contaminated water treatment system at the plant has been in operation since June 17, and it has been plagued with problems, most of which are blamed on the workers. When they blame "worker's mistake" as the reason for system malfunction or breakage, suspect some other reasons that they want to hide. This seems to be the case for the troubles at the contaminated water treatment system.

The author of the following tweets seems to be one of the workers at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant, and his tweets are considered very credible by many, though a few suspect him to be a TEPCO's shill (which I doubt).

His tweets from July 1, and he talks about the contaminated water treatment system, AREVA's in particular:

    The system was stopped during the day today [July 1]. It was reported as "due to a worker's mistake", but I think it's the management mistake. In particular, AREVA's system [that was built] in the 1st phase of construction came from the active processing plant somewhere, which they dismantled and brought to Fukushima. But it was set up here by the Japanese.

    AREVA's system was made in Italy. The drawings are in Italian and French, so it's hard to understand. When we ask questions on the structure in detail, they don't answer, because of national security or corporate security or whatever. TEPCO, who paid for the system, doesn't seem to know much either.

    The second phase of construction has started, but the reality is that we are very confused because the jobs are not being assigned properly.

He says the system is not working as well as they thought, and that it should have been set up by the French or Italians who are the most familiar with the system.

The last I heard about the contract between TEPCO and AREVA (I also read somewhere later that there is no signed contract), even TEPCO didn't know what nuclides that AREVA's system would remove. Matsumoto of TEPCO said it was a corporate secret at AREVA and not to be disclosed."

Good news, while the decontamination system is not on track for the July 17th target date in the plan, the nitrogen injection may be.

"Nitrogen injection starts at No. 3 reactor - http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/14_42.html
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has started injecting nitrogen into the plant's No. 3 reactor's containment vessel to prevent a hydrogen explosion.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company started the procedure on Thursday evening after Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency confirmed the plan's safety.

Tokyo Electric had already begun injecting nitrogen into the plant's No. 1 and 2 reactors. The work at the No. 3 reactor was delayed due to high radiation levels.
Nitrogen injection is essential for the utility to complete the first step of its plan to bring the plant under control by the target date of July 17th.
Thursday, July 14, 2011 21:52 +0900 (JST)"


CONTAMINATION

 
More contaminated hay found affecting more cattle (42 head) than the first disclosure. The meat has not yet been traced or tested for contamination, but the feed contamination is much higher than the first reported which did in fact contaminate meat that was tested. And the government has ordered the farm to stop selling cattle.

"Cesium found in hay at another farm in Fukushima - http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/14_39.html
Radioactive cesium far exceeding safe limits has been detected in hay fed to cattle at a second farm near the crippled nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture.

Fukushima's government warned on Thursday that 42 possibly contaminated cattle have already been shipped out from the farm in Asakawa Town.
The finding came during inspections ordered by the prefecture after a large dose of the radioactive substance was found in hay at the first farm in Minami-Soma City.

The latest checks uncovered radioactive cesium [in hay] measured up to 97,000 becquerels per kilogram -- some 73 times the government-set safety limit.

The 42 cattle had been sent to 4 meat-processing plants between April 8th and July 6th -- 14 to Yokohama; 13 to Tokyo; 10 to Sendai and 5 to Chiba.

The prefecture has ordered the farm to stop shipping and transporting its cattle.

It has also provided detailed information to relevant municipalities, asking them to trace back distribution channels of beef from the cattle.

Thursday, July 14, 2011 21:52 +0900 (JST)"

More action on worker safety has been ordered by NISA. What the statement "TEPCO lacks information" about subcontracted employees means is that they have no information that the workers have any radioactive safety training. Therefore, the agency is requiring TEPCO to supervise these workders more effectively by hiring more safety managers. They are also requiring the company to provide more safety gear to these poor bastards.

"TEPCO urged to tighten workers' radiation control - http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/14_07.html

Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency [NISA] has urged the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant to tighten controls on workers' radiation exposure.

About 3,000 workers are struggling daily at the plant to contain the nuclear crisis.

The safety agency has been inspecting Tokyo Electric Power Company's measures to protect them from exposure to radiation.
The agency says it has found 8 areas of concern and ordered TEPCO on Wednesday to take appropriate measures.

The agency said that TEPCO lacks information about subcontracting employees and ordered the company to boost the number of safety managers for such workers.
It also urged the utility to provide more full-face protective masks and make sure that plant workers wear them properly.

Since the nuclear crisis began in March, 6 workers have been exposed to radiation doses above the allowable emergency limit of 250 millisieverts.

About 1,500 have still to receive medical checks for exposure to radiation.
Thursday, July 14, 2011 07:51 +0900 (JST)"


And finally, the "stress test" plan for nuclear plant safety has still not been finalized. Reading between the lines, this story rather confirms my suspicions that the stress test announcement was a knee jerk reaction by government to the email scandal. The headline would better read, "Agency yet to DRAFT stress test plan"

"Agency yet to finalize stress test plan - http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/14_12.html

Japan's nuclear safety agency has yet to finalize plans for new safety checks on the nation's nuclear power plants, despite being asked to do so in a week.

The government announced on Wednesday last week that it would conduct so-called stress tests on all nuclear plants. It later said the tests would be carried out in 2 stages.

The Nuclear Safety Commission had asked the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency to finalize in about a week the methods and a timetable for the tests.

On Wednesday, a week after the safety commission's request, the agency's official in charge of nuclear disasters, Yoshinori Moriyama, said they are unable to say at present when they would be able to report on their plan.

Stress tests involve checking whether a plant's equipment and facilities could withstand computer-simulated earthquakes and tsunami.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan's abrupt instructions for the tests have created confusion among government officials and drawn skeptical views and criticism from local governments that have nuclear plants.

Thursday, July 14, 2011 09:57 +0900 (JST)"


There are other stories at NHK today on the email scandal, cancelled nuke plant restarts, plan to move away from nuclear fuel to alternative energy and so forth.

I will report on these stories later.