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information about Fukushima published in English in Japanese media info publiée en anglais dans la presse japonaise

The rat saga continues

 

April 23, 2013

Fukushima nuke plant forced to stop cooling system for fuel pools due to dead rats

dead-rats.jpg

Two rats were found dead inside the transformer outside the No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant. (Photo courtesy of TEPCO)


http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130423p2a00m0na021000c.html

 

The operator of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant said on April 22 it had to temporarily stop a cooling system for a spent fuel pool after finding two dead rats inside a transformer.


According to Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), workers patrolling at the site found the dead rats at around 10:15 a.m. on April 22 inside the makeshift transformer which was built after the plant disaster in March 2011. TEPCO had to temporarily stop the cooling system for the No. 2 reactor's spent fuel pool for a cleanup. The cooling system restarted before 4 p.m. on the same day after the company covered a hole that rats apparently entered through.


Just last month the Fukushima No. 1 plant experienced a blackout caused by rats that disabled cooling systems for about 30 hours.


"Fortunately, we didn't have a blackout this time," Toshihiko Fukuda, general manager at TEPCO's Nuclear Quality and Safety Management body, told a news conference. "We'll continue our inspection around the plant to eliminate any problems," he said.


In addition, TEPCO said it finished transporting radioactive water from the No. 2 underground tank, which was found to be leaking earlier this month, to another cistern above ground before noon on April 22. The amount of water that was transported was 1,070 cubic meters. The company plans to start moving radioactive water from the No. 1 water tank as well.

Fuel-rod cooling halted by rats at crippled Japan nuclear plant

April 22, 2013


http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201304220119

 

REUTERS


Japan's crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant halted cooling of a spent fuel pool at the site on April 22 to remove two dead rats, the third time cooling equipment has gone offline in five weeks because of rodents.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said it halted cooling of the No. 2 unit pool, which stores spent uranium fuel rods at the Fukushima site, for a few hours to remove the rats and install a net to stop further such intrusions.

Last month, TEPCO lost power to cool fuel rods for 29 hours, an outage it later blamed on a rat that had shorted a temporary switchboard.

Two weeks later, workers attempting to install a net tripped the system again.

A tsunami crashed into the plant in March 2011, causing fuel-rod meltdowns at three reactors and triggering the evacuation of 160,000 people in the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

The incident on April 22 follows a string of mishaps including four leaks of contaminated water from underground storage pits.

The problems at the plant, 240 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo, attracted a rebuke from the government and the nuclear regulator, reviving public debate over whether TEPCO was up to the task of a decommissioning project expected to last decades.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said it believed TEPCO could handle the job, but said the contaminated water was its "biggest challenge."

Juan Carlos Lentijo, an IAEA team leader, said decommissioning would be an enormous task.

"It will be near impossible to ensure the time for decommissioning such a complex facility in less than 30, 40 years as it is currently established in the roadmap," he said after a week-long IAEA tour of the site.

TEPCO has been waging a constant battle to filter and store groundwater that continues to flood the basements of the reactor buildings at a rate of 400 tons a day.

The IAEA said that TEPCO had achieved the stable cooling of the reactors and spent fuel pools, but cautioned that it needed to improve systems to treat the toxic water and find reliable ways to monitor and store it on site.

More than 80 percent of available storage capacity has been filled, forcing TEPCO to scramble to build new tanks.

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