Japan to review its nuclear policy
Engineers are working around-the-clock in an effort to stabilise the Fukushima nuclear plant, nearly two weeks after an earthquake and tsunami battered northeastern Japan, leaving nearly 26,000 people missing or dead.
“It is certain that public confidence in nuclear power plants has greatly changed,” Japanese chief cabinet secretary Yuki Edano said. “In light of that, we must first end this situation and then study from a zero base.”
Before the disaster, Japan’s 55 nuclear reactors provided about 30% of the country’s electric power. The percentage had been expected to rise to 50% by 2030, among the highest in the world.
There were no fresh incidents of smoke or steam at the plant yesterday, but four of the reactors are still considered volatile, although on the way to stability.
Peter Hosemann, a nuclear expert at the University of California, said: “It’s still a bit early to make an exact time prognosis, but my guess is in a couple of weeks the reactors will be cool enough to say the crisis is over.”
“It will still be important to supply sufficient cooling to the reactors and the spent fuel pools for a longer period of time. But as long as this is ensured and we don’t see any additional large amount of radioactivity released, I am confident the situation is under control.”
Tokyo’s 13 million residents were told not to give tap water to babies after contamination twice hit the safety level this week. However, it had dropped back to allowable amounts yesterday.
Despite government appeals against panic, many supermarkets and stores sold out of bottled water.
“Customers ask us for water. But there’s nothing we can do,” said Masayoshi Kasahara, a supermarket worker in eastern Tokyo.
“We are asking for more deliveries but we don’t know when the next shipment will come.”
Radiation above safety levels has also been found in milk and vegetables from Fukushima.
Singapore said it had found radioactive contaminants in vegetables imported from Japan. Earlier, Singapore and Australia joined the United States and Hong Kong in restricting food and milk imports from the zone. Canada became the latest of many nations to tighten screening after the world’s worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.
Meanwhile, a shipping industry official said some merchant ships were avoiding Tokyo port due to concerns crew members may be exposed to radiation.
Radiation particles have been found as far away as Iceland, and although Japan insists levels are not dangerous to adults, it is the nation’s most testing time since World War II.
The estimated $300 billion damage from the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami makes it the world’s costliest natural disaster, dwarfing Japan’s 1995 Kobe quake and Hurricane Katrina, which swept through New Orleans in 2005.
In Japan’s north, more than 250,000 people are in shelters. Some displaced elderly people have died from the cold and lack of medicines.
Exhausted and traumatised rescuers are still sifting through the mud and wreckage where towns and villages once stood.
The official death toll from the disaster has risen to 9,523, but is expected to rise as 16,094 people are still missing.
Amid the suffering, though, there was a sense that Japan was turning the corner in its humanitarian crisis. Aid flowed to refugees, and phone, electricity, postal and bank services began returning to the north.
“Things are getting much better,” said 57-year-old Tsutomu Hirayama, staying with his family at an evacuation centre in Ofunato town. “For the first two or three days, we had only one rice ball and water for each meal. I thought, how long is this going to go on? Now we get lots of food, it’s almost like luxury.”
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