Kick Nuclear Newsletter July 2021

 KICK NUCLEAR

The Olympics edition of the Newsletter.

FUKUSHIMA, THE CORONA VIRUS AND THE OLYMPICS

(Some of the material on Fukushima appeared in the March edition of Kick Nuclear)

Before the Covid-19 (C19) pandemic forced the 2020 Olympic Games in Japan to be postponed for a year, the then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was advertising the Games as “The Recovery Olympics” – showing the world that Japan had recovered from the effects of the 2011 tsunami, in particular from the consequent Fukushima disaster, and to promote reconstruction efforts in the region.

Abe’s successor, Yoshihide Suga, said last year that going ahead with the Olympics this year would be “proof that humanity has defeated the pandemic”.

Both sets of claims are false. In his pitch in 2013 for the 2020 Olympic Games to be held in Japan, Abe claimed that the situation at Fukushima was “under control”.

Such a claim, false in 2013, is still false. After the disaster a 20km radius no-go zone was created around the destroyed plant. Over time parts of this zone have been reopened but people originally evacuated have shown reluctance to return; thus of 160,000 people originally evacuated some 40,000 have not yet returned.

Some 5,000 workers plus scientists and engineers are still working to clean-up the plant, but have not yet even managed to remove the melted-down cores of the three destroyed reactors there.

This has meant that for over 10 years water has had to be continually poured down through the three reactors to prevent them heating up and further melt-downs occurring.   The water used for this purpose itself becomes radioactive and has to be stored in large steel tanks. Currently there are over 1,000 of these tanks, holding some 1,250,000 tons of this water, which is continuing to be added to.

After over 10 years of keeping this water from flowing into the Pacific to save it being polluted with all this radioactive water, at the Japanese government is proposing to give up on this attempt and just empty all the tanks into the sea.

Not that the Pacific has been spared of such pollution already. Some 10 tons of water a day is made radioactive by flowing through the destroyed plant. So far all attempts to hold back this water from entering the Pacific have failed.

Another unsolved problem is with the radioactive topsoil and vegetation removed from large areas in order to drive radiation levels there.   This material remains in over 1000 large plastic sacks stored in piles over the Fukushima area, thus concentrating rather than eradication the radioactive material.

One of the ways in which the Japanese government aimed to “prove” that Japan had recovered entirely from the Fukushima disaster was to run the Japanese leg of the torch rally that precedes the Games through through the Fukushima area.  

However rising Covid-19 infection levels in the Tokyo area forced the organisers to cancel the first leg of the torch rally and replace it with small flame-lighting ceremonies, closed to the public, both at the original starting point in J village, only 20kms. south of Fukushima, and at what would have been each day’s final destination.

The claim that the Olympics would help show that Japan had recovered from the effects of the pandemic has indeed spectacularly misfired.  

With C19 infection levels in Japan currently much higher than they were a year ago when the Games were postponed, all semblance of a normal Olympic Games have been stripped away.  

Number of new infections in Japan were reported on June 22nd 2020 as 526 but on June 21st 2021 as 10,457. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government reported that on June 30th there were 714 new corona virus infections in Japan’s capital – the highest daily tally for over a month. There is indeed a quasi-state of emergency in Tokyo and neighbouring prefectures which is currently due to end on July 12th, but which may well have to be extended if the situation doesn’t start improving.

Spectators from abroad have been banned from this supposedly international event, sizes of crowds have been limited to half a venue’s capacity, or up to 10,000 at most. On 25th June, Seiko Hashimoto, the president of the Tokyo Olympic s organising committee, even admitted that a “no-spectator games” remained a possibility.  

In Tokyo and many other parts of the country, all mass public viewings of this summer’s Olympics and Paralympics have been cancelled as a precaution against the virus.

However about 11,500 athletes from abroad who are competing will be allowed in but be required to test negative for the virus twice on the flight over and each day while they are in Japan. They are required to socially distance and, in a farcical twist, not to use the free 150,000 condoms being distributed to them, until they return home!

Spectators, presumably not being issued with free condoms, are required to wear masks in venues at all times and to refrain from shouting or speaking loudly, and must travel directly to the venue and return home immediately afterwards. So, strictly no fun! The government is also reported as considering making it mandatory for spectators at the Olympics to present proof of having tested negative for covid-19 before being allowed into venues.

The Japanese government is, very late in the day, trying desperately to increase the proportion of the population fully vaccinated against C19. However vaccinations only started in February and just 4% of Japanese had been inoculated by May 21st.   By June 24th, 22.7% are reported to have received their first dose of the vaccine and 11.5% their second dose also.   At this rate less than half the population will have received a first dose by the start of Olympics and less than 25% their second dose, clearly quite insufficient to stop the pandemic from spreading.

Most Japanese don’t even want the Olympic Games to be held in Japan in July, in view of the continuing C19 pandemic. A poll by Asahi Shimbun newspaper on June 19th & 20th found 34% of Japanese backed holding the Olympics, while 32% wanted the Games cancelled and another 30% wanted them postponed again. However, as the Games approach, opposition seems o be softening. A similar poll a month earlier had found 14% supporting holding the Games in July, with 43% wanting them cancelled and 40% wanting them postponed.

“ISSUE” AT CHINESE EPR

European Pressurised Water Reactors (EPRs) were once seen as the future of nuclear power, with each designed to produce an enormous amount of power for the grid. However, 16 years after the first of them started construction they have not delivered much! Three are currently in construction, one in Finland starting construction 2005 and one in France stating construction 2007, with provisional opening dates of 2022 and 2023. The third one is in construction at Hinkley Point in Somerset. This started construction in 2016 and is due to be completed in 2025.  

Otherwise Electricite de France (EDF), the builders of EPRs have generally had contracts to build EPRs terminated (as in the US) or have failed to find buyers.

The single bright spot is in China, where two EPRs have been built and went into operation in 2018 and 2019, though they also were also completed a couple of years later than planned and a lot over budget. However, CNN reported in June that one of the two was leaking radioactive gas. It’s difficult to know how serious this malfunction was since both EDF and its Chinese co-owner did not explain fully what the problem was, dismissing it as a “performance issue”

RIP

The death knell of Dungeness B’s two “advanced gas-cooled reactors” was announced n June 2021 when they were both declared “beyond repair”. They had already been out of operation since September 2018.

Dungeness B had not been a success! It had taken 20 years to construct, was beset with problems throughout its life and its output was the worst of the seven two-reactor EDF-owned power stations in the UK.

This is only the start. Also in June, EDF agreed to close its 6 remaining UK AGR nuclear power station by 2030, it seems largely to save money. That would leave just one nuclear power station in operation in the UK, Sizewell B, opened 1997; unless Hinkley C is opened by then.