{"id":140886,"date":"2020-12-24T14:49:23","date_gmt":"2020-12-24T11:49:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/fukushima-nuclear-debris-removal-delayed-by-virus\/"},"modified":"2020-12-24T14:49:23","modified_gmt":"2020-12-24T11:49:23","slug":"fukushima-nuclear-debris-removal-delayed-by-virus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/fukushima-nuclear-debris-removal-delayed-by-virus\/","title":{"rendered":"#Fukushima nuclear debris removal delayed by virus"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Fukushima nuclear debris removal delayed by virus<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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\"Plans
\n Plans to remove debris from one of Fukushima’s melted-down reactors have been delayed by the coronavirus pandemic
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The removal of nuclear debris from Japan’s crippled Fukushima power plant will be delayed by about a year, because the pandemic has set back development of specialised equipment, the plant’s operator said Thursday.<\/p>\n

The Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) had been scheduled to start removing melted fuel from deep inside one of the mangled reactors next year, a decade after the nation’s worst ever nuclear crisis was triggered by a tsunami.<\/p>\n

The process is considered the most difficult of the massive decommissioning programme, which is expected to take three to four decades to complete.<\/p>\n

TEPCO had planned to develop a robot arm in Britain that would have arrived in Japan next year to start work\u2014but chief decommissioning officer Akira Ono told a news<\/a> conference that a recent spike in COVID-19 infections in the UK had delayed this.<\/p>\n

“It will now be difficult to transfer the system in January as scheduled,” Ono said, adding he hoped the delay would be limited to a year. <\/p>\n

The removal process is expected to take several years for the number two unit, which is estimated to contain some 237 tonnes of debris, Kyodo News said. <\/p>\n

Altogether, three melted-down units are estimated to house around 880 tonnes of debris.<\/p>\n

Ono said the delay was “regrettable” but insisted that it was unlikely to affect the entire plan to decommission the plant between 2041 and 2051.<\/p>\n

The company also faces other difficult challenges, including working out how to dispose of large quantities of contaminated water stored in containers at the plant site.<\/p>\n

In the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986, reactors one, two and three at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant melted down after a deadly earthquake and tsunami struck Japan in 2011.<\/p>\n

The tsunami killed around 18,000 people and wreaked widespread devastation, and the nuclear meltdown forced the evacuation of areas near the plant.<\/p>\n

An evacuation order has been partially lifted but regions affected by the disaster have struggled to attract residents back, with many still concerned about radiation despite government assurances.\n <\/p>\n\n

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Nuclear fuel removed from crippled Japan plant<\/a>\n <\/div>\n

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\n \u00a9 2020 AFP<\/p>\n

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Citation<\/strong>:
\n Fukushima nuclear debris removal delayed by virus (2020, December 24)
\n retrieved 24 December 2020
\n from https:\/\/techxplore.com\/news\/2020-12-fukushima-nuclear-debris-virus.html<\/p>\n

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