Today marks the 5th anniversary of the Great Tohoku Earthquake and subsequent tsunami which caused the death of nearly 18,500 Japanese citizens and the meltdown &/or explosion of four power reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility.
The biggest accomplishment in all that time was the defueling of the unit 4 spent fuel pool. This is the reactor plant that was not operating when the disaster occurred, but which blew up anyway. Other than that, there is not much to report. TEPCO has not found any of the melted fuel (corium) from any of the three meltdowns, but thanks to muon scans have found out where it's not - in the reactors.
So far nothing attempted has managed to stop the leaking of corium contaminated water from the facility into the Pacific Ocean, while strontium-90 contamination in the river of underground water flowing beneath the destroyed plants plants on its way to the sea has soared to unprecedented levels and sets new records regularly. The new harborfront breakwater facing is crumbling under the groundwater pressure, the freeze wall still isn't working, and every time they move debris around the cesium contamination levels downwind go up again. Bizarre new meltdown-spawned contaminates are aggregating into highly radioactive 'black dirt' deposited along natural drainage pathways, and much of the contaminated soil removed during early decon efforts (and stupidly stored in trash bags set in vulnerable locations) was released by flooding in the wake of tropical storm Etau in September of 2015. None of the thousands of tons of spent fuel in the overloaded spent fuel pools at units 1, 2 or 3 has yet been removed. Radiation inside these plants is still too high for humans, and the death toll of various invented-for-the-purpose robots has grown every time there's a new robot to send on suicide missions. Meanwhile, children in Fukushima and surrounding prefectures are still developing aggressive thyroid cancers at an "alarming" rate.
The government of Japan has decided it will stop compensating the evacuees this year for living expenses, hoping to force them to move back to their still contaminated homes in the still contaminated "exclusion zone." New Japanese laws designed to put a lid on bad nuclear news have served to take Fukushima off the list of frequently reported world news topics, and both the government and utility are still caught lying about the ongoing nuclear disaster on a semi-regular basis.
The good news is that after five years ALL of Japan's once-mighty nuclear fleet remains shut down, though two of the Oi facility's reactors did operate at diminished capacity in 2012. They were shut down again in 2013 and also remain off line. Polls show that up to 70% of Japanese citizens are now opposed to nuclear power, and it is unlikely that any of the shuttered plants will come back on line in the future. No new reactor plants are being built.
Japan's CO2 contributions went up in the immediate aftermath as old coal plants took up the shortfall, but they have been shutting down again as new NG power plants are built. Extensive plans to develop offshore and highlands wind are in the works, and solar installation is booming in Japan just as it is everywhere else in the industrialized world. The nation expects to meet or exceed its CO2 projections by 2020.
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Issues, Details and Roundups
My Diaries covering Fukushima and its aftermath, March 2011 - December 2015
Nuclear Meltdown: Releasing radiation and containing the truth
Current State of Post-Accident Operations at Fukushima NPP - July to December 2015
Japan marks fifth anniversary of Fukushima disaster