New leak found in Fukushima plant’s wrecked No. 3 building

A new water leak, possibly from the effort to cool a crippled reactor, has been detected on the first floor of a reactor building at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Jan. 18.

TEPCO said workers discovered by a video feed that water was leaking on the first floor of the wrecked No. 3 reactor building earlier in the day.

The utility added that the water was flowing into the basement of the reactor building and not outside the structure. It is investigating the source of the leak.

TEPCO suggested the possibilities that the water was leaking from a pipe that is sending cooling water to the reactor or from the reactor containment vessel.

If the leak is from water being used to cool the reactor, it would be highly contaminated and a new headache for TEPCO and the government. A series of leaks from storage tanks of water that had been used to cool the damaged reactors and problems with groundwater entering reactor buildings and mixing with radioactive water there has hampered the plant’s decommissioning process.

TEPCO, however, said the latest leak could simply be rainwater draining off. The company said no signs of irregularity have been observed in terms of the operation to cool the reactor.

Radiation levels outside the building and the volume of water sent to cool the reactor and the temperature of the reactor remained the same, it added.

Workers spotted the leak in images sent by a remote-controlled robot when they were operating it to remove debris on the first floor of the building around 2:40 p.m.

The water was coming from near the door of a room housing the main steam isolation valve and flowing into a drain. The flow was about 30 centimeters wide, and the amount of the leak and when it started were unknown, TEPCO said.

Radiation measured about 30 millisieverts per hour near the drain, not substantially different from levels found at other areas of the first floor.

6 Comments on "New leak found in Fukushima plant’s wrecked No. 3 building"

SilentRunning on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 2:26 am 



This is certainly not good news for Tepco. However, the radiation levels don’t sound extremely high, which is better than some of the alternatives.

SilentRunning on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 2:39 am 



In other Fukushima News, Tepco just announced that they have removed over 10% of the fuel assemblies from the No. 4 fuel pool.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/01/15/fukushima-fuel-transfer-reaches-10-milestone/

So far, there have been none of the disasters that some of the more hysterical voices have warned us about. I predict that they will in fact have well over 80% of the fuel assemblies removed by the end of this year – with no major catastrophes.

Makati1 on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 6:53 am 



For your Fukushima reading pleasure:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/why-the-obama-administration-will-not-admit-that-fukushima-radiation-is-poisoning-americans/5365626

http://enenews.com/image-published-embassy-japan-shows-fukushima-melted-fuel-deep-underground-photo

What is bull shit and what is diamonds?

Kenz300 on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 5:45 pm 



Had Fukishima been a wind or solar powered plant the surrounding area would not have needed to be evacuated. The plant would already have been cleaned up and new solar panels or wind mills would be producing power. Instead we have a 40 year plan to decommission and clean up the disaster site.

Nuclear energy is too costly and too dangerous……..

chilyb on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 8:41 pm 



It is to my understanding that without being able to assess the damage, there is no specific plan on how to dismantle reactors 1-3. And we yet need to develop the technology in order to perform the cleanup.

According to Michio Kaku, theoretical physicist – It will take years to invent a new generation of robots able to withstand the radiation.

http://www.flashpoints.net/?p=2951

not to argue against your point…

Ghung on Wed, 22nd Jan 2014 11:28 pm 



@Makati1- Thanks for the links. The second one led me to this very reasonable assessment from Arnie Gunderson (podcast, and surprise; it’s all about money, or lack thereof):

http://podcast.gcnlive.com/podcast/power_hr/0116143.mp3

“TEPCO hiring street people to do the cleanup”; can’t afford trained technicians.