5 Jul (NucNet): The crisis at the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan last year was the result of “a multitude of errors and wilful negligence” by plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), regulators and government, a Japanese parliamentary investigation has declared.
In a preface to a report released today, Kiyoshi Kurokawa, MD, former president of the Science Council of Japan and chairman of the parliament’s Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission, said although the March 2011 accident was triggered by “cataclysmic events”, the subsequent accident at Fukushima-Daiichi cannot be regarded as a natural disaster. “It was a profoundly manmade disaster that could and should have been foreseen and prevented,” Mr Kurokawa said.
The report, which has been presented to parliament for review, said last year’s failure of Fukushima-Daiichi was a “Made in Japan” crisis caused by the “ingrained conventions of Japanese culture”.
It said: “What must be admitted – very painfully – is that this was a disaster ‘Made in Japan.’ Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions of Japanese culture: our reflexive obedience; our reluctance to question authority; our devotion to ‘sticking with the programme’; our groupism; and our insularity.
“This conceit was reinforced by the collective mindset of Japanese bureaucracy, by which the first duty of any individual bureaucrat is to defend the interests of his organisation.”
The commission’s report also points to problems in the response of Tepco and then prime minister Naoto Kan, who resigned last year after criticism of his handling of the crisis.
“The... Fukushima nuclear power plant accident was the result of collusion between the government, the regulators and Tepco, and the lack of governance by said parties”, the commission said in an English summary of a 641-page report.
Regulators, it said, had been reluctant to adopt global safety standards that could have helped prevent the disaster in which reactors melted down.
The commission concluded that the root causes of the accident were the organisational and regulatory systems that supported “faulty rationales for decisions and actions”, rather than issues relating to the competency of any specific individual.
The direct causes of the accident were all foreseeable, but the Fukushima-Daiichi plant was incapable of withstanding the earthquake and tsunami that hit that day. The operator (Tepco), the regulatory bodies the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) and the Nuclear Safety Commission (NSC), and the government body promoting the nuclear power industry (METI), all failed to correctly develop the most basic safety requirements, the commission said.
The report highlighted what it called “collusion” between NISA and Tepco before the accident. It says NISA told Tepco that it did not need to consider a possible station blackout (SBO) because the probability was small and other measures were in place. NISA then asked the operators to write a report that would give “the appropriate rationale” for why this consideration was unnecessary.
The report said: “In order to get evidence of this collusion, the commission was forced to exercise its legislative right to demand such information from NISA, after NISA failed to respond to several requests.”
The report has taken some six months to prepare. The commission was the first independent commission chartered by parliament in the history of Japan’s constitutional government and commission members said it is vital that the report be acted upon globally.
Mr Kurokawa’s commission is one of three large-scale investigations into the failure of Fukushima-Daiichi, which suffered multiple reactor meltdowns and hydrogen explosions after its safety systems were knocked out by the huge earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan’s north-east coast.
The 88-page English summary of the report is online: http://cryptome.org/2012/07/daiichi-naiic.pdf
