KORIYAMA, Fukushima Prefecture--The government will ask Tokyo and seven prefectures to host interim storage facilities for waste contaminated with radiation from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
KORIYAMA, Fukushima Prefecture--The government will ask Tokyo and seven prefectures to host interim storage facilities for waste contaminated with radiation from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
The plan, announced by Hideki Minamikawa, administrative vice minister of the Environment Ministry on Sept. 28, is designed to resolve the problem of dealing with the enormous amount of relatively high radioactive sewage sludge and incinerated ashes created by the nuclear accident caused by the March 11 quake and tsunami.
Minamikawa told reporters during his visit to Koriyama that the government will soon make formal requests to Tokyo and the prefectures of Fukushima, Chiba, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Miyagi and Iwate, all of which are in the Kanto and Tohoku regions.
"(The disposal of contaminated material) is not a question that concerns only Fukushima Prefecture," he said.
He also promised that "such waste found in other prefectures will not be brought to Fukushima Prefecture, which is not responsible for the accident."
The ministry had previously said incinerated ashes containing radioactive cesium at 100,000 becquerels or less per kilogram could be buried at existing disposal sites after they are encased in concrete. But the ministry had not determined what to do with waste at levels exceeding 100,000 becquerels.
The interim storage sites to be built in Tokyo and the seven prefectures are expected to hold incinerated ashes.
Minamikawa also said the interim storage site to be built in Fukushima Prefecture will have a capacity of about 90 million cubic meters.
The ministry has estimated that the government's decontamination operations would produce 29 million cubic meters of contaminated soil and other radioactive waste, such as fallen leaves and branches. The targeted areas for decontamination, all in Fukushima Prefecture, are those with an estimated annual radiation dose of 5 millisieverts.
Minamikawa said that the Fukushima storage facility needs to be larger because the actual amount of waste could surpass the ministry's estimate.
He also said the facility could eventually store relatively high radioactive waste, such as incinerated ashes and sewage sludge.
The location for the site has yet to be decided, but Minamikawa said it will likely not be located on the premises of the nuclear plant because of the large operation needed to decommission the damaged reactors.
Minamikawa also indicated that the government would build more than one interim site to secure enough storage space for the waste and accelerate the decontamination operations.
The Forestry Agency has begun discussions with Iitate village and Nihonmatsu city in Fukushima Prefecture to set up provisional sites in state-owned forests for radioactive soil dug up in the decontamination operations. Iitate agreed to a prospective site covering several hectares in national forests within the village. Nihonmatsu is narrowing down candidate sites within the city.
Local governments had asked the agency to store the contaminated soil in national forests in Fukushima Prefecture, and the agency approved the idea if it is accepted by local residents and would not jeopardize water sources. The agency envisages keeping such soil in national forests until it can be moved to an interim storage facility.
The agency is considering encasing the contaminated soil in concrete blocks on reclaimed land covered with shielding sheets in national forests. Work is expected to start in the current fiscal year.