静岡県にある浜岡原子力発電所について、中部電力が、巨大地震による津波の高さが最大で２２.５メートルに達する可能性があるとの想定をまとめたことがわかりました。
これは、「防波壁」の高さを超える想定となっています。
[…]
中部電力では、マグニチュード９クラスの地震での津波の発生事例が少ないため、不確かな部分が多く、より厳しい条件で検討した結果だと説明しています。
浜岡原発の前面には、津波対策として高さ２２メートルの防波壁が建設されましたが、新たな想定では最大の津波の高さが壁の高さを上回ることになります。
これについて中部電力は「現時点では追加の対策などを検討する段階ではない。まずは真摯に審査に対応し、基準津波の高さをきちんと策定することに全力を尽くしたい」とコメントしています。
By Molly Hurley | November 26, 2021
[…]
Though I thrived amid the frenzied surprises of the city, I also found sudden moments of quiet solemnity while sketching inside the many art museums of the Big Apple. One of those museums was the Noguchi Museum, established in 1985 by its namesake Isamu Noguchi, a Japanese-American sculptor who is also well known for his landscape architecture and modern furniture designs such as the iconic Noguchi table.
[…]
I strolled through the museum five times within a single month, sketched some of the pieces from the exhibit that held my attention most captive, and bought multiple books about Noguchi and his work as I confronted an important question facing those of us studying nuclear weapons today: How will the victims of atomic warfare continue to be remembered and honored in the future? Perhaps “art” is an obvious answer from an art student, but my time in the Noguchi Museum, combined with my first semester in a Master of Fine Arts program, has helped me appreciate how art can help people “un-forget” the legacies of the hibakusha (or “bomb-affected people”) of Japan.
[…]
Noguchi left Poston in November 1942, deeply affected by what he experienced. Though he was outwardly disillusioned and claimed to want little to do with politics from then on, it’s clear from his work that he found it nearly impossible to separate art and politics. After the atomic bombings of Japan, he explored his personal relationship with weapons of mass destruction, as someone whose identity was tied to both the perpetrators of violence and its victims.
In 1951 he submitted a proposal, later to become the centerpiece of the exhibit Memorial to the Atomic Dead, for a memorial to be built in Hiroshima to honor those who died in the blast in 1945. Though the city rejected Noguchi and instead chose a design hastily drawn up by his close friend and colleague Kenzō Tange, Noguchi continued to revisit his own proposed model and once was even in talks about erecting his structure on the National Mall in Washington, DC.
[…]
I often return to the same two questions: What kind of legacy do I hope to leave as an activist and artist? And how might I and others best cultivate and honor the legacies of the hibakusha?
Noguchi very much took matters into his own hands by creating his art and erecting his museum. But because he is no longer with us, the responsibility for his legacy now lies almost entirely in the hands of the museum staff. And so we begin to see connections across continents and generations. Almost like a game of “telephone,” Noguchi’s experiences as a mixed-race Nisei who lived during extreme anti-Japanese sentiment are shared through his art, through his museum and its staff, and now through me to you. Noguchi’s work serves as a link in this chain between his own experiences and those of the people he met throughout his life, such as the hibakusha.
Thinking about all of this, I once again became acutely aware of my presence in a majority-white America as a Chinese-American during a time of extreme anti-Chinese sentiment. Thus far the legacy of COVID-19 is one of worldwide upheaval, and I am processing my experiences, and the experiences of others shared with me online or in real life, through my art.
[…]
In 1945, Japanese photographers worked to document the raw brutality of nuclear detonations, despite heavy censorship by both the Japanese and US governments. Many of these photos were later collected in various exhibits and in the 2020 book Flash of Light, Wall of Fire. Hibakusha themselves have used a vast array of artmaking techniques to assist in their own recovery from traumas, such as those depicted in the photographs, and Japanese schoolchildren today sometimes make their own art as a medium through which to process the collective pain and resiliency lingering over Japan since 1945. All of these works then outwardly function to support educational efforts the world over on the inhumanity of using a nuclear weapon.
The hibakusha narrative has expanded over time to include victims beyond the city limits of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—and as far away as the Navajo Nation, which still suffers the radiation effects of uranium mining; the Marshall Islands, where the United States conducted so many nuclear tests that, on average, the equivalent of 1.6 Hiroshima-size bombs was detonated every day for 12 years; Kazakhstan, where the Soviet Union tested its nuclear weapons for four decades; and other places around the world adversely affected by the development and maintenance of nuclear weapons. Noguchi himself considered the term hibakusha to include the victims of nuclear weapons worldwide; he changed the name of his proposed Memorial to the Dead of Hiroshima to the more inclusive Memorial to the Atomic Dead.
I believe my musings on legacies and memorials will continue to gain urgency. The youngest of the first-generation Japanese hibakusha still alive are well into their 80s. When they pass, so too will their stories if we do not take the remaining time we have to listen intently and record meaningfully the firsthand experiences of what could happen if the current near-dogmatic faith in deterrence theory fails.
“Memorials were, for [Noguchi], democratic acts of un-forgetting,” writes Noguchi Museum Board of Trustees member Spencer Bailey. Noguchi himself said, “One does not silently bury the dead building a monument.”
Artists like me are also “building a monument” with our drawings and articles. Hawaiian singer and guitarist Makana was “un-forgetting” when he and filmmaker Kayko Tamaki composed “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes,” as were the Noguchi Museum curators when they established the special exhibit. Each of us is hoping to pick up the baton from the hibakusha. I wonder what song from Spotify Unwrapped will send me back into rooms of the Noguchi Museum, filled with his legacy and the legacies of those who touched his life.
Read more.
By Şebnem Udum | November 24, 2021
[…]
International proponents of nuclear energy tout its affordability, environmental friendliness, and ability to provide abundant, uninterrupted electricity. Meanwhile, international nuclear energy opponents born from the 1960s and ‘70s antinuclear movement were first concerned with nuclear testing and later with nuclear waste disposal. Since Turkey maintained a closed economy until the 1980s, its nuclear energy debate remained independent as well. Unlike the international debate, Turkey’s nuclear energy debate has been shaped by its struggle with development, progress, and identity.
Turkish citizens began to grow concerned about nuclear safety in the mid 1970s, but anti-nuclear opposition started in earnest after 1986, when the Chernobyl nuclear accident affected the northern coast of Turkey. Though official government statements underplayed Chernobyl’s impact on the region, Turkish public perception of nuclear hazards remained—and remains—high. This is due, in part, to an increase in cancer deaths in the Black Sea region, including a famous rock singer, Kazim Koyuncu, who died of cancer in 2005, at the age of 32. Turkish citizens engaged in anti-nuclear protests, demonstrations, and rock concerts highlighting Chernobyl’s impacts. When Greenpeace later arrived in Turkey, the organization added environmental concerns to the discussion.
Before and around the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, Turkey entered what many have dubbed a “nuclear renaissance.” Demand for oil and natural gas had increased at the same time global availability of these resources decreased, due in part to Chinese and Indian economic policies. The Fukushima disaster reminded Turkish citizens of Chernobyl, while also highlighting the potential for natural disasters. On the one hand, anti-nuclear advocates both in Turkey and abroad felt emboldened. On the other hand, proponents trumpeted Japan’s continued reliance on nuclear energy while strengthening safety measures.
Both sides of the nuclear energy debate in Turkey offer convincing arguments for uninformed audiences. They use words like “development,” “energy security,” and “environmental protection,” though with different expected policy outcomes. I attended a nuclear energy panel in 2008 in Ankara; one presenter highlighted the benefits of nuclear power on the basis of energy security criteria (reliability, affordability, and environment-friendliness), while anti-nuclear audience members argued against nuclear power because it was dangerous, expensive, and harmful to the environment. After both sides had accused each other of “treason,” the debate intensified—and I worried a physical fight would break out.
In Turkey’s nuclear energy debate, both proponents and detractors emphasize a need for reducing dependence on foreign energy sources and for promoting economic development. While the antinuclear coalition ranks environmental preservation higher, even it supports the state’s drive to maintain political and economic power.
[…]
Citizens near the Akkuyu nuclear power plant construction site appear to have accepted the plant in their midst, at least based on my observations during a trip to Taşucu—the closest town to Akkuyu—in the summer of 2021. The construction site’s large security perimeter has quieted anti-nuclear and environmental activist activity. Social unrest is focused on the significant influx of Syrian refugees in Mersin, the central town of the formerly İçel province, where Akkuyu is located. Yet Taşucu’s long coastline has recently become a point of attraction, in a way similar to the French Riviera or Miami Beach. White- and blue-collar Russian employees of the nuclear power plant and their families have turned the environs into an collection of natural and historical sites for tourism. Residents are thriving economically, because of increasing demand for agricultural products, fish, hotels, rental houses, and restaurants. The Taşucu harbor’s importance has risen as ships transport construction materials. Infrastructure renovations have improved land transportation as well. New social facilities and construction have revitalized the local economy—none of which likely would have happened without the construction of a nuclear power plant.
Read more.
Yosomono-net, a worldwide anti-nuke network of Japanese people living abroad, invites well-known scientists, experts, and activists from all over the world who alert us to numerous problems of nuclear energy. In this project, they send their messages specifically against the release of contaminated water from Fukushima Daiichi into the Ocean. This is the fifth in the series. The fifth speaker is Tim Deere-Jones from the UK. He has been working as an independent Marine Pollution Consultant/Campaigner and Researcher since the 1980’s. He was educated at the Cardiff University (Wales) Department of Maritime Studies, where his dissertation researched the sea-to-land transfer of marine pollutants. Tim has worked on a wide range of marine and coastal issues on campaigns covering marine environments from the Arctic to Australia. Tim has a particular interest, expertise and focus on issues related to marine radioactivity and marine hydrocarbon pollution. He has worked with, and for, leading marine environmental NGOs, Local Government organisations and Citizens Campaign groups and has never worked for, or with, the polluting industries. For further information and references of the work mentioned in this video, please see the following report by Tim Deere-Jones. https://bit.ly/3kUQT49 For the Scottish research on North Uist: https://bit.ly/2Z6C1rw YOSOMONO-NET: Worldwide anti-nuke network of Japanese people living abroad and their sympathizers. Sayonara Nukes Berlin Head quarter Germany /Berlin Blog http://sayonara-nukes-berlin.org/ Facebook https://bit.ly/3nyGTPF Twitter https://twitter.com/NoNukesBerlin Nos Voisins Lointains 3.11 Head quarter France/Grenoble HP (In French and Japanese) Since March 2018 https://bit.ly/3FCHE03 Before March 2018 https://bit.ly/3FAJui4 Facebook Nos Voisins Lointains 3.11 Les paroles des sinistrés nucléaires https://bit.ly/3cu2Nxc Yosomono-net France Head quarter France/Paris HP（Japanese） http://yosomononet.blog.fc2.com Facebook（Japanese） https://bit.ly/3kVU3V8
よそものネットでは、原子力エネルギーのあらゆる問題に警鐘を鳴らしている世界各地の科学者、専門家、活動家たちに、日本の汚染水海洋放出に反対するメッセージを届けていただき、それを日本の皆様に見ていただけるよう日本語字幕付きで公開しています。今回はそのシリーズの第五弾目です。 シリーズ第5弾目はティム・ディアー＝ジョーンズ氏です。 ティム・ディアー＝ジョーンズ氏は、1980年代から政府や産業ロビーから独立した海洋汚染研究者、コンサルタントおよびキャンペーン担当者として活動してきました。 カーディフ大学（ウェールズ）の海洋研究学部で教育を受け、卒業論文では海洋汚染物質の海から陸への移動をテーマにしました。 彼は、北極からオーストラリアに至る海洋環境を対象としたキャンペーンで、海洋と沿岸に関する幅広い問題を扱ってきました。 特に、海洋の放射能汚染と炭化水素汚染に関する問題に関心と造詣が深く、これに焦点を当て取り組んできました。 ディア＝ジョーンズ氏は、主要な海洋環境NGO、地方自治体、市民キャンペーングループと協力しあって活動してきました。 汚染産業のために、または汚染産業とともに働いたことはありません。 このメッセージ動画のさらに詳しい内容及び参照文献をお知りになりたい方はティム・ディアー＝ジョーンズ氏の以下のレポート（英語）をご覧ください。 https://bit.ly/3kUQT49 ノース・ウイスト島の調査についてはこちら（英語）です。 https://bit.ly/2Z6C1rw よそものネット 在外邦人による脱原発ネットワーク Sayonara Nukes Berlin Blog http://sayonara-nukes-berlin.org/ Facebook https://bit.ly/3nyGTPF Twitter https://twitter.com/NoNukesBerlin 遠くの隣人3.11 本部 フランス・グルノーブル HP (日仏語) 2018年3月以降 https://bit.ly/3FCHE03 2018年3月以前 https://bit.ly/3FAJui4 Facebook Nos Voisins Lointains 3.11 Les paroles des sinistrés nucléaires https://bit.ly/3cu2Nxc よそものネット・フランス 本部 フランス・パリ ブログ http://yosomononet.blog.fc2.com Facebook https://bit.ly/3kVU3V8
ディア・ジョーンズさんの論考を訳しておりますので、あわせてお送りします。
By Marcus Wacket
BERLIN, Nov 23 (Reuters) – Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD), Greens and Free Democrats, who are negotiating to form a new government, have agreed to commit to a coal phase-out by 2030 in a coalition deal, sources involved in the talks told Reuters on Tuesday.
The three parties are in the final stages of clinching a coalition agreement and hope to present the deal on Wednesday, one source close to the talks said.
Climate policy is one of the closest-watched areas for the new government as Europe’s biggest economy shifts towards carbon neutrality.
The three parties have also agreed to end power generation from gas by 2040, sources involved in the coalition talks told Reuters. In addition, gas heating systems would be banned in new buildings and replaced in existing buildings, they said.
The parties also want to allow “blue” hydrogen, or the production of hydrogen using natural gas with CO2 emissions captured in underground or subsea storage.
[…]
Read more.
福島県いわき市から新地町までの６号国道で清掃活動を繰り広げる「みんなでやっぺ！！きれいな６国（ろっこく）」は２０日に各地で催され、約１３００人がごみ拾いなどに取り組んだ。
広野町のＮＰＯ法人ハッピーロードネットと浜通りの各青年会議所でつくる実行委員会の主催、福島民報社などの後援。住民や浜通りで復興事業に携わる作業員らが参加した。
メイン会場となる広野町の二ツ沼総合公園で行われた開会式には約３００人が参加した。実行委員長の西本由美子ハッピーロードネット理事長らがあいさつし、参加者がごみ袋を手に出発した。
参加者はそろいのオレンジ色のＴシャツを着て作業に臨んだ。広野町の、ふたば未来学園中・高の生徒も参加した。
日本原水爆被害者団体協議会（日本被団協）は２２日、被爆者の親を持つ被爆２世を対象とするアンケート結果を発表した。３４１７人のうち６割が「２世としての不安や悩みがある」と回答。うち８割近くが「健康と放射線の影響」を挙げた。日本被団協による被爆２世に対する大規模調査は初めて。（津田六平）
全国被爆二世団体連絡協議会は全国の被爆２世を３０万～５０万人と推計。ただ、国は調査しておらず、正確な人数や実態はわかっていない。日本被団協は実態を把握する一環として、２０１６年～１７年に１万７５６７人に調査票を配布。１９・５％から回収、有効回答が３４１７人だった。コロナ禍で集計に時間がかかったことなどから、この日の発表となった。
日本被団協は今後、調査結果を国への要求などに反映させていきたいとしている。
調査によると、不安や悩みを感じたことがあると答えた人にその内容（複数回答可）をたずねたところ、「自分の健康・放射線の影響」が７８・６％だった。「父母の健康問題・介護」が５６・０％、「自分の子どもへの放射線の影響」が４１・８％と続いた。
被爆者は、被爆者援護法に基づいて被爆者健康手帳を交付され、医療費が原則無料になる。一方、被爆２世について国は被爆の遺伝的影響を認めていないため援護法の対象外。広島、長崎では、被爆２世が「国は放射線の遺伝的影響が否定できない被爆２世への援護策を取らなかった」とする訴訟を起こし、係争中だ。
国は被爆２世向けに年１回の無料健康診断を実施しているが、がん検診は含んでいない。今回の調査では、この健康診断を５１・３％が受診していないと回答。理由は「知らなかった」という人が３９・６％いた。
国や自治体への要望（複数回答可）は「医療費の助成」４８・７％、「健康手帳の発行」４８・３％、「がん検診の実施」４１・９％と続いた。
被爆２世として取り組みたい活動については、「ない」と答えた人が５５・５％で、「ある」の３２・４％を上回った。各地にある被爆２世の会に「関心ない」との回答も３７・４％だった。
調査のとりまとめを担当した昭和女子大の八木良広助教は、差別や偏見を恐れて名乗りを上げない被爆２世が多いとみられる点もふまえ、今回の結果が一部の声の反映にとどまる可能性を説明。それでも「国が調査をしない中、被爆２世が個別に抱えていた課題をまとめられた」と話した。
東京電力は２２日、福島第１原発で内側が汚染され、亀裂が入った配管の交換作業をした４０代の男性社員２人が、鼻から微量の放射性物質を吸い込み内部被ばくした疑いがあると発表した。ルールに従い作業着に防じんマスクの軽装備だったが、東電は全面マスクと防護服を着用するよう手配するべきだったとしている。
２人からセシウム１３７は検出されず、被ばくは微量とみられるが、引き続き健康への影響を調べる。
東電によると、２人は１９日午前１０時すぎから約１時間半、暖房や空気を循環させる装置がある施設内で配管を交換した。作業後の検査で鼻の中に放射性物質が付いていることが確認された。
By Hal Bernton, The Seattle Times
RICHLAND — Near the Columbia River, Clay Sell hopes to launch a new era of nuclear power with four small reactors, each stocked with billiard ball-sized “pebbles” packed full of uranium fuel.
Chief executive officer of Maryland-based X-energy, Sell aims to bring the project online by 2028 as part of a broader attempt to develop safer, more flexible reactors to redefine the nation’s energy future.
These efforts have gained support in the nation’s capital where many Democrats eager to make progress on climate change have joined with Republicans to funnel money into development. The federal Energy Department has received $160 million to help fund X-energy, and the infrastructure bill that cleared Congress on Friday ups that amount to cover almost half the projected $2.2 billion cost of the Washington reactor project.
“We believe what starts here in Washington is going to change the world,” Sell said to public-utility officials gathered Oct. 28 in Kennewick.
X-energy, along with Bellevue-based TerraPower, founded by Bill Gates, and Portland-based NuScale, proposes reactors that can ramp up and down their electrical output much more rapidly than the large reactors now operating. This agility could help keep electrical grids in balance as more wind and solar power comes online.
[…]
The nuclear industry, in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere in the nation, has a history of pitching, and sometimes starting, projects that fail to come to pass. Skeptics say these next-generation projects are being oversold and face big challenges in producing competitively priced power without compromising safety and security, and in a time frame soon enough to help reduce carbon emissions by midcentury.
“I’m frankly speechless at the success that the proponents of these plants have had in bamboozling … a lot of government officials,” said Peter Bradford, a former member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and former chair of the Maine and New York utility commissions. “They should be shouldering a much heavier burden when it comes to the credibility of what they are saying.”
The NuScale project in southern Idaho involving small reactors cooled by water is furthest along in development, and has struggled with delays, design changes and escalating cost projections.
[…]
The claims of a meltdown-proof fuel are dismissed as “absurd” by Edwin Lyman, a physicist with the Union of Concerned Scientists who has researched nuclear reactor safety for many years.
Lyman questions whether the X-energy reactor would be safe enough to justify a design that does away with costly leak-tight containment buildings standard for the current generation of water-cooled reactors.
He says the safety of TRISO fuel requires the ability to consistently manufacture it to exacting standards. So far, he said, that has not been demonstrated in the United States.
In a report he published this year, Lyman notes a 2019 test of the fuel at a national laboratory in southern Idaho “had to be terminated prematurely” when monitoring indicated “the fuel began to release fission products at a rate high enough to challenge offsite radiation dose limits.”
If the project moves forward, Lyman calls for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to take a more cautious licensing approach that would first approve the reactor as a prototype before moving into commercial production.
“A lot of the rationale for why you would embark on this journey is not supported by the evidence,” Lyman said.
[…]
Read more.
A nuclear power plant in Byron, Illinois. Taken by photographer Joseph Pobereskin (http://pobereskin.com).
