Outrage over Japan nuclear reactor coverup

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/15/AR2007031500393.html

Outrage over Japan nuclear reactor coverup

By Ikuko Kao
Reuters
Thursday, March 15, 2007; 6:17 AM

TOKYO (Reuters) - A Japanese power company admitted on Thursday that it had covered up a 1999 incident in which mishandling of nuclear fuel rods led to an unintended self-sustaining nuclear fission chain reaction for 15 minutes.

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The news of the 15-minute "criticality" -- an unintended self-sustaining nuclear fission chain reaction -- is likely to further dent public confidence in Japan's nuclear power industry, already undermined by safety scandals over the past decade.

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"There was a cover-up," Toshihiko Takahashi told a news conference, bowing deeply. He added that the incident may have breached laws governing nuclear plant regulation.

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Activists were outraged, citing a long history of previous incidents such as Tokaimura or the leak of high-pressure steam that killed four workers at a nuclear power plant in 2004.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601101&sid=aUj9CeyvPi34&refer=japan

Hokuriku Electric Ordered to Shut Reactor by Ministry (Update4)

By Megumi Yamanaka

March 15 (Bloomberg) -- Japan's trade ministry ordered Hokuriku Electric Power Co. to shut a reactor immediately because the utility covered up a ``critical accident'' at its nuclear power plant eight years ago.

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In November last year, the ministry ordered Tokyo Electric and other utilities to check all their power generation plants by March 31 to ensure they were safe, following a series of data fabrications and plant accidents.

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Tokyo Electric, the nation's biggest utility, said on March 1 it found six additional cases of falsified safety data at nuclear power plants, a month after apologizing for almost 200 incidents of faked information. Tohoku Electric said on March 12 that it hid the emergency shutdown of a reactor nine years ago.

In 2002, Tokyo Electric received an order to shut all its nuclear power reactors for an investigation after the utility admitted that it faked safety documents. The company's president and chairman at the time resigned after the false safety documents were discovered.

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