New camera gear developed to probe Fukushima nuclear reactor

By Mari Yamaguchi The Associated Press

7 years ago

Toshiba Corp. unveiled a pan-tilt camera which it jointly developed with the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, to inspect the interior of the damaged primary containment vessel of Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station Unit 2 in Yokohama, Friday. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara)

In this Sept. 2017, photo, tanks are seen at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Okuma. More than six years after a tsunami overwhelmed the Fukushima nuclear power plant, Japan has yet to reach consensus on what to do with a million tons of radioactive water, stored on site in around 900 large and densely packed tanks that could spill should another major earthquake or tsunami strike. (Daisuke Suzuki/Kyodo News via AP)

Toshiba Corp. unveiled its pan-tilt camera design with the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning (IRND), to inspect interior of damaged primary containment vessel of Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station Unit 2 in Yokohama, Friday, Dec. 22, 2017. The device shown to media Friday is 13 meters (43 feet) long and designed to give officials a deeper view into the nuclear plant’s Unit 2 primary containment vessel, where details on melted fuel damage remain largely unknown. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara)

Toshiba Corporation unveiled a pan-tilt camera developed by the Toshiba Corp. and the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning (IRND), designed to inspect the interior of the damaged primary containment vessel of the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station Unit 2 in Yokohama, Friday, Dec. 22, 2017. The device shown to media Friday is 13 meters (43 feet) long and designed to give officials a deeper view into the nuclear plant’s Unit 2 primary containment vessel, where details on melted fuel damage remain largely unknown. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara)

This image captured by an underwater robot provided by International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning shows a part of equipment housing a control rod drive system of Unit 3 at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Okuma town, northeastern Japan Wednesday, July 19, 2017. The underwater robot has captured images and other data inside Japan’s crippled nuclear plant on its first day of work. The robot is on a mission to study damage and find fuel that experts say has melted and mostly fallen to the bottom of a chamber and has been submerged by highly radioactive water. (International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning via AP)

This image captured by an underwater robot provided by International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning shows a part of a control rod drive of Unit 3 at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Okuma town, northeastern Japan Wednesday, July 19, 2017. The underwater robot has captured images and other data inside Japan’s crippled nuclear plant on its first day of work. The robot is on a mission to study damage and find fuel that experts say has melted and mostly fallen to the bottom of a chamber and has been submerged by highly radioactive water. (International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning via AP)

FILE – In this May 28, 2012 aerial file photo, reactors of the tsunami-stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant stand in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan. An underwater robot on Wednesday, July 19, 2017, captured images and other data inside Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant on its first day of work. The robot is on a mission to study damage and find fuel that experts say has melted and mostly fallen to the bottom of a chamber and has been submerged by highly radioactive water. (AP Photo/Tom Curley, File)

FILE – In this Feb. 23, 2017, file photo, an employee walks past storage tanks for contaminated water at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant of the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan. More than six years after a tsunami overwhelmed the Fukushima nuclear power plant, Japan has yet to reach consensus on what to do with a million tons of radioactive water, stored on site in around 900 large and densely packed tanks that could spill should another major earthquake or tsunami strike. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Pool Photo via AP, File)

FILE – In this Nov. 12, 2014 file photo, a Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) official wearing a radioactive protective gear stands in front of Advanced Liquid Processing Systems during a press tour at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan. More than six years after a tsunami overwhelmed the Fukushima nuclear power plant, Japan has yet to reach consensus on what to do with 1-million tons of radioactive water, stored on site in around 900 densely packed tanks that could topple should another major earthquake or tsunami strike. The stalemate is rooted in a fundamental conflict between science and human nature. (AP Photo/Shizuo Kambayashi, Pool, File)

FILE – This Nov. 22, 2016, aerial file photo shows Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okuma, Fukushima prefecture, Japan. A suspected wartime bomb was dug up at Thursday, Aug. 10, 2017, a construction site near the wrecked complex. The plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., said that a worker spotted the suspected bomb early Thursday while digging the ground at a parking lot about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) north of the reactors destroyed in the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. (Kyodo News via AP, File)

This image captured by an underwater robot provided by International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning on Saturday, July 22, 2017 shows heaps of solidified lava-like rocks believed to be nuclear fuel that had melted in the 2011 accident during a probe inside of the Unit 3 reactor at Japan’s tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant in Okuma town, northeastern Japan. (International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning via AP)

YOKOHAMA, Japan — Toshiba Corp.’s energy systems unit on Friday unveiled a long telescopic pipe carrying a pan-tilt camera designed to gather crucial information about the situation inside the reactor chambers at Japan’s tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant.

The device is 43 feet long and designed to give officials a deeper view into the nuclear plant’s Unit 2 primary containment vessel, where details on melted fuel damage remain largely unknown.

The Fukushima plant had triple meltdowns following the 2011 quake and tsunami. Finding details about the fuel debris is crucial to determining the right method and technology for its removal at each reactor, the most challenging process to safely carry out the plant’s decades-long decommissioning.

A team deployed from Nellis Air Force Base played a part in evaluating the radiation released in the initial 2011 disaster.

Japan’s stricter, post-Fukushima safety standards also require nuclear plant operators elsewhere to invest more time and money into safety measures.

On Friday, Kansai Electric Power Co. announced that it would decommission two idle reactors at the Ohi Nuclear Power Plant in western Japan, citing the difficulty of adding all the safety requirements at the nearly 40-year-old reactors that would be needed to get approval for their restart.

Reports have said it would cost about 58 billion yen ($500 million) and take 30 years to decommission a reactor, about half the estimated cost to restart one.

There's no such thing as simply "cleaning up" a nuclear accident. It destroys homes, and lives. Stand with the people of #Fukushima. pic.twitter.com/0oJJL8K15p

— Greenpeace (@Greenpeace) December 19, 2017

Also Friday, Japan Nuclear Fuel said that it was postponing the planned launch of its trouble-plagued spent fuel reprocessing plant by three more years until 2021. It cited delayed approval by the authorities. It also said it was postponing the planned manufacturing of fuel from recycled plutonium and uranium.

The mission involving Toshiba’s new probe at Fukushima’s Unit 2 reactor could come as soon as late January. Company officials said the new device will be sent inside the pedestal, a structure directly below the core, to investigate the area and hopefully to find melted debris.

The device looks like a giant fishing rod about 4.7 inches in diameter, from which a unit housing the camera, a dosimeter and thermometer slowly slides down. The probe, attached by a cable on the back, can descend all the way to the bottom of the reactor vessel if it can avoid obstacles, officials said.

Two teams of several engineers will be tasked with the mission, which they will remotely operate from a radiation-free command center at the plant.

A simpler predecessor to the pipe unveiled Friday had captured a limited view of the vessel during a preparatory investigation in February. A crawling robot sent in later in February struggled with debris on the ground and stalled in the end due to higher-than-expected radiation, its intended mission incomplete.

The upgraded probe has been co-developed by Toshiba ESS and International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, a government-funded unit of construction and nuclear technology companies over the past nine months.