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Thursday, April 7, 2011

THE NUCLEAR COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK News in Brief/ No. 94 / 7th April 2011

THE NUCLEAR COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK News in Brief/ No. 94 / 7th April 2011

‘No Significant Impact’ From New Quake, NISA Confirms

7 Apr (NucNet): Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) has said an earthquake that struck northern Japan today has not had any significant impact on the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant, although at the Onagawa plant it disabled two out of three external electricity supply lines.

NISA spokesman Masaomi Koyama told NucNet that according to the NISA inspector onsite at Onagawa only one external electricity supply line is operational.

All three units at Onagawa in Miyagi Prefecture – on the coast to the north of Fukushima – shut down automatically during the 11 March quake that struck the same region and are now in cold shutdown.

The plant is owned and operated by Tohoku Electric Power Company.

Mr Koyama said that at Fukushima-Daiichi there has been “no specific event”.

Initial details from the US Geological Survey said today’s quake was magnitude 7.1 and at a depth of 49 km. It occurred at 23:32 at its epicentre, near the coast of Honshu, or 16:42 central European time.

Earlier, nitrogen was being injected into the primary containment vessel (PCV) of unit 1 at Fukushima-Daiichi amid concerns that hydrogen that has accumulated there could cause an explosion.

Injecting nitrogen is intended to displace oxygen inside the PCV, thereby reducing the risk of explosion caused by the combustible combination of hydrogen and oxygen.

Dan Yurman 
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