SPECIAL REPORT-Fukushima long ranked Japan's most hazardous nuclear plant
By Chisa Fujioka and Kevin Krolicki
Tue Jul 26, 2011 5:28pm EDT
* One of 5 worst nuclear plants in world for exposure to radiation
* Tepco prioritised cost-savings over radiation standard
* Tepco says old plants like Fukushima have high radiation
* Foreign workers used to avoid exposing staff to high radiation
* Improvements made at Fukushima before disaster hit
TOKYO, July 26 (Reuters) - Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant ranked as one of the most dangerous in the world for radiation exposure years before it was destroyed by the meltdowns and explosions that followed the March 11 earthquake.
For five years to 2008, the Fukushima plant was rated the most hazardous nuclear facility in Japan for worker exposure to radiation and one of the five worst nuclear plants in the world on that basis. The next rankings, compiled as a three-year average, are due this year.
Reuters uncovered these rankings, privately tracked by Fukushima's operator Tokyo Electric Power, in a review of documents and presentations made at nuclear safety conferences over the past seven years.
In the United States -- Japan's early model in nuclear power -- Fukushima's lagging safety record would have prompted more intensive inspections by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It would have also invited scrutiny from the U.S. Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, an independent nuclear safety organization established by the U.S. power industry after the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, experts say.
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