Lessons Learned from the Fukushima Nuclear Accident for Improving Safety of U.S. Nuclear Plants (2014) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction
1 Introduction
Pages 15-30
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2 When the formal names of nuclear plants are used in this report they are capitalized, for example the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. Lower case is used for informal names, for example, the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
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and location of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.
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1.1 BACKGROUND ON THE STUDY CHARGE At the time of the Fukushima Daiichi accident, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future was completing an assessment for the U.S. Secretary of Energy of options for managing spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste in the United States.
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. in the damaged reactor buildings at the Fukushima Daiichi plant and the potential for large-scale releases of radioactive materials from the stored spent fuel.
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The figure 134 pro 0.3 to 30 MBq/m and in which IRSN added the 6 MBq/m2 level duced by the Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire based on airborne surveys carried out in April 2011 and published by the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The concentric circles demarcate the 20- and 30-km-radius zones aroundReportFukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.
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Lessons' implications for conclusions reached in earlier NAS studies on the safety and security of current storage arrangements for spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste in the United States, including an assessment of whether the amount of spent fuel currently stored in reactor pools should be reduced; 4. Lessons' implications for commercial nuclear reactor safety and security regulations; and 5.
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for accidents and terrorist attacks to existing nuclear plants. • An additional sentence was added to the end of the statement of task by NAS to preclude policy recommendations that involve nontechnical value judgments.
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These terms have specific meanings when applied to nuclear plant safety as described in this sidebar. Nuclear plant accidents are classified according to their implications for safety and the specific type of events that initiate them, known as an "accident se quence." Nuclear plants are designed with extensive safety features and operators are trained to handle a wide range of normal and abnormal conditions, including accidents caused by equipment failure, loss of power, and loss of reactor core cooling capability.
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experience in technical disciplines relevant to the study task; these include geophysics, health physics, human factors, law and regulation, materials sciences, mechanical and structural engineering, nuclear engineering, nuclear power plant operations, nuclear safety and security, public health, and risk analysis. The committee chair is an NAS member with demonstrated leadership capabilities and strong knowledge of Japan and its culture; however, he has no experience with the nuclear power industry.
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to learn about their designs, operations, and responses to the earthquake and tsunami. Additionally, subgroups of the committee visited two nuclear plants in the United States that are similar in design to the Fukushima Daiichi plant to learn about their designs and operations: Oyster Creek Generating Station in Forked River, New Jersey, and the Edwin I
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, The Nuclear Safety and Quality Assurance Meeting's Accident Investigation Examination Committee's Opinion of the Tokyo Electric Power Company's "Fukushima Nuclear Accident Investigation Report" (Midterm Report) (November 2011)
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(SCJ, 2011) • R ebuild Japan Initiative Foundation, Independent Investigation Commission on the Fukushima Nuclear Accident (February 2012)
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In the United States, the nuclear industry launched a fast-track effort to understand the Fukushima Daiichi accident and identify and implement appropriate countermeasures at U.S. nuclear plants.
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Most of the industry, government, and international activities described previously were undertaken under demanding schedules, typically a few months to a year, and were intended to implement safety improvements to existing nuclear plants on an accelerated schedule. This NAS study is being carried out on a longer (2-year)
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nuclear plants are safe. The primary focus of this study is on how nuclear plant safety and security can be improved based on lessons learned from the Fukushima Daiichi accident.
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• Chapter 7 describes the nuclear safety culture in Japan and lessons learned for the United States. The appendixes provide additional information to support the discussions in the report chapters.
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