Nearly 48,000 people are still evacuating 9 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake

Nearly 48,000 people have been evacuated for 9 years since the Great East Japan Earthquake. March 11 1:19

It has been nine years since the Great East Japan Earthquake and the accident at TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. Today, nearly 48,000 people, mainly residents of Fukushima Prefecture, are forced to evacuate. In addition, while reconstruction projects for houses such as the construction of public housing for disasters have been almost completed, the population has decreased compared to before the earthquake, and there is little realization that people have revived in terms of lifestyles and local connections.

Nine years ago, at about 2:46 pm on March 11, 2011, a huge 9.0-magnitude earthquake occurred off the coast of Tohoku, causing a tsunami exceeding 10 meters in height to strike the coasts of Tohoku and Kanto.

To date, 18,428 people have been identified as dead and missing, and more than 3,700 "earthquake-related deaths" have died in evacuation, etc., and two people have died or are missing, including "related deaths". More than 12,000.

With only one year remaining until the 10-year earthquake disaster, which the government has positioned as the "reconstruction and creation period," the reconstruction project for homes has been almost completed, and some people who have lost their homes by the end of January have entered the "Disaster Management" As for “Housing,” 29,555 units, which is 99.% of the plan7, were completed, and the residential land completed by relocation to a hill or raising the ground reached 18,053 units in total, 99% of the plan. .

Stopping population decline

On the other hand, the number of people who were forced to evacuate was 47,737 people nationwide as of the Reconstruction Agency as of last month, of which 30,914 were out of Fukushima from outside Fukushima. It accounts for about 65% of the people and the whole.

In the disaster-stricken area, population decline was unstoppable, and NHK used data from municipalities based on census data to summarize changes in population up to the last month. Among local governments, more than 23 and 60% of the local governments have reduced their population by more than 10% compared to before the earthquake.

Reconstruction remains poor

According to a questionnaire conducted by NHK to the victims of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima about the current state of reconstruction in the affected areas, "worse than expected" accounted for almost half, 49%.

When we asked these people about the realization of recovery in each field, the local economy did not reach 10%, and the connection between lifestyles and the region was less than 20%.

Decommissioning work at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant continues to be difficult

Meanwhile, nine years ago, on March 11, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant lost its power due to a huge tsunami exceeding 10 meters, and then came to the world's worst accident that caused three reactors to melt down one after another. Approximately a quarter of the decommissioning process, which is said to last forty years, has passed.

The presence of large amounts of "radioactive material" on the job site continues to make work difficult.

One of the major issues is that around 170 tons of contaminated water containing radioactive materials is still being generated every day, because nuclear fuel melted down under the reactor is injected with water and cooled. .

Contaminated water is recovered and treated to remove radioactive materials. However, some radioactive materials such as tritium remain difficult to remove, so approximately 1.2 million tons are currently stored in approximately 1,000 tanks.

According to TEPCO's current plan, all tanks will be full around summer 2022.

Regarding this water, a sub-committee of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry submitted a report to the government last month stating that "it is realistic to dilute below the standard and release it to the sea or the atmosphere, and the sea is more reliable". However, there have been various voices from local officials and others concerned about harmful reputation.

The government ultimately decides how to dispose of it, but much attention is being focused on how to gather opinions in the future.

Another challenge facing decommissioning is the removal of melted nuclear fuel, so-called "fuel debris."

It is thought that it melted into the reactors of Units 1 to 3 and the containment vessel that houses the reactors, and the total of the three units is estimated to be 880 tons.

The most advanced of these investigations was at Unit 2, which last year succeeded in capturing sediments that appeared to be debris with a remotely controlled robot.

Therefore, we plan to start taking out Unit 2 next year.

However, the amount of radiation around the area where the sediment was confirmed exceeded 6 Sieverts per hour, and the level was such that death occurred if the person stayed there for about one hour.

For this reason, the work is extremely difficult using a robot by "remote operation", and the initial removal amount is also expected to be "several grams".

TEPCO and other companies are gradually increasing the scale of takeout, but new technology development is also needed, and decommissioning can be said to be in a more difficult stage.