December-2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant Disaster

Saturday, 3  December -2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster  
Forty-five tons of highly (Fukushima Nuclear Plant )  radioactive water leaked from the apparatus being used to decontaminate the water at the plant. Plant workers attempted to contain the leak, but it was unknown if any of the water escaped into the water table or the ocean.

Thursday, 15 December-2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster
A long-range timetable is announced for the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi reactors. The plan is to repair the damaged containment vessels and determine the condition of the melted fuel by the end of 2021, then begin the retrieval of this fuel in 2022. The full duration of the schedule is 40 years, with the decommissioning work to be completed by 2052.

Friday, 16  December-2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster 


In a joint statement by TEPCO and the Japan government it is announced that the reactors have achieved a state of cold shutdown. Temperatures in the containment vessels were 38.9 degrees Celsius for reactor one, 67.5 degrees for reactor two, and 57.4 degrees for reactor 3. This announcement failed to lay to rest substantial concerns arising from TEPCO's inability to directly measure temperatures at the bottoms of the containment vessels, and the fact that the site is too radioactive for visual confirmation of the fuel rods' status .

Sunday, December 18-2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster  

230 tons of highly radioactive water is discovered in a tunnel below a building that stores contaminated water, raising questions about TEPCO's inspection and management capabilities. TEPCO admits that this radioactive water may be mixing with the ground water, yet claims that the tunnel is not connected to the sea .


Tuesday, December 20-2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster

US Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko, visiting Japan, confirmed that the Daiichi reactors were stable. Said Jaczko, "The temperatures have decreased significantly, the amount of heat that's being produced from the reactor fuel itself is very, very low now. So it simply doesn't have the kind of energy, if you will, that's needed to have any kind of off-site releases of radiation. I feel very comfortable with the (government's cold shutdown) decision."

Monday, 26 December -2011-Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster  

An interim report was issued by the investigative panel headed by Yotaro Hatamura. In the report, the panel concluded that poor internal communication by the Japanese government and faulty knowledge and actions by TEPCO employees contributed to the disaster. The Japanese cabinet was not informed of the government's System for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose Information, which could have told them of the wind direction's effect on the spread of radiation, which would have allowed them to make better decisions on which areas to evacuate around Fukushima Daiichi. TEPCO workers mistakenly believed that the isolation condenser for reactor #1 was still working, when it was not, delaying efforts to try other methods to cool the reactor. TEPCO workers turned off an emergency cooling system on reactor #3 for seven hours to try to switch to another system that was not working, allowing the reactor to overheat more quickly.

Timeline of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant  Disaster Information| Nuclear Plant