Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant

歌曲 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant
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[00:00.10] From VOA Learning English,
[00:02.59] this is the Technology Report.
[00:06.13] Workers at the damaged Fukushima
[00:09.21] Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan
[00:11.70] will soon begin one of the most
[00:14.15] important periods of the clean-up efforts.
[00:17.88] They will be removing the fuel rods
[00:21.22] from one of the worst-hit reactors.
[00:23.71] More than 1500 fuel rods
[00:27.69] sit in a damaged storage pool 30 meters
[00:31.73] above ground inside the reactor 4 building.
[00:36.55] TEPCO, the Tokyo Electric Power company
[00:40.89] owns the nuclear power station.
[00:44.03] Critics say TEPCO should not be trusted
[00:48.11] to carry out the operation.
[00:50.40] However, TEPCO General Manager Masayuki Ono says
[00:56.38] the operation has been carefully planned.
[00:59.91] He explains that because the reactor 4 building
[01:08.12] was destroyed by a hydrogen explosion,
[01:11.61] TEPCO had to rebuild the structure.
[01:15.45] This happened during the first year,
[01:18.59] the new building he says is stronger than the old one.
[01:23.46] The hydrogen explosion left pieces of wreckage
[01:28.24] all over the inside of the pool.
[01:30.94] TEPCO's first job is to remove this debris.
[01:35.52] Then, workers will remove the fuel rods one by one,
[01:40.99] they will use a crane suspended above the building.
[01:44.98] The fuel rods must not touch each other or break.
[01:50.92] Nuclear experts warn that any accidents
[01:54.56] could cause an explosion many times worse
[01:58.30] than the one in March 2011.
[02:01.88] Mitsuhei Murata is Japan's former ambassador to Switzerland
[02:07.75] and an anti-nuclear activist.
[02:11.14] He notes the problems over the past 30 months
[02:15.45] - including radioactive water leaks
[02:18.58] - have raised questions about TEPCO's ability
[02:22.26] to carry out this operation.
[02:24.65] "The Unit 4 contains 10 times more Cesium-137 than Chernobyl.
[02:34.26] So in case the worst occurs,
[02:37.20]a total withdrawal [from the site] will be imposed,
[02:40.74] which means this can be considered as the beginning of
[02:45.27] the ultimate catastrophe of the world and the planet."
[02:50.02] Japan has called on foreign expert to assist in the operation.
[02:54.80] Hironori Nakanishi is the Director-General for Energy Policy
[03:00.03] at the government's Agency for Natural Resources and Energy.
[03:05.51] "The sole responsibility in managing
[03:09.74] the situation safely is still on TEPCO corporation.
[03:14.92] But still we are in the same boat
[03:17.21] and we have to support their activity.
[03:19.46] So in order to achieve that goal
[03:21.84] we asked the specialists all over the world,
[03:25.13] from United States, the UK, France, Russia and Ukraine."
[03:31.01] Inspectors from Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority
[03:34.89] have approved TEPCO's planned operation
[03:38.38] to remove the fuel from Reactor 4.
[03:41.72] The process is expected to begin in November
[03:46.25] and to take up to 18 months to complete.
[03:50.68] And that's the Technology Report from VOA Learning English.