Tokyo set to tackle Fukushima crisis

The government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to demonstrate its ability to act. After revelations last week that the radiation levels at the crippled nuclear plant were higher than previously expected, Tokyo has decided to play a larger role in managing the crisis.

The government announced it would allocate some US$ 470 million to build a 1.5-kilometer long subterranean ice wall and for other steps aimed at stopping the leaks of radioactive water at the site.

"The world is closely watching to see whether the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi plant can be achieved" said the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Tuesday, September 3. The government’s announcement on taking over the cleanup operations in Fukushima comes days ahead of the International Olympic Committee’s final decision on the host for the 2020 Olympics, which Tokyo is contesting.

The level of radiation officially emitted by the leaking water was recently adjusted and increased from the original figure of 100 millisieverts per hour to 1800 millisieverts, a rate high enough to prove deadly to humans after only four hours of exposure.

The plant's operator has come under sharp criticism for its incompetent crisis management. The utilities company has been accused of continually covering up the extent of the disaster and not fully informing the public.

There have been new revelations that contaminated water used to cool the reactors has been leaking from storage tanks. Just weeks after Japanese officials acknowledged that radioactive water has been seeping into the Pacific Ocean from the plant for more than two years, the information has caused alarm.

On August 19, Japanese authorities revealed that some 300 tons of radioactive water had leaked from a storage tank. Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) reacted by raising the danger level to 3, a "serious incident," on the seven-level International Nuclear Event Scale (INES).

The NRA does not exclude releasing the contaminated tank water into the ocean, as long as radiation levels remain below a certain threshold. According to NRA chief Shunichi Tanaka, such as step is "unavoidable," as there is not enough storage capacity for the large amounts of toxic cooling water. TEPCO says the decommissioning of the crippled plant is expected to take about 40 years.