Japan officials probe TEPCO on reactor cover-up
Date: 09-Sep-02
Country: JAPAN
The investigation at the headquarters of Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) began after plants involved in the scandal were inspected earlier in the week, an official at the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said.
TEPCO said last week that evidence of cracks at nuclear reactors was covered up during inspections in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
The company planned to shut down for safety checks five reactors thought to have been operating with cracks in their shrouds, the stainless steel envelope that helps to encase and support the core reactor.
Two have already been closed, with the remaining three to be shut down by the end of October, a company spokesman said.
Senior executives at TEPCO said on Monday they would resign to take responsibility for the attempt to hide the existence of cracks at several of the company's nuclear reactors.
But the incident has sparked outrage among opposition lawmakers.
Mamoru Kobayashi, opposition Democratic Party member of the Lower House and chairman of a parliamentary committee on nuclear safety, hit out at both TEPCO and government safety officials last week.
"This is not a problem that can be solved through resignations - there must be a thorough investigation of the cover-up," he said.
"It is an extremely serious matter that is generating considerable public anxiety," he added.
The scandal came to light last week, more than two years after an employee at a unit of U.S.-based General Electric Co that conducted safety checks told the authorities that there appeared to be problems with TEPCO's reports.
Kobayashi said this indicated government checks were not working and called for a complete overhaul of nuclear safety inspections.
Fellow opposition parliamentarian and Socialist Party leader Takako Doi asked TEPCO's President Nobuya Minami to close all the company's nuclear reactors for checks.
In response to widespread concern, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which oversees the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said it was launching a new committee, headed by an engineering professor from Tokyo University, to look at ways to improve nuclear safety.
Public faith in the nuclear power industry, which provides about one-third of resource-poor Japan's energy, was already low after a 1999 accident at a plant at Tokaimura, 140 km (90 miles) northeast of Tokyo.
Japan's worst ever nuclear accident, it exposed hundreds of residents, plant workers and emergency personnel to radiation. Two plant workers died.
