A crane barge has begun lifting out rubble in the intake channel area in front of Fukushima Daiichi, in preparation for installation of work to permanently wall off Fukushima Daiichi units 1-4 from the sea.
Crane barge lifts rubble from water intake canal
To allow the crane barge to enter the intake channel, the protective fence that prevents silt from drifting out of the intake channel into the enclosed port area has had to be opened and closed again, but TEPCO has monitored radionuclide levels there during the operation. However, it has not yet released any data. The sheet pile wall will be installed slightly beyond the existing seawall. Landfill will be poured in between the two. The sheet pile wall will extend below the seabed, below two permeable layers and one low-permeable layer of rock.
TEPCO has announced that it started a unit 3 spent fuel pool water decontamination system, following treatment of unit 2, which finished on 5 December. If it is set up the same as at unit 2, the system takes water that has been cooled by the alternate cooling system and runs it through several truck-bed mounted units, including a valve unit and caesium adsorption tower, before returning the water to the cooling system. The unit 2 system reduced water radiation level by 1000 times.
A TEPCO inspection of the Fukushima Daiichi unit 4 main turbine has found what it calls only minor damage as a result of the Great Eastern Japanese earthquake. Traces of contact between moving and stationary surfaces were found in the high-pressure turbine, low-pressure turbine A, and in the oil thrower bearing in between them.
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