Feel free to use these quotes in your stories. Any further comments will be posted here. f you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

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Kevin McCue is an adjunct professor at CQUniversity, President of the Australian Earthquake Engineering Society and Director of the Australian Seismological Centre.

“According to the USGS website the magnitude 8.7 earthquake occurred well offshore, at least 300 km west of Sumatra so the damage onshore on Sumatra is likely to be minimal. The magnitude may well be decrease to 8.5 or 8.4 after more analysis. The epicentre is well west of the plate boundary and in the Indian Ocean, a fracture along the hinge where the subducting slab of oceanic crust starts bending downward and under Sumatra.

The mechanism seems to have been predominantly strike-slip ie no substantial vertical displacement of the sea floor so any tsunami would be small and local.”

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Professor James Goff is Director of the Australia-Pacific Tsunami Research Centre and Natural Hazards Research Laboratory, University of New South Wales.Note that Professor Goff is currently in the Cook Islands and so has limited availability for interviews.

“Like everyone else who just heard this news, we are now waiting to see what comes to pass. BUT, the tsunami warning system has worked well, and a tsunami watch is in place. Many people have self-evacuated and fortunately, because of the incredible amount of tsunami-related work in the region, since the massive 2004 event authorities and the general public are considerably better prepared this time. Those of us who are not in the region at the moment will now be monitoring developments over the next few hours.

It appears to be a strike-slip fault which means that it is unlikely to generate a large tsunami, but then we hear that at least small ones have been reported. Of course such a large shake could generate submarine landslides (like in Haiti) which can also generate tsunamis. We continue to watch.”

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Professor Kevin Furlong from Pennsylvania State University is currently in the US and is working with the US Geological Survey on this disaster. He is available for interview over the next 8 hours.

“The 11 April 2012, Mw 8.7 earthquake west of Banda Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia is a very large earthquake within the Indo-Australian plate. Although it is within the plate, its occurrence is almost certainly linked to the plate interactions between Indo-Australian plate and Indonesia (part of the Sunda segment of the Eurasian plate).

This earthquake reflects a style of faulting (strike-slip) which involves principally horizontal motion, and thus is unlikely to generate a significant tsunami; although very strong ground shaking would be felt on Sumatra. This is also an extremely large magnitude earthquake for this style of faulting, meaning that it likely involved substantial fault movement, and the fault likely extends for 200+ km This earthquake is of the same style of faulting and in approximately the same location as a Mw 7.2 earthquake on January 10, 2012.

Although this earthquake was within the Indo-Australian plate, any earthquake of this size will change the stress regimes acting on the nearby plate boundaries. The result is that stress conditions on the subduction plate boundary beneath Sumatra have changed, although the implications of that change are uncertain.”

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Associate Prof Huilin Xing is Deputy Director of the Earth Systems Science Computational Centre (ESSCC) at the University of Queensland’s School of Earth Sciences.

“This earthquake (M8.6) and following major aftershock M8.2 may be located at a splitting boundary that indicates the Indo-Australian Plate is splitting into two plates – the Indian plate and Australian plate.

If so, the mechanism would be different from the previous major Sumatra subduction earthquakes such as M9.1 in 2004 and thus a tsunami generated by the current earthquakes (M8.6 and M8.2) should not be that severe.”

Additional comment:

“The tsunami warning system worked again but not that perfect as expected. It’s better than nothing … But the problem is that there were a lot of false alarms, because not all large earthquakes can generate a tsunami. From research we know we can expect that if an earthquake is larger than magnitude 6.5 there may be a tsunami, but this is not directly or linearly related to size. This means we really need to keep looking deeper to work out what kinds of earthquakes can generate tsunamis and how big the tsunami might be. This is the most difficult part since one needs to know details of both the earthquake itself (i.e. depth and focal mechanism) and its triggered sea floor motion and interaction with water. Currently no single model can model the whole process of an earthquake and its triggered tsunami. It does needs a lot of research to do. It may take years before tsunami warnings can be made accurate enough to avoid such unnecessary evacuations or alerts, but it does depend also on the investment in it.”
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Comments from UK experts (collated by our colleagues at the UK Science Media Centre):

Dr Andy Gibson, Director of the Centre for Applied Geoscience at the University of Portsmouth, said:

“From our experience of the tsunami in 2004, we know that the worst affected regions are those low lying areas immediately adjacent to the coast. Broadly speaking, the shallower the slope of the shore, the greater the susceptibility to wave run-up. Areas farther inland could be affected if the tsunami was able to move along a water inlet. Lessons learned from that tsunami go far beyond early warning systems, residents are encouraged to take part in emergency drills which may include understanding escape routes, identifying safe havens and knowing when it is safe to return to the coast.

“Early indications are that this earthquake and tsunami risk are actually much smaller than that of 2004, but it will be some time before the pattern of any damage is known. It is always difficult to estimate damage as any tsunami wave depends upon many factors such as the volume of water displaced, the angle it approaches the coast, tidal conditions, the gradient of land offshore and onshore and of course, what is found on the shoreline.”

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Dr Susanne Sargeant, Seismologist & NERC Knowledge Exchange Fellow, British Geological Survey, said:

“Critical information that is required to assess the potential for a tsunami is the location, magnitude, depth and faulting mechanism. Tsunamis are caused when vertical displacement of the seafloor occurs. In the case of the 11 April earthquake, an earthquake of this magnitude (8.7 Mw) has the potential to generate an ocean-wide tsunami. However, although the earthquake is relatively shallow and offshore, the data indicate that the earthquake was the result of movement on a strike-slip fault. Strike slip earthquakes are caused when two blocks move horizontally past each other. Such an earthquake would not lead to the vertical displacement of the sea floor that would be required to generate a tsunami. Consequently, the potential for a large tsunami from this earthquake is likely to be low.

“The alert from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre issued after the earthquake indicates that an Indian Ocean wide tsunami watch is in place. See http://ptwc.weather.gov/ptwc/text.php?id=indian.TSUIOX.2012.04.11.1054 for info. Arrival time estimates issued by PTWC indicate that the initial wave (had one been generated) would have reached Banda Aceh a little under an hour after the earthquake. Whether any wave has been observed in this region has yet to be confirmed. The PTWC alert gives estimated arrival times for other locations in the Indian Ocean.

“The Sunda trench region is highly active. Earthquakes here are related to subduction of the Indian plate beneath Eurasia. Today’s earthquake occurred on a structure related to the subduction that is occurring here. The tectonics of the region are complex and large earthquakes are relatively frequent. The aftershock sequence has started and this includes an earthquake of magnitude 8.3.

“Although large, the 08:38 UTC earthquake is located approximately 400 km from the coast of Banda Aceh. As such, the potential for significant damage caused by ground shaking is likely to be relatively low although the actual impact of the earthquake in this region has yet to be confirmed.”

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Q&A ON AFTERSHOCKS Dr Bruce D. Malamud, Reader of Natural and Environmental Hazards, Department of Geography, King’s College London:

How many and what size aftershocks might we expect?

“When an earthquake occurs, it releases stress that has built up over time, along a fault. However, in addition to releasing stress, it redistributes the stress along that fault, and sometimes these will be redistributed to other nearby faults. In the case of the 11 April 2012 earthquake that occurred off the west coast of Northern Sumatra, the preliminary estimate of magnitude by the USGS is M8.6, and hundreds of km of fault may have been affected. With the redistribution of stress, aftershocks occur, for weeks, to months (and sometimes years) after the main shock. The magnitude 8.6 earthquake will result in aftershocks occurring all along the fault on which the original earthquake occurred. Some scientists say that one can expect aftershocks as much as 1 unit less than the original shock. So in this case, we might expect aftershocks of all sizes, but as big as a magnitude of about 7.6 (which would be in itself a concern of potentially triggering a tsunami).

How long might aftershocks continue for?

“After an earthquake occurs along a fault, stress is released in parts. But then, part of this stress is redistributed to other parts of the fault. This means that they are now more likely to become unstable, with many subsequent earthquakes. Aftershocks can continue for weeks and months after the main shock (the biggest earthquake in the sequence), sometimes even years.

How frequent have earthquakes been over the last century and are they increasing?

“One of the questions that has been asked by many is whether there have been more frequent large earthquakes in the last few years. Let’s take as a ‘large’ earthquake one with moment magnitude 7. The number of earthquakes per year with moment magnitude greater than or equal to 7 varies certainly, year to year, but the average from 1900 to present is about 17 magnitude 7 or greater earthquakes per year (compared to about 1 magnitude 8 or greater earthquake). If we just look at 1990 to 2010, then the average was about 15 magnitude 7 or greater earthquakes per year. And if we look at the last three years, then the average is also 15 of this size earthquake per year. So, no, the actual number of very large earthquakes is not increasing over time. It fluctuates year to year, with some years less and some years more.

How much energy is released in a magnitude 7 earthquake?

“Equivalent to the energy released in half a megaton nuclear bomb.

How much energy is released in a magnitude 9 earthquake?

“Equivalent to 1000 times the energy released in a magnitude 7 earthquake, or one thousand half-megaton nuclear bombs. If we converted this to energy, this would be roughly enough to power every home in the USA for 50 days.

How accurately can an earthquake like this be predicted? Why is it so difficult to predict the timing of earthquakes?

“For a complete prediction, we need to tell people when a disaster will occur, where, and how big. As scientists, we have a good idea of where large events might occur based on written and instrumental records of past events. So for instance, we know that Indonesia is near subduction zones, and that there is an extensive history of earthquakes in the past, so we know that Indonesia is likely to experience earthquakes. Based on these past records, we can also forecast the chance that a given size or larger earthquake might occur, in a given year. This is called probabilistic hazard forecasting, and has been very useful in telling us about how big we might expect, on average, each year. But true prediction is much more difficult, where we tell people that ‘next week there will be an earthquake of magnitude of 9’. Although scientists have been trying for many years to predict earthquakes (the when and how big), they so far have not succeeded, but are still working at it.”

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Dr David Rothery runs the Open University’s Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis course in the UK

“Today’s M8.7 quake in the Indian Ocean offshore of Sumatra has the potential to cause a tsunami that could cause devastation to coasts all around the Indian ocean. A tsunami warning from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre predicts tsunami wave arrival at Banda Aceh (Sumatra) 10:31 BST, and Sri Lanka between 11.30 and 12.30 BST.
http://ptwc.weather.gov/ptwc/text.php?id=indian.TSUIOX.2012.04.11.0845

A tsunami detection buoy (a DART station) in the Bay of Bengal http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=23227
detected a wave with an amplitude of 30 cm in deep water (see figs below), which has the potential to become several times higher as it approaches the shore.

Today’s quake was probably about ten times less energetic than the M9.1 quake that caused the 26 Dec 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. In addition, the nature of the quake, on the bending Indian ocean floor as it approaches the Sunda Trench (rather than a megathrust quake in the trench itself) may mean that the displacement of water to trigger the tsunami is less bad; the motion of the sea bed is different to that which occurred in 2004.”

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Comments from Canadian experts (collated by our colleagues at the Canadian Science Media Centre):

Tad Murty is Adjunct Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Ottawa

“My career was mostly with the federal government. When I was with the government, I was in charge of research and programming of tsunami early warning systems. I was involved in developing computer programs for the Canadian early warning system. The system is similar in Canada, Indonesia, India, everywhere, because the same principles apply.

If there is a large earthquake far from the ocean, on land, there is no tsunami. The earthquake itself needs to be shallow – some 20 or 30 km below the ocean bottom before it can generate a tsunami, and it needs to be a dip slip, like a subduction. The movement needs to be vertical, not horizontal. In today’s earthquake in Indonesia, the movement was horizontal, because the Indian plate slid past the Burmese plate.

In 2004, the Indian Plate went under the Burmese plate, and tens of cubic kilometres of water were suddenly displaced and piled at the ocean surface. This is what causes a tsunami.

How do early warning systems work?

There are many different kinds of detectors, and one can never depend on just one set of detectors. First, the earthquake itself has to be detected. This is done by seismographs, and these are mostly on land. Earthquake waves propagate through the interior of Earth’s crust, as well as earth’s surface.

We also have ocean-bottom pressure sensors. There are several dozen all around the ocean. They are the first indicators of a tsunami. Then we have tidal gauges, on land but on the coast, put in the water, and they catch the tsunami coming in. By then it’s usually too late.

Indonesia has an early warning system. But all the international agencies work together. They are all part of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, and that’s all coordinated by UNESCO.

Have there been any changes in the tsunami warning system since 2004?

Following the disaster in 2004, the first early warning systems were placed in the Indian Ocean.

With each disaster we learn new things. On the scientific side, we already know the physical principles but we fine-tune our computer models and we make our instruments more precise. The physical process is the same. On the social and economic side, there has been progress, for example, with evacuations.

When a cyclone hits in the area, almost all the damage and loss of life comes from the storm surge. In developing countries like India and Bangladesh, they use a ‘vertical evacuation system’. Because you can’t evacuate millions of people from the area, the infrastructure and the roads just aren’t there. So they built cyclone shelters on the coast, that are well built and can withstand storm surges and cyclones. In the US, they use a ‘horizontal evacuation system’, because the highways are good and the roads are there so people just move away from the coast.

In the 2004 tsunami, none of the cyclone shelters in India were damaged. So they thought maybe they could use them for tsunamis as well. Now, if there has to be an evacuation for a tsunami, they use the cyclone shelters.”

Feel free to use these quotes in your stories.  If you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

Australian expert nuclear comments

Australian expert tsunami comment

UK expert comments

Canadian expert comments

There is a separate Round-up for Japanese expert comments here.

Useful links

AusSMC hosted an online briefing on this issue earlier today with Japanese, UK and Australian experts – a full copy of the briefing is available here

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Nuclear comments

Tony Irwin is a Chartered Engineer and is a visiting lecturer for the Masters course in Nuclear Science at the ANU. Tony is the Chairman of the Engineers Australia Nuclear Engineering Panel. Tony worked for British Energy in the UK for more than thirty years commissioning and operating eight nuclear power reactors. Following the Chernobyl accident he was a member of a World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO) mission that reviewed operating practices at Russian RMBK reactors. In 1999 he moved to Australia and joined the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) and was Reactor Manager during the construction and operation of the OPAL research reactor; he retired from ANSTO in late 2009.

On the sequence of events:

We now have a better understanding of what happened :

Event Sequence – Key Events

*Estimated                                            source: Tony Irwin

- First core damage estimated to have occurred within 4 hours of the earthquake and reactors 1,2 and 3 cores largely melted within the first 3 days

- Hydrogen explosions caused the main damage and release of radioactivity

- Reactors stable within 2 weeks

On the Fukushima site today:

“The four damaged reactors are in a stable cold shutdown state, cooled by water circulated through a treatment plant. Site clean-up, including removal of radioactive rubble, continues. A mid and long-term roadmap for the decommissioning of units 1-4 was issued in December 2011. Phase 1 prepares for the removal of spent fuel from the cooling ponds to commence by 2013. Phase 2 prepares for the removal of fuel debris from the reactor core to commence within 10 years. The final phase completes the decommissioning of the reactors in 30-40 years.

There are still over 100,000 people evacuated from Fukushima Prefecture. In the areas within the 20km evacuation zone with an annual radiation dose of  <20mSv/year, it is expected that people will be allowed to return in March 2012. For higher radiation areas, remediation is required before restrictions are lifted by perhaps 2014.”

On nuclear power in Japan today:

“Before the accident, there were 54 reactors operating in Japan supplying 29% of the electricity demand.  Since the accident, as reactors have been shut down for routine inspection (every 13 months) they have not been allowed to restart pending a comprehensive assessment of the response of individual reactors to extreme accidents (‘stress tests”). To date, the Japanese safety authorities have not approved the restart of any reactor.

As of March 2012, there are only 2 reactors operating. Japan trade deficit is at record levels as fuel imports have soared.”

On the world situation:

“The severity of the accident and the need to ensure reactor safety in extreme events was recognised worldwide. Germany took the political decision to immediately shutdown 8 old reactors, and all reactors by 2022. Most countries announced plans to continue with nuclear power and assess the safety of their reactors. For example, the UK has confirmed the safety of their existing nuclear power plants and has recently approved design certification for two types of new reactor to be built in the UK.”

On lessons learnt:

“Reactor cooling is essential and must be maintained irrespective of external conditions. Modern reactors, for example the Westinghouse AP-1000 have passive cooling systems that require no external supplies and would have survived even this severe accident. The safety of existing reactors is being assessed to ensure they have diverse and physically separated cooling systems and electrical supplies.”

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Dr Don Higson is a retired nuclear safety specialist and Fellow of the Institution of Engineers Australia, Fellow of the Australasian Radiation Protection Society

On Engineering

“At Fukushima Daiichi, the reactors shut-down safely when struck by the fourth largest earthquake ever recorded. The nuclear emergency was due entirely to loss of on-site power supplies when the power station was inundated by a much larger tsunami than had been anticipated in its design. Clearly, the design of nuclear plants against the risk of flooding needs to be brought up to the level of design against seismic risk.”

On the health effects

“Rating the nuclear accident at Fukushima as 7 on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES) has given the misleading impression that it was as bad as the Chernobyl accident. At Fukushima, no physical health effects of radiation have been observed among the general public and effects on workers have been far lower than those at Chernobyl. The INES was meant to aid public understanding of nuclear safety but has, in fact, made it more confused. The INES should be substantially modified or scrapped.

As at Chernobyl, the major public health effect of the Fukushima accident has been psychological, due to the forced relocation of population and exaggerated fears about radiation. In such circumstances, the public must be evacuated from the area as a precaution when it is not known how the situation will develop. However, they would be better off being allowed to return to their homes once it is certain that the situation is under control and that potential exposure levels are no greater than 20 mSv/y. Many people in the world are exposed naturally to higher levels of radiation than this without discernible adverse health effects. It is counterproductive to behave as though 20 mSv/y is a dangerous dose rate.”

On the safety of nuclear power

“Outside the former USSR, the nuclear industry continues to be one of the safest industries in which to work and the safest way to generate most of the electricity the world needs.”

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Dr John Price is currently a consulting engineer.  He was a member of the Safety Policy Unit of the National Nuclear Corporation UK where he studied major nuclear power accidents.

“After the Three Mile Island Accident of 1978, people like me who advocated nuclear power said two things about that incident: the safety systems at the station had contained the radiation and that ‘lessons had been learnt’. What Fukushima demonstrates is that no lessons are ever really learnt. These lessons are many and deep. As an example, there was a very practical lesson from Three Mile Island. Once the fuel cladding overheats, the zirconium metal in the cladding reacts with water to produce hydrogen gas.

The appearance of hydrogen gas during the accident at Three Mile Island caused major alarm, though in the end no damage. So why was no lesson learnt?  At Fukushima the buildings of reactors 1 and 3 actually exploded violently while the world watched on television. Unit 2 also probably had a hydrogen explosion inside its containment and this may have caused leaks. Why, given the events of 1978, were the plants at Fukushima, and indeed nuclear plants worldwide, not fitted with the fairly simple means of dispersing hydrogen gas to prevent explosion?

I regard the damage caused by the hydrogen explosions to be the main reasons why recovery from the Accident at Fukushima will take a much, much longer time than some suggest. In a statement that went viral around the world in the week of the Fukushima accident, I said that clean-up will take 50 to 100 years. I still think this is the likely timeframe.

There have been other, more fundamental lessons which were not learnt. Can there ever be proper regulation of Nuclear Power, or indeed any other major risk? Are not the regulators always part of the cause of the accident? For non-nuclear examples, think of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Think of situations where people are permitted to build cities in areas subject to Tsunami. Think of recent financial crises. Whoever authorises something also has responsibility for its consequences. They own the benefits and they own the disasters.

Once the plant was agreed to be built, there were many bargains struck between the Japanese regulatory authorities and Tepco, the owner of the Fukushima plant. No matter which government department had been the regulator, no matter how independent the regulator might have wanted to be, compromises had to be made.

Here are some questions which we might hope should have been asked during regular licensing discussions:

• What emergency equipment should be provided for accidents beyond the design basis of the original design?
• What was to be the size of the Tsunami protection?
• Should Fukushima Units 1-4 have been operating in 2011?

All of these questions have associated major costs, whatever the answers. In each of these discussions, the regulator would want more and more expensive things, and Tepco would seek a financially possible compromise.

The last question, as to whether Daiichi 1-4 should have been operating in 2011, seems to have the easiest answer. No. It was an old superseded plant, in the wrong place. Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1 started operation in 1971 using 1960s designs. Units 2 to 4 also used the same design, though they are slightly larger. By the late 1970s, the designer of this type of plant, GE of USA, had already replaced Daiichi’s Mark 1 design of reactor with a design that they said was safer. By the 1990s even safer plants were being offered.

In retrospect, the decision as to whether the units should have had their licenses extended seems reasonably easy for Japan in the 1990s. Replacement could have been planned, new and safer plants could have been built. And nuclear energy would still be fulfilling its promise for Japan. Instead, a different decision was made. They fitted new tyres to their 1971 banger rather than buying the newer and much safer model. I assume that we will eventually find out what happened during regulatory discussions about the Daiichi plants in the 1990s. Whatever did happen in these discussions, the wrong decision was made for Japan, and for the world.”

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Dr Pradip Deb is a Senior Lecturer in Medical Radiations at RMIT University

“The Fukushima Daiichi accident has been one of the two major accidents in the international nuclear and radiological event scale (INES) in the last twenty five years (the other one was Chernobyl). The latest IAEA (international atomic energy agency) status report shows that the estimated external doses to the public from the cities within 20 kilometres from Fukushima Daiichi reactors are within the acceptance level for the public (1 mSv). Food monitoring data shows that in more than 99% samples (based on 14344 samples) the radioactive caesium and iodine isotopes (Cs-137 & Cs-134 and I-131) are within the acceptance level.

It is not practical to say that the world should be free of nuclear power. The next generation power reactors will be safer. The lesson we have learnt again is that it is radiophobia that harms us psychologically more than actual radiation doses do. Not only in the developing countries, but also in the technologically advanced countries, people are likely to believe unscientific reasoning about the effects of radiations. Topics of Radiation physics are currently not included in the school curriculum in most of the countries in the world, not even in Japan. To reduce radiophobia, the radioactivity and their effects should be understood by the general public. One way to make the public more trusting of radiation issues is teaching radiation physics starting from the school level science education.”

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Tsunami comment

Professor James Goff is Director of the Australia-Pacific Tsunami Research Centre and Natural Hazards Research Laboratory, University of New South Wales.

“A year on from the 2011 Tohoku tsunami and we are still asking questions, more than we have answers to. I have been invited by Tohoku University in Sendai to attend a special ‘One-year Memorial of the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami Disaster’. This will happen on the same day as a ‘Forum for International Research Collaboration’. This will be the fourth visit by people from our centre. First in May to carry out some of the earliest international research on the tsunami – how big it was, what it left behind and so on. We visited again in August to revisit this work and to see how things had changed. Currently a member of our team, Dr Catherine Chague-Goff, is also on a Visiting Professorship to the University of Hokkaido. Why so much commitment? Essentially because we want to help the Japanese to understand the 2011 event, its precursors and other events in the region. However, we are also committed to helping our Japanese colleagues. Our centre has skills that the Japanese are interested in exploring and we are keen to work in collaboration with them to make this happen.

What have we learnt so far? Well, one of the more interesting finds in that for nearly 50% of its inundation distance inland the tsunami left almost no sand deposit, just mud and debris. Who cares? Well, if you are looking at how big and how often these events have happened in the past – you need to look for more than just the sand or else you might under-estimate things. Hence the interest in our work and what we have done elsewhere. We have also learnt a lot about the longer term after effects of these events. What one might call the ‘what are things like on the ground one year on’. Yes, much of the debris has been being cleared up, yes much of the evidence of destruction has been erased by diggers and work crews, but what seems a minor point is starting to become an issue – there is still a vast amount of salt in the soil and rice doesn’t like salt – and so in these places crops are hard to grow. There are implications here for long term recovery. Add to this things such as the loss of communities, poor roads, contaminated land and the sheer enormity of the devastated area and you can see that there is no simple fix.

We are returning to Sendai again to start putting the 2011 events in context. We really do need to know how big and how often these events occur because we don’t want to under-estimate the next one, not just in Sendai but for the whole of Japan. We also want to take these lessons with us to the rest of the Pacific so that we can do a better job there as well. Whether we can achieve this quickly or not remains to be seen. We all still have lots to learn.”

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UK expert comments

Dr Jim Smith, Reader in Environmental Physics, University of Portsmouth said:

“When the first measurements began to appear of contamination levels in land around Fukushima, it quickly became clear that evacuation of the population would be for the long term. Several hundreds of square km of land have radioactive caesium levels similar to those seen around Chernobyl, so clean-up is an enormous, perhaps impossible, task. Experience from Chernobyl showed that, with massive effort, decontamination of towns can be successful by re-surfacing roads and skimming off contaminated topsoil from lawns.  But clean-up of large areas of fields and woodland wasn’t even tried because of the huge expense and amounts of waste it generates. More likely, as at Chernobyl, large areas surrounding Fukushima will remain contaminated for decades, some areas probably too contaminated for people to return to their homes.

If a Chernobyl-style permanent exclusion zone is set up at Fukushima, will it be a nuclear wasteland, or will nature reclaim the abandoned lands ? There are already reports of bird populations being damaged by radiation at Fukushima, but trying to separate the relatively small impact of radiation from all the other factors which affect animal populations is tricky. At Chernobyl, 25 years on, we have seen – often contradictory – evidence of long-term damage to wildlife, but also reports claiming the area is like a nature reserve because people are no longer hunting , fishing or farming. In 1996, Belarussian scientists even introduced the rare European Bison into the exclusion zone and the population is thriving, as are other large mammals such as deer, wild boar and wolves.

We can’t yet say what the future of the Fukushima exclusion zone will be until we know how far decontamination is possible, and how much residual radiation the evacuees are willing to return to. But my guess would be that we’ll see another permanent exclusion zone – much smaller than at Chernobyl – which eventually will return to nature. And, as at Chernobyl, in 25 years’ time scientists will still be arguing about whether the radiation is doing long term damage to the wildlife it contains.”

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Professor Richard Wakeford, Visiting Professor at the Dalton Nuclear Institute, University of Manchester said:

“There can be no doubt that the accident at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station has caused genuine concern among those living in Fukushima Prefecture, and throughout Japan, about the health effects resulting from exposure to radiation from the radioactive materials released into the environment. Ordinary people are not experts in radiation risks and their fears are driven by what they know of the radiation effects seen after the atomic bomb explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki and after the Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident. Unfortunately, some comments that have been made in the media have unnecessarily increased public concern.

That the Fukushima Dai-ichi accident was very serious is beyond dispute, and the reasons for it must be fully investigated. However, in an accident such as this, the consequences can be limited by appropriate actions to control exposure to radiation. So, unlike at Chernobyl, there have been no deaths or early health effects among the emergency workers because their doses were carefully limited. The only clear direct health effect among people living around Chernobyl is thyroid cancer in those heavily exposed as children to radioactive iodine – this was mainly due to the children drinking heavily contaminated milk because a food ban was not introduced quickly enough by the Soviet authorities. Measurements of radiation from radioactive iodine in the thyroid glands of children living near Fukushima Dai-ichi indicate that monitoring of the environment and the banning of consumption of foodstuffs where necessary have avoided this problem of high intakes of radioactive iodine. The main component of radioactive iodine (iodine-131) is short-lived, effectively disappearing from the environment after three months, so this problem has now passed.

The major issue for contamination of the environment now is radioactive caesium (caesium-134 and caesium-137), which exists in the environment for much longer than radioactive iodine. So, monitoring of radiation exposure and contamination of foodstuffs will have to continue for some time. Modern radiation measuring instruments are very sensitive, and it is possible to detect very small levels of radiation and radioactivity – for example, it is still possible to detect very low levels of caesium-137 in food from Chernobyl contamination and fallout from nuclear weapons testing. What matters is the levels of radiation and radioactivity, since radiation and radioactivity are a natural part of the world in which we live. Measures can be taken to reduce the amount of radioactive caesium in the environment (for example, by removing topsoil) and in foodstuffs (for example, by monitoring items of food from contaminated areas), so keeping radiation exposures to acceptable levels.

By ensuring that the damaged reactors at Fukushima Dai-ichi are stabilised such that further significant releases of radioactive materials are very unlikely, by the judicious removal of radioactively contaminated materials from areas used by people (for example, areas in villages and towns), and by the careful monitoring of radioactive caesium in foodstuffs, the risk to health from the Fukushima Dai-ichi accident can be reduced to a level that for the great majority of people in Japan is very small compared to the risks experienced in everyday life, including the risk posed by other sources of radiation and radioactivity (mainly natural sources) that are part of the everyday existence of everyone in the world.”

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Professor Paul Hunter, Professor of Health Protection (University of East Anglia) and Editor of the Journal of Water and Health, said:

“The Japanese have put a lot of effort into rebuilding the main roads through the affected areas and clearing away the rubble. There are mountains of rubble waiting to be sorted and then sent to landfill (the rubble contains many valuable metals such as iron etc. that they will not want to waste). This will take quite a few years to complete. The main WWT plant that we visited is now able to do primary treatment and chlorination but will not be back to full effectiveness for about 4 years, though when complete will be a state of the art plant much improved on the old one.

There is a major problem with rebuilding in some areas in that after the tsunami receded it took with it sediment and the land dropped 40 to 60 cm in many places which makes a lot of the land below the level of high tide. So issues with building sea walls or raising land levels. Indeed the rebuilt road have been raised up

Another problem is that the rubble mountains are fermenting and are at risk of developing spontaneous fires.

As regards infectious disease epidemiology, there does not appear to have been major problems although my colleagues are concerned about the impact of inadequately treated sewage discharge to sea and are monitoring the situation.”

———–

A reflection on the media coverage one year on

Professor Malcolm Sperrin, Director of Medical Physics at the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading , said:

“The Fukushima incident rightly caught the immediate attention of the media and led to discussions and debate about numerous aspects of nuclear power, safety, command and control following major incidents and also the perception of risk to name just a few. The level of commentary was generally balanced although there were some instances of conspicuous scare-mongering albeit generally based on poor initial information provided to the media.  The events that evolved over the months following the tsunami were often easy to explain for experienced and knowledgeable scientists. It is too easy to condemn facts and subsequent interpretation that we as scientists feel have been explained incorrectly in the media, it is essential that we maintain an awareness of how specialised some of this knowledge is. I also feel very strongly that we have a moral duty to provide, accurate, timely and digestible input to assist in the understanding of the population as a whole.

My specialisation falls into the broad division of radiation medicine and hence I had a role to play in interpreting the population risk from exposure to the released radiation. To me, the risk mitigation comprised the three tenets of time, distance and protection and with this in mind everything that could have reasonably been done by the Japanese authorities was done. The explanation of any risk that was present was far more difficult in that at low radiation doses, you cannot specify who will receive a health detriment or even what that detriment is and it was occasionally stated by some that such lack of precision was equivalent to ambivalence or even clandestine shrouding of the facts. It is my job to ensure that everything is done to measure and mitigate radiation risks and such accusations did occasionally hurt.

However, I do feel that as experts in relevant fields, we also have a clear responsibility to take concerns seriously and furthermore we must have the tact, social feelings and adaptability to ensure our points are understood

In summary, I feel that the [UK] media did an excellent job and repeatedly stated the need for accurate and timely comment. It should be borne in mind that the tsunami killed tens of thousands and has received relatively little coverage.”

———–

Canadian expert comments

On the Earthquake…..

John Cassidy
Research Scientist, Natural Resources Canada (Earthquake Hazards)

Japan had about 30 seconds of warning for the quake. Is 30 seconds of warning for a quake typical? Or how has the ability to project earthquakes changed recently?

Thirty seconds – that depends on distance – it’s not a prediction but really taking advantage of the fact that it takes seismic waves time to travel. So if a large earthquake happens right beneath your feet, or ten kilometers away, you have no warning. But if you have an earthquake about a hundred kilometers away, or further away, then you can have upwards of 20 or 30 seconds of warning. In a subduction zone we have these really long faults, and that’s area where you can actually have the longest warning time. If a subduction quake started in California and ruptured up towards us, it might actually take 4 or 5 minutes before the shaking reached Vancouver or Victoria. In Japan, the earthquake was offshore – in Tokyo they had about 30 seconds of warning. You need to have lots of instruments on the ground, automatic systems in place, and then you have to have systems in place to transmit and use that info – to media, to individuals. And that system was just being tested in Japan, and it actually worked really well, saving many lives. At the time of quake there were about 20 high-speed bullet trains that were stopped by this system. All of them were safely stopped – stopped from going into tunnels, over bridges, they shut down the trains, the nuclear power plants. Of course what didn’t work was the tsunami, which was much higher than planned for. This monitoring system is still being developed, and it’s not completely operational yet, but there’s really good promise from Japan that these systems can help save lives.

What kind of warning for such a quake could we expect here on the West Coast of Canada? Or indeed in Eastern Canada?

In Canada it really depends on where the quake occurs relative to cities. In a subduction zone like Cascadia, that’s where you have the possibility of anywhere from 20-30 seconds to a few minutes of warning. In Eastern Canada it depends on exactly where the quake occurs but you’re probably looking at up to 10′s of seconds.
Typically, a smaller earthquake is not going to cause damage, so you can look at a distance and magnitude combination and calculate where you’ll benefit from early warning. Often, if the earthquake occurs at greater than 100 kilometres away it doesn’t cause damage unless it’s over about 7.0 magnitude.

Can you explain a bit further why the tsunami was larger than expected?

This was the very first time that a giant subduction earthquake (magnitude 9) has been recorded in such detail. In Japan literally thousands of instruments recorded it, and provided detailed images of how the ground shook and moved. Using this data, you can work backwards and see how the displacement moved along the fault, up to 40 metres in some cases, and you can see where the plates slipped and didn’t slip.
What we discovered was that there were large movements at shallow depths, where the plate begins to bend. But these shallow depths produced about 40 metres of slip, and it was this shallow slip that generated the tsunami. It is believed that a key reason for such a large tsunami is this large slip. A key lesson from this quake is that understanding the region where these plates are interacting — which typically is offshore in areas such as Chile, Mexico, Japan — and getting instruments onto the seafloor to monitor – is critical. One of the questions that always crops up is, was there any signal that this magnitude 9.0 quake was about to happen? Having instruments on the seafloor is one of the best ways to do that because then you’re not limited by stations onshore that are 100 to 150 kilometres away from the action.

That leads into a lot of the studies we have underway, with Neptune Canada for example, which is a joint University of Victoria project with Natural Resources Canada. It’s the world’s first real-time seafloor observatory at a regional scale. For the first time we have seafloor seismographs, pressure gauges on the seafloor right above that locked fault zone. Natural Resources Canada scientists in Sidney, BC also have projects underway with Japanese colleagues, and we have these instruments on the seafloor just west of Vancouver Island, looking for small earthquakes, looking at the structure of the plate as it begins to dive beneath Vancouver Island, and looking at where energy is stored — little hotspots where we might see stronger shaking if we have a subduction quake in the future.

In Japan, there are plans for drilling into the subduction fault zone. An international ocean drilling program is sending their drilling ship to the region offshore, where the quake occurred, and they’re going to drill through oceanic crust into that fault zone. That will be the first time ever. In the ocean it will be about 7 kilometres down to the seafloor, and then they have to drill through about a kilometer of the ocean plate to reach the fault, and that will be underway later this year.

They’re hoping to see for the first time one of these subduction zones where the fault is, what happened where the slip took place. One of the things they should get from drilling is what is the material like along the fault zone, how does it store energy, and how often do these large quakes occur along that fault zone.

NRCan scientists are also working with US colleagues – and are planning  to deploy tilt-meters on the sea floor off Vancouver Island, Washington, and Oregon – to look for very subtle movements of that ocean plate. Are there things happening that we can’t see and can’t record with seismographs? These sensors will record tilting, looking at very tiny, and slow movements.
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**Michael Bostock
Earthquake Seismologist, Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences, University of British Columbia
More info on Michael Bostock

What we have learned from the Tohuku earthquake?

We still have much to learn about large earthquakes. But in terms of the stories coming out of this particular earthquake, first of all, this was not expected. In the last thousand years or so, records of earthquakes off Honshu, the island that was affected, have been in the magnitude of the 7 to 8 range. They occur regularly, and most of the structures and building codes are designed to meet that type of earthquake threat.

This particular earthquake in March 2011 was unusual. Generally the size of an earthquake is measured in terms of magnitude. That’s related to a couple factors: the strength of the rocks on either side of the fault, the size of the area of the fault that actually ruptures and the actual slip or displacement of the fault.

What made the earthquake that occurred last year at this time interesting is that it was actually a cascade of many smaller earthquakes, the total of which is greater than each individual quake. Basically what happened is there are parts of the fault called asperities that “stick”, and that can occur for a variety of reasons, but that’s where earthquakes are generated. Around the asperities, we think, the plates are moving smoothly. So gradually over time, strain and stress builds up in these asperity areas, whereas the rest of the plate is moving normally. So what happened last year is that a large rupture on one asperity caused the rupture of many other asperities, so that a cascade of many small earthquakes occurred – the total of which, in a way, was greater than the sum total of the individual parts.

So if you look back in historical records, you see that similar sized earthquakes have happened early in the previous millennia, the last one in that region occurring about 869 AD. Unfortunately the historical information came a little too late, but this has opened the eyes of seismologists and raised awareness that we can have superquake cycles within cycles of regular earthquake cycles.

There’s been a regular pattern of these smaller magnitude earthquakes over an approximately 50 year cycle, but we can have superquake cycles that encompass the regular cycles, that is closer to approximately 1000 years. This is one thing that we’ve learned.

Another thing we’ve also learned from the Tohoku earthquake has to do with subduction.  These major subduction zone thrust faults correspond to one plate – an oceanic plate — plunging beneath another continental plate, and it happens offshore in Japan and also here in southwestern BC.

The surface where the two faults meet is called the trench. This submarine trench or valley tends to get filled with sediment, like it is here off the west coast of Vancouver Island. And it has been thought that because the upper portion of the fault juxtaposes sediments against the downward moving plate, that it makes that part of the fault softer, and therefore causes it to slide more continuously. So it was thought that there were not great prospects for major displacement. And it was thought that there would not be an opportunity for asperities. But that assumption definitely wasn’t valid for Tohoku.

The assumption was that the displacements weren’t going to be as large as they actually were – when in fact they were the largest displacements ever recorded — on the order of 60-80m. That means one side of the fault moves with respect to the other side of the fault, by 60-80m. If one side is moving up, and the other side is moving down, that means the water column is being shifted by tens of metres. That means the water column, with gigatons of water, is being shifted by tens of metres. It’s a bit like in the bathtub if you were holding a basin underwater and then you lift it up — that’s what drives the tsunami. So the larger the surface displacement, in these deep ocean floor earthquakes, the larger the tsunami is going to be.
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John Clague
FRSC, Shrum Research Professor, CRC Chair in Natural Hazard Research, Department of Earth Sciences, Simon Fraser University; Emeritus Scientist, Geological Survey of Canada.
More information on this expert

“This earthquake raised some interesting questions because the Japanese were not expecting an earthquake so large. They knew that subduction zone earthquakes occur along that part of the Japanese coast. A subduction zone occurs where two tectonic plates move towards one another, and where they meet, one slides under the other. This particular quake released about 30 times the energy of the largest (ca. magnitude 8.5) event that Japanese seismologists thought was possible. Geologists, however, had found evidence of infrequent prehistoric tsunamis that were larger than could be produced by a magnitude-8.5 subduction zone earthquake. This size earthquake seems to recur, on average, about every 1600 years or so and involves larger slippage along the mega-fault that separates the Pacific plate from the plate that underlies northern Honshu. Unfortunately, the geological information had not yet found its way into the planning process in Japan.

This was the largest earthquake in Japan’s recorded history.

The Japanese had previously experienced earthquakes of magnitude 8, but nothing close to the February 2011 quake.

So what are the implications of the Tohoku earthquake for Canada? A subduction zone similar to that off the coast of Japan exists off in Cascadia. Scientists have shown that very large earthquakes, in excess of magnitude 9 and involving slip along the entire length of the subduction zone from central Vancouver Island to northern California, happen in Cascadia and have similar effects to the Tohoku earthquake. What became clearer after the disaster in Japan is that large, potentially damaging aftershocks occur for weeks or months after the main shock of these huge subduction zone earthquakes. We need to plan for aftershocks in the Pacific Northwest.

Examining what happened in Japan doesn’t give you specific details as to what would happen on the west coast of North America, because no two subduction zones are identical. It depends on a lot of things like the temperature of the subducting plate and the presence and distributions of asperities — meaning “sticky” patches along the fault that resist sliding. Japan’s experience with subduction zone earthquakes, however, does illustrate the range and complexity of these events.

The other interesting thing that we understand here on the West Coast of North America, which apparently the Japanese did not consider, is that the land subsides 1- to 2 m over a very large area of the coast when these earthquakes occur. The Japanese had built their tsunami defence walls to deal with waves of a certain height, but the freeboard — the height of buildings and infrastructure above the water level of the ocean — was reduced by 1-2 m because the land subsided this amount before the tsunami came ashore. The tsunami was bigger than anticipated, but it didn’t help that the Japanese officials hadn’t factored in the loss of 1-2 m of freeboard just due to the earthquake itself.”

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On the nuclear crisis:

Jeremy Whitlock
Reactor physicist at Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd.’s (AECL) Chalk River Laboratories, Manager of Non-Proliferation and Safeguards; Fellow of the Canadian Nuclear Society (F.C.N.S.)
More information on Jeremy Whitlock
A recent paper by Jeremy Whitlock on the future of nuclear power

“I think the thing that strikes me most now is the same thing that struck me in the days and weeks immediately after the tsunami: the degree to which the world’s attention appears to have been diverted almost entirely from the tsunami disaster itself and focused on the accident at Fukushima. This is made particularly stark when one realizes that the Fukushima plant was probably the only major piece of energy supply infrastructure affected by the tsunami that didn’t kill anyone. Mention the tsunami today, however, and the first thing that comes to people’s minds is almost certainly the nuclear crisis, not the 20,000 dead or the incredible loss of property, and to me that’s a sad reflection of the memetic imbalance in human compassion.

A year later we are certain that three reactor cores melted down, and that it was a close call, but what’s not widely appreciated is the degree to which the “robustness” of the technology contributed to reducing the severity of the accident. We had three meltdowns, all within a day or so of the tsunami, but standing outside of the reactor buildings we were not aware of this for about two months – mainly because of the lack of a clear radiation signature. This is a remarkable observation: one of the worst accidents in nuclear history was essentially contained, even with almost total lack of control and safety infrastructure. That is a compelling message that the technical world probably appreciates, but doesn’t go much beyond that eclectic border. This observation includes the contamination of the surrounding region by the way, which is generally at a level that in all likelihood will not likely lead to any negative health effects (this goes for the employees exposed during the event as well). There are places in the world with higher natural background levels of radiation exposure.

This isn’t to imply in any way that the accident at the Fukushima plant wasn’t a disaster, or that lessons weren’t learned (particularly in the area of emergency management) – just to point out a significant skew in the public and media perspective compared to the actual risks. Communication suffered greatly, which contributed to this situation, and in some ways it was the unprecedented application of social networking that did a lot of the damage (increased quantity of information does not necessarily translate to increased communication).

There are two aspects to the emergency management that are relevant: (1) within the station itself (accident mitigation) and (2) beyond the station (emergency preparedness). Lessons were learned on both counts – for (1) the main lessons were ensuring long-term back-up power supply, getting back-up cooling water to the site, proper venting of reactor vessel, long-term cooling of spent fuel; for (2) the main lesson was in communication – conflicting reports, govt control of information flow, giving assurances to the public, providing an effective single point of contact for information flow.

Regarding the effect in Canada, there was a slight disruption in the process to build new stations near Toronto, but otherwise not much of an effect. Even the lessons learned are different here since the CANDU design is already highly resistant to the kind of extended station blackout issue that plagued Fukushima. (Maybe one lesson is that everyone should buy CANDUs!).

To me it would be a step forward if a year later it became widely appreciated that the worst outcome of the 2011 earthquake/tsunami was not the meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi plant (in terms of public health and property damage) – however I fully realize that this will not likely be the case; Three Mile Island and Chornobyl both teach us this. 

When I speak on Fukushima I emphasize that the fourth objective of nuclear accident mitigation – after shutting down the reactor, cooling the fuel, and limiting releases – is to communicate effectively.  Fukushima showed how much people can be hurt by hearing poorly communicated information.”

———–

John Luxat
Professor and NSERC/UNENE Industrial Research Chair in Nuclear Safety Analysis Department of Engineering Physics
More information on John Luxat
A recent paper by John Luxat on the Fukushima crisis

What lessons can be learned one year after Fukushima?

There are things that in my view this event taught us, for example, it reinforced the importance of having an effective containment structure. Clearly, this was breached at Fukushima. With containment breached, there was release of contamination, but, unlike at Chernobyl which had no containment structure,  the radiation releases were significantly lower. Which just reinforces the importance of containment, especially if you factor in Three Mile Island where they had a larger containment than Fukushima that remained intact, and as a result there was no significant radiological impact.

In terms of lessons learned, the biggest lesson is that the industry as a whole needs to look carefully at their emergency response to events that are high impact but low frequency, so-called ‘black swan events’. I believe we need to augment our probabilistic risk assessments with alternate means of risk assessment to handle these kinds of events. Because when you get into very low frequencies, you tend to cut it off, and say that will never happen. I think we should learn from security, military and police, where you deal with challenges where you’re not saying ‘what is the frequency of the event’, but you’re saying, ‘if it happens, what do I do?’ More a deterministic, and not probabilistic, risk assessment would help guide our actions.

Do you think Fukushima had effect on Canada’s nuclear policy and attitudes toward nuclear energy?

I don’t believe it has. For example, if you look at the plans of the Ontario government to refurbish Darlington.

If you look globally, there has been very little change. Aside from Germany, Italy, Switzerland who decided very quickly to stop using nuclear power, most other countries renewed their dedication to their nuclear plans.

So far, what has happened has been more of a response to the economic crisis than to Fukushima. The European debt crisis, for example, has made the economic situation more difficult. Also, in the States there’s been a surge in shale gas resources, and that seems to be driving the energy plans there. Other issues like the issue of climate change, which was dominant in the early 90′s, has taken a back seat.

What should journalists be looking at that they perhaps haven’t looked at so far?

Looking back in retrospect, I realize a nuclear crisis was certainly more gripping as an ongoing crisis, but the relative severity of the crisis in terms of deaths was not as great, whereas the tsunami was a major, major disaster. But it very quickly fell off the screen, and all attention got focussed on Fukushima. So more a matter of newsworthy attention. That’s just the nature of the news reporting cycle, which is focused on matters that keeps attention of people, so the nuclear crisis was more newsworthy over a sustained period.
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On emergency management:

**Ali Asgary
Associate Professor of Disaster and Emergency Management, York University
More information on Ali Asgary

How prepared was Japan for a disaster like this?

Japan has experienced considerable number of large disaster events in the past. Earthquakes or tsunamis are not new to them and Japanese are normally prepared for such events. What Japanese were less prepared for was a worst-case scenario like this that combined earthquake, tsunamis and nuclear accident.  This compound disaster made emergency response and recovery very complicated and more challenging even for experienced societies like Japan. If emergency managers, officials, and general public want to know what a worst case scenario looks like and how prepared they are for such a case, they can look at Japan and see how they could have dealt with it, had it happened in their country.

There were many lessons for Japans as well as other countries.  The first and foremost is that some of our assumptions about the probability and likelihood of large events must be changed. Our industrial safety and risk assessment, and our preparedness plans need to be revised as these assumptions change.

In my view what would be useful for other countries to learn would be to always consider the worst-case scenario. When I compare Fukushima with the [Deepwater Horizon incident in] the Gulf of Mexico, it was a very catastrophic event, but not still the worst-case scenario. If it had happened during the hurricane season, that would have made this even worse. Japan’s disaster was very close to what you can call it a worst case scenario.

The time has passed for thinking and planning for simple, single disasters in limited geographic areas. We need to shift our planning focus to worst-case scenarios like the Tohoku earthquake and Tsunami. We know how to deal with typical emergencies. We need to learn more about managing large compound disasters.

This disaster showed us that we should think of worst-case scenarios. We should change our current hazard assessment methods to include secondary hazards, we should include hazards and scenarios like this in our long term industrial projects.  We should focus on the international economic and trade impacts of disasters in integrated global economy and try to mitigate such impacts.

———–

Useful links:

Information on an International Expert Symposium in Fukushima held last September:

http://www.nippon-foundation.or.jp/eng/media/news/2011/20111114.html

Stream of the symposium (which was followed by a large scale press conference):

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/17194336

Published conclusions and recommendations:

http://iopscience.iop.org/0952-4746/31/4/E02

The March issue of Journal of Radiological Protection will have (as short papers) most of the presentations, available soon:

http://iopscience.iop.org/0952-4746/page/Forthcoming%20articles#Notes:_SelFukushima_

ONLINE BRIEFING: 10.00am AEDT Tue 6 March

March 11^th marks one year since the devastating Tohoku earthquake, tsunami and associated nuclear incidents. We’ve asked several experts to give an update on everything from the current situation on the ground to future nuclear power plant designs, tsunami-proofability and whether experts think that nuclear power has a future.

Listen in to the briefing to hear from Japanese, UK and Australian nuclear and tsunami experts and ask questions such as:

• What is the situation on the ground at the nuclear reactor?
• What have we learnt and can we stop it from happening again?
• When can the hundreds of thousands of evacuated residents in Fukushima return home?
• What are the implications for the nuclear power industry worldwide?
• How is the tsunami recovery going?
• Can we become tsunami-proof in the future?

SPEAKERS:

• Prof James Goff, Director of the Australia-Pacific Tsunami Research Centre and Natural Hazards Research Laboratory at the University of New South Wales and will be in Japan from March 10 for the opening of the International Disaster Prevention Centre at Tohoku University. Japanese audio translation
  

• Dr Tetsuo Sawada, Research Laboratory for Nuclear Reactors Energy Engineering, Tokyo Institute of Technology. He’ll be joining us from Japan. Japanese audio translation
  

• Prof Richard Wakeford, Professor Epidemiology, Visiting Professor at the Dalton Nuclear Institute at the University of Manchester. Richard was a speaker at the International Expert Symposium in Fukushima – Radiation and Health Risks held last year and was in Japan last week for the International Symposium on the Natural Radiation Exposures and Low Dose Radiation Epidemiological Studies. He worked for British Nuclear Fuels Ltd for almost 30 years until 2006. He’ll be joining us from the UK. Japanese audio translation
  

• Mr Tony Irwin, Chartered Engineer and Visiting Lecturer for the Masters course in Nuclear Science at the ANU. Tony is the Chairman of the Engineers Australia Nuclear Engineering Panel. Tony worked for British Energy in the UK for more than thirty years commissioning and operating eight nuclear power reactors. Following the Chernobyl accident he was a member of a World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO) mission that reviewed operating practices at Russian RMBK reactors. In 1999 he moved to Australia and joined the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) and was Reactor Manager during the construction and operation of the OPAL research reactor; he retired from ANSTO in late 2009. Japanese audio translation

• Q&A session Japanese audio translation
  

Due to time zone differences Prof Richard Wakeford will have very limited availability so please ask your questions during the briefing.

BRIEFING DETAILS:

DATE:  Tuesday 6 March
START TIME: 10am AEDT
DURATION: 45 min
VENUE:  Online

Audio files will be posted here as soon as possible after the event.

For further information, please contact the AusSMC on 08 7120 8666 or email us.

Feel free to use these quotes in your stories.  If you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

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Peter Marosszeky is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Science, School of Aviation at the University of New South Wales.

“All new aircraft are likely to experience a few teething problems in their first few years of service. The checks of the fleet that have been ordered are a sensible step and will ensure that the airline operators have got the safest product flying that is possible.

The types of cracks they are reporting are not of great concern and it is unlikely they would progress to the level where they would become a danger. I would not be overly concerned as it is something that is happening at a controlled level and that aircraft engineers will have a handle on.

———–

Comments from the UK SMC

Chris Yates, independent aviation consultant, said:

“The inspection regime relates directly to a series of L shaped brackets attaching the outer skin of the wing to the rib substructure.

“Examination of these small components on early delivery Airbus A380 aircraft reveals tiny cracking which could potentially weaken the wing structure over a considerable length of time.

“Aviation safety authorities have ordered inspection of all currently in service A380s out of an abundance of caution.

“It is important to stress that this is a relatively minor issue which can be fixed during heavy maintenance periods and does not impact the overall integrity of the aircraft.”

———–

Philippa Oldham, Head of Transport at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, said:

“It is welcome that the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) is calling for checks on all Airbus A380 as safety has to be the biggest priority for all airlines.

“It is important to note that these cracks are very small and will be monitored by the airlines. They are unlikely to affect aircraft operation.

“Airlines approved by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) have very strict regulations and require there to be rigorous inspection procedures so an aircraft would not be allowed to fly unless it was deemed to be fully airworthy by the authority or their delegates.”

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Feel free to use these quotes in your stories. Any further comments will be posted here. If you would like to speak to an expert, please don’t hesitate to contact us on (08) 7120 8666 or by email.

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The New Zealand SMC has set up a Rena Oil Spill resource page which will be updated throughout the next few days as expert information comes to hand.

———–

Impact of the oil spill:

Dr Norm Duke, Professorial Research Fellow, Mangrove Hub, James Cook University comments:

“There needs to be great care taken in mitigating the impacts of large oils on coastal ecosystems – and in selecting the chemicals and methods applied.

“Petroleum oil will naturally break down – but this takes time and oxygenation. So, the longer the oil remains floating at sea – the safer it becomes. And, the rougher the weather – the better also.

“My results in Australia and in Panama with studies of major oil spills – and experimental studies – clearly show that oil can persist in tidal sediments for 20-30 years. And, the effect of this persistence is longer term impacts on biota growth – and its genetic makeup. For the latter, we know for instance, that there are mangrove plants can have increased genetic mutations with increased levels of oil in sediments.”

———–

Dr. Barbara Bollard-Breen, senior lecturer in marine conservation biology at AUT University’s School of Applied Science comments:

“This morning Maritime New Zealand indicated that up to 350 tonnes of oil have spilled from the Rena and more is expected over the next several hours.”

“While the oil spill from the Rena has placed the marine and coastal regions in the Bay of Plenty at great risk, all of New Zealand’s coastal areas are vulnerable to this sort of disaster.”

“It highlights the urgent need to develop rapid response protocols for ship groundings and oil spills and mechanisms to prevent this from occurring again. It also highlights the need for a more comprehensive approach to marine ecosystem management in New Zealand.

“This has turned into an environmental disaster with widespread implications.  It has the potential to not only affect some of our most pristine coastal areas in the Bay of Plenty region, but also estuaries and already threatened marine habitats, sea birds, shellfish, marine mammals and other marine life.It will also impact upon commercial, amateur and customary fishing, tourism, surfing and other recreational activities in the area.”

———–
Legal jurisdiction under the Resource Management Act:

Joanna Mossop, Senior Lecturer and maritime law expert, School of Law, Victoria University comments:

“My understanding is that [Rena] is within the territorial sea because it is less than 4 nautical miles from Motiti Island which generates its own territorial sea of 12 nautical miles.

“The RMA provisions in respect of pollution offences applie up to 12nm.  Beyond that, the Maritime Transport Act contains offences in relation to pollution. As far as I can tell, section 65 is not limited to beyond the territorial sea because the MTA is the primary source of regulation of shipping and maritime activities.”

———–

Dr Simon Boxall, National Oceanography Centre, University of Southampton, comments:

“The main concern now is securing the containers on the ship.  A couple of years ago the container ship Napoli ran aground off Devon and Dorset in England and lost a significant number of containers.  These are potentially more worrying now than the fuel oil leaking from the ship.  Once they break away from the ship they present a hazard to shipping – often floating just below the surface and difficult to see and track until they finally fill with water and sink.

“Containers can remain afloat for weeks at a time. There should also be concern as to the contents of the containers. This could range from household good to chemicals and in the case of Napoli there were several tonnes of herbicides amongst other materials. The emergency will remain until the vessel is finally towed to safe haven.”

On the growing oil spill:

“The volumes of oil have evidently increased over the past two days but even at 350 tonnes, when this is 12km offshore the damage will be short term. The focus should be on securing the ship and its cargo and dealing with oil as and when it reaches shore.  There will be blobs of material (emulsified oil we often call mousse) on the beach which will require mechanical collection by hand.”

On use of dispersant Corexit 9500:

“Scientists will argue over the use of dispersants, for and against, but given the one used in this case the discussion is rather academic. [That is because Corexit 9500] is one of the less toxic dispersants and the volume used so far (under two tonnes) should not cause undue concern.”

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On the weather:

Winds now pushing oil onto the Bay of Plenty coast could turn offshore on Thursday, forecasters say.

State science company NIWA is providing Auckland City Council’s emergency management staff with weather and sea state (currents and waves) forecasts from its EcoConnect forecasting system relevant to the salvage and clean-up operation for the grounded container ship Rena.

NIWA Principal Scientist Dr Mike Revell said:

“Our forecasting system EcoConnect indicates that winds over the Tauranga harbour entrance region should peak from the north -north-east at about 35 kmh gusting up to 50 kmh during the early hours of Wednesday morning gradually easing and turning more easterly during the day – onshore winds for Tuesday and Wednesday  with frequent periods of rain. On Thursday and continuing into Friday winds are expected to turn to the westerly quarter – offshore – and reduce to 20 km/h gusting to 30 km/h with the rain clearing”.

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) marine ecologist Dr Drew Lohrer comments:

“There are naturally occurring micro-organisms that break down hydrocarbons. However, oil will arrive at the coast much more quickly than the bacteria can break it down. In areas where the oil arrives in thick slicks or clumps, it may take years or decades for it to disappear naturally. This is why it is imperative to clean up as much of the spill as possible”.

“I don’t have any information on how rates of degradation will differ in different types of habitats. However, rates of breakdown were expected to be much faster in the Gulf of Mexico (Deepwater Horizon spill) than in the Gulf of Alaska (Exxon Valdez spill) due to the much warmer water and air temperatures. The Gulf of Mexico may have higher populations of hydrocarbon consuming bacteria due to numerous natural hot and cold hydrocarbon “seeps” present on the seafloor”.

“A significant slick of black oil has the potential to damage wildlife and the functioning of the ecological systems in coastal systems including sandy and muddy intertidal flats. It can smother the small creatures living on and in the sediments, and the oil’s toxicity can cause longer term problems for the animals that do not immediately succumb. Estuarine tidal flats and wetlands are ecologically important areas that contain an interconnected web of invertebrate, fish and birdlife”.

“(Spraying of) dispersants may help the birds and larger fauna by breaking up the larger thicker slicks and globules. However, the effects of more diffuse and widespread toxicity are unknown. There could be negative effects on organisms including the invertebrates and plants that live in coastal and estuarine areas”.

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University of Southampton lecturer in oceanography Dr Simon Boxall, who has experience of the Erika oil spil on France’s Brittany coast in 1999, and the MV Braer oil spill in the Shetland Islands in 1993, comments:

“There is nothing positive about an oil spill, they shouldn’t happen. A ship going aground and spilling its fuel oil is inexcusable. So far it is a relatively small volume. The stormy weather is both a pro and a con.  The bad news is that it hampers the clean up and access to the stricken vessel.  The good news is that it helps the oil disperse naturally. A good example of this was the Braer spill off the Shetlands … very large volumes dispersed very quickly by heavy storms. Tides and currents will also help.

“Microbe activity will act quickly and break the oil that is naturally dispersed in about 4-6 weeks given current temperatures and increasing daylight.  Add to that a team of beach clean-up personnel and the impact of the (estimated) 30 tonnes will be minimal. There will be some distressing sights of some sea birds killed and of oil on beaches but it will be short-term.

“Some experts disagree on the dispersants. Dispersants do have a role to play but only in a few cases (but) there is a tendency to use them regardless.

“Contrary to what is coming out, they are more harmful than the oil itself and they are NOT less toxic than dishwashing liquid!  Fairy dishwashing liquid doesn’t carry hazchem advice and you don’t wear protective clothing and masks to do the washing up. In their raw form some dispersants can be very toxic and I believe will do more harm than good.  Most of the Corexit dispersants were banned from use by the UK Government in 1998 for rocky shore areas and can only be used offshore after consultation with govt., and if no alternatives are available. Sweden has a blanket ban on all dispersants in the marine environment. In this case – with limited knowledge of the region – I’d advise caution on use of dispersants.

“Nature did a lovely job of Braer and very little human intervention took place (no dispersants).  The Erika involved substantial mechanical beach clean up but we did a study 5 months after the spill and levels of hydrocarbons on the beaches of France that had been impacted were below background levels (and in fact were better than one or two control beaches). The Rena spill needs containment as first priority, booming where possible to contain the marine based oil. Beach clean-up will be important and the oil breaks down more slowly on the beach than at sea.  At sea, nature will disperse and break the oil down very quickly, without use of chemicals.

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CSIRO research scientist Professor Nic Bax, who leads the Biodiversity Hub at the University of Tasmania,  comments:

“Responding to oil spills is a very complex, high pressure situation requiring decisions to be made based on whatever data are available at the time. One of the difficulties in assessing the environmental impacts of oil spills is the lack of environmental baselines against which to measure the changes. Hydrocarbons impact the environment and plants and animals through several different pathways – physically through smothering or the external oiling of birds and marine mammals, and chemically through the toxicity of the compounds entering the animal itself causing different levels of short and long-term poisoning. The most visible impact of oil spill is through smothering and this is often the one that gets most attention. The chemical impacts are harder to quantify being less visible, although tainting in commercial species (or the perception of tainting) can have immediate commercial impacts”.

“While the impacts of oil spills are visually alarming with high local impact, far more oil enters the global oceans through other mechanisms. Local environmental impacts of oil spills will continue after the obvious tarry oil has been removed or dispersed. This is at least in part because some oil seems to usually remain hidden at depth in the sediments. The time this oil remains depends on the environment, with cold, low energy environments being the slowest to recover”.

“Dispersants when applied on reasonably fresh oil can disperse the oil though the water column. Dispersants do not change the amount of oil but they redistribute it. They can be used to alter the parts of the environment that are affected from surface creatures and sensitive shorelines to the water column and bottom creatures. Where they are used in deep water and high energy environments they also serve to spread the oil over a wider area (or volume),  diluting it and reducing its immediate impact. Dispersants used to be quite toxic but now are considered to be much less toxic than the oil itself, so the main environmental decision regarding their use is determining where the oil will have least harm i.e. concentrated at the surface and on sensitive shorelines, or dispersed through the water column. There does not seem to be much evidence to indicate that dispersing oil leads to greater uptake by organisms, although this would be very hard to measure”.

“It seems that oil will eventually be broken down by natural processes including microbial activity. Microbial activity may be especially important after oil has entered habitats such as sub-surface sediments where physical weathering can no longer occur. It seems to be a long-term process as oil has been detected in sediments a decade after oil spills have occurred. The more volatile components of the oil are typically considered to be the most toxic, but they are also the components that will boil off or evaporate most rapidly. Typically heavier crudes hang around longer are harder to disperse and have a greater visual and aesthetic impact. Evaporation of the oil will be increased in warmer temperatures thus reducing impacts. Dispersion in the water column will be increased in high energy environments (such as high wave action) which will dilute the oil … reducing its local impact”.

“In low energy environments, such as there is little opportunity for physical processes to operate. Areas of high tidal energy will again serve to spread and dilute the oil, but may make it harder to prevent the oil reaching sensitive areas. Spilt oil that remains at the surface will gradually be dispersed by natural physical processes at least in high energy environments. Oil that reaches low energy environments or gets buried in sediments may persist for several years”.

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Use of oil dispersants and the ability of marine microbes to break down oil pollutants:

Professor Ravi Naidu, Managing director of the Co-operative Research Centre For Contamination Assessment And Remediation Of The Environment, in South Australia, comments:

“This spill could impact on the sensitive aquatic environment and life cycle of the marine ecosystem. The oil will not disappear quickly… it will be in the aquatic environment for a while. There are volatile hydrocarbons in the oil which will disperse but the oil which is not removed will continue to have an effect. There will be some natural remediation by microbes in the coastal environment, but it may be found that these are not as active as they are in warmer tropical waters. Oil which is bound to organic matter in the sediments may be the easiest to break down — the wave action will be an advantage.”

Marine ecologist Associate Professor Mark Costello, at Auckland University’s Leigh Marine Laboratory, comments:

“[Effectiveness of the microbes] seems to depend on what type of oil it is, and what type of environment it is, as the physical environment breaks it into smaller pieces. Dispersants, like a lot of detergents, will kill animals and plants as well. Some of the new ones may be safer, but I don’t know how safe they are.

“You do get natural oil and gas leaks in various parts of the world. The marine microbes which break down oil slicks seem to be pretty cosmopolitan and they break down lumps of oil in other places.

“I know people have sprayed nutrients such as nitrogen on beaches to try and speed up the growth of bacteria that would help degrade the oil — but as far as I know this has been experimental and it’s not yet clear whether it has any effect in degrading the oil faster. The nutrients could have their own knock-on effect”.

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More on oil dispersants:

Last month, a project based out of the University of Houston in Texas was launched to research new types of oil dispersants that would be friendlier to the environment and appropriate for use in deep sea oil releases – such as that experience in the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Ramanan Krishnamoorti, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Houston is leading the research. He said:

“Safety has been a big issue in dispersant technology. We already know they can be highly toxic, so the challenge is to make them less so. We hope to make safer and more efficient dispersants.

“My efforts will be focused on coming up with novel, particle-based and biological dispersants,” Krishnamoorti said. “I’ll be working on developing dispersants that we can use less of and are more biocompatible with the water, plant life and wildlife.”

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Rena oil spill Resources:

- Latest updates from Maritime New Zealand

- Real time satellite location data for the Rena and nearby ships

- Bay of Plenty Regional Council information on the Astrolabe Reef

- Cawthron Institute guidelines for Maritime NZ on oil dispersants

- Northland Regional Council backgrounder on oil pollution
- Backgrounder on past oil spills in Australia

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International research

- Community Attachment and Negative Affective States in the Context of the BP Deepwater Horizon   Disaster (log into the SMC Resource Library for the full paper)

- Acute health effects of the Tasman Spirit oil spill on residents of Karachi, Pakistan

- FAQ on microbes and oil spills With fist-sized “patties” of clumping fuel oil washing up on New Zealand’s Mt Maunganui beach and tonnes more expected to land on Bay of Plenty beaches further south, authorities say they face difficulties dealing with the estimated 50 tonnes of oil already in the water.

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