THE IMPACT OF THE FUKUSHIMA DISASTER ON INTERNATIONAL NUCLEAR TRANSPORT SAFETY - A UK PERSPECTIVE

On 11 March 2011, Japan was struck by an earthquake measuring over 9.0 on the Richter magnitude scale, the strongest known to hit Japan and one of the top five largest earthquakes ever recorded in the world. The epicentre was 175km (110 miles) east-north-east from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, and within an hour a massive tsunami had inundated the site. This caused a serious nuclear accident, with an International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES) rating of Level 7 (the highest). Following the events at Fukushima, the nuclear industry in the UK responded quickly to review UK nuclear installations against seismic and flooding hazards. On 14 March 2011 the UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change requested that Dr. Mike Weightman, HM Chief Inspector of Nuclear Installations, examine the circumstances of the Fukushima accident to see what lessons could be learnt to enhance the safety of the UK nuclear industry. An Interim Report was published in the middle of May 2011, with a Final Report six months later. A further report was published in October 2012 that provided an update on progress in implementing the lessons for the UK’s nuclear industry. In addition to the Weightman Reports, the UK Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) produced two national reports on the European Council ‘Stress Tests’ focussing on licensed nuclear sites. The first covered all civil nuclear power plants with the second, on the instructions of the Chief Inspector, covering all of the remaining UK nuclear installations. In both of these reports, areas for potential improvement (known as ‘considerations’) were identified by licensees and these were augmented by Stress Test Findings identified by ONR. This paper reviews the key findings of these reports with the objective of extracting and drawing out key learning which could translate to and impact nuclear transport safety. It summarises the potential impact on INS and its nuclear transport operations, and the progress made to date.