» TEPCO released “see-through” image of Fukushima nuclear power plant

2015/03/20

TEPCO released a “see-through” image of the No. 1 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant on March 19, suggesting that most of the nuclear fuel was no longer in the reactor.

The image was taken with muons, which are created when cosmic rays hit the Earth’s atmosphere. Muons pass through substances like concrete but are absorbed by highly dense material like nuclear fuel.

The image was taken from Feb. 12 through March 10. The inside of the reactor’s pressure vessel, which holds the nuclear fuel, showed as white, meaning that most of the fuel was gone. The muons should have shown the presence of fuel rods around one meter or longer.

The image supports the calculations by TEPCO and others that most of the fuel melted out of the reactor. It marks the first time the interiors of the Fukushima plant’s reactors have been directly photographed. In the future, TEPCO plans to insert a camera-equipped robot into the lower part of the containment vessel to look for the melted fuel.

<Media Report>
TEPCO releases ‘see-through’ image of Fukushima reactor (Mainichi Newspaper)

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