Fukushima Watch: Doctoring Dosimeters — How Far Did It Go?

Over the weekend, a subcontractor that worked at the devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant confessed to asking some of its employees to put lead covers on their dosimeters in order to keep their radiation exposure readings artificially low.

Workers gather near their lockers inside the emergency operation center at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in November 2011.

Now, Japanese officials are trying to figure out whether the subcontractor, a small Fukushima Prefecture-based firm, was the only one to doctor dosimeters or whether other companies may have done the same.

“If other companies got away with doing this as well, that would be incredible,” Tatsuya Hariu, a spokesman for Fukushima Prefecture’s Labor Division, which is spearheading the probe into the matter, told JRT. “It would be something that impacted everyone who works at nuclear plants. We’re not just targeting (the one firm) — we’re looking into whether other companies properly recorded radiation exposure.”

The disclosures highlight what experts say could be a major staffing problem as the work of cleaning up one of the world’s worst nuclear disasters stretches on — possibly as long as 40 years. There’s a limited pool of people qualified and willing to work in an environment that’s still highly radioactive in places. When these people hit maximum radiation-exposure levels they are mandated to stop working at the plant. Yet replacement workers — especially in specialized fields — aren’t easy to come by.

Click to read more...