An IAEA expert team will visit Japan this month at the request of the Japanese government to review the efforts and plans to decommission TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.
Japan has developed a Mid-and-Long-Term Roadmap towards the Decommissioning of TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station Units 1-4, and the IAEA mission will assess that plan and, in particular, efforts to manage contaminated water at the accident site and to remove fuel assemblies from the Spent Fuel Pool in Reactor Unit 4. The mission will also review marine monitoring activities taking into account findings of the IAEA marine monitoring experts' visit to Japan on 6 to 12 October.
Comprised of 19 international and IAEA experts, the IAEA team will conduct its visit from 25 November to 4 December 2013. The team will hold meetings with Japanese officials and TEPCO experts in Tokyo and visit the Fukushima Daiichi site. The team will be led by Juan Carlos Lentijo, Director of the IAEA Division of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology, whose deputy leader will be Pil-Soo Hahn, Director of the IAEA Division of Radiation, Transport and Waste Safety.
The team expects to hold a press briefing in Tokyo on 4 December 2013 to describe the mission's preliminary results. Journalists are advised to be in contact with IAEA Press Officer, Greg Webb, for further details as they become available.
Japan's request for the mission comes in the context of the IAEA Action Plan on Nuclear Safety, endorsed by all IAEA Member States in September 2011. The Action Plan defines a programme of work to strengthen the global nuclear safety framework, and it encourages the use of peer review missions to take full advantage of worldwide experience.