The powerful earthquake that struck the Noto Peninsula without warning on New Year’s Day shed light on the difficulty of evacuating residents around a nuclear power plant to safety.

At the time of the tremor, the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors at Hokuriku Electric Power Co.’s Shika nuclear power plant had suspended operations.

With no radiation leaks, the natural disaster prompted no emergency measures where people must remain indoors or are ordered to evacuate elsewhere.

“My home was destroyed so I was unable to even think about the nuclear plant,” said a 70-year-old man who lives 10 kilometers north of the Shika plant. “I am relieved to hear that no significant problems were detected.”

However, the temblor, with a maximum intensity of 7 on the Japanese seismic scale, knocked out two of the five outside power sources essential to cool nuclear fuel at the plant in Shika, Ishikawa Prefecture.

These power outages are adding to the concerns among residents about how they can evacuate safely in the event of a nuclear disaster.

A nuclear accident, alongside an earthquake and tsunami, would have created a major catastrophe. The reason is that many factors taken for granted in developing evacuation plans became infeasible.

NO WAY TO FLEE FROM DANGER

Current evacuation plans compiled by Shika town and Ishikawa prefectural officials cover 150,000 people living within a 30-kilometer radius of the Shika plant.

In the event of a nuclear accident, residents of the northern side of the facility are expected to flee to Noto town and other places at the tip of the Noto Peninsula.

But the Cabinet Office said seven of the 11 basic evacuation routes designated by Ishikawa Prefecture for citizens to escape to safety outside the 30-km radius were cut off by road cracks and road collapses.

A total of eight districts in the prefecture’s Wajima and Anamizu were temporarily isolated within 5 to 30 km of the Shika plant.

Data from 18 of the 116 monitoring posts to check radiation levels around the power station became inaccessible, whereas the readings from them are vital to determine detailed evacuation strategies.

One day in late January, an Asahi Shimbun reporter left the Shika plant. The aim was retracing an evacuation route for a possible nuclear disaster by car.

Driving 7 to 8 km north of the plant, the quake had rendered the road wavy. Traces of a landslide were apparent in some locations.

Traveling 10 km farther along a prefectural road leading northeast to Wajima revealed that the route was completely blocked.

A man in his 50s whose home is located around the stretch called the road “the sole route to get away from the nuclear power plant.”

“There would be no way out if a nuclear accident occurs,” the resident said.

Shika Mayor Kentaro Inaoka, who took office toward the end of December, pointed to issues that should be considered from now.

“The earthquake this time showed it is virtually impossible for all residents to flee exclusively by land,” Inaoka said. “Among the agenda items are how far citizens can escape by sea or by air and whether the Self-Defense Forces can come to their rescue.”

Ishikawa Prefecture’s evacuation plan stipulates that routes for escapes can be “changed, depending on the situation,” so residents could take flexible approaches to reach safety.

The central government alike states a range of steps ought to be implemented by sea and air, or through indoor evacuation, when the accessibility of courses on land is limited for some reason.

Despite all that, the effectiveness of the current evacuation plans for residents is being called into question, given that the recent quake spawned coastal uplifts and high waves, which would make it difficult to seek refuge by ship.

Taking flights to safety would likewise face uncertainty. Aircraft can transport only a limited number of passengers and are easily affected by weather conditions.

PRECAUTIONS ENHANCED

Evacuation plans define how residents should take shelter indoors or flee to distant areas at the time of nuclear accidents. They are compiled by prefectural governments as well as cities, towns and villages located near nuclear plants.

The criteria for radiation levels for evacuation, along with other technical standards, are released by the Nuclear Regulation Authority via the Guide for Emergency Preparedness and Response.

Responsibility for beefing up concrete regional countermeasures against potential nuclear disasters belongs to the Cabinet Office.

The Cabinet Office is looking to extend strengthened support for local governments to improve conditions for indoor evacuation.

Relying on conventional subsidies and other means to ensure safety around nuclear power stations, the Cabinet Office will focus on improving the protection of shelters, securing power sources and widening roads.

Those forms of assistance were formerly provided primarily to regions in close proximity to nuclear plants. To assure security in broader areas, more funds will be poured into the initiative.

“We will be considering the routes and ways of evacuation while looking at the damage caused by the catastrophe this time,” said Environment Minister Shintaro Ito, who is in charge of safeguards against nuclear disasters, at a news conference following a Cabinet meeting on Feb. 2. “Opinions from local regions will also be taken into account to work out future steps.”

Ito touched upon plans to interview officials of local governments hosting nuclear plants by the end of this fiscal year ending in March.

Asked if he viewed current evacuation plans as inadequate, Ito declined to comment.

“We are still in the process of consideration,” Ito said.

FACE UP TO RISKS

Naoya Sekiya, a social informatics professor at the University of Tokyo, who is knowledgeable about preparedness for nuclear accidents, said that reactors in Japan often are sited in areas marked by vulnerable traffic networks.

“It should be pointed out above all else that regions home to nuclear plants are frequently plagued by difficulties in establishing evacuation routes,” Sekiya said.

He stressed the issues concerning home collapses and isolated communities had already been observed on the heels of the 2004 Niigata Chuetsu Earthquake and the 2016 Kumamoto Earthquakes. 

These issues are now drawing considerable attention in the wake of the Noto Peninsula quake.

“Those problems were simply reaffirmed lately because they had previously not been properly examined,” Sekiya said. “What is important is coming to grips with them thoroughly.”

(This article was compiled from reports by Takashi Funakoshi, Koji Nishimura, Kai Ichino and Keitaro Fukuchi.)