Photo/Illutration The No. 3 reactor building at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, in January (Ikuro Aiba)

Forty percent of the workforce at the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant worry about radiation issues on the job, a nearly three-fold spike over the previous year, a survey found.

More than half of those respondents cited fears of their body coming into contact with a radioactive substance.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., the plant operator that conducted the annual survey, said recent incidents at the plant probably contributed to the heightened concerns.

For example, two workers were hospitalized in October 2023 after they were accidentally splashed with waste liquid containing highly radioactive substances while cleaning piping in a contaminated water treatment facility.

The survey was carried out between September and October to improve the working environment.

TEPCO distributed a questionnaire to all workers at the plant and received responses from 5,498 individuals, or 94.5 percent.

The questions covered things like the comfort of rest stations, concerns during work and aspects of the job that workers find rewarding.

Of all respondents, 12.1 percent harbored concerns about radiation while at work and 28.2 percent said they have some concerns.

The combined 40.3 percent was 2.8 times higher than in the survey in 2023, although the proportion of respondents feeling this way had been generally declining in recent years.

Asked to choose specific issues they were concerned about, 52.2 percent, the largest percentage, picked “physical contamination,” up about seven points from 2023.

In another incident, about 1.5 tons of contaminated water flowed out of a water purification facility at the plant through an air exhaust opening in February 2024.

Akira Ono, president of Fukushima Daiichi Decontamination and Decommissioning Engineering Co., said less experienced workers tend to feel concerns about radiation.

“Inside buildings, there are some areas with high radiation levels where workers can be easily contaminated, but people can work safely if proper measures are taken,” Ono said. “We want to assuage workers’ concerns by communicating this fact.”

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