The Basic Points About the Fukushima Daiichi Accident from the Perspective of “Structural Disaster”

To elucidate the problem of secrecy in the Fukushima Daiichi accident, several basic points can be noted from the perspective of “structural disaster,” which should be kept in mind in approaching the hidden accident that happened much earlier than the Fukushima Daiichi accident. First, there seems to have arisen a repeated occurrence of similar patterns of behavior that have run through various different instances and in the end have given rise to secrecy. It is true that the emergency situation during and after such an extreme event as the Fukushima Daiichi accident can provide a good reason to expect confusion and delay in transmitting information. But the degree and range of confusion and delay went far beyond those to be expected from an emergency situation alone.

For example, the System for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose Information (abbreviated to SPEEDI hereafter) was developed with the assistance of more than ten billion yen to make the early evacuation of the people affected smoother and safer. The first recommendation from the Japanese government for evacuation was made on March 12. The prediction obtained from SPEEDI was made public for the first time on April 26, despite the fact that its prediction had been made shortly after the accident. As a result of this secrecy, the affected residents were advised by the government to evacuate without reliable information at the critical initial phase when they were exposed to a high level dose. All they could do was to trust the government or not. SPEEDI had been awarded the first nuclear history award by the Atomic Energy Society of Japan in 2009 [12], but its prediction was never made public when it was needed.

A similar behavior pattern of the government and the resulting secrecy and serious suffering can be observed in various other cases in the accident, such as the delayed venting of the nuclear reactors in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, the deregulation for recycling decontaminated mud for concrete production, and the rise and fall of dose levels allowed for children in primary school and for workers in the station. In light of structural causes implied in the “structural disaster”, organizational errors seem to have intervened behind this state of affairs: TEPCO's disobedience of the directive by the prime minister, the malfunction of the so-called “double check” system within Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), miscommunication between nuclear engineers of the makers of the reactors and TEPCO officials, and others. If we look into the details of the Fukushima Daiichi accident as embodying “structural disaster,” organizational errors of this kind should be scrutinized, elaborated on, and extended as one of the crucial causes of “structural disaster.” This is the first point to be noted in approaching the hidden accident that happened much earlier than the Fukushima Daiichi accident and in obtaining a broader perspective.

Second, we need to carefully place the specifications of six nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power station in a technological trajectory, within which

Table 10.1 Specifications of the nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power station

Source [13]

we might be able to properly understand what “structural disaster” implies (see Table 10.1).

There are two reasons for paying attention to the technological trajectory to understand the Fukushima Daiichi accident as “structural disaster.” First, every reactor there had a long history of successful operation extending over 30 years since its start in the 1970s, which forces our attention to turn to the possibility of a more “structural” cause of the accident beyond picking up individual ad hoc troubles and errors. Second, as the ratios of domestic production indicate, the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power station embody the turning point leading from licensed production to self-reliant production. For these reasons, there could exist common characteristics throughout the reactors in question at the Fukushima Daiichi power station and it is possible that such characteristics are somehow related to the “structural disaster” of the science-technology-society interface as manifested in the accident.

In a word, the causes of “structural disaster” can be divided into two different categories, organizational errors and technological trajectory, as the first step to explaining the Fukushima Daiichi accident.^[1] If we can substantiate these two elements in understanding other independent cases as “structural disaster,” then we will be able to have a stronger position to learn lessons from the Fukushima Daiichi accident as a “structural disaster” and to extend their implications for potential future extreme events. What follows is an independent substantiation of these two elements by examining the hidden accident happened long before the Fukushima Daiichi accident with a focus on a complex relationship between success and failure in the science-technology-society interface and secrecy in the interface.

The hidden accident long before the Fukushima Daiichi one is a very perplexing accident of the naval turbine developed by the Imperial Japanese Navy, which occurred immediately before the outbreak of WWII. This accident enables us to redefine the complex relationship between success and failure in the science-technology-society interface both in peacetime and wartime. The accident was treated as top secret because of its timing. The suppression of information about the accident means that it has not been seriously considered as an event in the sociology of science and technology up to now. However, the description and analysis of this accident will suggest that technological development can depart significantly from a unidirectional process. This also implies that we need to revise our view of the science-technology-society interface beyond a simplistic dichotomous understanding in terms of success or failure.

The steam turbine was invented, and finally patented in 1884, by British engineer C.A. Parsons, who in 1894 obtained a patent for the marine turbine [19].^[2] After Parsons' original invention, it was supposed that the marine turbine had become a reliable, mature technology in the prewar period. The hidden accident of the naval turbine that occurred immediately before WWII, however, throws doubt on the validity of a unidirectional and one-dimensional view of such a development trajectory for technology. To confirm this doubt, it is necessary to outline the development trajectory of the Japanese type naval turbine by making clear the locus of the complex relationship between success and failure.

• [1] On organizational errors in the context of technological failures, see [14–17] regarding the Fukushima Daiichi accident. For a pioneering study referring to the dynamic aspect of technological trajectory in the history of technological change, see [18].
• [2] As for the procession of events before 1884, see [20].