15 Years On: 60 Pct of High Schoolers Misidentify Fukushima N-Plant Operator

(2nd para should have read “… ensuing …,” instead of as sent) Tokyo, March 9 (Jiji Press)–A survey has found that nearly 60 pct of high school students in eastern and northeastern Japan do not know correctly which company operates the 2011 meltdown-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant. The triple meltdown occurred at the plant in the northeastern prefecture of Fukushima operated by Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. after it was hit by a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami on March 11, 2011, severely contaminating surrounding areas including the Fukushima town of Futaba and other municipalities where all residents had been evacuated. The survey of 1,877 high school students, conducted last year chiefly by a Tokyo high schooler participating in a learning program at the Great East Japan Earthquake and Nuclear Disaster Memorial Museum in Futaba, showed that 53.4 pct of respondents in Fukushima picked TEPCO as the operator of the crippled plant while only 24.9 pct of those in Tokyo and neighboring east Japan prefecture of Chiba chose the correct answer. The overall correct answer rate dropped 7.6 percentage points from 52.4 pct in a similar survey in 2024. Wrong answer picks included regional utility Tohoku Electric Power Co. and fictitious Fukushima Electric Power. The 2025 survey also found that only about 30 pct of the total respondents knew that final disposal of soil removed from contaminated areas and stored at interim facilities in the Fukushima towns of Okuma and Futaba should be made outside the prefecture by March 2045. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]