Japan on defense over disaster

TOKYO - Japanese officials struggled through the day Tuesday to explain why it had taken them a month to disclose large-scale releases of radioactive material in mid-March at a crippled nuclear power plant, as the government and an electric utility disagreed on the extent of continuing problems there.

The government announced on Tuesday morning that it had raised its rating of the severity of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station to 7, the worst on an international scale, from 5. Officials said the reactor had released one-tenth as much radioactive material as the Chernobyl accident in 1986 but still qualified as a 7 according to a complex formula devised by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Japan's new assessment was based largely on computer models showing heavy emissions of radioactive iodine and cesium March 14-16, just after the earthquake and tsunami rendered the plant's emergency cooling system inoperative. The nearly monthlong delay in acknowledging the extent of these emissions is a fresh example of confused data and analysis from the Japanese, and put the authorities on the defensive about whether they have delayed or blocked the release of information to avoid alarming the public.

'A panicked reaction'

Seiji Shiroya, a commissioner of Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission, an independent government panel that oversees the country's nuclear industry, said the government had delayed issuing data on the extent of the radiation releases because of concern that the margins of error had been large in initial computer models. But he also suggested a public policy reason for having kept quiet.

"Some foreigners fled the country even when there appeared to be little risk," he said. "If we immediately decided to label the situation as Level 7, we could have triggered a panicked reaction."

The Japanese media, which has a reputation for passivity but has become more aggressive in response to public unhappiness about the nuclear accident, questioned government leaders through the day about what the government knew about the accident.

"What I can say for the information I obtained -- of course the government is very large, so I don't have all the information -- is that no information was ever suppressed or hidden after the accident," he said. "There are various ways of looking at this, and I know there are opinions saying that information could have been disclosed faster. However, as the head of the government, I never hid any information because it was inconvenient for us."

Junichi Matsumoto, a senior nuclear power executive from the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., fanned public fears about radiation when he said at a separate news conference on Tuesday morning that the radiation release from Daiichi could, in time, surpass levels seen in 1986.

"The radiation leak has not stopped completely, and our concern is that it could eventually exceed Chernobyl," Matsumoto said.

But Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy director general of Japan's nuclear regulator, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said that he did not know how the company had come up with its estimate. "I cannot understand their position," he said.