Japan observed the 15th anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11.

People offered prayers at 2:46 p.m., the time the magnitude 9.0 temblor struck 15 years ago.

The shaking and ensuing tsunami took the lives of 15,901 people, with 2,519 still missing.

An additional 3,810 people have died from disaster-related causes, including prolonged evacuation.

A total of 23,410 Fukushima residents remain evacuated within and outside the prefecture due to effects of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

In six Fukushima municipalities that have zones where residents have yet to return, the national government is conducting decontamination and infrastructure work, with plans to gradually lift the evacuation orders starting in fiscal 2026 which begins on April 1.

There are 14 million cubic meters of soil removed during decontamination work stored at interim facilities in Fukushima.

The soil is set to be disposed of outside the prefecture by 2045.

At Fukushima Daiichi where decommissioning work continues, a combined 1,007 nuclear fuel assemblies remain in the spent fuel pools at Units 1 and 2.

Their removal is scheduled to begin in fiscal 2026.

In addition, about 880 tons of nuclear fuel debris, or fuel that melted during the accident and later cooled and solidified, remain inside reactors.

So far, only 0.9 grams of the fuel debris has been removed in test operations, and officials are discussing how to remove it on a full scale.

Against this backdrop, TEPCO activated Unit 6 at its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant in January this year, marking the first time for the company to restart a nuclear reactor since the Fukushima Daiichi accident.