More than a decade after the triple meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, Japan is again turning to nuclear power as it struggles to reach its emissions targets and bolster its energy security. In a draft strategic energy plan due to be approved by the cabinet this month, the trade and industry ministry signalled it was ditching attempts to lessen Japan's reliance on nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster – the world's worst nuclear accident since Chornobyl 25 years earlier. The document dropped a reference to "reducing reliance" on nuclear energy that had appeared in the three previous plans, and instead called for a "maximisation" of nuclear power, which will account for about 20% of total energy output in 2040, based on the assumption that 30 reactors will be in full operation by then. The plan envisages a share of between 40% and 50% for renewable energy – compared with just under a third in 2023 – and a reduction in coal-fired power from the current 70% to 30-40%. The push to restart reactors idled since the plant was struck by a tsunami triggered by a magnitude-9.0

Fox News Flash top headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com. A robot that has spent months inside the ruins of a nuclear reactor at the tsunami-hit Fukushima Daiichi plant delivered a tiny sample of melted nuclear fuel on Thursday, in what plant officials said was a step toward beginning the cleanup of hundreds of tons of melted fuel debris. The sample, the size of a grain of rice, was placed into a secure container, marking the end of the mission, according to Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, which manages the plant. It is being transported to a glove box for size and weight measurements before being sent to outside laboratories for detailed analyses over the coming months.

A piece of the radioactive fuel left from the meltdown of Japan's tsunami-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has been retrieved from the site using a remote-controlled robot. Investigators used the robot's fishing-rod-like arm to clip and collect a tiny piece of radioactive material from one of the plant's three damaged reactors – the first time such a feat has been achieved. Should it prove suitable for testing, scientists hope the sample will yield information that will help determine how to decommission the plant. The plant's manager, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (Tepco), has said the sample was collected from the surface of a mound of molten debris that sits at the bottom of the Unit 2 reactor's primary containment vessel. The "telesco" robot, with its frontal tongs still holding the sample, returned to its enclosed container for safe storage after workers in full hazmat gear pulled it out of the containment vessel on Saturday.

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel visited a Fukushima coastal city to support the local fishing industry after China and South Korea raised the alarm over water discharge began from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. As Japan prepares to mark the 13th anniversary of its worst-ever nuclear disaster, the man in charge of cleaning it up says his team is fighting to bring a sample out of the heart of the site's radioactive debris. A decades-long project to clean up the remains of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is preparing to remove damaged fuel debris from the plant's reactors, but much about what's inside them is still a mystery. The key to unlocking that mystery -- and figuring out how to clean it up -- is a sample of melted fuel from inside a reactor, said Akira Ono, head of decommissioning for Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, in an interview with The Associated Press. Getting that sample would be like penetrating "the main keep of the castle" in the battle of decommissioning, Ono said.

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel visited a Fukushima coastal city to support the local fishing industry after China and South Korea raised the alarm over water discharge began from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. A drone small enough to fit in one's hand flew inside one of the damaged reactors at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant Wednesday in hopes it can examine some of the molten fuel debris in areas where earlier robots failed to reach. Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings also began releasing the fourth batch of the plant's treated and diluted radioactive wastewater into the sea Wednesday. The government and TEPCO, the plant's operator, say the water is safe and the process is being monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency, but the discharges have faced strong opposition by fishing groups and a Chinese ban on Japanese seafood. A magnitude 9.0 quake and tsunami in March 2011 destroyed the plant's power supply and cooling systems, causing three reactors to melt down.

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!): Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos. Agility Robotics had a good week. Cassie had a meet-and-greet with a four-legged friend during one of our visits to Playground.

This month, seven years after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi reactor meltdowns and explosions that blanketed hundreds of square kilometres of northeastern Japan with radioactive debris, government officials and politicians spoke in hopeful terms about Fukushima's prosperous future. Nevertheless, perhaps the single most important element of Fukushima's future remains unspoken: the exclusion zone seems destined to host a repository for Japan's most hazardous nuclear waste. No Japanese government official will admit this, at least not publicly. A secure repository for nuclear waste has remained a long-elusive goal on the archipelago. But, given that Japan possesses approximately 17,000 tonnes of spent fuel from nuclear power operations, such a development is vital.

Barely a fifth of the way into their mission, the engineers monitoring the Scorpion's progress conceded defeat. With a remote-controlled snip of its cable, the latest robot sent into the bowels of one of Fukushima Daiichi's damaged reactors was cut loose, its progress stalled by lumps of fuel that overheated when the nuclear plant suffered a triple meltdown six years ago this week. As the 60cm-long Toshiba robot, equipped with a pair of cameras and sensors to gauge radiation levels was left to its fate last month, the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), attempted to play down the failure of yet another reconnaissance mission to determine the exact location and condition of the melted fuel. Even though its mission had been aborted, the utility said, "valuable information was obtained which will help us determine the methods to eventually remove fuel debris". The Scorpion mishap, two hours into an exploration that was supposed to last 10 hours, underlined the scale and difficulty of decommissioning Fukushima Daiichi – an unprecedented undertaking one expert has described as "almost beyond comprehension".