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Aug 24, 2023 · TOKYO, Aug 24 (Reuters) - Japan began pumping more than a million metric tons of treated radioactive water from the destroyed Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Thursday, a process that will...
Jul 5, 2023 · SINGAPORE: More than a decade after the devastating 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, Japan is set to release over a million tonnes of treated wastewater from its destroyed Fukushima Daiichi...
- Rachel Chan
Aug 24, 2023 · 5 things to know about Japan's Fukushima water release in the Pacific. Storage tanks for contaminated water at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are near capacity. Workers in Japan...
- Overview
- ‘We’re not going to die’
- The U.S. and U.N. seem poised to support the discharges
The plan to gradually discharge more than a million tons of treated water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant has deeply divided nations and scientists.
On February 21, 2021, a Tokyo Electric Power Company employee measures radiation outside its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, devastated a decade ago by an earthquake. Japan’s planned releases of wastewater used to cool damaged reactors is stirring controversy.
Japan has started releasing wastewater into the ocean. But this isn’t the kind of wastewater that flows from city streets into stormwater drains. It’s treated nuclear wastewater used to cool damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, stricken by an earthquake over a decade ago.
Japan claims that the wastewater, containing a radioactive isotope called tritium and possibly other radioactive traces, will be safe. Neighboring countries and other experts say it poses an environmental threat that will last generations and may affect ecosystems all the way to North America. Who is right?
Following a 9.1-magnitude quake off the east coast of Japan's main island on March 11, 2011, two tsunami waves slammed into the nuclear plant. As three of its reactors melted down, operators began pumping seawater into them to cool melted fuel. More than 12 years later, the ongoing cooling process produces more than 130 tons of contaminated water daily.
Since the accident, over 1.3 million tons of nuclear wastewater have been collected, treated, and stored in a tank farm at the plant. That storage space is about to run out, the Japanese government says, leaving no choice other than to begin dispensing the wastewater into the Pacific.
The releases need to be viewed in perspective, says Ken Buesseler, a marine radiochemist and adviser to the Pacific Islands Forum. The 2011 accidental release of radioactive materials from Fukushima into the Pacific was comparatively massive, he says, but even so, the levels detected off the west coast of North America “were millions of times lower than the peak levels off Japan, which were dangerously high in the first months of 2011.”
Because distance and time lower radioactivity levels, “I don’t think that the releases would irreparably destroy the Pacific Ocean,” Buesseler says. “We’re not going to die. This isn’t that situation.”
But, he adds, it “doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be concerned.”
The stored wastewater age tanks contains varying levels of radioactive isotopes such as cesium-137, strontium-90, and tritium, says Buesseler, who questions how effective the wastewater filtration system is at eliminating all radioactive elements in the tanks. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the nuclear plant’s owner and operator, uses a system that the IAEA says removes 62 different kinds of radionuclide isotopes, except tritium, a radioactive form of hydrogen.
A TEPCO spokesperson said in an email that the impact of the discharges on “the public and the environment will be minimal.” All wastewater will be “repeatedly purified, sampled, and retested to confirm that the concentrations of radioactive substances fall below regulatory standards” before being released. Although the filtration system can’t remove tritium, the treated wastewater will be diluted with seawater until the discharges contain lower tritium levels than are released “by other nuclear power stations both in Japan and around the world,” according to the spokesperson. (Tritium is a comparatively weak isotope that can’t penetrate the skin but can be harmful when ingested.)
Buesseler cautions that the filtration system has not yet “been shown to be effective all of the time.” He says there are other “highly concerning elements … that they haven’t been able to clean up,” such as cesium and strontium-90, an isotope that increases risks of bone cancer and leukemia, earning it the sinister designation of “bone seeker.”
Asked about the United States’s position on Japan’s proposed discharges, a State Department spokesperson expressed cautious support, saying in a statement that the country has been “transparent about its decision, and appears to have adopted an approach in accordance with globally accepted nuclear safety standards.” The spokesperson declined to comment on specific concerns about the possible spread of radionuclides across the Pacific to North American shores. Representatives for Canada’s and Mexico’s foreign ministries did not respond to multiple requests for comment about that.
A task force from the International Atomic Energy Agency is reviewing the intended wastewater releases against international safety standards and is expected to release a report in late June detailing its final assessment. The plan is “in line with practice globally,” said Rafael Mariano Grossi, the agency’s director general, in 2021. “Our cooperation and our presence will help build confidence—in Japan and beyond—that the water disposal is carried out without an adverse impact on human health and the environment.”
Richmond and Buesseler say that although they’ve been privy to much of the same data as the IAEA, and have met with representatives from TEPCO and the Japanese government, they remain skeptical.
“The root of this problem is that they are moving already with a plan that has not yet shown that it will work,” Buesseler says. “They’re saying, ‘We can make it work. We’ll treat it as many times as it takes.’ If you want to put a nickname on this plan, it’s ‘trust us; we’ll take care of it.’”
Aug 23, 2023 · TOKYO, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Japan said on Tuesday it will start releasing into the sea more than 1 million metric tons of treated radioactive water from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant on...
Getty Images. Japan is releasing waste water from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the ocean after receiving a green light from the IAEA. Japan has begun releasing treated radioactive water from...
Aug 22, 2023 · Japan will start releasing treated radioactive water from the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean on Thursday, despite opposition from its neighbours. The decision comes...
