Wastewater from Fukushima cleanup to be released

Japan approved a plan Friday to release treated water from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant into the ocean. In 2011, an earthquake and tsunami destroyed the water cooling systems on three largely melted reactor cores, causing radioactive water to leak into the plant’s basement. That water has been collected and stored in tanks that are set to reach their capacity next year, and officials said the tanks must be removed to decommission the plant. The plan was approved by the Nuclear Regulation Authority, and Japan could begin gradually releasing the water into the ocean as soon as 2023. 

What safety precautions are they taking? Local fishing communities and neighboring countries are concerned that the contaminated water could harm marine life. The Tokyo Electric Power Co. says it plans to filter the water, send it through a pipeline to a coastal facility where it will be diluted with seawater, then pumped 0.6 miles into the ocean. The power company and the government said all but one isotope, tritium, will be reduced to meet safety standards. The exact effects of low doses of tritium on the environment and humans are unknown, but experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency said Japan is taking the appropriate steps. 

Dig deeper: Read John Dawson’s article in Beginnings on pigs that lived after the Fukushima meltdown.