Japan will begin releasing treated radioactive water from the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean this week, reports the BBC.
Approximately 1.34 million tonnes of water have accumulated since the 2011 tsunami destroyed the plant. The tsunami, triggered by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake, flooded three reactors of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. The event is regarded as the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.
Shortly after, authorities set up an exclusion zone which continued to be expanded as radiation leaked from the plant, forcing more than 150,000 people to evacuate from the area.
The water will be released over 30 years after being filtered and diluted.
The plan to release water from the plant has caused alarm across Asia and the Pacific since it was approved by the Japanese government two years ago. China accused Japan of treating the Pacific as “its local sewer”. Despite opposition from the surrounding countries, the decision comes weeks after the UN’s nuclear watchdog approved the plan, with authorities concluding the impact on people and the environment would be negligible.
Authorities will request for the plant’s operator to “promptly prepare” for the disposal to start on 24 August if weather and sea conditions are appropriate, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said.
The government has said that releasing the water is a necessary step in the lengthy and costly process of decommissioning the plant, which sits on the country’s east coast, about 220km north-east of the capital Tokyo.
Many people, including fishermen in the region, fear that discharging the treated water will affect their livelihoods. Experts, in exchange, have said they are not a danger unless consumed in large quantities, because they emit very low levels of radiation. Plant operators Tepco have been filtering the water to remove more than 60 radioactive substances but the water will not be entirely radiation-free as it will still contain tritium and carbon-14- radioactive isotopes of hydrogen and carbon that cannot be easily removed from water.
Experts also note that the contaminated water is being released into a massive body of water, the Pacific Ocean, and will therefore be massively diluted.
