According to Protect Mother Earth, Fukushima nuclear disaster has contaminated the world’s largest ocean in only five years and it’s still leaking 300 tons of radioactive waste every day.
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex was damaged by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The Nos. 1 to 3 reactors suffered fuel meltdowns as their cooling systems were crippled.
In addition to ocean spill caused by the disaster, radioactive substances have been left unremoved from treated but still tritium-containing water at the crippled nuclear power plant. The government and Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. (TEPCO) have faced the pressing need of disposing of such treated water now kept in tanks. One option is to dump it into the sea, as tritium is said to pose little risk to human health.
According to TEPCO, a maximum 62.2 becquerels per liter of lodine 129, far higher than the 9 becquerel legal limit, was found in the water filtered by the Advanced Liquid Processing System used to remove various types of radioactive materials.
Related: Fukushima clean up costs will approach US 1 trillion.
Lodine 129 has a half-life of 15.70 million years.
Tepco, which gathered data in fiscal 2017 through March, also detected a maximum 92.5 becquerels of Ruthenium 106, shy of the 100 becquerel legal limit, as well as 59 becquerels of technetium 99 against the limit of 1,000 becquerels.
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
