Japan: Ten years after the nuclear accident that melted three of the six reactors at the Fukushima plant in Japan, that country’s prime minister, Yoshihide Suga, said the government has waited too long to decide what to do with the contaminated water that has accumulated. at the plant, and announced that the liquid will be poured into the Pacific Ocean.
According to the Reuters agency, Tokyo Electric (Tepco) collected more than 1 million tons of contaminated water from the cooling pipes that were used to prevent the melting of all fuel cores, since the plant was hit by an earthquake and an tsunami in March 2011.
However, the politician argues, the plant will soon run out of space to store all of this contaminated groundwater that begins to leak into the facility, which will make the release of the liquid into the ocean “inevitable”.
Reactions to the plan to spill radioactive water into the ocean
The plan has aroused many controversies, especially among fishermen who fear the devaluation of their products because they are caught in radioactive waters. But the Japanese trade minister, Hiroshi Kajiyama, assured that, before being discharged in the Pacific, the water will be purified in order to dilute the radioactive tritium, the residue that remains even after the cleaning process.
Yoshihide Suga has not yet formalized the decision on the fate of the Fukushima radioactive water, but the verdict is expected to come out soon. If the option is really for disposal at sea, the plan is to dilute tritium to 2.5% of the maximum concentration allowed by national protocols, and only after that to pour water into the sea over 30 years.
Although the Japanese authorities assure that the spill of water will not cause risks to people or contamination to the aquatic fauna of the region, the fishermen remain skeptical, since, since the nuclear accident happened, they are not able to sell their fish to 15 countries.
