The day before, the head of the IAEA, Rafael Grossi, had given Japan the green light for the planned disposal of large amounts of filtered cooling water at sea. Japan’s plan meets international safety standards, the final review report said.
Fishing cooperatives in the three neighboring prefectures of Fukushima, Miyagi and Iwate announced that they would send a petition to the central government and the operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant this week, in which fishermen would demonstrate against the planned dumping of the cooling water. “I am extremely concerned as I don’t know how the release of treated water will affect my work and livelihood,” Japan’s Kyodo news agency said, quoting one of the concerned fishermen in Fukushima. He and his colleagues fear reputational damage and lost sales.
Japan’s plans are also met with concern and rejection in neighboring countries such as China. So far, the South Korean government has emphasized that it intends to maintain the ban on importing fish products from and around Fukushima as long as concerns about the planned disposal of cooling water are not allayed. IAEA chief Grossi travels to Seoul on Friday.
In 2011, an earthquake and tsunami caused the core of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to melt. Destroyed reactors still need to be cooled with water, which is stored in huge tanks. But according to operator group Tepco, there is now no room for that. The water must therefore be filtered through a tunnel built about a kilometer into the sea and discarded diluted. However, the ALPS technical system cannot filter out the tritium isotope. According to Tepco and the IAEA, there is still no danger, as tritium is harmless in small amounts.