Tokyo Electric Power, (TEPCO) the utility operating Fukushima's Daiichi plant, hit by a powerful tsunami
in March that caused the world's worst nuclear accident in 25 years,
said it was running out of space to store some of the water it treated
at the plant, due to an inflow of groundwater.
Thousands of tonnes of water have been pumped into reactors at Fukushima
in an effort to cool the molten nuclear fuel and bring the plant to a
safe shutdown. Within weeks of the world's worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl, TEPCO
dumped more than 10,000 tons of low-level radioactive water into the
Pacific.
Subsequent reports have found the radiation was widely dispersed and did not pose a threat to human or animal life. But Ogawa said the water release plan was outrageous, especially
after the power company had to apologise this week for accidentally
leaking highly radioactive waste water into the Pacific.
TEPCO plans to come up with possible ways to handle radioactive waste
and present its proposals to the government's nuclear regulatory body
for approval. The operator estimates that due to the inflow the amount of water requiring storage is increasing by 200 to 500 tons every day. The utility released more than 10,000 tons of water tainted with low
levels of radiation in April to free up space for water with much higher
levels of radioactivity, drawing sharp criticism from neighbors such as
South Korea and China.
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| New nuclear water dump; TEPCO |
TEPCO May Dump Decontaminated Water into Sea
Japan Plant Operator Mulls New Nuclear Water Dump
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