Dozens rally against Fukushima plant water release plan

Japanese officials say the water will be filtered to far below international releasable levels and further diluted by large amounts of seawater before release, making it harmless. However, some scientists say the impact of long-term, low-dose exposure to tritium and other radionuclides on the environment and people is still unknown and the release should be delayed.

Since when do officials care about the environment?

Look at the mess that Japan has become with officials in charge of housing and roads overbuilt or leading nowhere

Bioaccummulatiion in the environment is never spoken about by ‘officials’ but each time dumping goes on then the environmental radioactivity gets higher…

Those people who decide and pro for water to be released should provide proof by drinking those water in front of media and public.

Dozens of anti-nuclear activists protested

Dozens? How many "dozen", three, five, seven?

Several activists from South Korea

I am not especially impressed by the turn out.

sakurasukiToday  07:02 am JST

Those people who decide and pro for water to be released should provide proof by drinking those water in front of media and public.

Sounds like you don’t understand how the process works. You are drinking polluted water every day. Even rain water is not clean anymore in any part of the world due to air pollution.

You are eating microplastics daily. The amount of hormones and medicine leftover that circulates into the environment is huge.

Why would you suddenly care about tritium? “Because radiation is bad”?

I understand people's concerns about this release of water, but what is the alternative? They cannot continue to build tanks holding the cooling water forever. I'm fairly certain they have looked at all other options and this is the best of them all, no? They are kind of damned if you do and damned if you don't.

sakurasukiToday  07:02 am JST

Those people who decide and pro for water to be released should provide proof by drinking those water in front of media and public.

The final release will have a concentration of tritium 100 times less than what you’re drinking now.

And it will be salt water.

Barely enough people for a soccer team, but “newsworthy.”

I mean I agree with them but also it’s a literal “there’s dozens of us “ meme in real life.

also “don’t nuke the pacific”… kid I got some world history/wiki articles from the last 70 years for you to look at

Dozens of protesters, now that's a hell of a lot in Japanese terms. Most are so subservient and singularly focused, they find it hard to remove their heads from the sand. In the meantime, the Pacific will be nuked.

The amount of wastewater being generated at the plant amounts to approximately 140 tons, now if a ton is equal to about 268 gallons of water, this would mean that for the more than 1million tons of water that is already in storage, this is equivalent to 268 million tons of water; I assure you, having that much water around a defunct nuclear facility poses a risk in itself as another earthquake or even more devastating tsunami may occur at anytime, sure they’ve already rebuilt sea defenses and upgraded them to account for any major surge over a period of about 5 centuries or so, but it’s really hard to determine just how big the next tsunami could be or when it could happen. Storing that much water underground also poses its on risks and would be a very expensive undertaking, something that politicians would always frown upon. They’re just delaying the inevitable at this point. That’s what we get for harnessing resources with a negative effect on our terrestrial ecosystem despite the scientific backing of the water being “technically” safe for the dumping into the pacific.

Just dump the water and move on. I'm pretty sure they've weighed all possible options and safe alternatives and this is probably the best one. They can't store it on land forever. People will complain about any and everything. Just get it over with.

TEPCO should go bankrupt for the catastrophe they've created.

Instead we have a 42% increase in household electricity prices, and a Tritium yuru-chara on TV.

Sorry but democracy does not exist in Japan. it is only a delusion

Dozens is about right.....in general Japanese dont do protests no matter what the cause is.

Truth is they have probably been secretly letting it out into the sea already, because there is no way they could have stored all that water since 2011.

TEPCO should go bankrupt for the catastrophe they've created.

Instead we have a 42% increase in household electricity prices, and a Tritium yuru-chara on TV.

exactly

Sorry but democracy does not exist in Japan. it is only a delusion

Hit the nail on the head!

The government is currently paying until September 20% of the monthly power bills and gas if it's city gas.

TEPCO's lowest rate is ¥19.88 kWh to ¥30.57 kWh. ¥15.90 to ¥24.45 with subsidies.

MarkXToday  08:03 am JST

I understand people's concerns about this release of water, but what is the alternative? They cannot continue to build tanks holding the cooling water forever. 

You don’t really need a viable alternative plan, nor any real sophisticated understanding of the issues you (think you) stand for when you are an activist. Low-resolution moralism is suffice when you are on the side of the 'good'.

”Don’t dump contaminated water into sea!”

There, you’ve been told.

トリチウムくん had a short life.

https://youtu.be/-us4B0MvM6Y?t=42

We are lucky that it stopped before convenience stores start selling Poccari Tritium Sweat, Tritium Pan and Strong Tritium Zero.

"The Pacific Ocean does not belong to Japan."

Tell that to the Japanese. East Sea doesn't belong to them either, but hey, most still call it the "Japan Sea".

In any case, when they dump, all fisheries products from Japan should be banned immediately, and Japan sued for any radioactive materials sensed on the shores of other nations. The "There's nothing else we can do!" argument doesn't cut it when they are still funding the company responsible for this mess.

South Korea’s key Wolseong Nuclear Power Plant released around 17 trillion becquerels in liquid form and around 119 trillion becquerels in vapor form, adding up to the equivalent of roughly 136 trillion becquerels total in 2016.

In 2015 the La Hague nuclear fuel reprocessing facility in France released roughly 13,778 trillion Bq into the ocean and atmosphere.

Also in 2015, the Sellafield reprocessing facility in the United Kingdom released approximately 1,624 trillion Bq, while the Darlington Nuclear Generating Station in Canada released 495 trillion Bq the same year.

For the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant of Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited, the operational target value for discharge of tritium is 1,000 trillion Bq/year and 9,700 trillion Bq/year for gases and liquids, respectively.

@wallace, please stop going out of topic. focus in Japan.

lunatic

so I shouldn't mention the other countries which have released huge amounts of tritium because it weakens your argument?

I am not saying I support the release of the water but many other countries continue to release tritium too. The atomic bomb testing released huge amounts.

TEPCO's forecast looked at four scenarios for releasing the contaminated water into the ocean, ranging from 22 trillion to 100 trillion becquerels annually based on the tritium amount released from nuclear power facilities in Japan and abroad.

"The regulatory limit for tritium concentrations is 60,000 becquerels per liter. An annual emission target is set by each nuclear power facility. Fukushima Daiichi Plant’s pre-accident target was 22 trillion becquerels per year.

Based on the facility’s legal radiation dose limit (1 millisievert / year), TEPCO’s regulatory limit for tritium is set at 1500 becquerels per liter when releaseing water from the subdrain* or the groundwater bypass system.

Regulatory limits for tritium concentrations in drinking water vary widely; the WHO limit is 10,000 becquerels per liter, in Canada it is 7,000 becquerels per liter (Ontario Drinking Water Advisory Council ), in the USA it is 740 becquerels per liter, and in the EU it is 100 becquerels per liter.

*By pumping up groundwater from a well located near the building, the subdrain lowers the groundwater level, preventing the flow of groundwater into the building, and the outward flow of groundwater on the sea-side of the building."

TEPCO is not very good forecasting anything.

We all know exactly how TEPCO faked the radiation numbers of the triple meltdown, the inspection reports all over decades, the monitoring of radiation spreading.

To put a 3rd party in charge of the sampling and measurements would be for the best.

We all know exactly how TEPCO faked the radiation numbers of the triple meltdown, the inspection reports all over decades, the monitoring of radiation spreading.

How did they do that and what were the figures?

The water could be turned into concrete blocks or pods and stored or used on the coast.

The water cooling problem will last for several decades until TEPCO can think of a way to remove the molten fuel. The other side of 2050.

TEPCO does not listen to anyone here so its all academic.

トリチウムくん had a short life.

Oh, interesting. But from what I can see the only time he was "on TV" was when the news reported that he was pulled the next day. Blink and you miss it, and I blinked.

Learn somethin new everyday. Never seen tapdancers dance eyes shut before?

TEPCO does not listen to anyone

TEPCO is well protected by the Japanese government as most nuclear power generators across the world are.

And as consumers we can avoid food from Fukushima and travel to the area.

Bioaccumulation is a real danger for residents of Fukushima

The Japanese government is and has hidden the truth from the Japanese public and the world - corruption and lies are very much in evidence…

Why care about next generations?