Plan to reuse decontaminated soil in Fukushima safe: IAEA

All can say is, if the IAEA approve it, it must be safe, right.

Ohh, apart from I've yet to meet anyone who believes a single statement that comes out of that organization.

spewing massive amounts of radioactive materials into the air, resulting in decontamination of land in the vicinity

decontamination the contamination

Japan plans to recycle roughly 75 percent of the removed soil that contains low concentrations of radioactivity -- or 8,000 becquerels per kilogram -- using it within road embankments, railways, agricultural land and land reclamation, among others.

Sounds nice until you have flood, which Japan just had in past few weeks.

The IAEA also said in its report that Japan's radiation exposure limit can be "sufficiently achieved" by using the recycled soil of 8,000 becquerels per kilogram or less.

Meanwhile

The Act on the Regulation of Nuclear Source Material, Nuclear Fuel Material and Reactors sets the safety criteria for recycling metals and other materials generated from the decommissioning of nuclear reactors at no more than 100 becquerels per kilogram, and requires materials whose radiation levels exceed that level to be buried underground as "radioactive waste." 

and

in the aftermath of the Fukushima meltdowns, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries restricted rice planting in paddies whose radiation levels topped 5,000 becquerels per kilogram of soil.

0rei0Today 07:06 am JST

Ohh, apart from I've yet to meet anyone who believes a single statement that comes out of that organization.

Maybe you haven't. But that still doesn't prove, or even suggest, that they're lying.

I think they were already "recycling" this soil at public works. I noted a large increase in the black storage bags it river bank strengthening works in my area after 2011...

isabelleToday 09:28 am JST

Maybe you haven't. But that still doesn't prove, or even suggest, that they're lying.

I didn't say they were liars- That's your interpretation of what I said.

The rationale behind their existence is to promote the use nuclear energy, so unsurprisingly they rarely have a bad word to say about it.

That seems to me to be far from a balanced view to issue 'Universal' safety statements, from afar.

Data

Today 09:46 am JST

I'm not sure where that number comes from.

> A bit further digging suggests that there are two laws with attached regulations at play.

> Up to 100 Bq/kg anything (including food) is regarded as harmless. Materials that don't hit that limit can be recycled into anything handled by the general public.

> Beyond 100 Bq/kg more special laws come into play depending on the material and its use. For soil, the limit is set at 8,000 Bq/kg.

Yes despite the 100 Bq/kg they established as the safe limit they approved the 8,000 limit for reusing the soil, and despite the 5,000 limit for soil they established as unsafe for cultivating rice.

A clear "live" example of gaslighting

isabelleToday 09:28 am JST

Maybe you haven't. But that still doesn't prove, or even suggest, that they're lying.

I didn't say they were liars- That's your interpretation of what I said.

The rationale behind their existence is to promote the use nuclear energy, so unsurprisingly they rarely have a bad word to say about it.

Excuse me? To ANYONE at the IAEA: Bioaccumulation. ANYONE? Strontium-90, Caesium-134, 137, Plutonium... and a whole sopping list of isotopes harmful to organic life.

"The final destination is yet to be determined", read, Pacific Ocean. Jpn.Inc's dumping ground.

YongYangToday 02:28 pm JST

Excuse me? To ANYONE at the IAEA: Bioaccumulation. ANYONE? Strontium-90, Caesium-134, 137, Plutonium... and a whole sopping list of isotopes harmful to organic life.

I think they understand the issues, since the article says "Soil and waste with higher radiation levels will not be recycled and are scheduled to be disposed of."

"The final destination is yet to be determined", read, Pacific Ocean. Jpn.Inc's dumping ground.

No, it means "yet to be determined." The current candidates for the final disposal site are in Saga and Hokkaido, but the situation is just that - yet to be determined.

https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2024/05/178b40fd7df7-nuclear-waste-site-survey-to-go-ahead-in-southwestern-japan-town.html

read, Pacific Ocean. Jpn.Inc's dumping ground.

If you're talking about the treated water release here (and you may not be), the IAEA has confirmed many times that it is "consistent with international safety standards" and will have a "negligible radiological impact to people and the environment."

https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/iaea-finds-japans-plans-to-release-treated-water-into-the-sea-at-fukushima-consistent-with-international-safety-standards

Of course, you may not trust the IAEA, as it seems is the case with some other posters here. If so, I won't bother trying to convince you.

Data

Today 02:07 pm JST

Yes despite the 100 Bq/kg they established as the safe limit they approved the 8,000 limit for reusing the soil, and despite the 5,000 limit for soil they established as unsafe for cultivating rice.

I'm honestly not sure where you see an inconsistence

Ok

YongYang

Today 02:28 pm JST

Excuse me? To ANYONE at the IAEA: Bioaccumulation. ANYONE? Strontium-90, Caesium-134, 137, Plutonium... and a whole sopping list of isotopes harmful to organic life.

Just to clarify, whatever statements come from iaea is not the same as the spin news and people put on those statements.

That safe wording on the title for example did not come from iaea or I just missed it totally

after "nuclear plants safety myth" ruined, this time "radioactivity safety myth".

Long term damage to health is always difficult to be proved, But government or corporations escape from responsibility is not difficult. Besides, compensation is from taxpayers money in many cases, not from perpetrators.

Also, IAEA seems to repeat to underrate radioactive damage from when Chernobyr disaster.

The contaminated soils should remain in their current locations.

They should also reuse the wastewater

Around 14 million cubic meters of radioactive soil and other waste generated from decontamination activities are placed in the interim facility built near the disaster-stricken Fukushima Daiichi plant.

Another spin is describing the radioactive soil as decontaminated.

If the Magate said that you can drain the waste water into the ocean, then that means the water is clean and you can drain it.

There is nothing safe about the way the Government of Japan has treated this terrible accident.

It is actually difficult to call it an accident when the folks who should have known better did not. They placed an atomic device in a place that was unsafe. Then they started dumping the atomic waste into the ocean after the resulting catastrophy ! This is truly despicable and will long be remembered !

Reusing the highly radioactive soil on AGRICULTURAL land ?!? I will not be trusting any food item with a Made/Grown in Japan label in that case. I'm sure the "specialists" know much better than I but I don't believe these people making these decisions have the pubilc's safety as their top priority. Not happy with this decision. Come on Japan, please try to do better. Saving money anywhere and everywhere isn't going to be to your benefit forever. It will come back to bite you eventually.

We are all part of a large experiment, as the effects of radiation on the human body are dependent on many variables.

Suggesting that ingesting food coming from soil mixed in with contaminated radioactive waste is acceptable is just pure fantasy.

There is nothing safe about the way the Government of Japan has treated this terrible accident. $50 for a Fukushima peach selling at Harrods say other wises. It could be said the post government action to the contamination area has produce a better quality and better price is indication of an exceptional job.

@Data

You are making the same mistakes that many have already made talking about this incident.

A question for you.

What is the safe level of radioactivity for a human?

What is highly radioactive?

please define that.

What are the dangers of radioactive bioaccumulation?

What’s the difference between ingesting radioactive substances or being near them?

Waiting patiently…

To the people who gave thumbs down to my previous post I feel you are blindly protecting anything and all Japanese. This mentality does not help the children of Japan and actually is a detriment to their futures.

Most likely it will be put on some big barges and dumped into the Ocean...

The mistake is you all are overreacting. Your iPhone you are using would cause more damage. You all watch to many docos. You take in too many experts alarmist opinion, not facts. Because it all gets and been tested now go and test your iPhone so you will have some to bark about for real.

Not sure where you two are getting this from..

From the article. That's where. And by the way, why are some people so full-heartedly supporting anything and everything nuclear???!

I personally am not completely against it when it's done correctly but when things are handled poorly and people just defend the nuclear industry no matter what, then I can't help but compare it to how the gun-loving folk here in the US defend the NRA (in America) even in times of mass shootings and absolutely horrific attacks on innocents. These NRA folk come up with THE lamest excuses for not facing the facts and allowing truths to be spoken.

I remember when the Fukushima Meltdown occurred and people were comparing it to Chernobyl. Some even saying it was worse than Chernobyl. Then, people from the IAEA started using technical information saying things like “Chernobyl was worse because more strontium was released but Fukushima had more uranium released”. Now, you never hear the two in the same conversation. What is the truth?

@Data

front the article

I can breathe a sigh of relief if what you're saying is true. Thanks.

Then again, why not just simply keep it away from anything agricultural? It still is a risk and we all know that when something of concern which has been deemed safe at one point in time only becomes to be proven otherwise decades later by which time we are speaking of much more serious health issues such as cancers and birth defects. And as we all know it is extremely difficult to prove the cause of cancers and birth defects while trying to do so also takes decades for victims by which time they are either dead or dying, rather than living their lives.

Being concerned about something like this should not be frowned upon. We should all think, discuss, learn and speak up about matters rather than letting those "wonderful" algorithms define who you are and be your sole source of vital information ( this final comment is directed only to those who take offense at what I stated) ;)