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Japan tries to explain to embassies merits of releasing Fukushima water into ocean

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Sounds legit.

I mean, c'mon, they'd never lie to us, right?

25 ( +27 / -2 )

Well, they figured it worked with people in Japan, why not give it a shot

10 ( +12 / -2 )

1,600th to one-40,000th of the radiation that humans are naturally exposed to.

I would not be particularly welcoming of being radiated by even 1% above of normal exposure for humans. Anyway, can anybody explain to me why Japan needs to brief foreign countries of an autonomous and internal affair issue? Regardless of how disastrous it is? I don't understand.

-13 ( +4 / -17 )

The briefing was attended by 28 embassy officials from 23 countries and regions -- Afghanistan, Belgium, Benin, Brazil, Britain, Cambodia, Canada, Cyprus, East Timor, France, Germany, Italy, Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon, Moldova, Panama, Russia, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey and the European Union.

The USA was not represented? Much of the irradiated water will flow to West Coast US.

17 ( +17 / -0 )

Anyway, can anybody explain to me why Japan needs to brief foreign countries of an autonomous and internal affair issue? Regardless of how disastrous it is? I don't understand.

It won't, if it keeps its filth within its precincts.

15 ( +16 / -1 )

can anybody explain to me why Japan needs to brief foreign countries of an autonomous and internal affair issue?

You see, ocean water isn’t static, it moves all over the world. This means as soon as Japan dumps radioactive water into the Pacific, other countries will be affected when that water flows to foreign shores.

19 ( +20 / -1 )

Japan tries to explain to embassies merits of releasing Fukushima water into ocean

Merits? Does 'merits' have a different meaning in Japanese? I know it means a positive or advantageous thing in English. There is nothing positive or advantageous about releasing over a million tons of irradiated water into the Pacific Ocean. They keep trying to sell this as a positive thing because they have left it so long and ignored it until they have no other choice than to dump it in the ocean.

19 ( +21 / -2 )

The merits? There is ZERO merit.... Japan you created this, don't pollute the rest of the world!

18 ( +21 / -3 )

Not going to help a land of sushi lovers by killing all the fish is it? smh in disbelief!

14 ( +14 / -0 )

Can't find any "merits" in the article after reading the headline's promise.

17 ( +17 / -0 )

To cut through the BS, it’s the cheapest and easiest option available.

18 ( +18 / -0 )

It's disgusting. To even think of doing this reflects the moral vacuum that these dregs occupy.

16 ( +16 / -0 )

All these news updates make me realize that the water will be released into the ocean soon.

There is no doubt that nobody will then want to eat seafood or anything really from that sea area.

But a solution to that problem seems to be more urgent than the locals needs.

The fishermen will sue and get puny damages.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Keep on repeating the same BS until people finally believe it.

Straight from the playbook of conservatives.

11 ( +12 / -1 )

Japan tries to explain to embassies merits of releasing Fukushima water into ocean

They can try all they want. They'll end up looking like a bunch of incompetant fools in a clown car- which pretty much sums up the Fukushima disaster in a nutshell

10 ( +10 / -0 )

here we see the true nature of the Japanese psyche which is we don't care what world opinion is we will do whatever we want

14 ( +15 / -1 )

merits of releasing Fukushima water into ocean

A laudable headline right there!

i wonder how many countries showed them the door like foreigners do to NHK prophets

So, I’m still waiting to read about the “merits”. Also, Korea was not on the “visitation list”?

10 ( +10 / -0 )

Does anyone have a better idea???...... I didn't think so. By the way other countries do the same thing for example France and the US

-17 ( +2 / -19 )

Would it be possible to transfer the water to (oil) supertankers? It would only require 4 of them (320,000 tons capacity each) to store the lot, so far. Surely better than discharging it all in the ocean.

6 ( +6 / -0 )

here we see the true nature of the Japanese psyche which is we don't care what world opinion is we will do whatever we want

Spot on.

12 ( +12 / -0 )

explain to embassies merits

Merits . . .ha! Merits implies that there are some good qualities to this proposal, when in fact it is just the most palatable of the two bad options.

I think the best option would be to load it on to series of large tankers and ship it down to Point Nemo for dumping in international waters. Point Nemo is the furthest you can get from any landmass in the deep South Pacific, half way between New Zealand and South America. It is already used as a dumping ground for de-orbiting spacecraft by the international community, along with all the hazardous chemicals (some radioactive) that go along with them.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

one mention of evaporation (feasible") and not another word about it in the article

8 ( +8 / -0 )

The honest answer is there is nothing else Japan can do.

Water will continue to flow into the reactors and will continue to become contaminated until either the inventory (core/fuel) can be removed or isolated in such a manner it poses no further risk.

Storing all of this water is a near impossible task and the risk of onshore contamination due to a release from an earthquake or other event (which is worse than releasing where it will be heavily diluted) increases every day.

@Jonathon - The supertanker idea does have some merit but there would then be risks of leaks there as well.

Removing my emotion from this all I can say is the engineers tasked with dealing with this problem are in a tough spot.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Another BS facade.

Why don’t the gov explain instead why they purposely dumped radioactive contaminated soil next to riverbanks so that rising waters from typhoon Hagibis “accidentally” swept it into the sea.

Nothing to believe coming from the J gov, Complete crooks and a disgrace.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

@sumikonagoya - Does anyone have a better idea???...... I didn't think so. By the way other countries do the same thing for example France and the US

Yes, there are quite a few alternatives, but they are costly and require management. Firstly, despite what the J-Gov keeps telling everybody, tritium can successfully be removed from water, which is the obvious choice. However, due to sitting on their hands and watching this water build for just shy of a decade it is too late to attempt to remove the tritium due to the huge cost of treating so much water and having no more space on the site to store it. However, there are still scores of square kilometers of uninhabitable land surrounding the plant. The water should be moved to a larger storage area until they can remove the tritium making the water 100% safe to pump into the ocean. There is the better idea!

There was a report late last year where TEPCO admitted the water contained more isotopes than just tritium due to inadequate processing and filtering. It seems quite disturbing that this report has just been buried and forgotten and replaced with the above 'merits' rubbish.

Meanwhile, there is still untreated water leeching into the ocean from the damaged containment vessel after their ice-wall failed miserably, which also seems to be missing from any statements by TEPCO and the criminal organisation known as, the J-Gov.

7 ( +9 / -2 )

Long overdue... Do it already and stop talking about it.

We are running out of space, this water has been filtered many times over, other countries have done similar steps and released it in the ocean to dilute.

S. Korea the biggest anti-Japan country in the world loves to see Japan build millions of containers to keep this water for years now, costing a huge amount of money for the Japanese citizens and taking valuable space and possible leaks the longer you keep them there for decades.

You have to put Japan first, our country first before what half of Korea wants you to do. All of their policies are Anti-Japan in nature, move on and release the water!

-12 ( +2 / -14 )

Can the geologists tell us why it can't be pumped down a volcano? .....

-6 ( +1 / -7 )

@Bamboozler - Can the geologists tell us why it can't be pumped down a volcano? .....

Wow! Have you considered the logistics of getting a million tons of radioactive water into an active volcano? Perhaps they could use skyhooks?

5 ( +6 / -1 )

Tokyo-EngrToday  09:09 am JST

The honest answer is there is nothing else Japan can do. 

Water will continue to flow into the reactors and will continue to become contaminated until either the inventory (core/fuel) can be removed or isolated in such a manner it poses no further risk.

Storing all of this water is a near impossible task and the risk of onshore contamination due to a release from an earthquake or other event (which is worse than releasing where it will be heavily diluted) increases every day.

@Jonathon - The supertanker idea does have some merit but there would then be risks of leaks there as well.

Removing my emotion from this all I can say is the engineers tasked with dealing with this problem are in a tough spot.

I tend to agree with you. This problem needs to be tackled from a dispassionate engineering perspective, not an emotional one - basically the solution with the lowest overall risk. Without being an expert in nuclear physics, I wonder how long it would take for the released water to disperse and dissipate the radiation into nothing more than background levels.

Problem is in the short term, how much of the material is ingested by sea life that eventually finds its way onto our plates before it can reach background levels?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

One major piece of information is missing!

And it is the fact that Japan wants to release over a million tons of contaminated water!

The more radioactive elements released the more they build up in ....everything....

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Let the water slowly evaporate.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

@Hokkaidoboy

Anyway, can anybody explain to me why Japan needs to brief foreign countries of an autonomous and internal affair issue? Regardless of how disastrous it is? I don't understand.

Because it will be released to open water that can reach international water immediately after being released.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

A briefing session was held at the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo to give an update on how more than 1 million tons of water that have been treated and kept in tanks at the crippled complex will be disposed of as storage space is quickly running out.

But no embassy officials voiced such concerns at Monday's briefing, according to the industry ministry.

We will see again another briefing after this that ensure that Fukushima agriculture products including fisheries are safe to consume and will bring to WTO countries that refuse to accept imported products from Fukushima region.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

We will see again another briefing after this that ensure that Fukushima agriculture products including fisheries are safe to consume and will bring to WTO countries that refuse to accept imported products from Fukushima region.

Wakarimasen. What are you trying to say? Briefings don't ensure that agricultural products are safe. The absence of radioactive substances does. Therefore, Fukushima products will clearly not be safe for many generations, regardless of any dim-witted PR stunts the government may try to put together.

Because it will be released to open water that can reach international water immediately after being released.

How very polite of them to tell us they're going to willfully contaminate other countries. I guess that makes it okay. (That's known as sarcasm, by the way.) Foreign representatives are not as gullible as the Japanese public. Fukushima can kiss goodbye to its fishing industry, for a start.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

There seems to be some misunderstanding of how decay in an unstable atom works. Putting the “water in a volcano” or letting it “slowly evaporate” does NOT magically get rid of the radiation.

7 ( +7 / -0 )

Can the geologists tell us why it can't be pumped down a volcano? .....

I'm sure they could, but geologists tend to be a mentally stable bunch, so I'm guessing they wouldn't want to waste their time responding to such utterly childish fantasies.

2 ( +5 / -3 )

Another interesting thing that never seems to get discussed is how long the radiation is actually harmful to the surrounding environment. Take Hiroshima and Nagasaki, for example. After being bombed and covered in fallout, the cities were quickly rebuilt and repopulated. Where did all the fallout go? Quite an amount must have found its way into the groundwater, water supply, soils etc. So aside from people directly exposed to the blast itself and radiation from fallout soon after, what have the effects been on the second generation and beyond since the bombs?

Here's a brief article that summarises a meta-study about it.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/08/160811120353.htm

That said, there's probably a lot more nuclear material at Fukushima than in the bombs, but it's still a question worth asking.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Where was Koizumi kun when this was going down, making PR time with a diaper?

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Dump the water. However, transport it to the middle of the Pacific to do it. The mathematical numbers are on our side. And yes, I will continue to eat sushi, Fukushima peaches, and I have kids and grandchildren.

-8 ( +0 / -8 )

@kyronstavic

Problem is in the short term, how much of the material is ingested by sea life that eventually finds its way onto our plates before it can reach background levels?

If I knew what I was eating, I would never knowingly eat anything caught in Fukushima. The trouble is, there are recent cases on record of false product labeling here in Japan. The only sure way of staying safe is to avoid ocean fish altogether, but who's going to do that? I guess we've all got to die of something...

Another interesting thing that never seems to get discussed is how long the radiation is actually harmful to the surrounding environment. Take Hiroshima and Nagasaki, for example.

Yes, that's an interesting point. I'm not a scientist, but as I understand it, it's harmful for hundreds of years- period. The only really relevant question is "How much radioactive material was/will be released?" I do know that the A-bombs were detonated in mid-air, and although contamination of the soil and water would have occurred, a lot of radiation would also have been carried away on the wind. Also, it was a one-off event. I suspect that the amount of radiation in those blasts would be very small in comparison to Fukushima, especially when you consider that it will take days, weeks... how long?... to dump the massive amount of water that is going to come from Fukushima THIS TIME.

The biggest concern is that this is the first proposed dumping. It's going to take decades to clean up Fukushima. If this "solution" is accepted, they will do it again and again. The likely irreversible damage to the oceans, not just around Fukushima, is unthinkable. I know there is no ideal solution available yet, but until there's something better, they just have to keep building more storage tanks.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

@Tom

Oh, carry it all out into the middle of the Pacific! Why didn't I think of that? There's no marine life out there! How many ship loads are we talking about?

The mathematical numbers are on our side.

Really? What "mathematical" numbers are they?

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Only Japan benefited from their nuclear power plants. Why, for the love of me, should the whole world carry the burden of this problem? Pour the water in their lakes at the center of Japan, then maybe problem solved. Or pay a huge amount of money to other countries.

2 ( +5 / -3 )

"tritium can successfully be removed from water"

Really?

Water contaminated with radioactive materials in the process of cooling the damaged reactors is building up in the storage tanks at the site as tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, cannot be removed using the existing water processing ally?

https://www.google.co.uk/search?source=hp&ei=Wfk4XsOxA8eNoASVyKLQBA&q=removing+radioactive+materials+from+water&oq=removing+radiotive&gs_l=psy-ab

There are some promising tech to remove it but it still on the drawing board.

-5 ( +1 / -6 )

"tritium can successfully be removed from water"

sumikonagoya - Really?

Yes! Really!

The Japanese government and TEPCO have been aware the technology exists to remove tritium from the water stored on the site for many years. However, they have been lying to the Japanese sheeple who are foolish enough to believe them. They even state it cannot be removed in the above article. Half a dozen teams of researchers from all over the globe have successfully removed tritium from water. A team of researchers in Osaka developed a technique in 2018, but the J-Gov and TEPCO are ignoring it. They are LIARS!

Here are a few links for you to read:

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/06/28/national/science-health/radioactive-tritium-removed-water-kindai-university-team-raising-hopes-fukushima-cleanup/#.Xjj9oRMzZTY

https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20180828/p2a/00m/0na/013000c

From 2014 - https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newsremoving-tritium-from-fukushimas-contaminated-water-4915827

4 ( +4 / -0 )

I agree with Tom.

It's no biggie... just dump the water.

Halfway between Japan and Hawaii would be OK.

-6 ( +0 / -6 )

It's no biggie... just dump the water. Halfway between Japan and Hawaii would be OK.

OK for who? Japan or Hawaii? Are you aware of the existence of ocean currents?

Put the water into Lake Inawashiro up the road from the plant. No biggie. After all, it's harmless right?

5 ( +5 / -0 )

If the radioactive waste which the water contains is only tritium, no problem. Nuclear plants all over the world release the water containing tritium into the ocean. The problem is that there is a high probability it's not only tritium the water contains.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2019/09/12/its-really-ok-if-japan-dumps-radioactive-fukushima-water-into-the-ocean/?utm_source=TWITTER&utm_medium=social&utm_term=Dottie%2F#23b2a50cb298

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

@Dr Maybe

Wakarimasen. What are you trying to say? Briefings don't ensure that agricultural products are safe. The absence of radioactive substances does. Therefore, Fukushima products will clearly not be safe for many generations, regardless of any dim-witted PR stunts the government may try to put together.

Not that briefing but other briefing after they released that water, they did that to ensure food safety.

https://www.cccj.or.jp/news/politics/japanese-ministries-host-briefing-foreign-business-community-fukushima-situation

0 ( +0 / -0 )

@Rizdown

I agree with Tom.

It's no biggie... just dump the water.

Halfway between Japan and Hawaii would be OK.

Okay guys, you've convinced me. That's a really fantastic plan... But wait! Actually, we could send hundreds of space craft past the moon each year. Muscular crew members could throw out bucket loads of radioactive water over the moon as they fly past. Sounds reasonable, don't you think?

4 ( +4 / -0 )

"Half a dozen teams of researchers from all over the globe have successfully removed tritium from water."

All of it in the lab, in control conditions, None of it is proven in the real world.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/06/28/national/science-health/radioactive-tritium-removed-water-kindai-university-team-raising-hopes-fukushima-cleanup/#.Xjj9oRMzZTY

and

https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20180828/p2a/00m/0na/013000c

Both links refer to the Kindai team and the tech is still in development. From the article:

The research team will cooperate with local companies in Fukushima Prefecture and others to develop equipment that can be put to actual use to separate tritium.

In other words, they can't do it yet.

Your other link

https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newsremoving-tritium-from-fukushimas-contaminated-water-4915827

Is about a Russian demonstration project and it too, is still under development. From the article:

 RosRAO had in March delivered to Japan a science and technology report on experiments at a demonstration facility 

None of tech is proven.

-4 ( +1 / -5 )

Can the geologists tell us why it can't be pumped down a volcano? .....

Wow! Have you considered the logistics of getting a million tons of radioactive water into an active volcano? Perhaps they could use skyhooks?

geologists tend to be a mentally stable bunch, so I'm guessing they wouldn't want to waste their time responding to such utterly childish fantasies.

Ship it by tanker to somewhere uninhabited like Yokoatejima or Kaminonejima, pump it into the caldera. No water table pollution issues as they're uninhabited, if the volcano wakes up and spouts it back out, no worse than if it had been evaporated in Japan. Most likely better than dumping it in the Pacific, as it stands a good chance of being contained for many years, and not affecting fish stocks or other nations. It might cost a few million dollars to tanker it, ship it and pump it to an elevation of 500 metres or so, but all solutions will have a cost. This is why I asked for geologists' opinions, but all I got were cynics.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Freeze the water into blocks of ice. Toss the lot into a volcano. Maybe a Godzilla-like monster will result. Fun times.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

Ship it by tanker to somewhere uninhabited like Yokoatejima or Kaminonejima, pump it into the caldera.

Sounds legit. Let's turn somewhere prisitine into a nuclear dump. I'm sure the fishermen of Kagoshima will be thrilled. If only volcanic rock wasn't so porous and the logistics involved in doing it so absurd.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

The Government didn’t talk about the overflow before the tanks where put in place. So much destruction of sea life and a huge no life zone just moving around that area. They need to release that water in Fukushima Ghost Towns since no- one can live there anymore for 30 years.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Doesn’t water evaporate? Leaving a radioactive sludge which could then be safely stored? Can someone knowledgeable about these things explain why this isn’t an option?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Sorry folks, but dumping all this water far out in the ocean will not be registerable as a concern or NORM. Please read up on things before declaring the sky is falling.

https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-security/radiation-and-health/naturally-occurring-radioactive-materials-norm.aspx

Excluding uranium mining and all associated fuel cycle activities, industries known to have NORM issues include:

The coal industry (mining and combustion)

The oil and gas industry (production)

Metal mining and smelting

Mineral sands (rare earth minerals, titanium and zirconium).

Fertiliser (phosphate) industry

Building industry

Recycling

Another NORM issue relates to radon exposure in homes, particularly those built on granitic ground. Occupational health issues include the exposure of flight crew to higher levels of cosmic radiation, the exposure of tour guides to radon in caves, exposure of miners to radon underground, and exposure of workers in the oil & gas and mineral sands industries to elevated radiation levels in the materials they handle.

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

I would not be particularly welcoming of being radiated by even 1% above of normal exposure for humans.

Boy then I sure hope you've never ridden in an airplane where you're exposed to 3000% higher levels of radiation than "normal exposure" (correctly known as Background Radiation) for 12-15 hours.

Or worse, Pilots who spend upwards of 50 hours per week at 3000% higher than background levels of radiation. Pilots must be dropping dead all over the place from cancer caused by exposure to such extreme radiation levels.

Ohh wait. That only happened when Fukushima turned California into a Nuclear wasteland, killing 70 Million people in 2012. 8 years later, The entire west coast of the US is still uninhabitable. Clearly the effects of Fukushima were not exaggerated, for nearly a decade now, and therefore dumping the radioactive water into the sea is a bad idea.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Scrubbing most isotopes where will they go?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Hiroshima is a thriving city these days with seafood goodies

so why care about where we are heading

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

Of all those attending it seems only Canada would be in any way affected..possibly a little Russia. What did they have to say? They could store all this radioactive water for years and now it’s OK to release it. What are they going to do with all the impurities? Is anyone learning any lesson out of all this? What next Japan?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

What do any gov't have to explain abt radioactive water ???.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

A laughable headline right there. I can already picture the Japanese deputies explaining to the Western journalists:

"You see, releasing irradiated water into the ocean is perfectly safe for the environment, and it also makes the fishes happy!"

3 ( +3 / -0 )

if the 1/1'600 to 1/40'000 holds water, then i dont see the problem in releasing the water in the ocean... the scientific world should be able to confirm these estimates.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

At the very least, make a serious effort TEPCO/Japan to remove some of the other radioisotopes from the contaminated water.

https://news.rice.edu/2017/01/19/treated-carbon-pulls-radioactive-elements-from-water-2/

Does Japan have the US equivalent of a Superfund Site?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Someone needs to tell Southern California Edison(SCE)/San Onefre of the merits of the "Third Method."

www.desertsun.com

The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is home to 3.55 million pounds of radioactive waste.Jul 27, 2019

and from NRC site (https://www.nei.org/resources/fact-sheets/decommissioning-nuclear-power-plants).

"Contaminated materials can be disposed of in two ways: decontaminated on-site or removed and shipped to a waste-processing, storage or disposal facility."

The NRC and SCE have overlooked the the third method. The Pacific Ocean is just a short walk from the San Onofre storage facility...

As an SCE rate payer, I imagine the savings on my future bills. That is a big merit. Not only that, the US government can save a lot of tax money this way by not having to deal with Hanford, Sandia, Oak Ridge, and the other 1,342 Superfund Sites. I suppose the savings in tax money could be put to other uses; yet another great merit...

0 ( +0 / -0 )

TEPCO has to make room for more contaminated water due to the reactors still requiring cooling to avoid further meltdown. Where else can they dump their responsibilities on to someone else?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

If it's so harmless make your own lake with it

1 ( +1 / -0 )

You get more radiation from a aircraft flight

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

@shane,

That may be what TEPCO states when hiring new employees for the Fukushima site, but I don't buy it.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

@ Shane,

you repeat what you heard without understanding it. like a parrot.

bubble, bubble...

From aircraft flight you get no internal emitters into your body.

some idiots like to "measure" radiation doses in what they call banana units; a foolish thing. bananas contain a lot of K40, a radioactive isotope of potassium, BUT the human content of it is homoeostatically regulated to the lowest possible concentration. co- evolution found this solution. we should not speculate that humankind will find an adequate solution for all the artificial radionuclides from nuclear power plants.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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