The mess following the meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in 2011 continues – and will do for decades!

The latest concern, see for example the Guardian of 16 September, is that the power company Tepco wants to discharge a million or more tons of contaminated water into the sea.

Currently, just over one million tonnes of contaminated water is held in almost 1,000 tanks at Fukushima Daiichi, but [Tepco] will run out of space by the summer of 2022.
… … …
Tepco … removes highly radioactive substances, such as strontium and caesium, from the water but the system is unable to filter out tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that coastal nuclear plants commonly dump along with water into the ocean … water in [the] tanks still contain[s] contaminants beside tritium.

What the other contaminants are we are not told.

Having spent the last eight years trying to rebuild their almost destroyed industry, needless to say the Fukushima fishermen are opposed to the idea.

Understandably this is a problem. Tritium does occur naturally, although at incredibly low levels. So given that its half-life is a little over 12 years, depending on the initial concentration of tritium the water will reduce in radioactivity and toxicity relatively quickly (a few decades) and could eventually be discharged safely.

On the other hand contaminated groundwater is still being recovered and stored at the rate of around 100 tonnes a day. And that’s likely faster than water can be released following the tritium decay.

While the decay products of tritium cannot penetrate skin it can be a concern if ingested in the form of tritiated water (water molecules containing a tritium in place of one of the hydrogens). And of course marine life swims in the would be contaminated water.

So no wonder the Fukushima fishing industry is concerned. It’s a circle that is going to be very hard to square.