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Introduction
by Akio Matsumura
Contaminated water is posing a new problem at the Fukushima site. Tepco must continue to cool the irradiated fuel rods, but has not devised a permanent and sustainable disposal process for the highly radioactive contaminated water that results. While they have a process that can remove much of the radiation from the water, some elements like tritium – a carcinogen – cannot be removed and is concentrating at magnitudes much higher than is legal. Tepco wants to spill the water into the Pacific Ocean in order to dilute the tritium levels to legal amounts, but fishermen skeptical of the power company oppose the move. Meanwhile, Tepco is storing the contaminated water in tanks. Unsurprisingly, those tanks are leaking (NYT). They admit they will eventually run out of space for the storage tanks.
Management of the contaminated cooling water has come to be the most demanding and dangerous issue that Tepco has faced since 2011.
Background
According to the Japan Times (excerpted):
… Continue readingAs of May 7, Tepco had routed 290,000 tons of radioactive water into some 940 huge tanks at the complex, but 94,500 tons remain inside the basement floors of the reactor buildings and other facilities.
Tepco must perpetually pour water over the melted cores of reactors 1, 2, and 3 via makeshift systems to prevent the fuel from melting and burning again.
But the cores’ containment vessels were damaged by the meltdowns, allowing the highly radioactive coolant water to leak and flow into the basements.