Radioactive water leak (follow-up)

April 6, 2013

TEPCO removing radioactive water

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20130406_13.html

Tokyo Electric Power Company has begun transferring radioactive water from a leaking storage tank at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The company says radioactive strontium and other substances were detected on the ground around a storage tank from Wednesday to Friday.

TEPCO estimates that 120 tons leaked so far based on the change in the level of water in the tank.

The work began on Saturday morning.

Workers are using 4 pumps to transfer radioactive water in the tank to an adjacent tank.

The utility says the leaked water has not flowed into the ocean because there is no ditch around the tank, and the sea is some 800 meters away.

TEPCO says it will take at least 5 days to finish the transfer of water.

Fukushima reservoir tank may have leaked contaminated water

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130406p2g00m0dm003000c.html

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Friday that up to 120 tons of contaminated water may have leaked into soil from one of the seven underground reservoir tanks at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Around 13,000 cubic meters of contaminated water remain in the tank, with TEPCO having begun transferring it to other tanks nearby with four pumps on Saturday morning, the utility said.

It will take roughly five days to complete the transfer, TEPCO added.

Radioactive substances have been detected in water accumulated around the tank, which measures some 60 meters long, 53 meters wide and 6 meters deep and is covered by three layers of waterproof sheets.

According to TEPCO and the Nuclear Regulation Authority, around 6,000 becquerels of radiation per cubic centimeter were logged Friday in water between the sheets. Trace amounts of radioactive substances were also detected in water between the outermost sheet and the soil.

The tank stores water used to cool down atomic reactors at the crippled plant after radioactive cesium is removed, but other radioactive substances are thought to remain.

The tank is around 800 meters from the ocean and TEPCO believes the contaminated water is unlikely to flow into the sea.