Three types of contaminated water

July 6, 2013

Column] Summary of Fukushima situation ~Contaminated water problem

Posted by Mochizuki on July 6th, 2013

http://fukushima-diary.com/2013/07/column-summary-of-fukushima-situation-contaminated-water-problem/

There was a hope in pandora’s box.
In Fukushima, the bottom is already melted through.

Most of the people are controlled by mood. Not even emotion. We are not allowed to talk about something real in public.
People who are still concerned about Fukushima are scattered around in the world. It’s almost impossible to reach them in the traditional way, but internet, google and SNS make it possible fortunately. I’m happy about that.

I’m trying to explain the situation as simply as possible. However, the situation is getting more complicated and more.

The “hottest” topic about Fukushima is “contaminated water” recently. You can’t mistake these 3 types of contaminated water.

1. Contaminated water in the basement floor of the plant

Now 400m3 of groundwater flows into the basement of the plant everyday.
They have to choose one of these two, “Let it out” or “Let it in”. Because they can’t spread contamination, they let it in. They are pumping it up and reserving.

2. Leaking contaminated water from reservoir

Because they are in short of contaminated water (The one above) storage, they made underground reservoirs and stocked. However, the vinyl cover was broken and reserved water leaked.
It happened this April and they transferred the reserved water to spare tanks.
For some reason, they are still detecting high level of radiation from around the reservoirs.

3. Contaminated groundwater

This May, they detected extremely high level of Tritium from groundwater. This is the hittest topic recently. Officially, this has nothing to do with “1″ or “2″ above. Tepco assumes it is due to the leakage in 2011.
In order to see if it’s not flowing to the sea, Tepco is testing seawater, but the radiation level is significantly increasing. It’s already leaking to the sea for almost sure.
As countermeasures, Tepco is planning to inject grout into the ground and “watch the contamination trend carefully”. The former attempt hasn’t been started. The latter attempt is useless.
I hope I made the situation a little bit clearer.
The temperature of reactors look stable, but the contaminated water situation still has a long way to go.

Fukushima contamination spreads in various ways, from the sea, air, products, food etc.. It has just started.

Officially, it’s going to take 40 years to decommission (If someone develops the technology). Until then, radioactive material keeps spreading and it’s accumulated in the environment. We shall calculate from the inevitable result. This is what Fukushima Diary is trying to tell.