United Nations nuclear watchdog says Japan can release nuclear wastewater into the ocean

Japan plans to release more than one million tons of nuclear wastewater into the Pacific.

Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

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Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Japan plans to release more than one million tons of nuclear wastewater into the Pacific.

Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

MANILA, Philippines The International Atomic Energy Agency has approved a plan by Japan to dump more than one million tons of treated nuclear wastewater from the destroyed Fukushima nuclear power plant into the ocean, despite vehement international opposition.

In a report released on Tuesday, the IAEA said it had concluded, after a two-year evaluation, that the plan is “consistent with relevant international safety standards” and that while social, political and environmental concerns have been raised, the discharged water “will have a negligible radiological impact on people and the environment.”

IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi traveled to Tokyo to present the findings to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. During a press conference, Grossi said the UN nuclear watchdog will monitor the dumping from the site.

“This will ensure that relevant international safety standards continue to apply during the ten-year process established by the Government of Japan and TEPCO [Tokyo Electric Power Company]Grossi told reporters at the Japan National Press Club on Tuesday.

The plan was first presented in 2021 by the Japanese government, its Nuclear Regulation Authority and TEPCO, the operators of the destroyed Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. All claim that the process is safe.

The water, which was used to cool the plant’s fuel rods in 2011 after the meltdown of three of its reactors, will be treated and released into the Pacific Ocean over the next 30 to 40 years. The disaster was caused by tsunami waves triggered by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake.

Japan has not yet said when it will start releasing the water, as it awaits IAEA approval.

The plan has drawn significant criticism from the scientific community, with many scientists saying they are not convinced by the Japanese government and TEPCO’s claims that it is certain that the treated wastewater will essentially be diluted into the ocean.

Robert Richmond, a biologist at the University of Hawaii and one of five experts commissioned by the Pacific Islands Forum to study the plan, said scientists in Japan have not provided enough evidence that harmful elements will not be released into the ocean.

“There are major gaps in critical information that are needed for us to make the final decision,” said Richmond, who noted that the panel raised this and other issues with the Japanese government, but to no avail.

He says this is problematic because harmful elements can bind to ocean sediments and living organisms, potentially damaging their DNA and causing mutations. “We are unanimous that this has not been proven safe,” Richmond says.

The plan has also drawn criticism both domestically and internationally, from neighboring countries such as South Korea, the Philippines and China. Their argument is that it is a cross-border issue that the sewage released by Japan will not just stay in and around Japan.

“I would like to emphasize that Japan’s release of nuclear-contaminated treated water from the Fukushima plant affects the global marine environment and public health, which is not a private matter for the Japanese,” he said at the start of this issue. ‘year Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning.

Further afield, many Pacific Island nations and their residents have also voiced all-out opposition, citing a threat to their livelihoods and oceanic way of life. Meanwhile, many across the Pacific say the sewage release plan is a continuation of the Pacific’s traumatizing relationship with nuclear technology and harkens back to a past in which larger powers used their islands and people as collateral damage. to further their nuclear ambitions.

Bedi Racule, a Fiji-based nuclear justice advocate, says she was shocked when she found out about Japan’s nuclear waste release plan because she thought nuclear issues were a thing of the past. Racule hails from the Marshall Islands, where the United States tested nearly 70 atomic bombs over 12 years, including Operation Castle Bravo in 1954, the first test of the hydrogen bomb.

“[The shock] It was a really common experience for young Pacific people who often don’t even realize how much testing has been done in the Pacific, the ongoing health and environmental impacts, and how nuclear colonialism continues today through the development of the ‘nuclear energy and nuclear weapons,” she said.

However, not all leaders of the Pacific island nations are against the plan. The leaders of Micronesia and Papua New Guinea recently spoke in favor of it, citing trust in the Japanese government to respect safety standards.