Source: Associated Press Deep beneath Fukushima’s crippled nuclear power station, a massive underground reservoir of contaminated water that began spilling from the plant’s reactors after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami has been creeping slowly toward the Pacific. Now, 2 1/2 years later, experts fear it is about to reach the ocean and greatly worsen what is fast becoming a new crisis [...] [...] experts believe the underground seepage from the reactor and turbine building area is much bigger and possibly more radioactive [than highly contaminated water in storage tanks with 80 million Bq/liter], confronting [Tepco] with an invisible, chronic problem and few viable solutions. [...] To keep the melted nuclear fuel from overheating [funnels] water into the broken reactors [which] leaks into the reactor basements during the cooling process — then through cracks into the surrounding earth and groundwater. [...] [...] According to a Japan Atomic Energy Agency document, the contaminated underground water is spreading toward the sea at a rate of about 4 meters (13 feet) a month. [...] The Experts Atsunao Marui, underground water expert at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology and member of a government committee studying Fukushima Daiichi’s contaminated water problem: “The water from that area is just about to reach the coast [...] We must contain the problem as quickly as possible.” Toyoshi Fuketa, Nuclear Regulation Authority commissioner: “This is a race against the clock.” Ken Buesseler, marine chemist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts: “Any contamination in the groundwater would eventually flow into the ocean. That is very difficult to stop even with barriers.” Masakazu Yabuki, isherman in Iwaki (40 km south of plant): “Nobody knows when this is going to end.”
Posted on: Sat, 24 Aug 2013 20:35:20 +0000
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