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The removal of hundreds of thousands of tonnes
of water containing tritium, a relatively harmless radioactive
isotope left behind in treated water is one of many issues
facing Tokyo Electric as it tries to cleanup the wrecked plant.
Tokyo Electric wants to release the tritium laced water to the
ocean, a common practice at normally operating nuclear plants
around the world, but is struggling to get approval from local
fisherman, who are concerned about the impact on consumer
confidence and have little faith in the company.
With the release to the ocean stalled, the government task force
overseeing the cleanup is looking at letting the water evaporate
or storing it underground, chief decommissioning officer Naohiro
Masuda, told Reuters at the close of a seminar on
decommissioning.
Masuda said he didn't know when the discussions would be
completed and a decision made.
Time and space is running out for Tepco, which has been forced
to build hundreds of tanks to hold contaminated and treated
water.
The evaporation method was used after the Three Mile Island
disaster but the amounts were much smaller, Dale Klein, an
outside adviser to Tepco told Reuters last week.
"They have huge volumes of water so they cannot evaporate it
like they did at Three Mile Island," Klein said. "If they did it
would likely be evaporated, go out over the ocean, condense and
fall back as rainwater. There's no safety enhancement."
Tepco has been fighting a daily battle against contaminated
water since Fukushima was wrecked by an earthquake and tsunami
in March 2011 and three reactors underwent meltdowns.
Water flushed over the wrecked reactors to keep them cool enough
to prevent further radioactive releases is treated but current
technology can't remove tritium.
"They really do need to make a decision," Klein said. "Storing
it in all those tanks, you are just asking for failure."
Missteps and leaks have dogged the efforts to contain the water,
slowing down the decades-long decommissioning process and
causing public alarm.
"I think they will need to make that decision," U.S. Nuclear
Regulatory Commission Chairman Stephen Burns, said when asked
should Japan release the tritium laced water at a media briefing
at the U.S. Embassy on Wednesday.
(Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
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