Highly radioactive water from Japan’s crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant is pouring out at a rate of 300 tonnes a day, officials said on Wednesday, as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe ordered the government to step in and help with the cleanup.
The revelation amounted to an acknowledgment that plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) has yet to come to grips with the scale of the catastrophe, two-and-a-half years after the plant was hit by a huge earthquake and tsunami.
TEPCO only recently admitted water had leaked at all.
Calling water containment at Fukushima Dai-ichi an “urgent issue,” Abe ordered the government for the first time to get involved in helping struggling TEPCO handle the crisis.
The leak from the plant 220km northeast of Tokyo is enough to fill an Olympic swimming pool in a week. The water is spilling into the Pacific Ocean, but it was not immediately clear how much of a threat it poses.
As early as January this year, TEPCO found fish contaminated with high levels of radiation inside a port at the plant. Local fishermen and independent researchers had already suspected a leak of radioactive water, but the company denied the claims.
Fukushima Fisheries Federation chairman Tetsu Nozaki said he had only heard of the latest estimates of the magnitude of the seepage from media reports.
Environmental group Greenpeace said TEPCO had “anxiously hid the leaks” and urged Japan to seek international expertise.
“Greenpeace calls for the Japanese authorities to do all in their power to solve this situation, and that includes increased transparency … and getting international expertise in to help find solutions,” Rianne Teule of Greenpeace International said in a statement.
In the weeks after the disaster, the government allowed TEPCO to dump tens of thousands of tonnes of contaminated water into the Pacific in an emergency move, but the escalation of the crisis raises the risk of an even longer and more expensive cleanup, already forecast to take more than 40 years and cost US$11 billion.
The admission further dents the credibility of TEPCO, criticized for its confused response to the disaster during which it covered up shortcomings.
“We think that the volume of water is about 300 tonnes a day,” said Yushi Yoneyama, an official with the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which oversees energy policy.
Tatsuya Shinkawa, a director in the ministry’s Nuclear Accident Response Office, told reporters the government believed water had been leaking for two years, but Yoneyama said it was unclear how long the water had been leaking at the current rate.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique