An estimated 5,500 liters of radioactive water leaked from Japan’s stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant but no sign of contamination has been detected outside the facility, its operator said yesterday.
A spokeswoman from Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said that the leak was detected at part of the plant that processes contaminated water.
“We estimate that roughly 5.5 tonnes [5,500 litres] of water leaked” on Wednesday morning, but “there have been no significant changes” at posts monitoring radioactivity around the power station, she said.
Photo Tokyo Electric Power Co via AFP
Even so, TEPCO plans to remove soil from around the area that might have been contaminated, the spokeswoman said, without providing specific details on the location of the leaked water.
The Fukushima plant was wrecked by a huge earthquake and tsunami in 2011 that killed 18,000 people. It was one of the worst nuclear disasters in history.
The clean-up operation is expected to take decades, with the most dangerous part — removing radioactive fuel and rubble from three stricken reactors — yet to begin.
In August last year, Japan began gradually releasing into the Pacific Ocean 1.34 million tonnes of treated wastewater that had collected since the catastrophe, saying it is harmless and heavily diluted with seawater.
This view is backed by the UN atomic watchdog, but China and Russia have criticized the release and banned Japanese seafood imports.
Wednesday’s leak took place at a facility which processes the water before most radioactive elements are filtered out at a different, advanced facility known as ALPS.
TEPCO said the leak from a vent was spotted by a worker who was cleaning the vent before operating the facility.
“Vents should be closed during cleaning, but this time they were open,” the spokeswoman said.
FALSE DOCUMENTS? Actor William Liao said he was ‘voluntarily cooperating’ with police after a suspect was accused of helping to produce false medical certificates Police yesterday questioned at least six entertainers amid allegations of evasion of compulsory military service, with Lee Chuan (李銓), a member of boy band Choc7 (超克7), and actor Daniel Chen (陳大天) among those summoned. The New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office in January launched an investigation into a group that was allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified medical documents. Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) has been accused of being one of the group’s clients. As the investigation expanded, investigators at New Taipei City’s Yonghe Precinct said that other entertainers commissioned the group to obtain false documents. The main suspect, a man surnamed
The government is considering polices to increase rental subsidies for people living in social housing who get married and have children, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said yesterday. During an interview with the Plain Law Movement (法律白話文) podcast, Cho said that housing prices cannot be brought down overnight without affecting banks and mortgages. Therefore, the government is focusing on providing more aid for young people by taking 3 to 5 percent of urban renewal projects and zone expropriations and using that land for social housing, he said. Single people living in social housing who get married and become parents could obtain 50 percent more
DEMOGRAPHICS: Robotics is the most promising answer to looming labor woes, the long-term care system and national contingency response, an official said Taiwan is to launch a five-year plan to boost the robotics industry in a bid to address labor shortages stemming from a declining and aging population, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. The government approved the initiative, dubbed the Smart Robotics Industry Promotion Plan, via executive order, senior officials told a post-Cabinet meeting news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s population decline would strain the economy and the nation’s ability to care for vulnerable and elderly people, said Peter Hong (洪樂文), who heads the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Department of Engineering and Technologies. Projections show that the proportion of Taiwanese 65 or older would
Democracies must remain united in the face of a shifting geopolitical landscape, former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) told the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday, while emphasizing the importance of Taiwan’s security to the world. “Taiwan’s security is essential to regional stability and to defending democratic values amid mounting authoritarianism,” Tsai said at the annual forum in the Danish capital. Noting a “new geopolitical landscape” in which global trade and security face “uncertainty and unpredictability,” Tsai said that democracies must remain united and be more committed to building up resilience together in the face of challenges. Resilience “allows us to absorb shocks, adapt under
RSS