From Global Times

Xu Keyue and Xing Xiaojing
May 19, 2023

Although Japan suffered a lot from the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in WWII as well as the Fukushima nuclear accident in March 2011, the Japanese government has seemingly failed to learn from history and insists on dumping nuclear-contaminated wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the sea. The plan has continued to arouse opposition and skepticism at home and abroad.

Japanese lawmakers and international nuclear experts said in recent exclusive interviews with the Global Times that they are opposed to the dumping plan, stressing that this disposal is not the only way to deal with the nuclear-contaminated wastewater, and it is unacceptable to experiment with the future of the Earth.

Public opposition and recourse to the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Law of the Sea can be regarded as effective ways to prevent the Japanese government from insisting on pushing forward with the plan.

“I oppose the discharge of Fukushima nuclear-contaminated wastewater into the sea,” Junichi Tamatsukuri, Japanese lawmaker in Ibaraki Prefecture, told the Global Times.

Two nuclear accidents have occurred in and around his prefecture. The first was the Tokaimura critical nuclear accident in a small fuel preparation plant operated by JCO (formerly Japan Nuclear Fuel Conversion Co) in September 1999. The second was the Fukushima nuclear accident in March 2011. The two accidents severely affected the local economy, with consumers worried that food produced in Ibaraki contained radioactive substances that could harm their health. Many people have stopped visiting Ibaraki out of safety concerns.

“Local people from all walks of life have been working hard for years to recover from the economic losses caused by the two accidents,” Tamatsukuri said. “If the nuclear-contaminated wastewater from Fukushima is released into the sea this time, many industries such as fishing, agriculture, industry and tourism in Ibaraki Prefecture will be affected,” the lawmaker said.

Shaun Burnie, a senior nuclear expert at the Japan office of the international environmental organization Greenpeace, told the Global Times that the Japanese government and TEPCO have failed to explain their scientific justification for the discharge plan and have so far ignored the opposition of communities in Fukushima – especially the fishing communities.

Organically bound tritium (OBT) in the contaminated water is a “particular concern, because the amount to be discharged is on a vast scale,” said the expert who has been working on nuclear issues for nearly 40 years and radioactive waste discharge for more than 30 years.

“The Japanese government and TEPCO have deliberately miscommunicated on the risks of radionuclide tritium,” Burnie said. “They only focus on the external hazards, but the problem with tritium is when it is inside plants or seaweed, animals, fish or shellfish and humans,” Burnie said.

The scientific literature shows OBT has the potential to bio-accumulate and even potentially bio-magnify – as a slow energy radionuclide, when tritium is inside cells it can repeatedly damage the DNA structure. In this way, tritium is a much more dangerous radionuclide than the Japanese government and TEPCO have claimed, Burnie warned.

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