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Radioactive waste can be classified as either high-level or low-level waste
RADIOACTIVE OCEAN
Dear HIW, I’m a school student in New Zealand. I’ve been reading your magazine since the start of this year. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you and the team for making such an incredible magazine to read. I heard that Japan has been dumping radioactive waste in the sea. Is this true, and how could it affect sea life and humans?
Ella
Towards the end of August 2023, it was announced that Japan will release treated radioactive wastewater into its seas. This wastewater was used to cool down parts of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, which was flooded by a tsunami in 2011, causing radiation to leak from the plant. Everyone in the local town of Okuma was evacuated while work to decontaminate the site began. This process involved using water to cool the reactors, mixing the used water with rain and groundwater and storing the
contaminated waste in large tanks. Recently, however, Japan stated that there was limited space left to store this, and a new plan was revealed to dilute the water to make it safer, then release it into the ocean from 24 August 2023.