FUK-U-SHIMA: Japan Prepares For Release Of Tritium From Fukushima Plant Into The Pacific Ocean - The Radioactive Substance Could Pose SEVERE HEALTH RISKS, Prolonged Exposure Increases Occurrence Of CANCER; Release Could DEVASTATE Local Fisheries!

In this Feb 10 file photo, a worker, wearing protective suits and masks, takes notes in front of storage tanks for radioactive
water at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Toru Hanai/Pool Photo via AP

April 13, 2016 - JAPAN - To dump or not to dump a little-discussed substance is the question brewing in Japan as it grapples with the aftermath of the nuclear catastrophe in Fukushima five years ago. The substance is tritium.

The radioactive material is nearly impossible to remove from the huge quantities of water used to cool melted-down reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, which was wrecked by the massive tsunami in northeastern Japan in March 2011.

The water is still accumulating since 300 tons are needed every day to keep the reactors chilled. Some is leaking into the ocean.

Huge tanks lined up around the plant, at last count 1,000 of them, each hold hundreds of tons of water that have been cleansed of radioactive cesium and strontium but not of tritium.

Ridding water of tritium has been carried out in laboratories. But it’s an effort that would be extremely costly at the scale required for the Fukushima plant, which sits on the Pacific coast. Many scientists argue it isn’t worth it and say the risks of dumping the tritium-laced water into the sea are minimal.

Their calls to simply release the water into the Pacific Ocean are alarming many in Japan and elsewhere.

Rosa Yang, a nuclear expert at the Electric Power Research Institute, based in Palo Alto, California, who advises Japan on decommissioning reactors, believes the public angst is uncalled for. She says a Japanese government official should simply get up in public and drink water from one of the tanks to convince people it’s safe.

But the line between safe and unsafe radiation is murky, and children are more susceptible to radiation-linked illness. Tritium goes directly into soft tissues and organs of the human body, potentially increasing the risks of cancer and other sicknesses.

“Any exposure to tritium radiation could pose some health risk. This risk increases with prolonged exposure, and health risks include increased occurrence of cancer,” said Robert Daguillard, a spokesman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The agency is trying to minimize the tritium from U.S. nuclear facilities that escapes into drinking water.

Right after the March 2011 disaster, many in Japan panicked, some even moving overseas although they lived hundreds of miles (kilometers) away from the Fukushima no-go zone. By now, concern has settled to the extent that some worry the lessons from the disaster are being forgotten.

Tritium may be the least of Japan’s worries. Much hazardous work remains to keep the plant stabilized, and new technology is needed for decommissioning the plant’s reactors and containing massive radioactive contamination.

The ranks of Japan’s anti-nuclear activists have been growing since the March 2011 accident, and many oppose releasing water with tritium into the sea. They argue that even if tritium’s radiation is weaker than strontium or cesium, it should be removed, and that good methods should be devised to do that.

Japan’s fisheries organization has repeatedly expressed concerns over the issue. News of a release of the water could devastate local fisheries just as communities in northeastern Japan struggle to recover from the 2011 disasters.

An isotope of hydrogen, or radioactive hydrogen, tritium exists in water form, and so like water can evaporate, although it is not known how much tritium escaped into the atmosphere from Fukushima as gas from explosions.

The amount of tritium in the contaminated water stored at Fukushima Dai-ichi is estimated at 3.4 peta becquerels, or 34 with a mind-boggling 14 zeros after it.

But theoretically collected in one place, it would amount to just 57 milliliters, or about the amount of liquid in a couple of espresso cups - a minuscule quantity in the overall masses of water.

To illustrate that point, Shunichi Tanaka, chairman of the Nuclear Regulation Authority, showed reporters a small bottle half-filled with blue water that was the equivalent of 57 milliliters.

Public distrust is running so high after the Fukushima accident that Tokyo Electric Power Co, or TEPCO, the utility that operates the Fukushima plant and oversees its decommissioning, has mostly kept quiet about the tritium, pending a political decision on releasing the water.

Privately, they say it will have to be released, but they can’t say that outright.

What will be released from Fukushima will be well below the global standard allowed for tritium in the water, say Tanaka and others favoring its release, which is likely to come gradually later this year, not all at once.

Proponents of releasing the tritium water argue that tritium already is in the natural environment, coming from the sun and from water containing tritium that is routinely released at nuclear plants around the world.

“Tritium is so weak in its radioactivity it won’t penetrate plastic wrapping,” said Tanaka. - Japan Today.

MAJOR ALERT: Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant - Ruptured Berm And Burnt Worker As Missouri River Floods Overflows The Facility!

As the swollen Missouri River surrounds the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant in Nebraska, a 10-mile mandatory evacuation area has been established by authorities in a precautionary step to prevent a major catastrophe. Meanwhile, a worker was burned at the plant as a pump caught on fire.

The head of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said a Nebraska nuclear power plant is safe from flood waters a day after a protective berm failed leaving key parts of the facility surrounded by overflow from the Missouri River. NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko visited the Fort Calhoun plant Monday, and a commission spokeswoman said he found the plant to be in safe condition. Federal officials will continue to oversee steps to control flood waters from the swollen Missouri and plan to conduct a follow-up inspection. "We do have robust systems in place to protect public health and safety," NRC spokeswoman Lara Uselding said. Mr. Jaczko's visit came 8 hours after a protective berm collapsed early Sunday, causing water to surround the containment buildings and key electrical equipment at the Fort Calhoun plant. Local officials in towns around the plant, which is 19 miles north of Omaha, weren't concerned about safety at the plant Monday, saying operators there had the situation under control. The plant is operated by the Omaha Public Power District. Rod Storm, the city administrator of Blair, said officials in the town of about 8,000 people near the plant are more worried about keeping the city's wastewater treatment facility running so it can pump about 10 million gallons of water a day to local industries. The facility sits on the bank of the Missouri River. "We've got a lot to worry about and the event at the nuclear facility is the least of our worries," Mr. Storm said. These days we don't hear too much about the ailing nuclear reactors in Fukushima Japan, but make no mistake the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant remains very serious. Now the U.S. is dealing with it's own potentially serious nuclear situation in Nebraska.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) said the breach in the 2,000-foot inflatable berm around the Fort Calhoun station occurred around 1:25 a.m. local time. More than 2 feet of water rushed in around containment buildings and electrical transformers at the 478-megawatt facility located 20 miles north of Omaha. Reactor shutdown cooling and spent-fuel pool cooling were unaffected, the NRC said. The plant, operated by the Omaha Public Power District, has been off line since April for refueling. Crews activated emergency diesel generators after the breach, but restored normal electrical power by Sunday afternoon, the NRC said. Buildings at the Fort Calhoun plant are watertight, the agency said. It noted that the cause of the berm breach is under investigation. - Wall Street Journal.

A worker at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station was burned while refilling a gas tank on a water pump Thursday. Omaha Public Power District officials said a pump used to remove water seepage caught fire when the employee was refilling its gas tank. The worker was able to put the fire out with a fire extinguisher, but his arms and face were burned. Emergency crews took him outside the plant, where a medical helicopter picked him up and took him to a burn center in Lincoln. Officials said the incident took place outside the security building, which is not part of the power plant. It remains surrounded by a barrier to protect it from the rising Missouri River. OPPD officials stress that the plant was not in danger at any time, and they have notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission about the incident. - KETV.

WATCH: Flood challenges nuclear plant.

WATCH: Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant main building underwater, as a 10-mile mandatory evacuation area is established.

MAJOR ALERT: Flood Berm Collapses at Nebraska Nuclear Plant!

A protective barrier which was holding back floodwater surrounding a nuclear power plant in Nebraska has collapsed, sending water gushing around key electrical equipment. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission confirmed the 2,000-foot berm at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station dramatically collapsed on Sunday.

A berm holding the flooded Missouri River back from a Nebraska nuclear power station collapsed early Sunday, but federal regulators said they were monitoring the situation and there was no danger. The Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station shut down in early April for refueling, and there is no water inside the plant, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said. Also, the river is not expected to rise higher than the level the plant was designed to handle. NRC spokesman Victor Dricks said the plant remains safe. The federal commission had inspectors at the plant 20 miles (32 kilometers) north of Omaha when the 2,000-foot (610-meter) berm collapsed about 1:30 a.m. Sunday.

Water surrounded the auxiliary and containment buildings at the plant, it said in a statement. The Omaha Public Power District has said the complex will not be reactivated until the flooding subsides. Its spokesman, Jeff Hanson, said the berm wasn't critical to protecting the plant but a crew will look at whether it can be patched. "That was an additional layer of protection we put in," Hanson said. The berm's collapse didn't affect the reactor shutdown cooling or the spent fuel pool cooling, but the power supply was cut after water surrounded the main electrical transformers, the NRC said. Emergency generators powered the plant until an off-site power supply was connected Sunday afternoon, according to OPPD. - FOX News.

WATCH: Raw Video - Flood challenges nuclear plant.

WATCH: Top nuclear regulator tours Nebraska nuclear plant.

ALERT: Radioactive Tritium Leaking From American Nuclear Sites!

Radioactive tritium has leaked from three-quarters of U.S. commercial nuclear power sites, often into groundwater from corroded, buried piping.

The number and severity of the leaks has been escalating, even as federal regulators extend the licenses of more and more reactors across the nation. Tritium, which is a radioactive form of hydrogen, has leaked from at least 48 of 65 sites, according to U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission records reviewed as part of the AP's yearlong examination of safety issues at aging nuclear power plants. Leaks from at least 37 of those facilities contained concentrations exceeding the federal drinking water standard - sometimes at hundreds of times the limit. While most leaks have been found within plant boundaries, some have migrated offsite. But none is known to have reached public water supplies. At three sites - two in Illinois and one in Minnesota - leaks have contaminated drinking wells of nearby homes, the records show, but not at levels violating the drinking water standard. At a fourth site, in New Jersey, tritium has leaked into an aquifer and a discharge canal feeding picturesque Barnegat Bay off the Atlantic Ocean.

Previously, the AP reported that regulators and industry have weakened safety standards for decades to keep the nation's commercial nuclear reactors operating within the rules. While NRC officials and plant operators argue that safety margins can be eased without peril, critics say these accommodations are inching the reactors closer to an accident. Any exposure to radioactivity, no matter how slight, boosts cancer risk, according to the National Academy of Sciences. Federal regulators set a limit for how much tritium is allowed in drinking water. So far, federal and industry officials say, the tritium leaks pose no health threat. But it's hard to know how far some leaks have traveled into groundwater. Tritium moves through soil quickly, and when it is detected it often indicates the presence of more powerful radioactive isotopes that are often spilled at the same time. For example, cesium-137 turned up with tritium at the Fort Calhoun nuclear unit near Omaha, Neb., in 2007. Strontium-90 was discovered with tritium two years earlier at the Indian Point nuclear power complex, where two reactors operate 25 miles north of New York City. The tritium leaks also have spurred doubts among independent engineers about the reliability of emergency safety systems at the 104 nuclear reactors situated on the 65 sites. That's partly because some of the leaky underground pipes carry water meant to cool a reactor in an emergency shutdown and to prevent a meltdown. More than a mile of piping, much of it encased in concrete, can lie beneath a reactor. Tritium is relatively short-lived and penetrates the body weakly through the air compared to other radioactive contaminants. Each of the known releases has been less radioactive than a single X-ray. The main health risk from tritium, though, would be in drinking water. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says tritium should measure no more than 20,000 picocuries per liter in drinking water. The agency estimates seven of 200,000 people who drink such water for decades would develop cancer. - App News.