Highly radioactive waste water from a crippled Fukushima nuclear plant has leaked to the Pacific, its operator said on December 06, promising to prevent similar incidents. Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said it believes 150 litres (40 US gallons) of waste water including highly harmful strontium, linked with bone cancers, has spread to the open ocean.
The announcement came a day after TEPCO said it found 45 tonnes of waste water pooled around the leaky water-treatment system at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
TEPCO said on December 05 it believed about 300 litres of waste water have escaped and run into a nearby gutter that leads to the ocean before crews could contain the leaks. The water leaked to the sea is believed to contain 26 billion becquerels of radioactive materials, TEPCO said. The company said, however, human health should not be affected even after eating sea food caught in the area for every day for one year.
"We again sincerely apologise for causing worries and troubles to the area residents as well as the society at large for releasing water containing radioactive materials," TEPCO said in a statement. In the weeks after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit the plant, TEPCO dumped 10,000 tonnes of lower-level radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean.
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