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Group of IAEA experts begins review of Fukushima water treatment process

The previous review testing sea water near the nuclear facility was held last October

TOKYO, April 23. /TASS/. A task force from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), including independent experts from a number of countries, has launched a review of the treated radioactive water discharge process at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), Kyodo reported.

It is expected that during the review slated to run until April 26, the task force will inspect the safety and normative aspects of the process.

The previous review testing sea water near the nuclear facility was held last October. The task force includes independent international experts from Argentina, Australia, Canada, China, France, Russia, South Korea, the UK, the US and Vietnam.

In March 2011, a tsunami knocked out power and cooling facilities at the Fukushima NPP, leading to a nuclear meltdown in three reactors, the destruction of their casings, explosions and the release of large amounts of radioactive material. To date, the plant and surrounding areas have been almost completely cleaned up. However, the water that is constantly poured into the destroyed reactors to cool down nuclear fuel fragments flows out through gaps highly contaminated with radioactive particles.

There are currently over 1.34 mln tons of water at the NPP. That said, the Japanese government decided to gradually treat and then discharge this water into the sea. The process is expected to take 30 to 40 years. The water is treated through the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) and is also diluted with seawater but still contains tritium that cannot be removed. The maximum allowable concentration of tritium is 1,500 becquerels per liter, and the measurements that the Japanese officials and IAEA experts take in the ocean confirm that the treated water meets these parameters.

Tokyo’s decision triggered negative reactions by a number of countries. Thus, China stopped importing seafood from Japan from August 24, 2023, when the first batch of water was discharged into the ocean. On October 16, 2023, Russia’s agricultural watchdog joined China’s temporary ban on imports of fish and seafood from Japan as a precaution.

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