Workers at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant have started removing radioactive water that leaked into the basement of the turbine buildings of the No. 1 to No. 3 reactors.
Workers at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant have started removing radioactive water that leaked into the basement of the turbine buildings of the No. 1 to No. 3 reactors.
The removal of the water is essential for restoring electricity to cool the reactors.
The first phase, which began Monday, involves transferring water in the condensate storage tanks outside the reactors' turbine buildings to suppression pool storage tanks with a capacity of 4,000 tons. This phase is expected to take 60 to 90 hours.
The next step involves filling the condensate storage tanks with water from the condensers. The now-empty condensers will take in the leaked radioactive water from the basement.
The trenches around the reactors are also on the verge of overflowing with contaminated water that could spill into the ocean. Workers are searching for empty tanks from other facilities at the plant to collect that water.
But hindering these efforts is the high level of radiation around the No. 2 reactor, at 1,000 millisieverts per hour, as well as debris surrounding the No. 3 reactor.
To prevent the contaminated water from further spreading into the environment, the government is considering creating reservoir pools or using tankers to store the contaminated water.
According to the Nuclear Safety Commission, reservoirs would need to be fully enclosed and built at some distance from the plant to prevent workers from being further exposed to the radiation emitted by the pool.
Seiji Shiroya, a safety commission member, said while contaminated water should normally be decontaminated, building a facility to do so would take years.
The commission is therefore considering temporarily storing the contaminated water inside the factory and later moving it to another location for disposal, said Shiroya, a nuclear engineering expert.