The amount of radiation waste created from the treatment of highly radioactive water at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is estimated at 2,000 cubic meters, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said June 9.
The amount of radiation waste created from the treatment of highly radioactive water at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is estimated at 2,000 cubic meters, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said June 9.
Details on how to dispose of the radiation waste have yet to be determined.
TEPCO will operate equipment on June 15 to purify radioactive water. During the process, radioactive substances in the water, such as cesium, strontium and iodine, will be either separated by a special chemical agent or removed by zeolite, an agent that absorbs cesium.
When the process is completed, the radioactive waste will remain on the bottom of a container used in the process.
The radiation level of the waste is expected to be more than 100 times the level of the highly radioactive water at the plant, and will require remote operations to handle the substances.
The waste will be held in a storage pool in the basement of the plant's water treatment facilities or in newly installed tanks for the time being.
Apart from the radiation waste, the containers--each 2.3 meters in height and 90 centimeters in diameter--holding the used zeolite will also be stored in a safe place. When the radiation level of the container's surface is measured at 4 millisieverts per hour, the container will be replaced with a new one.
TEPCO will use two to four containers a day in the early phase of the project, totaling 400 containers in a year.
After the treatment process, the radiation levels of water at the plant are expected to be lowered to between one-1,000th and one-10,000th of the current levels. The treated water will be stored in a makeshift tank and be reused to cool reactors at the plant.
TEPCO will decontaminate 1,200 tons of radioactive water every day until December, meaning it will purify 200,000 tons in total, including water still at the plant now.
Currently, TEPCO is injecting 500 tons of water a day into the reactors to cool them. The company expects to see the amount of radioactive water go down once the purification process starts.
TEPCO also said it will install other purification facilities in August.