MOSCOW, Aug 24 Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova, commenting on the beginning of the discharge of water into the ocean from the emergency Japanese nuclear power plant Fukushima-1, she said that Russia expects Japan to provide all the necessary information to the interested states. the impact of the discharge of water used to cool the reactor at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant on the state of the environment, providing all the necessary information to interested states, up to the possibility of taking environmental samples at the place of discharge,» she said.
On Thursday, TERCO began discharging the ocean water, which previously served to cool the damaged reactors, and then was treated in the ALPS system. The system allows cleaning it from 62 types of radionuclides, with the exception of tritium. This water is stored in giant tanks at the station. Every day, about 140 tons of radioactive water are added to them. About 1,000 giant tanks have been installed at the station, but almost 90% of their volume of 1.37 million tons is already filled.
Discharging this water into the ocean was chosen as a way to dispose of it. To do this, water from the tanks is pre-mixed with sea water in a special tank, similar to an outdoor pool, in order to reduce the concentration of radioactive tritium per unit volume of water to a level 40 times below the established norms. Due to the fact that water from nuclear power plants is diluted with sea water, it is possible to bring the concentration of tritium to 1500 becquerels per liter, which is 40 times less than the norms adopted in Japan for draining water into the sea from the operation of operating nuclear power plants — 60 thousand becquerels. According to the Ministry of Industry of Japan, the radioactivity of tritium in the 1.25 million tons of water accumulated at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant is 860 trillion becquerels. Before the accident, the station annually dumped into the sea water containing 2.2 trillion becquerels of tritium. After that, it is poured into the ocean through a specially laid tunnel along the bottom at a distance of 1 kilometer from the coast. It is expected that the water will be drained for 30 years.