A commercial fishing organization this week backed the discharge of groundwater accumulating at Fukushima Daiichi, while a government ministry concluded that Tokyo Electric Power Co. underestimated worker doses early in the crisis there.
Recent developments related to the plant blacked out and severely damaged in 2011 include:
Permission Granted for Groundwater Discharge
On Tuesday, Fukushima Prefecture's commercial fishing association gave its blessing to TEPCO plans to pump up groundwater before it reaches damaged reactors and discharge it into the ocean. The approval comes a year after TEPCO dug the wells needed to divert the water, the Japan Daily Press and other outlets reported. Fishermen acquiesced to the plan after receiving promises that water would meet tight decontamination standards and in the face of the plant's diminishing capacity to store contaminated water. TEPCO estimated the groundwater bypass system will reduce the amount of water entering plant buildings daily from 400 metric tons to 300 metric tons.
Ministry: Worker Doses Underestimated
Japan's health ministry reported Tuesday that TEPCO underestimated the internal doses of 142 people who worked at the plant early in the crisis. According to a Kyodo report, the doses were revised upward by an average of 5.86 millisieverts. In one case, a worker's dose was revised from about 90 millisieverts to 180 millisieverts, which exceeds government limits. The study evaluated doses for 1,536 of 7,529 people who worked at Fukushima in March and April of 2011.