» Typhoon raised tritium concentration in grounwater at Fukushima No.1

2014/10/12

The radioactive water woes at the  Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant got worse after the tritium concentration in a groundwater sample surged more than tenfold this month.

A spokesman for TEPCO said that heavy rain caused by Typhoon Phanfone probably affected the groundwater after the storm whipped through Japan last week.

Some 150,000 becquerels of tritium per liter were measured in a groundwater sample taken from a well east of the No. 2 reactor. The figure is a record for the well and over 10 times the level measured the previous week.

In addition, materials that emit beta rays, such as strontium-90, which causes bone cancer, also shattered records with a reading of 1.2 million becquerels, TEPCO said of the sample.

Tepco also revealed that, at a separate well also east of the No. 2 reactor, a groundwater sample was giving off a record 2.1 million becquerels of a beta ray-emitting substance, nearly double the level from a week earlier.

The cesium activity in the sample was 70 percent higher at 68,000 becquerels.

<Media Report>
Tritium up tenfold in Fukushima groundwater after Typhoon Phanfone (Japan Times)

Tags:leakage, news, radioactive water, TEPCO

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