TOKYO (AP) — Dozens of anti-nuclear activists protested Tuesday to demand Japan scrap its plan to release treated but still radioactive water from a tsunami-damaged nuclear power plant into the sea, which may begin this summer.
”Don’t dump contaminated water into sea!” protesters chanted outside the Tokyo Electric Power Company Holding’s headquarters in Tokyo, holding banners with their demands such as “Don’t nuke the Pacific,” and “Stop contaminated water.”
The utility that operates the plant wrecked in the 2011 disaster has almost finished building the needed facilities to release the massive amounts of water, which has been speculated to begin sometime after June.
“Even after treatment, some radiation stays in the water,” said Harumichi Saito, an activist from Iwaki, a city south of the wrecked plant. “It’s a decades-long, multi-generational project that must get public consensus.”
The tsunami and earthquake on March 11, 2011, damaged the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s cooling systems, damaging three nuclear reactors, causing their cooling water to become highly radioactive and leak into the basements of the buildings. The water is collected, treated and stored in tanks that cover much of the plant.