Five Years Later, Cutting Through the Fukushima Myths

Uranium (Nuclear Minerals) / Related Environmental Issues / Environmental Impact - Cases, Nuclear Wastes (Used Fuel)

Date posted: 03/12/17

Andrew Karam reports that in the five years since the Fukushima accident, there has been a lot of information put out about Fukushima, some is accurate but much is uninformed, hyperbolic, or worse. He took a look at what actually happened and what the science tells us. The highest radiation dose rates he measured were clearly elevated, but were also too low to cause short-term or long-term health risks. Radioactivity escaping into the environment sounds scary no matter how small the levels, which probably explains why there was so much bad information put out about the environmental impact of Fukushima radioactive releases. For example, it is true that radioactive cesium (Cs-134 and Cs-137) was measured in tuna caught in the Pacific Ocean. But it is not true that this cesium posed any risk to people eating this tuna. He interviewed the scientist who made these measurements and he pointed out that the radioactivity of the cesium was lower than the radioactivity content of the natural potassium in the fish. Likewise, there were claims that dissolved radioactivity from Fukushima was entering the ecosystem and causing massive die-offs of marine life. This claim was refuted by oceanographers who studied the matter extensively. As for claims that the collapse of the Unit 4 spent fuel pool might render the American West Coast uninhabitable? I calculated that dissolving all of the fuel of all three operating reactors, plus the entire contents of all of the spent fuel pools at Fukushima into the waters of the northern Pacific would still give a person swimming in the ocean off Hawaii, Alaska, or California about one billionth the amount of radiation dose needed to cause any harm. In the words of oceanographer Miriam Goldstein, radioactivity from this accident in seawater is detectable but not hazardous. He had no qualms about eating sushi when he was in Japan the month after the accident, as well as in later trips to the West Coast. Good article, read on ...