Japan under fire for Fukushima water

Radio active waste discharge to endanger humans, ecosystems

By Chang Mari

On April 13, Japan unveiled a plan to release radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean. The decision is simply unprecedented. Opposition from other countries and strong criticism within the country have been marginalized by the Japanese government.

The decision is a breach of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) since it fails to meet the requirements of an environmental impact assessment, information sharing consultation and negotiation with impacted countries. Greenpeace has advocated requesting provisional measures from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) as an immediate action.

Since one of the worst nuclear accidents in history, the Japanese government has downplayed the damage and dangers. Multiple radiation surveys by Greenpeace since 2011, however, reveal scientific facts that are in stark contrast to the Japanese government's claims.

For one, Japan claims that the discharge can be conducted without concerns since tritium will be treated to a safe level. But there is no safe level for radioactivity and the risks from radiation, including for tritium. And the water remains contaminated by many other radionuclides, such as strontium-90 and carbon-14 which are even more harmful than tritium. The Japanese government singled out tritium in an attempt to divert the public's attention and downplay the danger.

The Japanese government also claims that the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) can be used to remove cesium-137, strontium-90, and other more harmful radionuclides, which is inaccurate. ALPS has already failed, as recognized officially by the Tokyo Electric Power Company in 2018. Over 70 percent of the wastewater after initial treatment contained 100 times higher cesium-127 and 20,000 times higher strontium-90 than safety levels.

Even if the water is treated for a second time, the results are not guaranteed. The Japanese government is manipulating the facts by labeling the contaminated water as “treated,” while the fact remains the same, that 1.25 million tons of wastewater in storage is highly toxic even after ALPS treatment.

Japan has also downplayed the danger of tritium. Once entering into living organisms, tritium exchanges hydrogen to form organically bound tritium, which remains in the human body for longer than 12.5 years, the half-life of tritium, causing necrosis, cancers and genetic disorders. The Japanese government withheld this fact until Greenpeace revealed the existence of carbon-14 in the contaminated water in “Stemming the tide 2020: The reality of the Fukushima radioactive water crisis” published in October 2020.

The U.S. and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) support the decision, claiming that the water poses no threat as long as the level is lowered to meet safety guidelines. The guidelines, however, are skewed to benefit the nuclear industry with no limit on the total amount of radionuclides. Radioactive water can be diluted to meet the guidelines, but it does not stop radionuclides from entering the ocean.

U.S. Special Envoy for Climate John Kerry expressed concerns over the possible impact on Americans saying “that is why we have the IAEA.” The IAEA, however, is established to promote the agenda of nuclear power, which makes it impossible to be an impartial mediator.

The decision to discharge was solely based on non-scientific assumptions and without validation. Additionally, by 2030 there could be an additional 450,000 tons of highly contaminated water in addition to what exists today.

In a report “Decommissioning of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant” published in March 2021, Greenpeace alerted Japan's neighboring countries to the gravity of the issue. The report was based on technical analysis by Satoshi Sato, a former GE nuclear engineer who led the GE team at the Fukushima plant, warning that the decommissioning technology opted for by TEPCO will produce contaminated water for over a century.

The fact is that as much as twice the amount of highly radioactive molten nuclear fuel exists at Fukushima than Chernobyl. Japan's plan presented just eight months after the March 2011 accident proclaimed that it would restore it to “greenfield” within 30-40 years. However, this lacked feasibility given technologies currently available. Sato pointed to expected technological advances for more effective decommissioning.

Ocean release will mark the beginning of decades of major radioactive pollution. Decommissioning for a century or longer will add more radioactive water. Sato warns that contaminated water to be produced in the future will potentially be even more lethal. The current fuel removal process of pouring tons of water into the damaged reactors increases the risk of plutonium and other very hazardous radionuclides being dispersed outside them.

The Fukushima accident and resultant radioactive water remind us that a nuclear accident is so disastrous that it threatens the long-term health of people and the environment. Japan's actions are deplorable conduct for a government which is legally required to protect its people from pollution.

As United Nations human rights special rapporteurs have warned the Japanese government's decision threatens the human rights and livelihoods of citizens in Japan, and also in Korea and other neighboring countries. Therefore, the Japanese government's move to discharge the wastewater cannot be tolerated.

The significance of Japan's decision extends beyond South Korea. It will pose a threat to generation after generation. The U.S. understands this, too, which is why it hasn't lifted its ban on agricultural and fishery imports from Fukushima since the accident.

Japan should not risk the life of global citizens and ecosystems only to pursue its political interests. It is putting international waters in danger for its own sake. International intervention supported by UNCLOS should be facilitated without delay to stop Japan's dangerous plan.

Chang Mari (

mari.chang@greenpeace.org

) is a campaigner at the Greenpeace East Asia, Seoul office.

Korea can ask international court for measures to stop disposal plan

By Duncan Currie

On March 11, 2011, a magnitude 9 earthquake and 14-meter tsunami disabled the power and cooling supply of three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan, causing a meltdown of the three reactor cores.

It is both tragic and ironic that 10 years later, the Japanese government has announced that it intends to release over a million tons of contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean, causing anger and consternation around the world, but most notably in Korea, where cesium from Fukushima has already been detected from previous leaks.

We know that the Japanese government wants to discharge the radioactive waste into the Pacific over a 30-year period, and we know that radioactive particles from the discharge will reach Korean waters. Yet the government in Tokyo seems determined to proceed in any case.

This is despite there being two very practical solutions. Firstly, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the owner of the power station, could both use the existing site and acquire more land and put in more storage tanks. The longer the radioactive water stays in the tanks, the more its radioactivity decays, so time is on Japan's side.

Secondly, a U.S. company, Purolite, has shown that it has processes, with the exception of tritium, that can reduce radionuclides to non-detectable levels ― a task the current Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) technology has failed to do.

Why doesn't Japan do either or both of these things? The answer is simple. Both will cost a lot more than discharging the water into the Pacific Ocean. So instead of reducing radionuclides to “non-detectable” levels, TEPCO is reducing them only to what it says is below regulatory levels.

Japan is passing on the cost to its neighboring countries and to the environment. So what can Korea do about it?

The law of the sea is governed by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which 167 states have joined, including Japan, the Republic of Korea and China. That convention has three key provisions: Article 192 provides that states have the obligation to protect and preserve the marine environment. That is a clear obligation that Japan would be breaching: Discharging radioactive waste is not protecting the marine environment.

Secondly, Article 194 provides that “States shall take all measures necessary to ensure that activities under their jurisdiction or control are so conducted as not to cause damage by pollution to other states and their environment, and that pollution arising from incidents or activities under their jurisdiction or control does not spread beyond the areas where they exercise sovereign rights in accordance with this convention.”

That is also a clear obligation: The radioactive pollution from the water discharge will absolutely both cause damage by pollution to other states and their environment, and this will absolutely spread beyond Japanese waters.

But before those two provisions, there is another requirement in Article 206, which is that when states have reasonable grounds for believing that planned activities under their jurisdiction or control may cause substantial pollution of or significant and harmful changes to the marine environment, they shall, as far as practicable, assess the potential effects of such activities on the marine environment and shall communicate reports of the results of such assessments.

Such an environmental impact assessment, known as an EIA, which must be communicated to affected countries such as Korea would involve clearly establishing which radionuclides will be in the proposed discharged water, where the radioactive water will spread to and what will be its effects on the marine environment.

For example, what are the vulnerabilities of different species such as shellfish to the radiation and how will the radioactivity be passed through the food chain to fish and ultimately to humans and other mammals that eat the fish? There is another important provision which is the obligation to cooperate, in Article 197, which is itself an enforceable obligation.

The Law of the Sea Convention does not only contain these legal obligations but dispute resolution provisions to enforce them. There is an international court in Hamburg called the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS). Unless Japan and Korea agree that the case will be heard by the ITLOS court ― and that saves money, for one thing ― their case would be heard by what is called an Annex VII Arbitral Tribunal: a kind of court specially set up to hear the case.

But there is an important step: Korea can ask the ITLOS court for provisional measures, which are like an injunction. Those provisional measures can require Japan not to discharge the radioactive wastewater until the case has been heard, and can also order Japan to consult with Korea and to carry out an environmental impact assessment. Provisional measures would be heard before 20 international judges in Hamburg.

Since Japan has said it will take two years to start the discharge, Tokyo may decide to agree with Korea that it won't start until the case has been decided. But even then, unless Japan agrees to undertake an environmental impact assessment, ITLOS can order Japan to do that, and consult with Korea.

The provisional measures procedure is usually very quick ― perhaps four to six weeks.

So, there are some twists and turns, as there are with any legal case, but this much is clear: Procedures are laid down for exactly this kind of matter. There are two good examples: One involving a case brought by Ireland about a discharge from a nuclear power plant in the U.K. in 2001, where provisional measures were ordered.

Another is a case before the International Court of Justice in the 1970s, where New Zealand and Australia brought a case against France to stop it testing nuclear weapons in the atmosphere. During the case, French political officials announced they were going to stop the atmospheric nuclear testing, and the court said the announcement was legally binding on France.

Duncan Currie (duncanc@globelaw.com) has practiced international law and environmental law for over 25 years, and over that time has advised organizations, corporations and governments on a wide range of environmental issues including climate change and the law of the sea.