On August 24, the Japanese government, despite domestic and foreign opposition, insisted on launching the nuclear contaminated water discharge plan, which caused global concern. How does nuclear-contaminated water spread in the ocean? What are the consequences?
How to deal with it? In response to these social concerns, Science and Technology Daily reporters interviewed a number of scholars and experts.
Contaminated water could spread around the globe
In 2011, after the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, China immediately launched the emergency monitoring and assessment of the Marine environment in the Western Pacific. Yu Wen, a researcher at the National Security and Emergency Management School of Beijing Normal University, said that in the seven-year tracking and monitoring, the research team found that nuclear pollutants spread to the open sea area 600 kilometers away from Fukushima three months after the accident, and the content was seriously excessive. Eighteen months after the accident, the presence of nuclear contaminants was detected in the sea southeast of Taiwan. It is estimated that after entering the Marine environment, these nuclides will gradually spread to all seas through ocean currents in 8-10 years.
Using these observation data and ocean dynamics, Yu Wen predicted that the nuclear-contaminated water released from Japan will quickly spread to the entire ocean system with the help of ocean currents, and enter China's waters in about one and a half to two years.
"The nuclear-contaminated water is transported and dispersed by ocean currents, and some of the radioactive material can be absorbed by Marine life." Yu Wen said that the sea does have a certain dilution effect, but Japan's 30-year long plan to discharge the sea is still uncertain, considering the fragility of the environment and ecology, and needs to be carefully handled.
The consequences are uncertain and unpredictable
"There are various ways to deal with the contaminated water, such as evaporation, electrolytic discharge and underground burial, but Japan has chosen the cheapest solution to discharge the water into the sea, which is extremely irresponsible." Zhang Yan玱, a think tank expert and law school professor at Dalian Maritime University, said the international community is most worried about the ecological damage caused by nuclear radioactive elements entering the Marine environment.
Chen Xinjun, dean of the College of Marine Science of Shanghai Ocean University, believes that the nuclear element pollution produced by different levels of nuclear accidents is different, and the Fukushima nuclear accident is listed as the highest level 7 in the International nuclear event scale, and the pollution degree of nuclear sewage generated by it should not be underestimated.
"Tritium is probably not the most dangerous." Dalian Maritime University think tank chief expert Gao Guo said that Japan has been making "the problem is only tritium" misleading, but many scientists in the world have a consensus that the nuclear contaminated water contains up to 64 kinds of nuclear radioactive elements, and more than 70% are exceeded, multi-nuclide equipment is difficult to fully deal with.
After these radioactive elements enter the Marine environment ecology, the most harmful to humans and Marine organisms are carbon-14 and iodine-129, of which carbon-14 has a half-life of about 5,000 years, iodine-129 has a longer half-life, and carbon-14 will accumulate in Marine organisms, its abundance or concentration may be 50 times that of tritium.
Many interviewed experts and scholars said that after the integration of nuclides into Marine ecology, it involves complex and long-term biogeochemical processes, and at present, scientists have little systematic research and data accumulation on this. Japan's move is unprecedented, its harm is still difficult to assess, with uncertainty and unpredictability, and there is an urgent need to carry out international cooperation on Marine ecosystems, Marine life survival and other aspects of long-term tracking research.
Whether imported seafood can be purchased mainly depends on the source. In the future, can sea salt and seafood still be safe to eat? Zhang Yan玱 said that the local grouper and sebastes in Fukushima have been detected to contain excessive levels of radioactive elements, so if the seafood source is close to Fukushima, you should be vigilant.
Chen Xinjun said that after the discharge of nuclear contaminated water, the impact on fish in the waters around Japan is the greatest. In addition, fish in different water layers, sedentary fish and migratory fish are affected differently. "Chinese consumers can rest assured that the seafood circulating in China's market has been strictly tested and is safe."
At present, China has completely suspended the import of Japanese aquatic products, and after the Fukushima nuclear accident, China has included the monitoring of radioactive substances in food into the scope of food safety risk monitoring.
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