Thursday, November 15, 2012

More about Fukushima fish

Ocean still suffering from Fukushima fallout 

Nature reports:
Whether originating from plankton or sediment, the contamination is finding its way into the food chain. Bottom-dwelling fish in the Fukushima area show radioactivity levels above the limit of 100 becquerels per kilogram set by the Japanese government. Greenlings, for example, have been found to have levels as high as 25,000 becquerels per kilogram. But the contamination varies widely between species. Octopuses and squid seem to have escaped contamination, whereas other fish such as red snapper and sea bass are only sometimes found to be contaminated. Overall, the levels of caesium in fish and marine life seem to have begun dropping slightly this autumn, says Tomowo Watanabe, an oceanographer with the Fisheries Research Agency in Yokohama.

The implications are serious for the fishing industry, which lost an estimated ¥100 billion to ¥200 billion (US$1.3 billion to $2.6 billion) in 2011 as a result of the accident. Many fisheries remain closed, and because of the persistent contamination "we can't answer the basic question of when these fisheries will be able to open", says Woods Hole oceanographer Ken Buesseler.
Elsewhere in Nature, the extraordinary cost of the clean up of the reactors is noted:
 On 7 November, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, which owns the plant, announced that cleaning up the ruined reactors and surrounding countryside could cost ¥10 trillion (US$126 billion) — double the size of the clean-up fund set aside by the government.

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