nuclear-news

Contaminated water accumulates at a rate of 400 tonnes a day at the plant as groundwater flows into the destroyed basements of the reactor buildings and mixes with highly radioactive water used to cool melted fuel.

Row upon row of huge blue and gray tanks that store contaminated water are lined up while pink, white and purple azalea bushes are in full bloom nearby. Overgrown plants curl onto the streets while pipes snake across the site where numerous cranes still stand.

About 1,200 to 1,300 tanks storing about 450,000 tonnes of contaminated water are on site and over the next two years Tepco wants to set up enough tanks to store 800,000 tonnes of water, said Kenichiro Matsui, a spokesman for the utility.

Up to 5,000 workers are on site each day, according to the Tepco spokesman, Matsui, up from about 4,000 a year ago. In future, that number is likely to increase to about 6,000, he said.

Overseas companies including U.S. ones are eager to get in on the clear-up work and the decommissioning of the six reactors at the wrecked plant but most contracts have gone to Japanese companies……..

It’s good that she’s here because the situation at the plant needs to be reported worldwide,” said one man who now works as a driver for plant workers after hitting his annual radiation exposure limit in his former job at the site.http://planetark.org/enviro-news/item/71554