TEPCO Announces Release of Treated Water into Ocean Thursday Afternoon (UPDATE 1)

The Japan News

10:08 JST, August 24, 2023 (updated at 10:49 JST)

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. has made a final decision to start discharging treated water from the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant into the ocean at around 1:00 p.m. on Thursday. TEPCO made the announcement at a press conference on Thursday morning.

Junichi Matsumoto, a TEPCO corporate officer in charge of treated water discharge operations, cited as reasons for the decision the fact that the analysis of the tritium concentration in the treated water sampled from the upstream tank near the sea was below 1,500 becquerels per liter, as expected, and that there were no problems with the sea or weather conditions on Thursday morning.

A total of 7,800 tons will be discharged for 17 days starting Thursday, 24 hours a day. This will be the first of four releases fiscal 2023. A total of 31,200 tons are planned to be discharged this fiscal year. The amount of tritium released would be about 5 trillion becquerels.