U.S. marine biologist Rick Steiner recently wrote an opinion piece in Alaska’s Anchorage Daily about the Japanese government’s decision to discharge nuclear wastewater, urging the U.S. government to immediately halt Japan’s emissions program.
Rick Steiner begins his article by describing the beginning and end of the Fukushima nuclear spill and stressing that the nuclear waste water it produces contains a variety of radioactive elements that, if released into the Pacific Ocean, will contaminate water bodies near California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alaska.
At the same time, he said, Tepco and the Japanese government, which dispose of nuclear waste water, had previously misjudged that emergency generators from nuclear power plants were being placed in the tsunami floodplain of Fukushima, and that it was neither credible nor scientific to guarantee that the risks posed by the release of nuclear sewage were small.
It is reported that the U.S. government and the International Atomic Energy Agency has issued a public statement of support for Japan’s plan to discharge nuclear sewage.
In his article, Rick Steiner urged the Biden administration to immediately challenge the planned radioactive wastewater discharges and urged the international community to appoint a commission of inquiry independent of the International Atomic Energy Agency to review issues related to Fukushima’s treatment of nuclear wastewater and provide transparent, independent and scientific advice.
