A new catch of big fish has once again heightened fears of Japan's Fukushima nuclear leak.
According to the Daily Mail, not long ago, Japanese fisherman Hiroshi Shirasaka caught a huge wolffish in the waters off the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
The fish is nearly 2 meters long and has a mouth large enough to swallow a small child.
As deep-sea creatures, wolffish usually live in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. Normally, wolffish can grow up to 1.2 meters, but the wolffish caught by Hiroshi Shirasaka is close to 2 meters long.
Fishermen are concerned about the exacerbation of the adverse effects of the Fukushima nuclear accident on local fish stocks.
Fukushima nuclear accident
On March 11, 2011, Japan was hit by an 8.9-magnitude earthquake that damaged the cooling system of the Fukushima nuclear power plant, melted the cores of three nuclear reactors, and flooded the ocean with radioactive pollution.
The accident is considered to be the biggest nuclear disaster since the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident.
In the months that followed, more than 3,000 people were involved in the fight against the nuclear spill. Several people died at the work site.
Radioactive strontium was detected in Yokohama, 250 kilometers from the accident site.
Within 30 kilometers of the Pacific coast near the Fukushima power station, a small type of conch called a warty conch disappeared after the accident.
A year and a half after the accident, marine fish off Fukushima were found to have radioactive cesium more than 250 times higher than the standard.
In the past few years, there have been many accidents involving the leakage of nuclear sewage into the sea.
Even though the accident has been going on for more than four years, in early September this year, a large storage bag containing contaminated nuclear waste was washed into the river in the village of Oiza in Fukushima Prefecture due to heavy rains.
According to the news released by the Japanese Ministry of the Environment, a total of 240 bags have been found, of which 113 bags have been recovered, but some of them have been damaged and only empty bags are left.
After the accident, not only all units of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant will be scrapped. The Japanese government immediately ordered the closure of all 48 nuclear power plants and the switch to imported fossil fuels.
Nuclear power in Japan
As an extremely energy-poor country, in addition to importing a large number of fossil fuels such as oil, Japan has spared no effort to develop nuclear energy.
As early as 1955, Japan adopted the Basic Atomic Energy Law, which established three principles for nuclear energy development — a democratic approach, independent management, and transparency.
In 1971, Unit 1 of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, which generates 439,000 kilowatts of electricity per year, was put into operation.
In the following eight years, five more units of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant were built, generating an annual power of 760,000 kilowatts and 1,067,000 kilowatts. Together with the four units of the Second Nuclear Power Plant with an annual power generation capacity of 1.067 million kilowatts, the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant ranks among the largest in Japan and the world.
The construction of a large number of nuclear power plants has made Japan the third largest nuclear power country in the world.
The shutdown of all nuclear power after the earthquake put enormous energy pressure on Japan. After the implementation of the new safety standards, some nuclear power units passed the review and then restarted.
On August 11 this year, Kagoshima Prefecture's Kawakor Core Power Plant Unit 1 was restarted, becoming the first reactor in Japan to be restarted after being reviewed for meeting new safety standards.
For the restart of nuclear power, on the one hand, in the face of the current situation of energy shortage, on the other hand, the public is worried about safety and protests continue.
The Prime Minister's Choice
Faced with a dilemma, Prime Minister Abe has actively promoted nuclear energy policy. Even if the people protest and the "teachers" are dissatisfied, they are not at all moved.
In July, the Abe government finalized its energy plan, and by 2030, Japan's energy mix will still be about 20% dependent on nuclear power.
A few days ago, former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi was interviewed by local media and clearly expressed his opposition to Abe's plan to restart Japan's nuclear power project.
Koizumi believes that restarting nuclear power plants such as Kawakor Core Power Station Unit 1 is "wrong, and Japan can immediately implement zero nuclear power."
Koizumi advocated the development of nuclear power plants during his time as prime minister, but after the Fukushima accident in 2011, his thinking changed and he began giving speeches about the dangers of nuclear power plants everywhere.
Previously, the Japanese government and power companies had elaborated on the safety and low cost of nuclear power plants, intending to allay people's concerns about nuclear power plants, but Koizumi was strongly critical of this.
"It's all a lie. Looking at the current situation in Fukushima, it is obvious that nuclear power plants belong to the environmental pollution industry."
A cloud of nuclear contamination
For the Japanese, in addition to the Fukushima accident, there was also a nerve-wracking nuclear incident: Japan was the only country that suffered atomic bombing.
In 1945, in order to prompt Japan to surrender, the U.S. military dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing hundreds of thousands of people. The pain caused by the nuclear bomb to the survivors cannot be eliminated so far.
In the case of distrust of security, the anti-nuclear voice continues to rise.
Japan's developed nuclear industry technology has enabled Japan to have a complete technical capability and nuclear materials for the production of nuclear weapons.
At the end of 2011, Japan discovered a batch of undeclared nuclear material, containing enriched uranium that can be used to build atomic bombs, which attracted the attention of the international community.
This factor has also led japan's peace-seeking forces to actively oppose nuclear weapons.
But no matter how loud the protests, Japan's nuclear power has restarted operations last month in the face of energy shortages.
For the residents of Fukushima, the shadow of nuclear pollution remains.
TEPCO plans to complete the removal of the outer cover of Unit 1 of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in FY2016, followed by rubble cleaning and equipment installation, and begin to remove 392 fuel rods from the spent fuel pool in FY2020.
Today, about 300 tons of groundwater flows into the ground of the building where the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant reactor is located every day, becoming a steady stream of radioactive sewage when exposed to radioactive materials.
This sewage, after treatment, is discharged into the sea.
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