Four years after the meltdown at Fukushima Daiichi, tests of hundreds of water samples from the Pacific Ocean have revealed that the nuclear power plant continues to leak radioactive isotopes from the accident. However, the levels are still too low to harm human or ocean life, according to scientists.
“Despite the fact that the levels of contamination off our shores remain well below government-established safety limits for human health or to marine life, the changing values underscore the need to more closely monitor contamination levels across the Pacific,” cautions Ken Buesseler, marine radiochemist with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Woods Hole found trace amounts of cesium-134 and cesium-137 along the coasts of Oregon, Washington, California, and Canada. The spread of radiation to North American waters can be detected along a stretch of more than 1,600 km offshore; the latest readings measured the highest radiation levels outside Japanese waters.
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