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Elevated radiation levels have been noted in ash from incinerators
Last reviewed: 30.06.2025
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Elevated levels of radiation have been detected in ash from waste incineration plants located near the Japanese capital, AFP reports. Experts believe that this is ash from burning garden waste collected after the tragedy.
Radioactive cesium was found at a waste incineration plant in Kashiwa, Chiba Prefecture, northwest of Tokyo and nearly 200 km from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which has been leaking significant amounts of radioactive material since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
The source of the radioactive ash is believed to be garden waste. "It appears that some people cut tree branches and mowed their gardens out of fear of radioactive contamination, and this waste ended up in incinerators," Kiyoshi Nakamura, a local government spokesman, told reporters. Mr. Nakamura stressed that all of the radioactive ash had been carefully buried and posed no threat to human health.
But another official, Masaki Orihara, warned that the storage facility for the ashes could be full in 55 days, requiring a new one to be found.
Let us recall that the accident at the Fukushima I station occurred after a large-scale earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011. Following the failure of the cooling system of the nuclear power plant, fires broke out, the fuel rods completely melted, as a result of which a significant amount of radioactive substances were released into the atmosphere, water and soil. The danger level at the Fukushima NPP was equated to the level of the accident at the Chernobyl NPP in 1986. According to data as of mid-May, the concentration of radioactive cesium-134 off the coast of Fukushima Prefecture exceeded the permissible norm by 32 thousand times, and cesium-137 - by 22 thousand times.
Japanese experts expect to bring the nuclear crisis under control by the end of this year. They aim to reduce the number of radiation leaks in 3 months and cool the reactor in 9 months. Then they plan to build a protective cap over the destroyed building of the NPP. Incidentally, construction of a new cap, or sarcophagus, over the Chernobyl NPP will soon begin.
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