Workers at Japan鈥檚 crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have started dismantling water storage tanks to free up space for tonnes of nuclear debris, 14 years after the facility was hit by a devastating tsunami.
Operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has been charged with finding a suitable place to store around 880 tonnes of radioactive material that remains inside the Fukushima Daiichi plant鈥檚 damaged reactors.
鈥楥urrently, there is no more land available in Fukushima Daiichi鈥�, Naoki Maeshiro, project manager for TEPCO, who is overseeing the operation which began on Friday, told AFP.
Three of plant鈥檚 six reactors were operating when a tsunami caused by a massive earthquake hit on March 11, 2011, disabling their cooling systems and sending them into meltdown.
Ever since, TEPCO has been holding 1.3 million tonnes of water鈥攁 combination of groundwater, seawater and rainwater鈥攁t the site, along with water used for cooling the reactors.
The water, which is treated to remove various radioactive materials, has been held inside more than 1,000 tanks that occupy much of the plant.
In one of the zones called 鈥楯9鈥�, the giant steel tanks tower over employees at work, obstructing the view of the rest of the plant.
鈥楾o proceed with the next steps, such as retrieving the fuel debris, a certain amount of land is necessary,鈥� added Maeshiro.
Scrapping the water tanks became possible after TEPCO began discharging treated water from the plant into the Pacific Ocean in August 2023.
Japan and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have assured that the operation does not harm the environment.
