A federation of fisheries cooperatives in Fukushima Prefecture on March 25 accepted the so-called underground bypass plan by Tokyo Electric Power Co. to release groundwater into the sea to prevent it from flowing into the basements of the reactor buildings of its crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Two days later, a similar organization in Ibaraki Prefecture also accepted the plan, whose ultimate purpose is to reduce the amount of water radioactively contaminated by the plant.

The decisions were agonizing for the two fisheries organizations because the inflow into the sea of contaminated water from the plant has caused them tremendous economic harm. In addition to making serious efforts to halt the contamination of groundwater, Tepco and the government should adequately compensate local fishing cooperatives if they continue to suffer economic losses despite the bypass plan.

Every day about 400 tons of groundwater flows into the basement of the buildings housing Nos. 1 to 4 reactors, mixing with water from reactor cores and becoming highly radioactive. The underground bypass plan entails pumping 1,000 tons of groundwater directly into the sea on a daily basis to prevent it from flowing into the plant. This endeavor is expected to reduce the flow of groundwater into the basement of the reactor buildings by about 100 tons a day. The groundwater bypass was supposed to go into operation in 2012; Tepco now hopes to start operating it by the end of this month.