Radioactive cooling water leaked Monday at a reactor in the town of Ikata, Ehime Prefecture, but no radiation was released into the environment, Shikoku Electric Power Co. said Tuesday.
An employee found water leaking from a pipe at around 3:15 p.m. Monday at the No. 1 reactor of Shikoku Electric's Ikata nuclear plant, company officials said.
The water was leaking at a rate of one drop every five seconds from the 566,000-kw pressurized-water reactor, they said.
Some 230 cc of coolant water leaked, containing 550 becquerel of radiation, they said. Such an amount poses no threat to the environment and is equal to the level found in hot springs, they added.
The government has designated the standard for mandatory reporting of radiation leakage at 3.7 million Bq, the officials said.