The release of wastewater from Japan's crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant would have a negligible effect on South Korean waters, according to a South Korean government study published on Thursday.
"That change would be too small to detect," an official at the Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology said.
The simulation study by the institute and the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute showed the level of tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, would rise by 0.001 becquerel per cubic meter in 10 years, compared to the average of 172 becquerels per cubic meter of tritium currently found in Korean waters. A "becquerel" is a unit of radioactivity.