CNN News:日本可能要把放射性污水排入大海 韩方表担忧

CARL AZUZ, cnn 10 ANCHOR: A natural disaster that led to a nuclear disaster more than eight years ago is still causing problems for Japan and that's the first story we're covering today on cnn 10. I'm Carl Azuz. The big question facing the Japanese government is where do you put the water, what we're talking about is radioactive water, water that's been contaminated by a damaged nuclear power plant. On March 11th, 2011, a 9.1 magnitude earthquake, a very rare and very severe strength, struck about 230 miles off the coast of mainland Japan. It caused a tsunami with 30 foot waves that swept inland, leading to the deaths of roughly 20,000 people and cutting off electricity to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

Cooling systems at three of its reactors failed causing them to melt down. That sent radiation into the air and led to the evacuation of more than 100,000 people from the area. Since this happened, Japanese officials have had to pump water, tens of thousands of tons of it, to keep the fuel cores cool. Once that water is used, it's contaminated. It has to be stored and now storage space is running out. A Japanese government official says there are no other options than to release the contaminated water into the ocean and dilute it. We don't know how much water would be dumped at sea and the government hasn't made a final decision to actually do this. But it has led to concerns by countries like South Korea, whose government has suggested that Japan work with it to make sure the contaminated water doesn't hurt the ocean or the nations nearby.