原文
Japan has started releasing wastewater into the ocean. But this isn’t the kind of wastewater that flows from city streets into stormwater drains. It’s treated nuclear wastewater used to cool damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, stricken by an earthquake over a decade ago.
Japan claims that the wastewater, containing a radioactive isotope called tritium and possibly other radioactive traces, will be safe. Neighboring countries and other experts say it poses an environmental threat that will last generations and may affect ecosystems all the way to North America. Who is right?
Since the accident, over 1.3 million tons of nuclear wastewater have been collected, treated, and stored in a tank farm at the plant. That storage space is about to run out, the Japanese government says, leaving no choice other than to begin dispensing the wastewater into the Pacific.
Japan’s discharge plan involves incrementally releasing it over the next three decades, although some experts say it could take longer, given the amount still being produced. While the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)—the UN’s nuclear watchdog—assesses the plan’s safety, some of Japan’s neighbors are criticizing it as unilateral and dangerous. A senior Chinese official recently called it a risk "to all mankind” and accused Japan of using the Pacific as a “sewer.” The head of the Pacific Islands Forum, an organization representing 18 island nations (some already traumatized by decades of nuclear testing in the region) dubbed it a Pandora’s box. On May 15, South Korea’s opposition leader derided Japanese leaders’ claims that the water is safe enough to drink: “If it is safe enough to drink, they should use it as drinking water.”
Now, American scientists are raising concerns that marine life and ocean currents could carry harmful radioactive isotopes—also called radionuclides—across the entire Pacific Ocean.
“It’s a trans-boundary and trans-generational event,” says Robert Richmond, director of the Kewalo Marine Laboratory at the University of Hawaii, and a scientific adviser on the discharge plan to the Pacific Islands Forum. “Anything released into the ocean off of Fukushima is not going to stay in one place.”
Richmond cites studies showing that radionuclides and debris released during the initial Fukushima accident were quickly detected nearly 5,500 miles away off the coast of California. Radioactive elements in the planned wastewater discharges may once again spread across the ocean, he says.
The radionuclides could be carried by ocean currents, especially the cross-Pacific Kuroshio current. Marine animals that migrate great distances could spread them too. One 2012 study cites “unequivocal evidence” that Pacific bluefin tuna carrying Fukushima-derived radionuclides reached the San Diego coast within six months of the 2011 accident. No less worrying as carriers, Richmond says, are phytoplankton—free-floating organisms that are the basis of the food chain for all marine life and can capture radionuclides from the Fukushima cooling water. When ingested, those isotopes may “accumulate in a variety of invertebrates, fish, marine mammals, and humans.” In addition, a study earlier this year refers to microplastics—tiny plastic particles that are increasingly widespread in the oceans—as a possible “Trojan horse” of radionuclide transport.
参考译文
日本已经开始将废水排入太平洋。但这并不是那种从城市街道上流到暴雨水沟下水道里的那种废水，而是经过处理、本来是用于冷却福岛第一实业核电站受损严重的核反应堆的核废水。这座核电站在十多年前的那场大地震中遭到严重破坏。
日本宣称，这种含有放射性同位素氚以及可能存在的其它放射性物质的废水将会是安全的。然而各个邻国和专家都说，这种做法会对环境造成长达几代人之久的威胁，并且它对生态体系造成的影响将会直达北美洲。谁是对的？
自从事故发生以来，已经有130多万吨核废水被收集起来，经过了处理并储存在核电站的储罐区。日本政府宣称，由于储存空间就要告罄，除了向太平洋排放这批废水之外已经别无他法。
日本的计划是，花三十年时间将废水排放完毕，而在此期间逐渐增大核废水排放量。然而有专家说排放的时间还可能会进一步延长，因为核废水的数量仍然在增加。尽管国际原子能组织这个隶属联合国的监督机构评估说日本的计划是安全的，但是遭到了日本一些邻国的批评，认为它的说法纯属一面之词，而且相当危险。中国一位高级官员最近指出，这种做法是对“全人类的安全”造成威胁，并谴责日本是将太平洋当作“下水道”。太平洋岛国论坛是一个代表18个岛屿国家的组织（其中有些国家数十年来饱受核试验的摧残），该论坛首脑把日本的这种行为称为是“潘多拉的魔匣”。五月十五日，对于日本领导人宣称该水安全毫无问题、甚至能够饮用的说法，韩国反对党大加嘲讽：“如果他们说核废水很安全能够饮用，那他们直接作为饮用水不就得了？”
如今美国的科学家在担忧海洋生物和大洋海流会将有害的放射性同位素，又称为放射性核素传遍整个太平洋。
“这是一个跨越边界和跨越年代的大事件，“ 夏威夷大学丘瓦罗海洋实验室主任、太平洋岛国论坛排放计划科学顾问里奇蒙这样说。”从福岛排向大洋的任何东西都不会停留在同一个地点。“
里奇蒙引用研究结果表明，从福岛事故最初排出的放射性核素及其废料，很快就被远在5500英里之外的加州海岸所探知。这次计划中要排放的废水中所含的放射性元素可能会再度传遍太平洋。
放射性核素会由大洋海流所携带，尤其是太平洋黑潮暖流。那些远途迁徙的海洋动物也会传播这些放射物。一项2012年所做的研究就明确提出过“不容置疑的证据“，那就是2011年福岛核电站事故之后，携带其放射性核素的太平洋蓝鳍金枪鱼在短短六个月之内就到达了圣迭戈海岸。里奇蒙指出，同样令人担忧的携带者就是那些浮游生物—那些自由漂流的生物体，是所有海洋生物食物链的基础；而它们也会通过福岛冷却水沾染上放射性核素。摄入这些浮游生物之后，那些放射性同位素将会”在各种无脊椎动物、鱼类、海洋哺乳类动物以及人体内聚积起来。“除此之外，今年早些时候的一项研究指向了塑料微粒—一种在大洋中越来越普遍的细微的塑料颗粒，指出它们也可能成为运送放射性核素的”特洛伊马“。