While Japan is adding a new invisible scar to nature and its own probity by blatantly deciding to release nuclear waste water to the Pacific Ocean, the rare voices of support by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi look perplexing if not immoral.

Despite widespread criticism, the Japanese government seems determined to dump into ocean huge amounts of radioactive water from the earthquake-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, a decade after revealing its inadequacy in handling the crisis in 2011.

Whatever difficulty Blinken has on nuclear waste and whatever geopolitical motive behind, he seems glad to see Japan testing for disposal

The money-above-all choice of convenience among five options available exposes the selfish nature of capital-minded officials who dare to sacrifice the livelihood of its millions of people in fisheries industry, apart from ocean life and people in neighboring lands.

People including the Japanese have reasons to question the wording of Tokyo officials in “ensuring” the “harmlessness” of to be released radionuclide. Their method of diluting the radioactive isotopes in wastewater does not mean eliminating the radioactive substance from the water.

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Moreover, experts have revealed what Japanese company TEPCO and government officials did not: the Fukushima wastewater contains not only tritium as described the “only” radionuclide after treatment, but several others including iodine-131, Cesium-137, Cesium-134, Carbon-14, Cobalt-60 and strontium-90. Although scientists pointed out some of these elements in 2018, TEPCO managers, who were slashed for withholding information in 2011, acknowledged of Carbon-14 for the first time until August 2020. 

By forcing its neighbors and the rest of the world to shoulder the potential radiation risks, Japan refreshes itself again as an irresponsible member of the global community

By trusting these TEPCO officials the Japanese government is rousing distrust. By forcing its neighbors and the rest of the world to shoulder the potential radiation risks, Japan refreshes itself again as an irresponsible member of the global community. And by costing the livelihood and possible health of its own people and other peoples apart from causing uncertain disruption of marine ecology, the Japanese administration is wasting its own morality.

Yet Blinken is eager to “thank Japan for its transparent efforts in its decision”, telling the world he knew Japan’s move beforehand, though many other countries, including its neighbors, did not.

His gratitude to Japan and unwillingness to oppose the move may be knotty, but as a major nuclear power that used the first nuclear bomb against a Japanese city, the US has its own nuclear problems.

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Writing about forcing a path forward on US nuclear waste management, US research scholar Matt Bowen said in January in a Columbia University blog:  A new report, part of wider work on nuclear energy at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, explains how the United States reached its current stalemate over nuclear waste disposal.

A CNN report in 2019 said radiation levels across parts of the Marshall Islands in the Pacific Ocean, where the US tested nuclear bombs during the Cold War, are 10-1,000 times higher than areas contaminated by the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear disasters.

Whatever difficulty Blinken has on nuclear waste and whatever geopolitical motive behind, he seems glad to see Japan testing for disposal. And he kept his words vague possibly for escape once Japan’s immoral and irresponsible decision backfires.

The IAEA chief sounds less diplomatic in his tense, somber oral announcement, and in his web release, Grossi even called Japan’s decision “a milestone”. While the US Department of State suggested Japan “appears to have adopted an approach in accordance with globally accepted nuclear safety standards”, Grossi said “the Japanese Government’s decision is in line with practice globally, even though the large amount of water at the Fukushima plant makes it a unique and complex case”. 

Grossi’s words are a great concern, as the successor of former IAEA director-general Yukiya Amano admits the gravity of Japan’s case, but somehow remains persuaded, and stays complacent with referring to “practice globally” though losing moral values.

While the IAEA chief was expected to use his decade-old expertise in inquiring where such a practice may lead, his citing of such a practice seems an unlikely excuse. A global practice cannot always justify its good, as in a bad routine or habit like smoking.

Our world is changing fast with ecology more fragile and more important. The practice of dumping nuclear waste water to the ocean may appear acceptable before because it takes time for most people to grasp the real danger in an invisible world and nuclear industrialists lobby hard. Nowadays more people including scientists are regarding the low-standard but wide-spread practice bad and potentially dangerous, and the more technology advances, the clearer it will be.

As carrier of the best hope for nuclear safety in our tender world today, IAEA should do its utmost on make sure of nuclear energy “beyond doubt”. Instead, it long ignores criticisms of Japan building a series of nuclear power plants in earthquake-prone zones, which draws its own politician’s description as “Japan’s curse”.

However Grossi reached his own decision within the IAEA to jump into Japan’s wagon this time, his appreciation of Japan’s “transparency”, in contrast to neighboring countries’ criticism of Japan not engaging in adequate consultations, reminds people that an institution of integrity should not serve the privileged few at the cost of common heritage.

Tolerating such a controversial dumping practice to be extended to an extreme limit as in Japan “unique” case indicates the IAEA’s indolence, moral decline and unaccountability, which amounts to its poor governance.

As the top organization of our globe on a hot issue of “protection of workers, the public and the environment from undue radiation hazards",  IAEA should reflect the will of at least a majority of its 172 members, demand high and exacting standards with nuclear waste treatment, be accountable and make parties involved accountable. 

Failure to live up to public expectations will be calling for change for better nuclear governance.

The author is a current affairs commentator based in Hong Kong. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.