Atmospheric Dispersion and Deposition of Radionuclides from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant Accident

Mathieu, Anne; Korsakissok, Irène; Quélo, Denis; Groëll, Jérôme; Tombette, M.; Didier, Damien; Quentric, Emmanuel; Saunier, Olivier; Benoı̂t, Jean-Pierre; Isnard, O.

doi:10.2113/gselements.8.3.195

Cited by 77 publications

(70 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Estimates of the total atmospheric fallout of 137 Cs vary greatly because of the uncertainty in the transport and deposition parameters in the atmospheric models as well as the lack of observations required to conduct inverse calculations ( Table 1). Some of these studies constrained their atmospheric deposition models using terrestrial and/or surface ocean observations, and these estimates ranged from 8.8 to 50 PBq , Mathieu et al 2012, Stohl et al 2012, Winiarek et al 2014, Katata et al 2015. Other studies estimated atmospheric fallout deposition over the ocean only, and these estimates ranged from 5 to 14.8 PBq (Kawamura et al 2011, Estournel et al 2012.…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

Fukushima Daiichi–Derived Radionuclides in the Ocean: Transport, Fate, and Impacts

Buesseler

Dai

Aoyama

et al. 2017

Annu. Rev. Mar. Sci.

240

122

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The events that followed the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011, included the loss of power and overheating at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants, which led to extensive releases of radioactive gases, volatiles, and liquids, particularly to the coastal ocean. The fate of these radionuclides depends in large part on their oceanic geochemistry, physical processes, and biological uptake. Whereas radioactivity on land can be resampled and its distribution mapped, releases to the marine environment are harder to characterize owing to variability in ocean currents and the general challenges of sampling at sea. Five years later, it is appropriate to review what happened in terms of the sources, transport, and fate of these radionuclides in the ocean. In addition to the oceanic behavior of these contaminants, this review considers the potential health effects and societal impacts.

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Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

Fukushima Daiichi–Derived Radionuclides in the Ocean: Transport, Fate, and Impacts

Buesseler

Dai

Aoyama

et al. 2017

Annu. Rev. Mar. Sci.

240

122

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“…The earliest assessments, performed in March 2011 and regularly updated based on fresh available data, were highly inaccurate on the local scale (less than several tens of kilometers around the site) due to insufficient data on release conditions and local weather; however, better meteorological data made them satisfactory on the regional (several hundred to thousands of kilometers) and global scales (Mathieu et al, 2011).…”

Section: Tools and Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…After the crisis period in spring 2011, the IRSN fine-tuned its assessments using the higher amount of environmental data available and atmospheric dispersion models on the local (model pX) and regional scales (model ldX) to interpret them (Korsakissok et al, 2012;Corbin and Denis, 2012;Saunier et al, 2012;Mathieu et al, 2011). The dose rate measurements, mostly from Japan's SPEEDI automated monitoring stations network, were the most plentiful.…”

Section: The Irsn's Earliest Assessments Of the Fukushima Accident's mentioning

confidence: 99%

The IRSN’s earliest assessments of the Fukushima accident's consequences for the terrestrial environment in Japan

et al. 2013

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In 2011 the IRSN conducted several assessments of atmospheric radioactive releases due to the Fukushima Daiichi NPP accident (March 11, 2011) and of their impact on Japan's terrestrial environment. They were based on the IRSN's emergency management tools and on the abundant information and technical data gradually published in Japan. According to these assessments, the main release phase lasted from March 12 to 25, 2011 and impacted Japanese land in two events, the first on 15 and 16 March, in which the main radioactive deposits were formed, and the second from March 20 to 23, which was less significant. The highest amounts of radioactive deposits were found in an area extending upwards of several tens of kilometers northwest of the plant. Lower amounts were discontinuously scattered in an area extending up to over 250 km away. Initially composed mainly of short-lived radionuclides, the deposits' activity sharply decreased in the subsequent weeks. Since the summer of 2011, cesium-134 and cesium-137 have become the residual deposits' main components. According to IRSN estimates, in the absence of protection, the doses due to exposure to the radioactive plume during the atmospheric release phase may have been potentially higher for people who remained in coastal areas up to several tens of kilometers north and south of the damaged plant. Thereafter, people living up to 50 km northwest of the plant, outside the 20-km emergency evacuation zone, were potentially most vulnerable to residual radioactive deposits over time.

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“…For this particular accident at Fukushima, the Community Multi-scale Air Quality (CMAQ) model (Morino et al, 2011), the Lagrangian transport models HYSPLIT and FLEXPART with meteorological conditions provided by the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model (Srinivas et al, 2012), and the WRF-Chem tracer model which directly couples the simulation of the chemistry and meteorology (Huh et al, 2012(Huh et al, , 2013) have been used. These studies, together with many previous studies for other events, have identified a number of meteorological variables that can significantly influence the atmospheric transport and ground deposition of radionuclides, including wind and rainfall (Basit et al, 2008;Mathieu et al, 2012;Takemura et al, 2011;Ten Hoeve and Jacobson, 2012;Yamauchi, 2012). For example, the study of Morino et al (2011) has shown that during the period from 11 to 30 March 2011, the amounts of 131 I and 137 Cs transported across the eastern boundary (downwind) of their domain are 6.52 × 10 16 Bq and 4.58 × 10 15 Bq, respectively; while those across the western boundary (upwind) are only 1.49 × 10 12 Bq and 1.13 × 10 7 Bq, respectively.…”

Section: Published By Copernicus Publications On Behalf Of the Europementioning

confidence: 97%

Modeling and sensitivity analysis of transport and deposition of radionuclides from the Fukushima Dai-ichi accident

Huang

et al. 2014

Atmos. Chem. Phys.

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Abstract. The atmospheric transport and ground deposition of radioactive isotopes 131 I and 137 Cs during and after the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant (FDNPP) accident (March 2011) are investigated using the Weather Research and Forecasting-Chemistry (WRF-Chem) model. The aim is to assess the skill of WRF in simulating these processes and the sensitivity of the model's performance to various parameterizations of unresolved physics. The WRF-Chem model is first upgraded by implementing a radioactive decay term into the advection-diffusion solver and adding three parameterizations for dry deposition and two parameterizations for wet deposition. Different microphysics and horizontal turbulent diffusion schemes are then tested for their ability to reproduce observed meteorological conditions. Subsequently, the influence of emission characteristics (including the emission rate, the gas partitioning of 131 I and the size distribution of 137 Cs) on the simulated transport and deposition is examined. The results show that the model can predict the wind fields and rainfall realistically and that the ground deposition of the radionuclides can also be captured reasonably well. The modeled precipitation is largely influenced by the microphysics schemes, while the influence of the horizontal diffusion schemes on the wind fields is subtle. However, the ground deposition of radionuclides is sensitive to both horizontal diffusion schemes and microphysical schemes. Wet deposition dominated over dry deposition at most of the observation stations, but not at all locations in the simulated domain. To assess the sensitivity of the total daily deposition to all of the model physics and inputs, the averaged absolute value of the difference (AAD) is proposed. Based on AAD, the total deposition is mainly influenced by the emission rate for both 131 I and 137 Cs; while it is not sensitive to the dry deposition parameterizations since the dry deposition is just a minor fraction of the total deposition. Moreover, for 131 I, the deposition is moderately sensitive (AAD between 10 and 40 % between different runs) to the microphysics schemes, the horizontal diffusion schemes, gas-partitioning and wet deposition parameterizations. For 137 Cs, the deposition is very sensitive (AAD exceeding 40 % between different runs) to the microphysics schemes and wet deposition parameterizations, but moderately sensitive to the horizontal diffusion schemes and the size distribution.

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Atmospheric Dispersion and Deposition of Radionuclides from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant Accident

Cited by 77 publications

References 17 publications

Fukushima Daiichi–Derived Radionuclides in the Ocean: Transport, Fate, and Impacts

Fukushima Daiichi–Derived Radionuclides in the Ocean: Transport, Fate, and Impacts

The IRSN’s earliest assessments of the Fukushima accident's consequences for the terrestrial environment in Japan

Modeling and sensitivity analysis of transport and deposition of radionuclides from the Fukushima Dai-ichi accident

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