Radioactive Waste Is Piling Up in Japanese Sewage Treatment Plants, Some Sold as Fertilizer
Image via screengrab.
The disaster at Fukushima may have faded from the news cycle, but the radioactive waste it left behind isn't going anywhere. At the Saitama sewage treatment plant, 169 miles from Fukushima, workers are dealing with tons of radioactive sewage, Al Jazeera reported. Without any training with radioactive materials and unable to sell the sewage, they have put it under waterproof tarps, in a line of bundles that stretches a kilometer.
It's hard to decide which is the worst part: that Saitama is one of a dozen treatment plants facing the problem, or that some of the "safer" sewage is being sold as fertilizer to Japanese farmers.
Watch Al Jazeera's full report after the jump.
News like this makes it hard to believe that there will ever be a day when the effects of Fukushima are no longer felt. But the problem of disposing of radioactive waste isn't uniquely Japanese: more than 138 million pounds are stockpiled throughout the United States. Let's just hope it stays out of our food.
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