Five years after Fukushima, little radiation found in California

In the half decade since a nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan, melted down, scientists say they have found no levels of nuclear radiation along the California coast that would be harmful to humans.

Kai Vetter, a UC Berkeley professor of nuclear engineering, assembled a team of students and colleagues soon after a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami five years ago Friday heavily damaged the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station on Japan’s Pacific Ocean coast, allowing radiation to seep into the atmosphere.

“Most people who make cross-country flights choose to be exposed to a larger amount of radiation than what they’d be exposed to from Fukushima’s effects here,” he said.

Trace amounts of the radiation from the Fukushima catastrophe continue to linger, especially along the coast, but even at their peak, the radiation levels in the Bay Area never presented any immediate harm.

The levels of radiation were so low that they weren’t significantly different from the natural radiation people are exposed to from drinking a glass of milk or living in a brick building, he said.

At a dock next to Fukushima at the peak of the release in April 2011, Buesseler found levels of radioactive cesium in the 50 million Becquerels per cubic meter range.

Along the California coast, he recorded levels of radiation from the disabled power plant in the range of 2 to 10 Becquerels per cubic meter, slightly higher than the amount found naturally in the ocean before the event.

“Like putting a drop of dye in your bathtub,” Buesseler said, the dangerous levels of radiation in Fukushima dissipated as they fanned across the ocean, absorbed by a combination of air, water and other matter.

To make up for it, he and his research team developed RadWatch, which posts all of it’s data online for the public to view, with contextual comparisons to allow the levels to be better understood.