In January 2023, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Task Force completed a regulatory review of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (NPS) in Japan for discharging treated water at the NPS from the 2011 nuclear disaster.
The Task Force, consisting of independent experts and IAEA staff, was appointed by the IAEA Director General. Its mission was to assess how safe it was to release the treated water into the sea. The water had been processed at the site through the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS), then stored in tanks onsite.
The IAEA Task Force collaborated with Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) on standardizing the water treatment, authorizing the discharge, setting regulatory requirements for the plant’s current operators, and determining guidelines for communications with the public regarding the discharge.