Radio-tellurium released into the environment during the complete oxidation of fuel cladding, containment venting and reactor building failure of the Fukushima accident

Hidaka, Akihide; Kawashima, Shigeto*; Kajino, Mizuo*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 60(7), p.743 - 758, 2023/07

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2022.2142311

An accurate estimation of radionuclides released during the Fukushima accident is essential. Therefore, authors investigated Te release using the Unit emission-regression estimation method, in which the deposition distribution is weighted based on the hourly deposition obtained from mesoscale meteorological model calculations assuming Unit emissions. The previous study focused on confirming the applicability of this method. Subsequent examination revealed that if any part of the time when a release have occurred is missing from the estimated release period, the entire source term calculation will be distorted. Therefore, this study performed the recalculation by extending the estimation period to cover all major releases. Consequently, unspecified release events were clarified, and their correspondence to in-core events was confirmed. The Te release caused by Zr cladding complete oxidation can explain the regional dependence of the Te/Cs ratio in the soil contamination map.