title: Iodine-129 in seawater offshore Fukushima: distribution, inorganic speciation, sources, and budget.
abstract: The Fukushima nuclear accident in March 2011 has released a large amount of radioactive pollutants to the environment. Of the pollutants, iodine-129 is a long-lived radionuclide and will remain in the environment for millions of years. This work first report levels and inorganic speciation of (129)I in seawater depth profiles collected offshore Fukushima in June 2011. Significantly elevated (129)I concentrations in surface water were observed with the highest (129)I/(127)I atomic ratio of 2.2 × 10(-9) in the surface seawater 40 km offshore Fukushima. Iodide was found as the dominant species of (129)I, while stable (127)I was mainly in iodate form, reflecting the fact that the major source of (129)I is the direct liquid discharges from the Fukushima NPP. The amount of (129)I directly discharged from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant to the sea was estimated to be 2.35 GBq, and about 1.09 GBq of (129)I released to the atmosphere from the accident was deposited in the sea offshore Fukushima. A total release of 8.06 GBq (or 1.2 kg) of (129)I from the Fukushima accident was estimated. These Fukushima-derived (129)I data provide necessary information for the investigation of water circulation and geochemical cycle of iodine in the northwestern Pacific Ocean in the future.
authors: Center for Nuclear Technology, Technical University of Denmark, Risø Campus, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark.
authors: Xiaolin
authors: X
authors: Hou
authors: Pavel P
authors: PP
authors: Povinec
authors: Luyuan
authors: L
authors: Zhang
authors: Keliang
authors: K
authors: Shi
authors: Dana
authors: D
authors: Biddulph
authors: Ching-Chih
authors: CC
authors: Chang
authors: Yukun
authors: Y
authors: Fan
authors: Robin
authors: R
authors: Golser
authors: Yingkun
authors: Y
authors: Hou
authors: Miroslav
authors: M
authors: Ješkovský
authors: A J Tim
authors: AJ
authors: Jull
authors: Qi
authors: Q
authors: Liu
authors: Maoyi
authors: M
authors: Luo
authors: Peter
authors: P
authors: Steier
authors: Weijian
authors: W
authors: Zhou
mesh_terms: D062406:Fukushima Nuclear Accident; D007455:Iodine / Q000032:analysis*; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D007564:Japan; D055848:Nuclear Power Plants; D011834:Radiation Monitoring; D012623:Seawater / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D007455:Iodine