Radionuclide contamination in flood sediment deposits in the coastal rivers draining the main radioactive pollution plume of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan (2011–2020)

Olivier Evrard (1, 2) , Caroline Chartin (3, 1) , J Patrick Laceby (4, 1) , Yuichi Onda (5) , Yoshifumi Wakiyama (6) , Atsushi Nakao (7) , Olivier Cerdan (8) , Hugo Lepage (1, 9) , Hugo Jaegler (1, 10) , Rosalie Vandromme (8) , Irène Lefèvre (1, 2) , Philippe Bonté (1, 2)

1 LSCE - Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement [Gif-sur-Yvette]
2 GEDI - Géochimie Des Impacts
3 TECLIM - Centre Georges Lemaître for Earth and Climate Research [Louvain]
4 AEP - Alberta Environment and Parks
5 Université de Tsukuba = University of Tsukuba
6 IER - Institute of Environmental Radioactivity of Fukushima University
7 KPU - Kyoto Prefectural University
8 BRGM - Bureau de Recherches Géologiques et Minières (BRGM)
9 IRSN/PSE-ENV/SRTE/LRTA - Laboratoire de recherche sur les transferts des radionucléides dans les écosystèmes aquatiques
10 IRSN/PSE-ENV/SAME/LERCA - Laboratoire d'expertise, de radiochimie et de chimie analytique

Artificial radionuclides including radiocesium (134Cs and 137Cs) and radiosilver (110mAg) were released into the environment following the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant accident in March 2011. These particle-bound substances deposited on soils of northeastern Japan, located predominantly within a ∼ 3000 km2 radioactive fallout plume and drained by several coastal rivers to the Pacific Ocean. The current dataset (Evrard et al., 2021), which can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.928594, compiles gamma-emitting artificial radionuclide activities measured in 782 sediment samples collected from 27 to 71 locations across catchments draining ∼ 6450 km2 during 16 fieldwork campaigns. These campaigns were conducted in Japan between November 2011 and November 2020 in river catchments draining the main radioactive plume. This database may be useful to evaluate and anticipate the post-accidental redistribution of radionuclides in the environment and for the spatial validation of models simulating the transfer of radiocesium across continental landscapes.

Keywords: Panoply

Domains: Environmental Sciences; Continental interfaces, environment; Hydrology; Geomorphology; Geochemistry; Soil study

Olivier Evrard, Caroline Chartin, J Patrick Laceby, Yuichi Onda, Yoshifumi Wakiyama, et al.. Radionuclide contamination in flood sediment deposits in the coastal rivers draining the main radioactive pollution plume of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan (2011–2020). Earth System Science Data, 2021, 13, pp.2555 - 2560. ⟨10.5194/essd-13-2555-2021⟩. ⟨cea-03252617⟩