Spatial distribution of fallout 137Cs in the marine environment of Kudankulam and its comparison with Indian and Asia-Pacific regional seawater

Abstract

Benchmarking the fallout 137Cs in the coastal marine environment assumes significance in view of expansion of nuclear power plants (NPPs) in India and the Asia-Pacific region. This paper presents a snapshot of 137Cs activity in marine coastal water samples collected around Kudankulam NPPsite across a 50 km stretch from Kanyakumari to Uvari and attempts to compare with the 137Cs concentration observed across Indian coastal region and Asia-Pacific regional seawater. 137Cs activity of the Kudankulam coast ranges from ≤0.40 to 1.92 mBq/L with a geometric mean (GM) value of 1.0 mBq/L. In general, 137Cs activity in seawater of the entire Indian coastal region varies from 0.30 to 1.25 mBq/L, which may be considered as global fallout.

Keywords

• 137Cs
• 90Sr
• Asia-Pacific
• fallout
• Kudankulam