Scientific American article on Fukushima continually polluting the environment into the distant future.

Five years ago this month a devastating tsunami engulfed Japan’s northeastern coast, triggering the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. Washing over a 10-meter-high seawall, the waves knocked out electricity at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, causing cooling systems to fail and half of the facility’s uranium cores to overheat and melt through their steel containers. Hydrogen explosions in the next few days damaged three of the reactor buildings, venting radioactive materials into the air. That plume of airborne contamination forced some 160,000 people to evacuate from their homes.

Today the disaster site remains in crisis mode. Former residents will not likely return anytime soon, because levels of radioactivity near their abodes remain high. Even more troublesome, the plant has yet to stop producing dangerous nuclear waste: its operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), currently circulates water through the three melted units to keep them cool—generating a relentless supply of radioactive water. To make matters worse, groundwater flowing from a hill behind the crippled plant now mingles with radioactive materials before heading into the sea.

Scientific American, March 2016

Five years later and still leaking according to independent radiation measurements conducted by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute:

…we are not seeing the steady decrease we would expect to see off Fukushima if all sources had stopped; rather, we are finding values are still elevated, which confirms that there is continued release from the plant.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, March 2016