Tropical fishes vanished after the operation of a nuclear power plant was suspended in the Sea of Japan

Abstract

Thermal discharge from a nuclear power plant (NPP) provides an opportunity to foresee changes in faunal communities that may be induced by ocean warming. I assessed these changes by identifying characteristics of the fish community near the thermal discharge from a NPP and by recording temporal changes that occurred after the suspension of the NPP. Underwater visual censuses were conducted near Takahama NPP in the Sea of Japan, and fish assemblages were compared to those in two other sites: a site with discharge from a coal-fired power plant and a control site. During the surveyed period (8 years) when the NPP was in operation, the sea water temperature at the site near the NPP was warmer, had a significantly higher fish abundance, and a higher species richness, including tropical fishes, than the other two sites. However, once the NPP was suspended, tropical fishes dramatically decreased near the NPP. This abrupt change in fish assemblage may be due to the lowest lethal temperatures of tropical fishes being only slightly higher than the winter temperature in this area. Relatively poor ecosystem structure in the local warming area may also have contributed to low resilience of tropical fish species to this temperature change.