JAPAN HAS conceded defeat in its frantic three-week battle to save a crippled nuclear plant with the announcement that four of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi complex will be shut down.
The admission was made on television yesterday by Tsunehisa Katsumata, chairman of overwhelmed plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), which has been widely criticised for its handling of Japan’s worst nuclear crisis.
“Honestly speaking, work to effectively stabilise the temperature of the reactors has yet to begin,” said Mr Katsumata.
“Looking at the situation objectively, the company will have no choice but to shut them down for good.” But, he added, “basic functions have been retained” at two remaining reactors and hinted that they might be saved.
That possibility was immediately squashed by chief government spokesman Yukio Edano, who said the complex would have to be scrapped. “It is very clear looking at the social circumstances.”
The agriculture ministry released results yesterday showing that radioactive caesium-137, which has a half-life of 30 years, had been found at 2,200 times normal levels in soil about 40km (26 miles) from the Fukushima plant, according to state broadcaster NHK.
At least one of the reactors has been leaking radiation, contaminating food and water and forcing the evacuation of thousands of people within a 30km (19 miles) radius of the complex.
Small quantities of the radiation have been detected as far away as Ireland. Many countries have introduced radiation checks on Japanese produce and several have banned it altogether.
The crisis has wiped more than two-thirds of the share value off Tepco, which has been forced to seek emergency loans of almost two trillion yen to avoid bankruptcy and nationalisation, according to Kyodo News.
The company’s president, Masataka Shimizu, who has largely disappeared from public view since the meltdown began after the March 11th quake and tsunami destroyed the plant’s cooling systems, is reportedly in hospital, suffering from hypertension and overwork.
NHK said last night that engineers might cover the Fukushima reactors with giant tarpaulins to stem the flow of radiation. Some specialists have suggested that the plant could also be sealed in a so-called concrete coffin, the same approach used with Chernobyl, the world’s worst nuclear disaster.
The new measures have been prompted by fears that highly contaminated water in the bowels of the complex is leaking into the sea.
Small quantities of plutonium have been found in soil near the plant, probably from melted fuel rods. Japan’s nuclear safety agency said that radioactive iodine 3,555 times safe limits has been detected in seawater about 300m from the plant.
Engineers and self-defence force troops have been using sandbags and concrete blocks to stop more water leaking into the ocean. Iodine 131 is widely thought to have caused a sharp spike in thyroid cancers among children following the Chernobyl meltdown in 1986, probably via contaminated milk.
The nuclear safety agency says that the substance deteriorates quickly and poses no long-term risks. But environmental watchdog Greenpeace urged the government to widen the 30km evacuation zone around the plant, saying it had detected radiation levels of up to 10 microsieverts-an-hour 40km away. “The current evacuation zone does not match the reality of the risk,” said the organisation’s radiation expert, Jan van de Putte, in Tokyo.
Tepco’s Katsumata yesterday apologised for what he called the “trouble and anxiety” his utility had caused. “It is extremely regrettable that the people in the vicinity of the plant are suffering from the consequences, both physical and psychological,” he said.