Tokyo Electric to scrap 4 reactors at troubled nuclear plant

TOKYO, March 30 Kyodo - Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Wednesday that it will scrap the troubled four reactor units of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant while warning that the ongoing efforts to contain the country's worst nuclear crisis will be a drawn-out process.
But Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano suggested that all six reactors should be scrapped at the 40-year-old plant in Fukushima Prefecture, saying at a news conference, ''It is very clear looking at the social circumstances.''
Tsunehisa Katsumata, the company's chairman, said at a news conference nearly three weeks after a powerful earthquake and tsunami prompted the crisis that ''several weeks will be too short'' to stabilize overheating reactors and spent-fuel pools.
In a sign that the sheer size of the disaster is overwhelming the power provider, Katsumata also admitted that the cost of compensation in connection with the disaster will undermine the company financially, but said TEPCO -- as the utility is commonly known -- will try hard to remain afloat and avoid nationalization.
''We apologize for causing the public anxiety, worry and trouble due to the explosions at reactor buildings and the release of radioactive materials,'' Katsumata said at the company's head office in Tokyo, 220 kilometers southwest of the plant on the Pacific coast.
''We probably have no choice but to scrap reactors 1 to 4 if we look at their conditions objectively,'' Katsumata added, expressing for the first time the company's intention of scrapping the accident-stricken reactor units at a time when workers are continuing efforts to cool them down.
The No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 reactors are believed to have suffered damage to their cores, while the fuel rods of the No. 4 reactor that are kept at a spent fuel storage pool are also believed to be overheating, as they lost cooling functions after the March 11 quake and tsunami disaster.
The crisis has forced tens of thousands of local residents to evacuate and caused leaks of radioactive materials into the air, soil and sea, including small amounts of plutonium in the soil at the plant that caused alarm about the spread of the long-lasting, highly toxic radioactive substances into the environment.
In a sign of growing public frustration over a nuclear crisis that has no immediate end in sight, more than 100 antinuclear protesters gathered outside the TEPCO head office on Wednesday evening, calling for an end to reliance on nuclear power and criticizing the utility for causing the nuclear disaster.
''We don't need nuclear power,'' shouted the protesters, with one protester holding a banner that said, ''Take the blame, Tokyo Electric.''
As to the managerial responsibilities he and President Masataka Shimizu should bear, Katsumata said, ''Our greatest responsibility is to do everything to bring the current situation to an end and under control.''
Shimizu was hospitalized Tuesday for hypertension and dizziness, TEPCO said earlier Wednesday. But the chairman said, ''We have not been aware of any intention of our president to resign.''
Katsumata, who has already taken over Shimizu's role temporarily in leading efforts to bring the crisis under control, said that it will not take long for the ailing president to return to work and resume handling the crisis.
Shimizu has rarely appeared in public since attending a news conference on March 13, two days after the natural disaster wreaked havoc on areas centering on northeastern Japan. Shimizu fell sick for some days from March 16, the company said.
Regarding the Japanese power industry's plans to use plutonium-uranium mixed oxide, or MOX, fuel at reactors for so-called ''pluthermal,'' or plutonium-thermal, power generation, Katsumata indicated that they will suffer a setback and face postponements. TEPCO was using MOX fuel at the No. 3 reactor.
Katsumata said, however, that ''basic functions have been retained'' at the plant's remaining No. 5 and No. 6 reactors that TEPCO said are already in a stable condition called ''cold shutdown,'' as well as at the four reactors of the Fukushima Daini plant some 10 km to the south.
On the financial burden of compensation for the nuclear disaster, prospects for which have caused its stock to plunge and prompted rumors of its nationalization, Katsumata said the company has no room for calculating the costs at this point, but its ''dire situation'' is certain to continue for some time.
''By consulting with the government, we will work hard to avoid experiencing fund shortages because we are coming up short no matter how much money we have due to mounting fuel and restoration costs,'' he said.
Seven major banks and Shinkin Central Bank have decided to provide TEPCO with a total of 1.9 trillion yen in emergency loans, against the utility's request for a maximum of about 2 trillion yen to restore thermal power plants to make up for a large shortfall in power supply.
With its tsunami-crippled power plants causing serious electricity shortages in Tokyo and its surrounding area, TEPCO plans to boost its supply capacity to 46.5 million kilowatts by the end of July to cope with surging demand in the summer.
The chairman said that in the summer the utility hopes to avoid the rolling blackouts it began in its service area by adding more capacity by building new gas turbine power generation facilities.