Japan may scrap entire Fukushima nuclear complex

Tokyo: The future of the crippled Fukushima nuclear plants may be sealed with government officials suggesting that the entire complex of six nuclear reactors may have to be decommissioned. Their comments come after plant operator Tokyo Electric suggested that just four out of the six nuclear plants at the site may be decommissioned.

According to government spokesman and chief cabinet secretary, Yukio Edano, all of the reactors at the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant should be scrapped. ''I believe it is very clear from the viewpoint of society. That is my perception,'' he said at a news conference Wednesday.

His remarks came after Tsunehisa Katsumata, chairman of plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), told a separate news conference, ''We have no choice but to scrap reactors 1 to 4 if we look at their conditions objectively.''

Following the 11 March earthquake and follow-on tsunami, four of the six reactors at the nuclear power plant northeast of Tokyo lost their cooling functions and began leaking radioactive materials into the air and sea.

The No 5 and 6 reactors have caused fewer problems than the other four and are already in a state of cold shutdown.

Experts have suggested that the flooding of seawater into the reactor cores of Nos 1-4, in a desperate bid to cool them down, would eventually lead to decommissioning as salt and impure substances in seawater will likely cause equipment to corrode.