THE damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant must be scrapped, the country's top government spokesman has said. He also revealed "abnormal levels" of radiation had again been detected in milk and spinach taken from areas near the plant.
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The comment by the Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yukio Edano, yesterday was the first word from the government that the nuclear complex will have to be closed once its overheating reactors are brought under control.
In some of the first hopeful signs in the 10-day battle to stabilise the disabled power station, power has been restored to cooling pumps at four of the six reactors.
As a result, temperatures have dropped in the pools containing overheated spent fuel at two of the reactors, No. 5 and No. 6, the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, announced.
The state of the cooling systems in two other reactors at Fukushima, Nos. 1 and 2, are uncertain, and authorities continue to battle to keep the most damaged reactors, Nos. 3 and 4, under control by dousing them with water.
The number of people confirmed dead or missing after the earthquake and tsunami has risen to more than 20,000 as the grim task of recovery continues.
The director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Yukiya Amano, said that despite the new developments, it would be premature to be overly optimistic. "I hope that safety, stability will be recovered as soon as possible, but I still don't think it is time to say that I think they are going in a good direction or not," he said.
Compounding the problem of empty supermarket shelves, radiation has been detected in spinach and milk up to 140 kilometres from the damaged reactors.
Mr Edano called for calm. He said the radioactivity in the average amount of spinach and milk consumed in a year would only be equal to the amount received in a single CT scan. ''These levels do not pose an immediate threat to your health,'' he said.
Radioactive iodine and caesium have been detected in tap water, rain and air in a wide area south-west of the plant, including Tokyo, but officials said this also posed no health risk.
The incident has been upgraded from level four to level five on the International Nuclear and Radiological Events Scale, but the IAEA's safety director, Denis Flory, said it had not resulted in a "massive radiation release" or a "massive spread".
The Tokyo fire department spent 13 hours hosing the No. 3 reactor on Saturday night. Yesterday, however, pressure built up in the reactor and radioactive steam had to be released.
Fire engines from the Self-Defence Forces also aimed high-pressure water jets at the storage pool of No. 4 reactor.
The national police agency said more than 8000 people had been confirmed dead and more than 12,000 unaccounted for after of the March 11 catastrophe. The number of Australians unaccounted for has dropped to eight.
"This is very good news given that some days ago we started with a list in excess of 140," the Foreign Minister, Kevin Rudd, told the Ten Network.
The Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, said the government was not reconsidering the sale of uranium. "What is happening in Japan doesn't have any impact on my thinking about uranium exports," she told Sky News yesterday.
She also denied a suggestion the government was rethinking a ban on uranium sales to India.
The opposition's foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, said nuclear power should not be abandoned.
"If your top priority is to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions then nuclear power - as a low-emissions base-load power source - must continue to be in the mix," she told the Nine Network.
with agencies
