By IANS,
Tokyo: The crippled nuclear reactors at Japan’s Fukushima power plant have finally been stabilised, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda announced Friday.
An earthquake and tsunami in March knocked out vital cooling systems, triggering radiation leaks and forcing the evacuation of thousands of people.
Noda’s declaration of a “cold shutdown” condition marked the stabilisation of the plant, BBC reported.
The six-reactor Fukushima plant was badly damaged by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. Explosions occurred at four reactors after the cooling systems failed.
Workers at the plant operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company, used sea water to cool the reactors. Waste water has built up and some contaminated liquid has been released into the sea.
A 20-km exclusion zone remains in place around the plant.
“The nuclear reactors have reached a state of cold shutdown, and therefore we can now confirm that we have come to the end of the accident phase of the actual reactors,” Noda said.