TEPCO ready for fuel removal from No. 4 spent fuel pool: U.S. expert

U.S. nuclear expert Lake Barrett said Wednesday that Tokyo Electric Power Co. is "ready to start the safe removal" of fuel inside the spent fuel pool of the No. 4 unit at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, as he visited the site and talked to workers involved.

"I was very impressed with the preparations," Barrett, who has dealt with the 1979 Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident as an official of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said at a press conference, while warning that workers should not become "complacent" during the operation that will continue until the end of next year.

Barrett also said he expects the Fukushima plant's decommissioning process will take a few decades but added that creating a concrete sarcophagus to cover damaged reactors as seen in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster "is not a good idea" in Fukushima's case.
[link to english.kyodonews.jp]
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