Japan to Retire Five Old Nuclear Reactors

Three of Japan’s fifty nuclear reactors will be decommissioned due to old age and two more will follow suit shortly as the government seeks to reassure the public of the safety of the country's reactors which have lain idle for almost four years, NHK reported Tuesday.

The reactors are the Nos. 1 and 2 reactors at KEPCO's Mihama nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture and the No. 1 reactor at Japan Atomic Power's Tsuruga plant, also in Fukui.

The No. 1 reactor at Chugoku Electric's Shimane plant in Shimane Prefecture and the No. 1 reactor at Kyushu Electric's Genkai plant in Saga Prefecture are due to be shut down on Wednesday after more than forty years of work.

The move would mark the first time Japanese utilities are retiring power reactors after all 50 of Japan's reactors were shut down in the wake of the March 2011 meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.

In early 2013 Japan introduced new safety regulations for its nuclear power plants to prevent any repetition of the 2011 disaster at the Fukushima-1 station. Each station will now have two control centers, one of which will be located at a considerable distance from the facility.