Japan’s Nuclear Crisis Yet to Stabilize, NRC Chairman Says

Japan’s crippled nuclear station is yet to stabilize and the reactors must be kept cool to prevent the crisis from deteriorating, the U.S. atomic regulator said, as more aftershocks rocked the country.

“Currently the situation is static,” Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko said at a hearing of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee yesterday, after Japan raised the severity rating of the accident to the same level as Chernobyl. “It is not yet, however, what we believe to be stable” and “significant additional problems” could still occur at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant, he said in Washington.