Japan’s Nuclear Future in the Balance

By Andrew Pollack

New York Times

Published on May 9, 2011

            As a result of the Japanese earthquakes and tsunami in March 2011, The Fukushima Daiichi power plant has spewed radiation into the air as well as the sea.  Japan announced they would not abandon nuclear power as an important source of energy, so many existing reactors are expected to keep operating. However, Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan announced that Japan would abandon all plans to build new nuclear reactors. A recent policy that predates the Fukushima disaster requires construction of at least 14 new reactors by 2030 to go with the 54 that now exist. If completed, those reactors would have raised nuclear power’s share of Japan’s electricity generation to about 50 percent. Advocates for renewable energy think that the March earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident have given Japan a reason to rebuild its economy as a world leader in clean, renewable energy. Through solar, wind and geothermal combined makes up for only 1 percent of Japan’s electricity. Another 8 percent or so comes from hydroelectric power.  Some members of Parliament recently held a forum, called Energy Shift Japan, to promote a move toward renewable sources.

In my opinion, the article was informative. However it was very contradictive. At first it said that Japan was definitely going to rebuild 14 of the 54 nuclear reactors. Then, it said the prime minister announced that Japan would abandon all plans to rebuild the nuclear reactors. The Tokyo Electric Power Company has been forced to drop plans to build two new reactors on the site of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi plant. Also, the article stated that with a recent policy realized by Japanese government stated that they would indeed rebuild the 14 reactors by 2030.  “It is a battle between the future and the past,” said Tetsunari Iida, executive director of the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies, a nonprofit policy research organization in Japan. The Japanese citizens believe that this is a boost to help them become the world leader of clean energy. Masayoshi Son, the founder of Softbank and Japan’s richest man, said last month that he would donate about $12 million to start a research foundation for renewable energy to replace the use of nuclear energy. As of last Friday, the government requested that  Chubu Electric Power shut down a nuclear power plant 120 miles southwest of Tokyo until the company can develop its earthquake and tsunami defenses. This problem this is similar to that of explosion of the reactor in Chernobyl. To me, this is a little iffy, if they don’t rebuild the reactors, how are the Japanese citizens supposed to get their power?

If the Japanese government does not rebuild the 14 reactors, then there may not be enough power to supply homes and business throughout Japan. However, if they do rebuild the reactors, it could cost millions, even billions of dollars. So that could result in a rise in taxes to help repay the debt of rebuilding the 14 reactors. However, if they rebuild the 14 reactors, they may in fact have to do some maintenance of the remaining reactors to ensure that the same accident won’t happen in the future. If they do not fix the other reactors and something close to that of Chernobyl may happen causing twice the devastation that has already occurred in the country of Japan.