Reasons Not to Stop It

It took thirty-three years for the United States to decide to authorize building new nuclear power plant after the Three Mile Island accident. Japan may need less than two years to do that after the First Fukushima Nuclear plant accident, which magnitude of the accident exceed the TMI’s and recorded level 7. The reason why Japan can do such an immediate decision is not because scientific technology in Japan is so excellent that safe and reliable method was found for nuclear reactors operation, but because people in Japan easily forget how the accident took houses or jobs of 160 thousand residents in Fukushima area.

Voters in Japan obviously allowed LDP win in last election of the House of Representatives. Although LDP didn’t made clear whether they would resume building new nuclear reactors, the leader of the party and later the Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, indicated right after the election that he may allow new reactor if power supplying system would require. While power companies in Japan welcomed his comment, people in Fukushima and anti-nuclear community in Japan criticized his attitude. The Prime Minister, in this context, was the divider in chief.

In Japan, two reactors out of fifty are working now. There was even a period no reactor was operating. However, the bullet trains ran between cities in Japan, heavy industries kept on exporting their products, and the people have been living their ordinary lives. Japan is still working without full operation of nuclear power plants. According to a poll, six out of ten Japanese want to be independent from nuclear power within next ten years.

There are some reasons why LDP administration is so positive on nuclear power. The first is pressure from economic sector. Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the owner of Fukushima reactors and responsible for the accident, and other power companies have been main member of Japan Business Federation, or Keidanren, the most powerful business group in Japan. To maintain political support from economic sector, LDP has to rely on the group. Supposedly, there also is pressure from foreign business groups, which don’t care about victims of Fukushima accident.

Another reason is maintaining nuclear technology. Some colleagues of PM Abe insist on that Japan will fall out from the world top nuclear group. Some of them believe that the maintenance of nuclear technology leads to keeping “nuclear Japan” option. This is true aspect of the new hawkish administration, and there is ongoing argument inside policy community in Washington about Japan’s possession of nuclear weapons.

There is no sign of the government of Japan to have thoroughly considered nuclear-zero option. If the nation wants to live in the world community as an developed and highly technological country, it should pursue less dependency on nuclear power with collective effort on developing non-nuclear power.