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Japan To Restart Nuclear Power Tomorrow After Energy Prices Soar

Posted by samzenpus on from the start-it-up dept.

An anonymous reader writes: After the Fukushima meltdown, all of Japan's nuclear power plants were shut down, the last in late 2013. This week the government plans on starting up reactor No.1 at the Sendai nuclear power plant. Energy prices have risen 30% since 2011, and it is hoped that the plant will soon be producing a surplus of electricity. Not everyone is happy about the plant restarting. This weekend, about 2,000 protesters marched around the plant and voiced their opposition. "Past arguments that nuclear plants were safe and nuclear energy was cheap were all shown to be lies," said writer Satoshi Kamata, one of the demonstration organizers. "Kyushu Electric is not qualified to resume operations because it has not completed an anti-quake structure to oversee a possible accident as well as a venting facility."

8 of 338 comments (clear)

  1. Re:It'd be hilareous if not so sad... by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Japan's newest nukes are of the very latest design, and all of the plants being restarted have passed the latest safety tests, on a date that has been planned for years. No, this is not some panic move "in response to soaring energy prices" as the headline claims.

  2. Fine but they should invest in wind next by WolfWithoutAClause · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Japan actually has a large, and largely untapped, capacity to use wind power. They also have quite a lot of hydroelectricity, which is useful for buffering against variations.

    Wind power is actually cheaper than nuclear anyway now.

    Nuclear power is probably not such a great idea for Japan, it's quite a small country, very highly populated, and on the ring of fire, and any accidents could have much worse effects than we saw with Fukushima. With Fukushima, it was fortuitous that it was on the East coast, and the prevailing winds blew the fallout out to sea where it was diluted it down. If the accident had been West of Tokyo it would have been incredibly, stupendously bad, and if they return to using nuclear power in a big way, that could actually happen.

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    -WolfWithoutAClause

    "Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"
    1. Re:Fine but they should invest in wind next by Harlequin80 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The other way to look at it is if Fukushima had been on the West coast we wouldn't be talking about it at all and it would never have been damaged by the Tsunami.

      All power generation systems comes with some kind of risks. As a species we have been using nuclear all around the world for over 50 years and there are around 450ish plants with only 2 accidents of major note. In both instances we have learned what to look for and how to defend against those and similar issues in the future.

      One of the huge risks on other energy sources that is a major reason why Japan will have a nuclear energy sector for the foreseeable future is it is the only reasonably independent energy source available to it which other countries can't take away easily. Japan has no major fossil fuel reserves so must import gas, coal etc. putting it at risk to other countries for its energy supply.

      The same can be seen in their food production. Japan intensively farms its land and supports / protects its farmers. This is so that in the event of a conflict they retain the ability to feed themselves without imports.

      Wind is great, solar is great, hydro is great but I'm not convinced there is enough capacity, built or build-able, in those sources for Japan to move away from nuclear at this stage.

    2. Re:Fine but they should invest in wind next by Harlequin80 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I didn't know the event so just did a quick read. From what I can see the other cooling towers were more than capable of handling the heat load and the plant was throttled to 50% until the cooling tower was repaired. I couldn't find anything that referred to discharges into the river causing ecological damage, happy to read if you have something. Also it looks like it was a failure of a timber support not metal.

      That said cooling towers are not specific to nuclear power stations. They are used by all heat based generation systems to the impact would have been identical at a coal or gas plant.

  3. Re:What energy prices have risen? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Almost all energy prices (crude oil, natural gas, coal) have fallen by half comparing to the mid-point of 2011 prices, except uranium. What energy prices are they talking about?

    They are talking about their electricity supplies.

    Nuclear energy is mostly local energy. Fossil fuels are ALL IMPORTED into Japan. So yes, energy prices increased since yen devalued and Japan has been literally burning foreign currency reserves to burn fossil fuels.

    Uranium prices do not really matter for nuclear power. It forms a very small fraction of actual costs.

  4. Need something to arm Japan with nuclear warheads by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Oh, wait, were we supposed to pretend PM Abe is peaceful?

    Yeah, sure.

    The best use for the area is to cover the nuclear radioactive fields with wind and solar plants, and step away from the eternal conflict that nuclear fission represents.

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    -- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
  5. Re:It'd be hilareous if not so sad... by ColdWetDog · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Japan's newest nukes are of the very latest design, and all of the plants being restarted have passed the latest safety tests, on a date that has been planned for years. No, this is not some panic move "in response to soaring energy prices" as the headline claims.

    No, not really.

    "The vast majority of plants under construction around the world, 47 in all, are considered Generation II reactor designs—the same 1970s vintage as Fukushima Daiichi, and without integrated passive safety systems."

    Note the last phrase 'without integrated passive safety systems". That is the key. Fukashima required external power to shut itself down safely. Yes, TEPCO could have done things differently - site generators uphill, install a seawall that could actually contain a worst-case-scenario earthquake. Installed a hydrogen vent system. But it didn't. And TEPCO stated for years that the system was safe.

    Until you can shut down a reactor all by itself, then it isn't safe.

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    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  6. Re:It'd be hilareous if not so sad... by rmdingler · · Score: 3, Interesting
    You don't ever, really, completely prevent accidents.

    There becomes a measurable, yet acceptable level of environmental consequence for the creation of energy using fossil fuels, hydro, solar, and even wind.

    Should the bar for nuclear use be set right near perfection? Of course not, but maybe

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    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway