Nuclear Energy Insight
Summer 2012—Many countries responded to the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant by mandating a check of their own reactors, running “stress” tests, inspecting the facilities to ensure they were completely safe and reviewing regulations. Most countries continue to produce electricity at their reactors. Worldwide, 66 facilities are now under construction.
However, Germany and Japan have each responded to the accident at Fukushima Daiichi more drastically. Germany shut eight of its 17 reactors after the accident and intends to close the remaining nine by 2022. Japan’s 54 reactors were shut down for safety checks, though the prime minister is recommending the restart of two reactors. Both countries as a result already pay higher costs for energy, and, in Japan’s case, there is a possibility of disruption in electric service and a grinding halt to economic growth.
Germany’s decision was in response to a rising tide of public disapproval following the accident and came soon after the government had made a decision to keep facilities open. But the decision to shut the reactors and replace them with renewable energy sources has proven difficult, with Germany’s grid unable to efficiently carry electricity generated from wind farms in the north to industrial centers in the south.
Japan’s situation is more complicated. Although the nuclear accident did not contribute to the huge loss of human life, it happened at the same time, joining the accident and the natural disaster together in people’s minds.
As the central and local governments decide whether to restart nuclear reactors beyond the two at the Ohi facility, resource-poor Japan is energy starved. Closing all of Japan’s nuclear energy facilities means losing 30 percent of its electricity generation.
The deputy policy chief of Japan’s ruling party, Yoshito Sengoku, said that without nuclear energy, the world’s third-largest economy would suffer. “We must think ahead to the impact on Japan’s economy and people’s lives if all nuclear reactors are stopped. Japan could, in some sense, be committing mass suicide,” Sengoku said.
Sengoku means economic suicide. The Bank of Japan, the country’s central bank, made the point less dramatically in a report on the economy issued in April. “Depending on the weather, the power supply could constrain output during the summer [of 2012]. But we must be mindful not just of such short-term effects but [how] the chance [of power shortages] could hurt Japan’s medium- and long-term growth expectations.”
One response has been to reopen oil, gas- and coal-fired plants, although Japan must import most of the fuel. The result has been more carbon emissions, with predictions that they will surpass the country’s previous high levels and at considerably more cost than running its reactors.
Japan’s Ministry of Environment projected that Japan will produce about 15 percent more greenhouse gas emissions in 2012 than it did in 1990, the baseline year for measuring progress in reducing emissions. This raises a concern about Japan’s ability to meet its agreement at the Copenhagen COP conference in 2009 to slash emissions by 25 percent from 1990 levels by 2020.
Nuclear energy produces no carbon emissions and provides plentiful baseload energy. This is a powerful combination, responsive to the issues of energy security, growing electricity demand and climate change.
Alternatives to nuclear energy remain natural gas, coal and renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power, but natural gas and coal produce carbon emissions while wind and solar power are dependent on the intermittent availability of wind and the sun.
At present, neither country has proposed an alternative that resolves these issues as readily as does nuclear energy.
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