First Nuclear Plant Starts Up In Japan Since Fukushima Disaster

Kyushu Electric Power Co said yesterday that it will restart the No 1 reactor at its Sendai nuclear plant this morning.

The 31-year-old reactor – operating under tougher safety rules – was expected to reach full capacity around 11:00 pm Tuesday and would start generating power by Friday.

Nevertheless, opinion polls show a majority of the Japanese public oppose the return to nuclear energy.

The resource-poor nation, which once relied on nuclear power for a quarter of its electricity, restarted two reactors temporarily to feed its needs.

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Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has made the restart of the country’s nuclear energy industry a priority of his administration, with the hiatus sending electricity bills soaring, providing a drag on his so-called Abenomics reforms, and serving to highlight Japan’s dependence on energy imports.

Workers have been decommissioning the Fukushima plant Why has Japan decided to go ahead with the restart?

On Monday about 400 protesters rallied in front of the Sendai plant, which is on the southern tip of Japan’s Kyushu island.

The Fukushima accident resulted in the shutting down of all of Japan’s commercial reactors by the end of September 2013 due to safety concerns.

“The Nuclear Regulation Authority and Kyushu have not applied a robust enough risk assessment – they have disregarded the seismic and volcanic risks involved, while the reactors at Sendai are also aging”, Ai Kashiwagi, of Greenpeace Japan, told CNN.

“There are schools and hospitals near the plant, but no one has told us how children and the elderly would be evacuated”, the Guardian quoted a representative of a group opposing the Sendai restart as saying.

More than $100m (£64m) has been spent on fitting new safety systems at the Sendai plant.

Despite the NRA’s seal of approval for Sendai-1, critics say there are many unanswered questions, especially concerning the many active volcanos near the Sendai plant site. Dozens of protesters, including ex-Prime Minister Naoto Kan, who was in office at the time of the disaster and has become an outspoken critic of nuclear power, were gathered outside the plant as police stood guard.

The quake and tsunami claimed the lives of nearly 16 000 people and more than 2500 are still missing.

The damage of Fukushima NPP caused the evacuation of 160 000 people from the surrounding areas and continuing high radiation levels make their return impossible.