webfact Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 New environment minister says Japan should stop using nuclear power Japan's Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi attends a news conference at Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's official residence in Tokyo, Japan September 11, 2019. REUTERS/Issei Kato TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's newly installed environment minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, wants the country to close down nuclear reactors to avoid a repeat of the Fukushima catastrophe in 2011. The comments by the son of former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi, himself an anti-nuclear advocate, are likely to prove controversial in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, which supports a return to nuclear power under new safety rules imposed after Fukushima. "I would like to study how we will scrap them, not how to retain them," Shinjiro Koizumi said at his first news conference late on Wednesday after he was appointed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Japan's nuclear regulator is overseen by Koizumi's ministry. Three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi station run by Tokyo Electric Power melted down after being hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami in March 2011, spewing radiation that forced 160,000 people to flee, many never to return. Most of Japan's nuclear reactors, which before Fukushima supplied about 30 percent of the country's electricity, are going through a re-licensing process under new safety standards imposed after the disaster highlighted regulatory and operational failings. Japan has six reactors operating at present, a fraction of the 54 units before Fukushima. About 40 percent of the pre-Fukushima fleet is being decommissioned. Shinjiro Koizumi's father, a popular prime minister now retired from parliament, became a harsh critic of atomic energy after the Fukushima nuclear crisis. (Reporting by Elaine Lies and Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Paul Tait) -- © Copyright Reuters 2019-09-12 Follow Thaivisa on LINE for breaking Thailand news and visa info Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pegman Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Good idea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardColeman Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 16 minutes ago, webfact said: New environment minister says Japan should stop using nuclear power This guy wont be happy ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tug Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 What source do they plan to use to make up the short fall? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrTuner Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 8 hours ago, Tug said: What source do they plan to use to make up the short fall? The usual is coal. Instead of replacing nuclear with a polluting source, how about upgrading the plants to modern day from their 1950's tech. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brokenbone Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 9 minutes ago, DrTuner said: The usual is coal. Instead of replacing nuclear with a polluting source, how about upgrading the plants to modern day from their 1950's tech. agree, today standard they fail toward safety, if they fail at all Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sawadee1947 Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 9 hours ago, Tug said: What source do they plan to use to make up the short fall? Short fall? It's a tale. Japan can use power plants by enormous tidal ranges and also wind power. ???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sawadee1947 Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 16 minutes ago, brokenbone said: agree, today standard they fail toward safety, if they fail at all That is absolutely wrong. See my reply Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
metisdead Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Off topic posts and replies about Germany have been removed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forethat Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 7 minutes ago, sawadee1947 said: That's also wrong. Indeed at present 36% of energy is created by coal (from 84% in the 90') And the end of nuclear power is scheduled for 2022) I stand corrected, for 2018 it was 38%. I guess that makes it much more clever than had it been 40%. Good thing you pointed that out. I think - and I expect - Japan to come up with something much better than to start burning coal. I don't think the expectations from the environment extremist are any different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forethat Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 58 minutes ago, DrTuner said: The usual is coal. Instead of replacing nuclear with a polluting source, how about upgrading the plants to modern day from their 1950's tech. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2018/07/12/commentary/japan-commentary/future-shape-japans-energy-policy/#.XXoqY5NKiL4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rickb Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Nuclear power generation is the most logical for Japan. I don't believe they have any fossil fuel resources in country. Thus, were they to switch to coal or gas, the fuel would have to be imported (obviously very expensive). IMHO, upgrading the existing nuclear plants to today's safety standards makes the most economic sense. A lot of safety improvements have been made to nuclear power plant designs since the existing Japanese nuclear plants were designed back in the 70's and 80's. Let's remember that the catastrophe at the Fukushima plant was caused by a lack of proper design to withstand the large tsunami, not anything to do with the actual nuclear portion of the plant. Had the plant been properly designed to withstand the tsunami and earthquake, I think the plant would have survived without any meltdown. And switching to renewable energy is still way too expensive to supply the total electric power needs of Japan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forethat Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 25 minutes ago, rickb said: Nuclear power generation is the most logical for Japan. I don't believe they have any fossil fuel resources in country. Thus, were they to switch to coal or gas, the fuel would have to be imported (obviously very expensive). IMHO, upgrading the existing nuclear plants to today's safety standards makes the most economic sense. A lot of safety improvements have been made to nuclear power plant designs since the existing Japanese nuclear plants were designed back in the 70's and 80's. Let's remember that the catastrophe at the Fukushima plant was caused by a lack of proper design to withstand the large tsunami, not anything to do with the actual nuclear portion of the plant. Had the plant been properly designed to withstand the tsunami and earthquake, I think the plant would have survived without any meltdown. And switching to renewable energy is still way too expensive to supply the total electric power needs of Japan. Given how much Japan has invested in Gen IV nuclear research, I'd say you're bang on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolboy Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 10 minutes ago, rickb said: Nuclear power generation is the most logical for Japan. I don't believe they have any fossil fuel resources in country. Thus, were they to switch to coal or gas, the fuel would have to be imported (obviously very expensive). IMHO, upgrading the existing nuclear plants to today's safety standards makes the most economic sense. A lot of safety improvements have been made to nuclear power plant designs since the existing Japanese nuclear plants were designed back in the 70's and 80's. Let's remember that the catastrophe at the Fukushima plant was caused by a lack of proper design to withstand the large tsunami, not anything to do with the actual nuclear portion of the plant. Had the plant been properly designed to withstand the tsunami and earthquake, I think the plant would have survived without any meltdown. And switching to renewable energy is still way too expensive to supply the total electric power needs of Japan. Actually renewables are already much cheaper than coal and are now beginning to undercut the cost of natural gas. Nuclear energy is actually very expensive. Solar power in Japan actually costs way more than it should because the Japanese government has long guaranteed a high price to major power companies. Japan struggles to cut its high solar power costs https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Environment/Japan-struggles-to-cut-its-high-solar-power-costs Japan's use of wind power is even less than that of solar power. Wind power in Japan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Japan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ylmiri Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 11 hours ago, Tug said: What source do they plan to use to make up the short fall? Japan could follow some European countries and if they do it means Japan no longer so competitive in the world market. Life style has to change. But it will be good for Japan. In Japan many things could be done because the Japanese follow the laws to the letter and they work together once they see the benefits of doing so. Many other countries cannot even do that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolboy Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 2 minutes ago, ylmiri said: Japan could follow some European countries and if they do it means Japan no longer so competitive in the world market. Life style has to change. But it will be good for Japan. In Japan many things could be done because the Japanese follow the laws to the letter and they work together once they see the benefits of doing so. Many other countries cannot even do that. And in Japan there's lots of crony capitalism meaning that the government particularly afraid to offend the large industrial and commercial conglomerates that dominate so much of the Japanese economy. In the case of renewables, it means that it guarantees much higher rates than are economically feasible in genuine free market economies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timendres Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Start on one end, upgrading nuclear plants that are badly in need of an upgrade. On the other end, start investing in green energy, and every time green energy supplies enough power to replace an older nuke, decommission it. The balance is somewhere in the middle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thaibeachlovers Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 9 hours ago, rickb said: Nuclear power generation is the most logical for Japan. I don't believe they have any fossil fuel resources in country. Thus, were they to switch to coal or gas, the fuel would have to be imported (obviously very expensive). IMHO, upgrading the existing nuclear plants to today's safety standards makes the most economic sense. A lot of safety improvements have been made to nuclear power plant designs since the existing Japanese nuclear plants were designed back in the 70's and 80's. Let's remember that the catastrophe at the Fukushima plant was caused by a lack of proper design to withstand the large tsunami, not anything to do with the actual nuclear portion of the plant. Had the plant been properly designed to withstand the tsunami and earthquake, I think the plant would have survived without any meltdown. And switching to renewable energy is still way too expensive to supply the total electric power needs of Japan. France has been using nuclear safely for decades. Nuclear is the best option, as anyone that thinks Japan is going to put up it's electricity prices just to build windmills is dreaming. Japan has been in recession for decades- they ain't going to push it into depression willingly. As anyone that knows about those things knows, the disaster was caused by bad design, not a fundamental flaw. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brokenbone Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 12 hours ago, sawadee1947 said: That is absolutely wrong. See my reply no, and i dont care whichever reply you refer to, you havnt got adequate education and you havnt read up on the subject either Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tug Posted September 12, 2019 Share Posted September 12, 2019 Imo the biggest problem with renewables is we haven’t perfected a way to store the harvested energy yet when we crack that problem it will be unstoppable Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolboy Posted September 13, 2019 Share Posted September 13, 2019 2 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said: France has been using nuclear safely for decades. Nuclear is the best option, as anyone that thinks Japan is going to put up it's electricity prices just to build windmills is dreaming. Japan has been in recession for decades- they ain't going to push it into depression willingly. As anyone that knows about those things knows, the disaster was caused by bad design, not a fundamental flaw. The cost of power from wind is far less than that from nuclear plants. And no, Japan has not been in a recession for years. And how is "bad design" not a "fundamental flaw?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeekendRaider Posted September 13, 2019 Share Posted September 13, 2019 2 hours ago, Tug said: Imo the biggest problem with renewables is we haven’t perfected a way to store the harvested energy yet when we crack that problem it will be unstoppable and also crack the mining of any materials needed by such "technology", notwithstanding whatever that works out to be.... plus the manufacturing involved... plus all of the logistics chain including shipping and air transport.... such that they are also using mostly or all renewable energy sources. not just that we have some "renewables" to congradulate ourselves on how cheap they are and pretend are wonderful human technology. and safety test them. and what they are used in. and then.... roll them out. but also that same "success" will have a serious blowback. not only is "dirty energy" almost as big a negative forcing as GHG emissions but we now know we underestimated the aerosol effect [Rosenfeld et. al., Science, January 2019] overall in our models and those forcings are not at all pervasive in the atmosphere. meaning we need to continue burning coal until Donald Trump's US Space Force has the special aircraft needed for radiation management. the little old geo-engineering thing we will need if we stop using "dirty energy". for any reason. any reason. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brokenbone Posted September 13, 2019 Share Posted September 13, 2019 4 hours ago, Tug said: Imo the biggest problem with renewables is we haven’t perfected a way to store the harvested energy yet when we crack that problem it will be unstoppable the pumping back of water back up into the reservoir during low consumption may see clumsy tech but it actually works really well with not much losses Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sawadee1947 Posted September 13, 2019 Share Posted September 13, 2019 6 hours ago, brokenbone said: no, and i dont care whichever reply you refer to, you havnt got adequate education and you havnt read up on the subject either If you haven't yet it's high time to grow up now???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrTuner Posted September 13, 2019 Share Posted September 13, 2019 Japan does have an advantage using wind & co. It's population is dwindling so by the time they have them ready, there won't be many to use them. Problem solved and that should indeed be the global solution. Decrease the human population. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thaibeachlovers Posted September 16, 2019 Share Posted September 16, 2019 On 9/13/2019 at 7:41 PM, DrTuner said: Japan does have an advantage using wind & co. It's population is dwindling so by the time they have them ready, there won't be many to use them. Problem solved and that should indeed be the global solution. Decrease the human population. Anyone else notice that if humans caused the problems less humans would be a good idea, but no one in any government seems to be promoting birth control? I have to wonder why. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrTuner Posted September 16, 2019 Share Posted September 16, 2019 4 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said: Anyone else notice that if humans caused the problems less humans would be a good idea, but no one in any government seems to be promoting birth control? I have to wonder why. The reason for that is clear, they are running generational ponzi schemes. Each generation gets more and more in debt and needs more slaves to pay them off, rinse and repeat. Especially the pension schemes fit the bill. It's a known problem though: https://populationmatters.org/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolboy Posted September 16, 2019 Share Posted September 16, 2019 Here's a chart from Bloomberg. For many countries, including Japan, it shows which source of energy was cheapest in 2014 vs. 2019. It's notable that only in Japan and South Korea amongst fully developed economies is coal still the cheapest way to generate power. And it's also notable that nuclear is not the cheapest option anywhere. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2019-can-renewable-energy-power-the-world/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thaibeachlovers Posted September 16, 2019 Share Posted September 16, 2019 15 hours ago, bristolboy said: And it's also notable that nuclear is not the cheapest option anywhere. Perhaps, but it's the only non CO2 emitting viable source of enough electricity for countries with no other power than fossil fuel, at the moment. The Greens can't have it both ways, as long as they want to have electric cars replace petrol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolboy Posted September 16, 2019 Share Posted September 16, 2019 2 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said: Perhaps, but it's the only non CO2 emitting viable source of enough electricity for countries with no other power than fossil fuel, at the moment. The Greens can't have it both ways, as long as they want to have electric cars replace petrol. Pure and utter nonsense. Solar and wind are far far cheaper than coal and now undercut the cost of natural gas in most of the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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