December 28, 2012

(Commentary – Suggested Japanese Nuclear New Year’s Resolutions, click here) Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is ready to review his predecessor’s plans to end nuclear power in Japan by 2040. Industry Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said at a press conference, “We...

Suggested Japanese Nuclear New Year’s Resolutions

One of the western traditions as New Year’s approaches is to make resolutions, to be kept over the course of the following 365 days. Here are a few nuclear energy resolutions I suggest for Japan… For the Nuclear Regulatory Authority – (a) Create the new safety...

December 26, 2012

Shinzo Abe, leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, is the new Prime Minister. The lower house of the Diet elected him by a bigger landslide than the LDP had in the recent national election. Abe swamped DPJ candidate and former Naoto Kan side-kick, Banri...

December 24, 2012

Although the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan ran a nuclear-neutral campaign, they are beginning to show some pronuclear colors. The draft of the coalition between the LDP and the largely-Buddhist New Komeito Party includes the allowance of reactor restarts, given...

A “Mindset” That May Have Killed Thousands

This past July, the Chair of the Diet’s Fukushima Accident Investigative Committee, Kiyoshi Kurokawa, said that the “ingrained conventions” of Japanese culture were at least partly to blame for the Fukushima accident. To be precise, his preface to the NAIIC report...

December 21, 2012

The current focus of the Nuclear Regulatory Authority is earthquake possibilities concerning nuclear plants, and the issue has become foggy. This week, the NRA concluded that the geology near the Higashidori station in Aomori Prefecture has a seismically active fault....

December 19, 2012

It seems that both sides of the nuclear issue are touting Sunday’s election as a pro-nuclear victory, but these speculations seem to be premature. The victorious Liberal Democratic Party of Japan has not clarified its stance on nuclear energy policy, taking a...

December 17, 2012

As anticipated, the nuclear-neutral Liberal Democratic Party of Japan won yesterday’s election in a virtual landslide, taking 294 seats in the Diet’s lower house. This led Prime Minister Noda to announce he will resign and be replaced by LDP party-chief Shinzo Abe....

December 14, 2012

(For today’s Commentary – Latest Chernobyl Cancer Study Contains Numerous Problems – click here) A Nuclear Regulatory Authority panel has agreed that the nuclear watchdog should set the radiation level for evacuations well-below international...
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