Tohoku Electric Power Co. on June 10 applied to the Nuclear Regulation Authority for safety screenings to restart a reactor that might lie directly above an active fault.
Tohoku Electric Power Co. on June 10 applied to the Nuclear Regulation Authority for safety screenings to restart a reactor that might lie directly above an active fault.
The application for the Higashidori nuclear power plant in Aomori Prefecture was submitted after the government announced plans to replace a NRA commissioner criticized as overly cautious with a pro-nuclear expert. The personnel change has drawn praise from residents around the Higashidori plant and outrage from victims of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
NRA inspectors have visited the Higashidori plant four times but have yet to reach a conclusion on whether an active fault runs under important equipment at the plant. Under Japanese law, nuclear reactors cannot operate if they lie directly above an active fault.
“All those involved have been irritated with (the NRA’s) slow-moving inspections,” said Yasuo Echizen, the mayor of Higashidori village, adding that he hopes the nuclear plant will be restarted at the earliest possible date.
The NRA was set up in the aftermath of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant accident to replace two nuclear safety bodies that were criticized for their cozy ties to the nuclear industry. The new nuclear watchdog introduced stricter safety rules for nuclear power plant operations.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to restart nuclear power plants, but all reactors remain offline in Japan, with some utilities waiting for NRA approval.
Nuclear power plant operators and government officials have largely blamed NRA Commissioner Kunihiko Shimazaki for the delay in giving the green light for the resumption of reactor operations.
The Diet on June 11 approved the Abe administration’s proposed personnel changes that would replace Shimazaki, a seismology expert, with Satoru Tanaka, a nuclear engineering professor at the University of Tokyo and a leading proponent of nuclear energy.
Another NRA commissioner, Kenzo Oshima, will also leave the nuclear watchdog. He will be replaced by Akira Ishiwatari, a professor of geology at Tohoku University, who has only tepid links to the nuclear industry. Some experts expect Ishiwatari to be impartial in judging the safety of nuclear reactors.
Yoichi Suenaga, a former president of Aomori University who is currently chairman of a group of local companies and individuals who discuss nuclear energy and regional development, said he welcomes the changes in the NRA.
“We have had doubts (about the credibility of the NRA) because the body has just been sticking to the problem of a possible active fault,” Suenaga said.
The reaction to the NRA changes was quite different in Fukushima Prefecture, where evacuees from the nuclear accident triggered by the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 said they fear that nuclear safety is again taking a back seat to industry interests.
“The personnel replacement is advantageous to those who want to restart reactors, and will render the current nuclear regulations ineffective,” said Hiroaki Kanno, 66, a doctor in Fukushima, who evacuated from Namie, Fukushima Prefecture.
A resident of Tamura, Fukushima Prefecture, said the Abe administration’s latest decision violates personnel shift rules introduced by the previous administration led by the Democratic Party of Japan.
“It is lunacy that the Abe administration is attempting to appoint Tanaka, an obviously ineligible figure, as commissioner,” said Ruiko Muto, a 60-year-old former teacher who is seeking to hold senior officials of Tokyo Electric Power Co., operator of the Fukushima No. 1 plant, criminally responsible for the disaster.
Yayoi Hitomi, 53, a magazine editor in Koriyama in the prefecture, said the government’s move reminded her of the failures of the NRA’s predecessor to properly evaluate the dangers at the Fukushima plant.
“(The commissioner replacement) represents a de facto revival of the Nuclear Safety Commission,” she said.