By Fabíola Ortiz
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jun 20 2014 (IPS)

It has been three years since the nuclear accident in Fukushima, Japan. But the consequences are still ongoing due to continuous leaks of radioactivity into the environment, says independent nuclear energy consultant Mycle Schneider.

In 1997 Schneider won the Right Livelihood Award, considered the Alternative Nobel Prize, for alerting the world about the risks posed by the use of plutonium. He was appointed a member of the International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPFM), based at Princeton University, in 2007.

According to the scientist, the trend nowadays is towards fewer and fewer nuclear power plants operating worldwide. Instead of a renaissance, he says, the world is facing a decline in the use of this source of energy.

In this interview with IPS, Schneider also commented on the initiative Brazil and Argentina are developing as part of their mutual cooperation in the field of nuclear energy. In his opinion, it has the potential to be adapted in critical regions like the Middle East.

Q: What is the global situation of nuclear power as a source of energy?

A: The situation of the commercial use of nuclear energy is quite different from public perception. If one looks at the number of nuclear reactors operating in the world, the peak with the highest number of machines operating was back in 2002, twelve years ago. There were 444 nuclear reactors at that time.

Independent nuclear energy consultant Mycle Schneider says nuclear power is actually in decline. Credit: Fabíola Ortiz/IPS

Now we’re standing at around 400. Officially there are 48 reactors operating in Japan but none of these is generating electricity. However, the International Atomic Energy Agency continues to list all of these reactors as in operation.

So in reality, there is a significant decline. In Europe the peak was already in 1988, 25 years ago, where 177 reactors were operating at that time and now there are only 131 left – 46 units less.

We are not in the context of a so-called renaissance; we are facing a decline. The share of nuclear power in electricity generation worldwide peaked in 1993, 20 years ago. It was 17 percent then and is around 10 percent today. The trend is clearly towards a decrease in operating nuclear power plants.

Q: What are the lessons three years after the Fukushima accident?

A: Public opinion throughout the world was very much influenced by Fukushima. The use of this source of energy lost acceptance, in Asia much more than in other regions. In Europe as well with very large differences between countries, for example, in Switzerland enormously, in the UK a lot less, and in Germany the opposition was very much established. It changed a lot of things in countries like China and South Korea because those countries are much closer to Japan.

Society has operated nuclear power plants on a very simple equation: a very large danger potential multiplied with a very low probability of events equals acceptable risk. That equation blew up in Fukushima;people realised that low probability does not necessarily mean no event, zero risk.

The lesson, the most fundamental to be learned for society, is to reduce the danger potential in the first place. The energy contained in liquid natural gas tankers, for example, is just unbelievable: in terms of pure energy, it can be equivalent to over two times the Nagasaki bomb in one tanker. It is very unlikely that it will explode, but even if the risk was only 10 percent, the kind of damage that it could do is beyond imagination. And these bombs are all over the place.

Q: What did Fukushima represent regarding the safety of nuclear plants?

A: People think Fukushima was the worst case, but it was not. It can become much worse, it is not over. This accident is ongoing, it has been for three years. There are continuous leaks of radioactivity in the environment because the radioactive inventory is not stabilised.

It’s an unprecedented event in complexity, in size and in consequences. The biggest problem is that the methodology chosen by Tepco [the utility that operated the plant that melted down during the Mar. 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami] and the Japanese government appears inappropriate. We see that after three years the situation is very far from being stabilised.

The amount of radioactivity that has gone into water that was leaked into the basements is estimated to be roughly three times the amount of radioactivity released during the [1986] Chernobyl accident. This issue is vastly underestimated.

Q: Brazil and Argentina are developing a partnership of mutual cooperation in the nuclear field. How do you see this initiative?

A: Nuclear power in South America is insignificant for electricity generation and contributes only five percent in Argentina and three percent in Brazil.

The Brazilian-Argentine Agency for Accounting and Control of Nuclear Materials (ABACC), that is focusing on non-proliferation issues, is technically difficult to assess from the outside, but it seems ABACC is staffed with 100 inspectors. That is a lot compared to the number of facilities to be inspected.

It is a very interesting initiative. We have discussed the possibilities of adapting this kind of approach to other regions, for example in the Middle East, which is one of the problematic regions.

Excerpt:

Miles of farmland around the crippled Fukushima reactor have been transformed into contaminated wastelands. Credit: Hajime NAKANO/CC-BY-2.0

By Suvendrini Kakuchi
TOKYO, Mar 26 2013 (IPS)

Pushed and pulled in opposite directions, the future of Japan’s energy plans in the wake of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant two years ago is emerging as a fight between national economic advancement and what anti-nuke activists call “the lives of the people”.

“The tug-of-war between the government and opponents of nuclear power has become an excruciatingly difficult issue in Japan,” Professor Takao Kashiwage, nuclear technology expert at the prestigious Tokyo Institute of Technology, told IPS.

“The emotional (turbulence) following the devastating consequences of the Fukushima accident is masking a real and objective debate” about the country’s energy needs and its nuclear future, he added.

Kashiwage sits on the official cogeneration energy committee and backs Japanese Prime Minister Shintaro Abe’s energy platform that calls for a re-start of Japan’s nuclear reactors after the implementation of new safety standards that will be established by an independent expert commission in July.

“Japan’s energy security is heavily dependent on nuclear power. To halt this source (that produced around 30 percent of energy needs prior to the accident) completely is too drastic a step for the country,” he explained. Japan currently imports 84 percent of its energy needs.

On the other side of the fence are anti-nuclear activists, who have drawn negative attention to the development of nuclear power plants by Japan’s nine most powerful utility companies, supported by public funds on the basis of creating a secure supply of energy for resource-poor Japan.

Large sums of revenue were poured into cash-strapped localities to host nuclear plants that were touted as “safe”: according to official estimates, a single reactor costs about 10 billion dollars, though activists say the amount is much higher when other expenses, such as support for new facilities and subsidies for hosting local governments, are taken into account.

But, as the Fukushima accident made tragically clear, those projects failed to meet safety requirements such as contingency plans for large-scale evacuation of residents in the event of a crisis.

Activists point to the heavy toll the Mar. 11 disaster took on communities living close to the Fukushima Daiichi reactors as one of the more jolting examples of the tragic human consequences of nuclear power. They have also called attention to the environmental risks of storing radioactive material that could easily poison the surrounding area.

Indeed, life-threatening radiation leaks have already forced entire communities to leave their homes and jobs, with more than 300,000 people still living in temporary housing, scores of families separated and miles of farmland transformed into contaminated wastelands, unable to produce a single edible crop.

Yasuo Fujita, 67, is one of these many nuclear refugees.

His family had lived for several generations in Namie village, located just seven kilometres from the stricken nuclear plant. Shortly after the meltdown, he was forced to give up his beloved sushi shop that he had run for 30 years and move to Koto-ku, a Tokyo ward.

Today Fujita is still waiting for compensation from the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) to restart his life. “I lost everything in a second because of the Fukushima accident,” he told IPS.

“Despite government plans to rebuild Fukushima within three to four decades, nobody believes they can return. With (scores of) young people now moving away, there is no point in returning even if the government does make the area safe again, a prospect we do not believe in anyway,” Fujita added.

Anti-nuke environmentalists teach schoolchildren about solar panels as an alternative to nuclear power. Credit: Courtesy Morihiko Shimamura/Otentosan Project

Meanwhile, the announcement last Monday that cooling of the spent fuel rods of three reactors at the Fukushima plant would be suspended due to a power outage created national panic and exposed a key problem in Japan’s nuclear industry: the lack of transparency leading to poor information dissemination and negligence of solid safety procedures.

The ‘Yomiuri’, Japan’s leading daily, noted on Thursday that TEPCO’s public announcement of the problem on Monday evening came too late, and illustrates the company’s “lax safety measures”, including the absence of a back-up plan to deal with accidents.

But as Japan’s massive fuel bills continue to rise for the second straight year – in February liquefied natural gas imports grew 19.1 percent, contributing almost 40 percent of the record 8.2-billion-dollar trade deficit, according to the Finance Ministry – and household utility bills climb 20 percent on average to meet increasing electricity costs, public support for the anti-nuke camp appears to be wavering.

An opinion poll conducted by ‘Asahi’, Japan’s leading national newspaper, in February revealed that 46 percent of respondents were in favour of continuing nuclear power if safety measures are strengthened — higher than the 41 percent who support total abolishment.

Only two of Japan’s 50 nuclear reactors – units 3 and 4 of the Ōhi nuclear power plant located in the Fukui Prefecture – are operating, while the rest have been closed for maintenance or repairs, bringing nuclear power supply to almost zero.

This is a drastic reduction from pre-Fukushima levels, and a huge set back for national plans to grow the energy source to 50 percent of total supply.

Faced with the stark reality of the impacts of the accident and deep public commitment to avert another disaster, Abe is currently pushing safety measures, including installation of the new Nuclear Regulation Authority, comprised of independent experts, which has already issued seismic warnings against two nuclear power plants.

An upcoming national election in the summer marks an important turning point. If Abe’s conservative Liberal Democratic Party wins, experts contend the coast will be clear to restart idle nuclear plants.

But Aileen Smith, head of Green Action and a leader in the anti-nuclear movement, told IPS that activists will do their best to halt these plans, applying pressure in the form of lawsuits and large public protests and demonstrations.

“The government is talking of restarting idled plants. But the dangerous reality on the ground is such that utility companies applying for permission will face an uphill struggle,” she said.

(END)

For the past two decades Masao Ishiji (59), has been fighting tooth and nail to ban the operation of four nuclear reactors that dot the western coastline of Oi in the Fukui prefecture facing the Japan Sea.

Earlier this week, that desperate battle reached a critical front. When the Oi municipal assembly passed a new resolution Monday to restart Unit 3 and 4 reactors that had been closed for a year for stress tests, anti-nuclear activists knew they had reached a crucial juncture in their fight to eradicate nuclear power from the country.

“The new Oi decision is a blow to the anti-nuclear movement,” explained Yuki Sekimoto of Greenpeace, Japan. ” It is also a stark reminder of the excruciating position faced by the local residents. They have to chose between their jobs or stopping nuclear power, a very unfair situation.”

Indeed, Mayor Shinobu Tokioka, who now faces the difficult task of approving the local assembly decision, told the Japanese media on Monday that his main consideration was the potential damage to the local economy brought on by a prolonged halt of the reactors.

Local surveys conducted by Ishiji and his supporters from Wakasa, a town of 9000 people sandwiched between the Oi reactors, indicate residents are torn between loosing their jobs and facing a possible accident similar to the Fukushima Daiichi catastrophe caused by a massive earthquake and tsunami last March.

More than 90 percent of the 400 people polled said they were concerned about the lack of a safe evacuation plan in the face of another earthquake severe enough to damage reactors.

But the risk of ordinary people like local shopkeepers and innkeepers, who cater to the nuclear industry, loosing their jobs, also remains a grave threat.

“These are their biggest concerns. The Oi decision to restart the reactors has created a tense situation in the surrounding areas,” Ishiji reported at a large meeting of anti-nuclear NGOs in Tokyo on Tuesday.

Trend of nuclear-powered employment

The Oi nuclear reactors were built in the mid 1970s when local towns and villages comprised of farmers and fisherfolk grappled with a declining youth population and a faltering economy.

Ishiji said he used to work for the local forest industry that was hit by cheap timber imports from Asian countries.

“Japanese timber could not compete with Asian resources, leading to the neglect of our forests. The younger people moved to the big cities in search of better paying jobs, leaving behind a vulnerable local economy,” he explained.

During that period, many of Japan’s cash-strapped local economies turned to nuclear power plants, which rich utility companies and government bureaucrats were touting as a safe way for Japan to pursue economic growth.

The building of reactors was accompanied by generous subsidies from the central government for the construction of roads, schools and other infrastructure that brought jobs and revitalised the local economy.

But the destruction of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor last year was a drastic jolt to the long tradition of ‘nuclear-powered’ employment. Tens of thousands suffered radioactive contamination, and businesses and agriculture faced bankruptcy.

The incident thus created widespread anti-nuclear public sentiment – more than 70 percent of Japanese now report they do not trust nuclear power, making local politicians wary of restarting nuclear reactors in their constituencies. In fact, 50 operational nuclear reactors have closed down since early May.

Oi’s reactors are owned by Kansai Electric Power Company, the second largest utility company after Tokyo Electric Company, which is now saddled with debt after the disastrous Fukushima nuclear accident.

Utility companies have warned of looming power cuts this summer as a result of the nuclear power plant closures. Nuclear power currently provides at least 30 percent of national energy and was set to increase to 50 percent, until the accident last March brought things to a standstill.

Professor Takao Kashiwagi, expert at Japan’s prestigious Tokyo Technology Institute and a governmental adviser, pointed out that Fukushima has paved the way for more stringent safety measures for nuclear reactors, including higher tsunami barriers and the involvement of independent experts to monitor utility plants.

“Japan’s energy security must not be a political issue,” he told IPS. “The restart of nuclear reactors must have firm leadership based on concrete scientific research,” he said.

Environmentalists, meanwhile, say they remain undaunted by the Oi decision, which has become a watershed moment in their activism.

Aileen Smith from Green Action, a leading environment organisation, said that Fukushima was a brutal awakening for many to nuclear power’s fatal toll on humanity and the environment.

Additionally, “Fighting against nuclear power is closely linked to supporting employment,” said Ishiji who is now advocating for the development of alternative energy sources in Fukui.

(END)

France's energy mix includes solar panels at a fuel station. Credit: A. D. McKenzie/IPS

By A. D. McKenzie
PARIS, May 14 2012 (IPS)

As France’s president-elect Francois Hollande prepares to form a new government, many environmentalists are calling for the appointment of an ecology minister with real power who can deliver on promises to reduce the use of nuclear power as well as cut carbon emissions.

“We want a strong minister – one that will have energy as part of his portfolio,” said Marc Mossalgue, a spokesman for Climate Action Network France (RAC-F), which groups non-governmental organisations concerned with climate change and environmental protection.

Mossalgue told IPS in an interview that NGOs want to see a “clear mandate” so that the ecology minister won’t be overshadowed by his counterparts in the industry and economy sectors.

“The challenges demand … that the future minister also be able to address housing, transportation and energy issues to be effective.” Mossalgue said ahead of Hollande’s inauguration on Tuesday.

The former ecology minister, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, had limited authority in the administration of president Nicolas Sarkozy, who Hollande defeated in runoff elections on May 6. Decisions on energy then were largely in the realm of the Industry Ministry, which often had the final say, according to political observers.

“Kosciusko-Morizet was never able to live up to her own convictions. She chose the wrong side, and too bad for her,” said Joël Vormus, energy and environment project manager for the Comité de Liaison Energies Renouvelables (CLER), a non-governmental network of more than 200 professionals throughout France.

“The first promise we want to see Hollande keep is the holding of a public debate on the future of energy policies in France,” he told IPS. “It was never subjected to public debate and all NGOs are waiting for this to happen.”

Hollande, a socialist, says he will close France’s oldest nuclear plant, the two-reactor, 35-year-old plant at Fessenheim in north-eastern France; but that wouldn’t be until the end of his first term in 2017.

He also proposes to cut the amount of electricity generated from nuclear power in France to 50 percent from the current 75 percent, by 2030. This would mean closing half of the country’s 58 reactors.

Alongside these goals, Hollande has also said he wants to cut carbon emissions by 30 percent by 2020, which would be 10 percent higher than the European agreed objective.

“This is an ambitious goal, but it’s not unrealistic,” Vormus told IPS.

Other energy experts do not expect much to change in the short-term, however, because of the huge costs involved in moving to renewables and the spectre of higher electricity bills for consumers amid the present economic crisis.

“Over the next five years we wouldn’t expect to see very much change,” says Dr. Roy Cameron, head of the nuclear development division in the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

“Nuclear will continue to be a very significant contributor in the energy mix,” he told IPS. “In terms of basic issues of the interaction of nuclear and renewables, countries like France have to work out how capable they are of dealing with the increased costs that will come from any move to renewables and whether they are ready to impose hikes in electricity prices as is happening in Germany, for instance.”

The French Electricity Union (UFE) released a report last November saying that cutting nuclear energy use to 50 percent would necessitate an extra 60 billion euros in investments to meet projected electricity demand, and would increase carbon emissions by around 30 percent and cause electricity prices to rise by some 50 percent.

NGOs measure the monetary costs against the “grave and irreversible consequences for man and the environment” that could come from one accident at a nuclear plant, to use the words of Kosciusko-Morizet following the Fukushima disaster in Japan last year.

“That’s obviously an argument that can be made, but the accident in the world that’s killed the most people has been a dam collapse and not a nuclear plant,” said Cameron, referring to a 1975 dam burst in China in which an estimated 30,000 people perished and thousands more died in resulting epidemics.

“On any comparative basis … the health impacts are always much lower in nuclear than in other technologies,” he added. “That’s without dismissing the real costs related to relocation, loss of income or other issues in a nuclear accident.”

Cameron said that OECD studies have shown that governments and consumers are most concerned about “security of supply” when it comes to providing energy.

“Citizens are not happy if they turn on the light and it doesn’t come on or if they put on the shower and it’s cold water,” he told IPS. “Security of supply is often the issue we’ve found in our studies that motivates governments more. Climate change policy is secondary to security of supply.”

He said that the new French government will have to decide how much it can “take on board a climate change goal without affecting security of supply while ensuring affordability.”

Even if Fessenheim does close, Hollande has already agreed to the completion of a controversial third- generation reactor being built at the Flamanville Nuclear Power Plant in northwestern France, and he hasn’t indicated where he stands on the construction of another reactor at Penly.

The Flamanville 3 EPR (European Pressurised Reactor) will have greater power-generating capacity than Fessenheim, which means the country’s nuclear status quo will be kept for some time, analysts say.

“The number of reactors will stay the same for now,” says Pierre Terzian, editor and publisher of Petrostrategies, an international energy newsletter. “But Hollande will definitely invest more in renewables, probably encourage energy efficiency and probably not authorise the building of new nuclear plants.” (END)

Japan’s nuclear power industry, which once ignored opposition, now finds its existence threatened by women angered by official opaqueness on radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant after it was struck by an earthquake- driven tsunami on Mar. 11.

“Mothers are at the forefront of various grassroots movements that are working together to stop the operation of all nuclear plants in Japan from 2012,” Aileen Miyoko Smith, head of Green Action, a non- governmental organisation (NGO) that promotes renewable energy told IPS.

More than 100 anti-nuclear demonstrators, most of them women, met with officials of the Nuclear Safety Commission this week and handed over a statement calling for a transparent investigation into the accident and a permanent shutdown of all nuclear power plants.

Currently six of Japan’s 56 nuclear plants are closed, some for stress tests after the Fukushima accident exposed serious breaches of safety precautions in the nuclear power industry.

More than 150,000 people remain unable to return home because of high levels of radiation in the Fukushima vicinity. There is now evidence that contamination has spread to rice and vegetables grown in nearby farming areas, and found its way into baby food products on supermarket shelves.

Japanese authorities announced last week that the devastated Fukushima Daiichi complex has been brought down to a state of cold shutdown.

“The first stage of controlling the terrible accident has been achieved. The government will follow a road map which in 30–40 years will make Fukushima safe again,” said Goshi Hosono, minister of state for nuclear power policy and administration.

Speaking to the press, he explained that there is now no nuclear activity in the Fukushima nuclear reactors emitting radiation.

Power companies and government officials have also pledged to enforce safety regulations strictly and to ensure transparency.

Smith views the latest announcements as a warning. “We are stepping up our activism to ensure that the government and power industries, now eager to create a notion of security, will not restart nuclear plants,” she said.

Indeed, groups of women, braving a cold winter, have been setting up tents since last week preparing for a new sit-in campaign in front of the ministry of economic affairs.

The women have pledged to continue their demonstration for 10 months and 10 days, traditionally reckoned in Japan as a full term that covers a pregnancy.

“Our protests are aimed at achieving a rebirth in Japanese society,” said Chieko Shina, a participant, and a grandmother from Fukushima. “There is a need to change the way the authorities have run the country by putting economic growth ahead of protecting the lives of people.”

Experts view the ongoing protests as a landmark in Japan’s fledgling social movements long consigned to the sidelines of a prosperous and hardworking society that puts a premium on achievement and success.

“The ongoing demonstrations symbolise the determination of ordinary people who do not want nuclear power because it is dangerous. There is also the bigger message that we do not trust the government any more,” said Takanobu Kobayashi, who manages the Matsudo network of citizens’ movements.

Distrust stems primarily from the fact that the meltdown of the Fukushima reactors was not reported to the public immediately, causing huge health risks to the local population from radiation leaks.

Internet sites have recorded hundreds of thousands of comments by people expressing disbelief over assurances put out by the government or officials from the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), operator of the Fukushima plant, on nuclear safety.

The accident also broke the myth of safety of nuclear power plants that authorities had maintained for decades to gain public support as the country embarked on massive nuclear power programmes.

Faced with public anger, the government and TEPCO have acknowledged mismanagement and promised major reforms.

Prof. Hideo Nakazawa, a sociologist at Chuo University, describes the ongoing protests as both a display of resentment against authority as well the use of nuclear power.

“Demonstrations have reached cities, taking the nuclear issue to the forefront of civil movements in Japan,” he told IPS. He added that the lack of involvement of political parties in the anti-nuclear movement contrasts with the older pattern that had strong leftist leanings.

The leadership of women in civic movements is also unprecedented. Mothers have been leading the demonstrations, with many of them coming out for the first time to gain sympathy and support for their campaign to prevent exposing children to the dangers of radiation.

“Japanese civic movements have languished on the margins mostly because of the cold shoulder treatment they have received in society. These barriers are being broken now,” explained Nakazawa.

Parliamentarian Mizuho Fukushima, one of Japan’s leading female politicians and an active participant in the anti-nuclear demonstrations, told IPS that the protests against nuclear power are not going to die down.

“Forcing changes to stop nuclear power in Japan is very possible,” said Fukushima, chair of the Social Democratic Party of Japan since 2003.