Sanity Returns To Japan

18 Replies to “Sanity Returns To Japan”

1. Now let’s see if the same happens with Germany.

2. So, how much tax payers money will be wasted appeasing the enviro nut-jobs this time?

3. That’s not sanity. That’s the intertia of the sort of state-corporatist complex that defines Japan’s government and hobbles its economy. Nuclear is a subsidy whore.

4. Cyclist, not likely. Germany has lots of coal and access to Russian gas. Japan has none of the above. The shutdowns in Japanese industry last summer were severe because of power shortages. At least part of the conversation from the big auto and steelmakers would have been, “get the plants restarted or the offshoring of manufacturing will continue.”
   And just what do you expect them to do for electricity, LAS? Peddle bicycles?

5. “Nuclear is a subsidy whore” – LAS
   So are libertarians employed by government but as an energy technology it could (even under laissez-faire) stand on its own and still be competitive with current Asian LNG prices. In terms of subsidy per unit of consumed energy, nuclear power enjoys one tenth the subsidy of wind and one twentieth the subsidy of solar and in almost all of the developed world we unfortunately can’t seem to get away from fatally-mixed economies where almost everything is subsidized somehow.

6. cgh
   The Germans are actually buying US coal now that the EPA has ensured that there is a good supply for export (cheap shale gas helps as well). Even at $100/ton it’s competitive with current prices for Russian Gas.

7. @ Ken (Kulak)
   In Japan? Not as much as you’d thinkg, it’s not quite the industry as it is here. Their solution was to go coal or natural gas, the previous government was buying up as much coal as it could–so were the horizontally aligned companies(particular name for that, but can’t remember atm). Renewable energy is for all intents a pipe dream over there, not saying it doesn’t exist on buildings and all that it does. But the average layperson outside of the rabid anti-nuke circles knows that Japan has a voracious appetite for electricity.
   Even the people living near the nuclear power plants didn’t want them shut down, rather the press just ran with the story. And outside of the JP press, there was next to no mention on the protests to keep the plants operating.

8. Good for Japan. The real lesson they learned is to build all Nuclear infrastructure further inland. Nuclear is the only thing that makes sense for a country that has no natural resources.

9. I don’t know, PeterJ, they could always lubricate the tectonic plates and harvest the resulting geothermal power. No possible downside to that, is there? (/sarc)
   For non-geologists – rock strength decreases sharply with the addition of water. The higher pressure the water is under, the weaker the resulting rock will act. Lubricating a fault line with sea water to cause a massive earthquake was a large part of the plot of the James Bond movie “View to a Kill”. My rock mechanics professor at UBC refused to drive on the Squamish Highway within 48 hours of a rain. He wanted to be sure that the seeps and springs had a chance to depressurize the groundwater regime so that the slopes would be more stable before he drove below them.

10. nuclear power enjoys one tenth the subsidy of wind and one twentieth the subsidy of solar
    Wrong.
    http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/nuclear-power-dock
    Even the more optimistic projections of new nuclear power plant costs — such as those forwarded by MIT — find that nuclear’s production costs over the lifetime of a new facility are about 30% above those for coal or natural gas-fired generators.
    Japa should just use LNG.

11. Nuclear power is for men. Wind power is for metro-sexual sissies.

12. The Japanese are world leaders in Earthquake technology and I know nothing is fool proof, but I would bet they will set a new standard for safety. For a country with no resources it’s still the most logical course.

13. LAS, do you even pretend to read the sources you quote? The Cato document, aside from a lot of errors in it, is talking about NEW construction. That has nothing to do with the economics of restarting existing plants. The operating costs of nuclear are trivial compared to coal and gas because of the relatively tiny fuel cost.

14. Peter, the Fukushima reactors withstood the earthquake just fine even though the quake greatly exceeded the design basis. It was the tsunami that caused the problem when it flooded the diesel backup generators and washed away the diesel fuel storage.
    There’s three fixes, any one of which solves the problem. 1. Don’t put the diesels in the basement. 2. Build a higher seawall. 3. Have the diesels behind proper steam doors to keep the water out.

15. Japan has NO choice but to use every tool at it’s disposal…. regardless of other peoples opinions about those tools.

16. They also had the diesel tanks and pumps on the ocean side of the plant. They were the first to be wiped out leaving them without emergency cooling water. That was another mistake that won’t be repeated.

17. Cost to UK Taxpayers to decommission worn out nuclear plants is estimated at 73B so far it is costing 3.5B per year. No other industry is subsidized like the nuclear power industry. The taxpayers are forced to pay for Nuclear powers liability insurance in the event of a disaster, and is forced to pay to clean up their mess. If the industry had to pay their own bills they could not build one single reactor. Every reactor build so far in Canada has all been paid for by the taxpayer. Nuclear energy is a scam on the taxpayers. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/7498390.stm

18. As usual, RFB is circulating all kinds of fiction about nuclear power. First, the numbers in his source include facilities used for Britain’s nuclear weapons program. If the state is the owner, the state has to pay to decommission. Or would you rather have had nuclear weapons in private hands, RFB?
    Second, the reactors operated by utilities, specifically those of British Energy, all have decommissioning funds included in the cost of electricity, and are NOT therefore being paid for by the taxpayer.
    And then there’s this juicy lie.
    “Every reactor build so far in Canada has all been paid for by the taxpayer”
    On the contrary. All of Ontario’s 20 reactors were built by Ontario Hydro and paid for out of electricity rates charged to Ontario’s electricity consumers. The only exceptions are two prototype reactors built in the 1960s as demonstration projects.
    Same goes for the reactors in Quebec, built by Hydro Quebec, and Point Lepreau in New Brunswick built by NB Power.
    “The taxpayers are forced to pay for Nuclear powers liability insurance in the event of a disaster, and is forced to pay to clean up their mess”
    More lies. As a complicated issue I’ve already referred you to the legal decision on this matter, but you’d rather just repeat Greenpeace falsehoods.