Talk:Nuclear power in Japan

Graph Caption

The text under the graph at the top of the page on the right reads: "Japan has steadily increased its nuclear generation to about 72% today with the majority of the rest coming from conventional green plants. A dip around 2005 was due to data falsification scandels and caused a poor operating record." Aside from the typo in 'scandels', the text seems to contrast with the initial paragraph were it says that nuclear power provides 34.5% of Japan's electricity. However, this is also incorrect as the 2009 figure is approx. 30% (http://world-nuclear.org/info/inf79.html) Also, what are the conventional 'green' plants providing the rest of the electricity? --Gigoachef (talk) 17:58, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

There was a dip in 2003, after a scandal that hit TEPCO in September 2002, that caused the shutdown for inspection of all 17 TEPCO reactors (at Fukushima Daiichi, Fukushima Daini and Kashiwazaki-Kariwa). In 2005 all TEPCO reactors returned in commercial service. Robertiki (talk) 03:49, 29 January 2017 (UTC)

Looking good

Would be good to have a section on hydrogen production (which is briefly mentioned in lead). And lead section could be expanded to include discussion of some of the major organizations mentioned later on. -- Johnfos 09:55, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't really know what kinds of research in terms of hydrogen research is going on in Japan right now. That certainly is deserving to add in the context of "Hydrogen production may allow nuclear power to expand beyond electrical energy," which is what I was trying to do. Other than that, it may appear on the JAEA page or something as one of their research topics, and that's about the extent to which I planned on expanding it.

Oh, and I think some sort of Table that lists the larger power stations is needed. -- Johnfos 10:15, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that a table of power stations would be a good addition, but I've been meandering as to how this can be done without messing anything else up at List of nuclear reactors#Japan. The editors there are (understandably) skeptical of any attempt to migrate the information to a different place. I raised the issue on the talk page, but haven't seen any response yet. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

My anticipated expansions

Firstly, there needs to be some more history before the 1950s. Some copy edits from the Japanese atomic program would serve this purpose well. I think it also might be a little unclear what was happening in those first 4 years (before construction started on the first plant) and in the 60s and 70s (I think that Japan generated something like 2% of its electricity from nuclear at that time). This misrepresentation is mainly due to sources that are just attempting to glorify the subject with the feeling of "Japan got RIGHT into the development of nuclear power," when the reality is that nuclear didn't fill a significant part of the energy pie until into the 80s. I don't know how to say that yet, and will probably return to it later.

Also, if Wikipedia was a hierarchy, this article would be here: Japan -> Economy of Japan -> Energy in Japan -> Nuclear power in Japan

Of course, I've neglected to do any work with Energy in Japan, but some of the information I gathered should be easily movable. Sub-articles work well in this case. Eventually, I hope that the articles on Japanese utilities can be expanded to include that one that was the ONLY utility in the first part of the 20th century, and then the ones that preceded that one in the 1800s. Once we have that, it should tie in very well with a summary on the history of electricty in Japan and the rest of the economic history.

I'm also slightly troubled by the article that are missing on the Japanese Wikipedia, in particular:

• Nuclear Safety Commission
• Atomic Energy Society of Japan
• Atomic Fuel Corporation
• Nuclear Fuel Industries

All have links point to them, but still don't exist as articles. Nor do they have an article that equates to "Nuclear power in Japan," which is also slightly troubling. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

References

hi guys - great work on setting this article up. I'd suggest that further in-line references. For example, in the intro it is stated that nuclear power (presumably domestic) provides 30% of Japan's usage, but also, later, that Japan imports 80% of its energy. I presume that this is down to conflicting sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by James AL Williams (talk • contribs) 11:25, 4 October 2007 (UTC) -Ah, thank you, sorry for not signing. James AL Williams 11:23, 10 October 2007 (GMT)

Confusion in opening paragraph

The article states that 30% of Japans generated electricity comes from nuclear whilst 80% of Japan's produced or generated 'energy' comes from imported fuel.

I think these two statements are confusing to your average reader. I think the difference needs to be made between electricity and energy to make it more clear. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.149.117.69 (talk) 11:30, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Easy question, I'll take it. Electricity is only a certain fraction of total Energy use in a nation, although a very significant fraction. That alone could explain the discrepancy, but additionally, nuclear itself could be constituted as imported because the Uranium has to come from nations overseas. Aside from Hydro, I can not even think of a energy source that could be defined as a fully domestic resource to Japan on a large scale. Of course, the Uranium is a very small fraction of the cost and because of that, nuclear power affords more energy security, but Japan has discovered other large-scale reliability issues, which become obvious when understanding the subject of this article. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:18, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

CNIC

redirects here. But there is no notice about Commander, Navy Installations Command (U.S.). Could someone put it in the first line with a template? --77.4.56.253 (talk) 21:03, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Just wondering

What is the reason all Japanese nuclear plants are by the sea side? 178.103.39.150 (talk) 00:02, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

In the absence of large inland lakes or rivers, sea water provides the cheapest and easiest method of cooling the plant (the alternative being to build cooling towers so that water can be recirculated). See also Essential Service Water System. Ivolocy (talk) 14:56, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Greenpeace book

More incidents, including damage to cores covered up, etc.: [1]Redhanker (talk) 01:34, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Japan's nuclear reactors are placed by the sea as attempt to push any devastating radiation east towards the coast of California in case a devastating collapse occurred. It is shown on many conspiracy theorist shows and networks that the ocean current would carry a devastating amount of radiation to the U.S. continent. This would limit their exposure to deathly amounts of toxins and inhabit a foreign country to amounts of radiation that would essentially make Americas west coast inhabitable to all plant and animal life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Landyn06 (talk • contribs) 22:34, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Nuclear reactors in Japan are actually on all coasts, and in fact only three sites face the Pacific. Additionally, for an area to be uninhabitable (not inhabitable, perhaps you meant inhospitable?), a rate of several mSv/hr are necessary immediately after an incident involving long lived isotopes. No such rates are known to have ever occurred in or around the US except for isolated cases of exposure to radiation sources during tests and medical machine dismantling. 133.87.127.146 (talk) 05:18, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Nuclear reactors need to be placed near large waters, a sea, a big lake or a river, because the need of cooling. There's no conspiracy in this at all. The problem is more that the dangers are calculated not according to the "real" risks. 1947enkidu (talk) 07:54, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Naming

There is a discussion which is also related to this article or category. You are welcome to take a part of this discussion. Beagel (talk) 15:21, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Lead section

User:Dream Focus, thank you for removing the incorrect 18% figure which you added. But now you've added discussion of the 2007 Kashiwazaki-Kariwa outage under the heading "Tsunami of 2011 and its aftermath". What is going on? Are you a new editor? Whatever gave you the idea that a single sentence would be an adequate lead for the article. And why are you adding bare links for references and not full bibliographic details? Johnfos (talk) 22:36, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with the substance of the edit. It seems like a pretty important and useful fact. I hadn't realized how the accumulation of post-Fukushima edits had unbalanced this article. The lead should not be 90% Fukushima. NPguy (talk) 01:29, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Minor mistake. The lead is suppose to be about nuclear power in Japan, and to summarize what is in the article. It should be extended to list briefly that there have been protest and public sympathy against it do to accidents, as well as contain my fact about what percentage of their power comes from it. Dream Focus 01:43, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Let's find a happy medium here. I don't think the new headings are constructive edits. And a much better source for general background on Japan's nuclear program is the World Nuclear Association . NPguy (talk) 01:52, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

@NPguy: that world Nuclear Association site is more like a pro-nuclear advertisement, and certainly not a "neutral" or "encyclopedical" source. I wonder whether the Japanese people would accept this as the official policy, besides some politicians who sold themselves and a few power-generating companies ? After the 11 March tsunami and the start of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the status of nuclear power in Japan has been dramatically changed, why cannot this be reflected in the lead ? 1947enkidu (talk) 05:04, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree. It should state how many nuclear reactors they have total, and how many have been shut down, and what percentage of their power comes from nuclear power now. Dream Focus 09:31, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Something about the recent events, that had a great impact on the acceptance of this way of generating electricity, should also be there. and cannot be left out, last year btw all electricity from nuclear power was about 10% from the total consumed, in the Jaif earthquake reports athere was recently a item naming that percentage 1947enkidu (talk) 18:45, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

My points were (1) that WNA is a better source of statistical information on nuclear power in Japan than an article from a Philippine newspaper and (2) that deleting the section on Fukushima from the lead was going too far. I still think the lead is too much about Fukushima and too little about the long history of the third largest nuclear power program in the world. It reflects the bias of on prolific recent editor. NPguy (talk) 02:17, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

I didn't delete anything, I simply put it in its own section, as is proper. Please read WP:LEAD to understand what a lead section is suppose to be and not be. And I've been editing Wikipedia for years, so I'm not a new or recent editor. Dream Focus 03:45, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

@NPguy: that Fukushima disaster has eroused the worries from lots of people in Japan, and might be the start of abolishing nuclear power there, although some big compagnies think they can earn a lot of money with it elsewhere, the Japanese government could find a hard job completing any other reactor there. In the mean time they are sitting on a pile of Plutonium, that is hard to get rid of, and making&burning "mox" has proven rather difficult, dangourous and even more expensive. So that all about Fukushima belongs there.

Whether you like it or not.

just a little question: with all that money spent on nuclear power, if all that money would have been put into the generation of renewable power, (the production of solar-panels etc.) Would not Japan have been already quite independent for it's power-generation ?

Still the WNA thinks it will be able to save the world from climate-change with ... ?

1947enkidu (talk) 06:33, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

I've been away from this article for some months but have now printed it out and had a good look at it. I agree that there is too much about Fukushima in the Lead, and so have edited this. But there is not too much about the events leading up to Fukushima, the accident itself, and the implications, in the article as a whole. The article is about 75k long, and what is needed is about 15k of expansion in some other key areas to make the article more comprehensive. For example, we mention that "in the mid-1990s there were several nuclear related accidents and cover-ups in Japan that eroded public perception of the industry" but this was quite a notable issue and needs more coverage here. We mention "damage at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant due to the 2007 Chūetsu offshore earthquake", but again this is a major issue which needs more coverage in this article. Generally I think we should try to support the information presented with quality sources such as referreed journal articles and university/scientific press books. Johnfos (talk) 23:29, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I still think the lead is too much Fukushima, not enough background on Japan's nuclear program. The article itself also lacks factual information, other than perfunctory lists. By comparison, there's way too much on the day-to-day of anti-nuclear protests. Perhaps that could be spun off as a separate article on Japan's anti-nuclear movement. This seems to be driven by the focused interests of a few editors. It's not bias so much as a lack of balance. NPguy (talk) 01:47, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree that there is some lack of balance at the moment, but that is to be expected in an article that is still developing. Underrepresented areas, mentioned above, need to be expanded, rather than cutting content out. At 75k, there is no issue with article length, so there is plenty of room for expansion and no need to consider a split. When the article is expanded we will be in a better position to refine the lead to provide a better summary of the article. Please contribute the factual information that you think is missing. Thanks. Johnfos (talk) 03:14, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Fixing heavy bias throughout - split done

There seems to be a horrid oversupply of anti-nuclear bias. The anti-nuclear movement should be moved to it's own page as is the case with France, Germany, and other countries. A short summary should be provided along with a link to that.

This page should focus on the ACTUAL power properties of nuclear power in Japan, i.e. BWR vs PWR by region, plant lists, production lists, and plant status.

133.87.127.146 (talk) 05:07, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

A couple of people have now suggested that the anti-nuclear material be split off with a summary left here, per WP:SS. So be it. I will make the change when I get a chance. Johnfos (talk) 03:59, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Split done... Johnfos (talk) 03:28, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

Suggest removal of Lifton quote

Robert Jay Lifton has asked how Japan, after its experience with the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, could "allow itself to draw so heavily on the same nuclear technology for the manufacture of about a third of its energy".[20] He says: "There was resistance, much of it from Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors. But there was also a pattern of denial, cover-up and cozy bureaucratic collusion between industry and government, the last especially notorious in Japan but by no means limited to that country. Even then, pro-nuclear power forces could prevail only by managing to instill in the minds of Japanese people a dichotomy between the physics of nuclear power and that of nuclear weapons, an illusory distinction made not only in Japan but throughout the world."[20]

The above section should be removed from history as it adds nothing but bias. There is no reason or explanation for the quote, and the source, a psychiatrist, is not a valid source for the section. Furthermore, the section if somehow judged to be valid, should be included in the proper timeline for the quote, which is 2011 rather than 1950s to 1980s. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Basroil (talk • contribs) 02:30, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Please include the Mutsu vessel info

Can someone edit in information about Mutsu the only nuclear-powered ship Japan built? It had a minor accident during reactor tests, and it is to this and the protests it caused that Japan's lack of nuclear-powered vessels is attributed. It should probably be included in the Japanese nuclear incidents page, but I am not good with wiki notation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.102.64.146 (talk) 19:24, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Citizen's Nuclear Information Center

This is currently a loop reference in section http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens%27_Nuclear_Information_Center#Anti-nuclear_movement

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

• VOA Herman - 2011-04-16 anti-nuclear protests in Tokyo.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 17:52, 1 August 2018 (UTC)

2000's section showing age

The 2000's section looks to have been written in 2014, which means much of the information within is outdated. Specifically, several 'future' dates are discussed which are now a few years in the past. If someone could update the info in that section, that would be awesome. The Argonian Formula (talk) 22:38, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Changing sentiments in 2022

Japanese panel approves return to nuclear power as disaster memories fade could be mentioned. - Rod57 (talk) 20:48, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Takahama npp

Takahama npp has resumed operation at its reactor No. 1 & 2. I propose the list of power plants be updated to reflect such changes. source 62.168.12.22 (talk) 13:33, 21 September 2023 (UTC)