Noda Tells Wary Japanese Nuclear Power Is Needed to Save Economy

[phantom power]

Sounds like it will not be an easy sell.

Japan’s new Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in his first days in office started to deliver a difficult message to a public still in shock from the Fukushima nuclear disaster: Atomic power is needed to save the economy.

...

Japan’s gross domestic product shrank at an annualized 1.3 percent rate in the three months ended June 30, marking three consecutive quarters of declines, the Cabinet office said last month.

The new premier seems in agreement with Kan that Japan’s energy future should shift focus to renewable power, while saying for the current economy to grow nuclear power is needed.

“It’s a realistic option to use existing plants to a certain extent and develop nuclear technology until at least 2030 while aiming to decrease our dependency on atomic power,” Noda said in an article for the Bungeishunju magazine published on Aug. 10.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-04/noda-tells-japanese-atomic-power-needed-to-save-economy-as-he-takes-office.html

[kristopher]

1. I don't think that is a surprise generally.

I don't think the matter is any longer in the hands of the politicians, though. They will restart a good number of the reactors, but everytime there is any kind of severe tremor (which is at least several times a year) the events of Fukushima are going to be shoved back into the public's mind.

One thing about the Japanese is that they are willing to pay for things when they see a value in it. I believe solar is going to explode there. It will be enhanced by the energy bill Kan pushed through before resigning, but even without that my experience tells me that people are going to be laying out the money for solar systems at a pace that will make it an impossible path to ignore.


I'd like to know what part of the industry Noda is bowing down to with the remark about developing nuclear technology until 2030.

Rec.

[Someguyinjapan]

3. He's bowing down to peer pressure

"I believe solar is going to explode there."

I believe you're wrong. From the following article-"Post-tsunami Japan sticking with nuclear power" http://www.baynews9.com/article/news/ap/september/309615/Posttsunami-Japan-sticking-with-nuclear-power


"Unlike Germany, which accelerated plans to phase out atomic energy after Fukushima, Japan shows no signs of doing so."

"Moreover, consensus-oriented Japan doesn't have an outspoken public saying "No" to nuclear power. In a society that frowns upon defiance of the government, many Japanese are reluctant to join a movement that is often discredited as eccentric, even after Fukushima."

"The nuclear industry also benefits from close government ties. Bureaucratic ranks are packed with former utility executives. The same ministry both promotes and regulates nuclear power. Such relationships have endured, despite revelations of past cover-ups of radiation leaks and safety violations."

""We are responsible for having created this kind of society," he said with a sarcastic laugh, "a society that doesn't tolerate opposition."

Six months after a nuclear incident that spewed a Cesium equivalent to-last I read-168 Hiroshimas-and has irreparably poisoned a huge swath of countryside in a nation that can ill-afford the loss of territory to such calamities, nothing has changed. Except the guy wanting to change things getting driven out of office.

Ah Japan.... still collectively fantasising that one day they'll be able to restore their economic might and standing to bubble-economy levels, and are willing to take any risk to do so. *Sigh* When are they just going to accept that they are well on their way to becoming an economic backwater instead of risking the health of half the planet in trying to delay the inevitable?

For all of you on this board who seem to think that there is going to be a German-style revelation and redirection in policy, you have been sadly deluded.

Over here, FUKUSHIMA CHANGED NOTHING, AND NOTHING EVER WILL CHANGE. Why? Because IT'S JAPAN.

[kristopher]

4. No one ever said that.

You wrote, "For all of you on this board who seem to think that there is going to be a German-style revelation and redirection in policy, you have been sadly deluded."

No one on this board has written anything of the sort.

Germany has already been planning and preparing for the shutdown of their nuclear for 10 years. It would be asinine to think that Japan is going to completely walk away from nuclear power instantly when they depend on it for 30% of their power.

As for your take on what the Japanese may or may not do, I don't think you have a grasp of the Japanese culture at all. The only thing I've seen you demonstrate is hate towards the people you are living with.

75% of the country wants to move away from nuclear power and they will do it for 2 reasons: It is how a consensus society functions and the economics make it not only viable, but attractive.

[Someguyinjapan]

5. I live here; I understand them just fine.

Yeah, thanks for pointing out things that most people figure out within their first month over here. My understanding of Japan is just fine thanks; that I'm not a wantonly blatant Japanophile like you does not immediately render me incapable of grasping the finer points of their culture.

Your optimism is sadly-and I would say humorously misplaced, but it's sad coming from someone who obviously should know better-misplaced if you think a society that governs itself by consensus will get around to making any wideranging decisions in a timely fashion. Ever worked for a Japanese firm? The reason that the Japanese work until 8, 9 and 10 at night is not because they are more productive than us. It's because they spend the first 3 or 4 hours of the day f_cking around in meetings trying to decide what they are going to do with the rest of it.

In a country in which the electorate voted in the same political party with bovine-like docility from 1955 until two years ago (albiet with a few month's break in '93), do you honestly believe that your 75% will translate into some sort of proactive behavior? For the very reason you pointed out, because the Japanese cherish consensus over everything else when it comes to decision making it results in them making decisions at a sloth-like pace, if in fact they ever make them at all.

And no, I don't hate them Kris; if I did I would have left by now. What I hate is incompetence, intransigence, irrationality and ineptitude among governments and the citizens who are responsible for electing them, wherever I happen to be. I am as scathing in my assessment of my own government in my home country as I am in this one, so you can drop the implied suggestion that somehow my opinion is colored by racism.

[kristopher]

6. So few of us have lived there; we probably have more in common than most, no?

I've met many expats like you while living there and my evaluation is that their perception is dominated by an inability to assimilate the value structure that makes the Japanese culture what it is. This subset of expats can never get past the fact that such a fundamentally different belief structure - so alien to their own intuitive view of "how things should be" - could actually produce a product that in many ways functions better on a basic human level than what they grew up with.

I don't view Your obvious revulsion as being rooted in anything related to physical characteristics or physical differences, I see it as being a result of confusion, isolation. It results from trying to apply the "why do they do that" lessons you learned about human behavior as a child to a different world where you are having to struggle in order to get through the mundane acts of living- each and every waking day reality has more than bit of skew to it that can wear on you if not addressed.

If You wish to call that racism that is Your word selection, but it is not one I would choose.

Yes, I've worked at two Japanese companies; I also went through a 4 year program at Japanese college to study cultural anthropology with a focus on comparative analysis of Japan, China, Europe and the US. I have no illusions about their culture and I recognize that just as everwhere there are areas where great wrongs are accepted as normal. But I also know that they are a people with a highly successful culture that has accomplished some remarkable things. And while they are subject to the same ills and weaknesses as all other humans, you can bet that when your view is oriented around the perception that the people of Japan and their methods are characterized by "incompetence, intransigence, irrationality and ineptitude", as you wrote above, then you can be assured that it is you, not them.

My experience with Japan and foreigners who have spent lots of time there tells me you really might want to consider where you go from here. It is possible for someone enduring the kind of cultural isolation you seem to be experiencing to develop some issues that are better avoided if possible. You can always go back after you've centered yourself a bit.

Let me ask you a question, have you ever had a Japanese person seem to deliberately not understand something you know you've said correctly? You know, a taxi driver or something like that?
If you have, what do you think was the cause?

You could be sitting on a fuel source in those old jeans

BY RYO IKEDA STAFF WRITER

2011/09/13

Masaki Takao is involved in recycling clothes. But, no, he does not refit dresses or deal in vintage clothing in a trendy Harajuku shop.

What Takao does do is convert used clothing into an energy source. He has succeeded in refining bioethanol from cotton fibers and has commercialized the process. "...

"The accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant has brought home the fact that there are limits to energy," Takao said. "A small accumulation of recycling efforts will turn out to become a major contribution in the end."

http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201109120144.html

'Smart cities' envisioned / Raft of high-tech green energy projects planned in devastated areas

Plans to rebuild many areas devastated by the Great East Japan Earthquake as environmentally friendly "smart cities" are being explored by corporations and municipal governments.

By promoting large-scale projects that include power-generation facilities utilizing renewable energy and smart grids, the plans are also meant to create jobs. Some companies and local governments have already started working together on these projects.

Major electronics manufacturer Toshiba Corp. has proposed an integrated system, with facilities ranging from power generation and water-treatment systems to "smart meter" next-generation power meters, to some local governments.

An official of the company's smart community division said, "In the future, to export technologies created domestically."

Hitachi, Ltd. is ...

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/business/T110912004466.htm


And you might enjoy taking a look at this polling:
http://www.ap-gfkpoll.com/pdf/AP-Gfk%20Poll%20Japan%202nd%20release.pdf

[Yo_Mama]

7. I agree with what you write, except

"...everytime there is any kind of severe tremor (which is at least several times a year) the events of Fukushima are going to be shoved back into the public's mind."

I don't think the Fukushima Daiichi accident is ever going to leave the public's mind. How can it? They will be working on cleanup in that and neighboring prefectures heavily for two-three years, and in the Fukushima prefecture for decades.

I don't think any Japanese politician will be able to convince the public that NPPs are basically safe in their environment. The country really has a consensus on where it wants to go. Now it has to find a workable path to get there.

[SpoonFed]

2. the king is dead! long live the king! n/t