Japan set out to phase out the use of nuclear power plants after the country’s worst nuclear accident at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima No. 1 plant in March 2011, when the now-defunct Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) was in power.
Since the Liberal Democratic Party returned to power in late 2012, however, the country has shifted back to using nuclear plants, as electricity consumption is expected to grow rapidly with the rise of artificial intelligence.
For Sunday’s general election, political parties have made various pledges on nuclear power, ranging from abolishing all nuclear plants to maximizing their use, a situation that highlights the difficulty of reaching consensus on the issue.
Until the last House of Representatives election in 2021, the LDP had clearly stated in its campaign platform that it would “reduce the country’s dependence on nuclear power as much as possible.”
The phrase was replaced with “maximum use” of nuclear plants in the party’s platform for the 2022 House of Councilors election. And in February 2023, the LDP-led government adopted a policy of extending the operating lives of nuclear plants and lifted a moratorium on replacing old nuclear plants with new ones.
In its current election campaign, the LDP pledges to “maximize the use of power sources with high decarbonization effects.”
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered a spike in global energy prices, and rising gasoline and electricity bills weighed on households in Japan, exposing the vulnerability of a country that relies heavily on imported resources.
Although Japan once shut down all of its nuclear plants, 12 reactors have been restarted by this month under new safety standards set by the Nuclear Regulation Authority.
In line with the spread of artificial intelligence, the country’s demand for electricity at data centers and other facilities in fiscal 2033 is projected to increase by up to 5.37 million kilowatts from fiscal 2023, equivalent to the total output of about five nuclear reactors, according to the Organization for Cross-Regional Coordination of Transmission Operators.
Against this backdrop, the heads of Japan’s three major business groups, including the Japan Business Federation, or Keidanren, met with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba earlier this month and urged him to accelerate the restart of idled nuclear reactors.
Among opposition parties, the Democratic Party for the People and Nippon Ishin no Kai are positive about restarting existing nuclear plants, and their platforms include the development of next-generation nuclear reactors.
Meanwhile, the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP), a successor of the DPJ, vows to prevent the construction of new nuclear plants and the expansion of existing ones. CDP leader Yoshihiko Noda, who served as prime minister when the DPJ was in power, has said that it is not possible to immediately realize a society without nuclear plants, and that the party aims for a society that will eventually stop relying on nuclear power.
The Japanese Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party vow to reduce the country’s dependence on nuclear power to zero, and call for promoting the use of renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power.
Source: The Japan Times
