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Japan

Japan Formally Adopts Policy of Using Nuclear Reactors Beyond 60 Years (kyodonews.net) 115

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
Japan's Cabinet formally adopted a policy that will allow for the operation of nuclear reactors beyond their current 60-year limit alongside the building of new units to replace aging ones as part of efforts to cut carbon emissions while ensuring adequate national energy supply. From a report: The government's "green transformation" policy features extensive use of nuclear power along with renewable energy and marks a major policy shift for the country, which suffered a devastating nuclear disaster in 2011. The Cabinet decision follows a meeting in late December, in which the policy was agreed upon.

Bills necessary to implement the new policy were submitted to parliament Friday. The government also plans to raise about 20 trillion yen ($152 billion) through the issuance of green transformation bonds to boost investment in decarbonization projects, as it estimates public and private investment of over 150 trillion yen will be necessary over the next 10 years. The new policy will effectively extend the amount of time reactors can remain operational beyond 60 years by excluding time spent on inspections and other offline periods from consideration when calculating their entire service life.
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Japan Formally Adopts Policy of Using Nuclear Reactors Beyond 60 Years More

Japan Formally Adopts Policy of Using Nuclear Reactors Beyond 60 Years

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  • This is what worries me about nuke (Score:4, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @03:59PM (#63290309)
    not enough money for maintenance, so you run reactors well past their "best by" date. I mean, there's plenty of money, but good luck prying it from the hands of multi-nationals. It's not like their CEOs live nearby these plants (or can't just move/fly off if the shit hits the fan).

    Nuclear might be solved as a technical problem but the social problems are still there. For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance.

    • at least MR Burn's is on site most of the time and lives in town but that plant is very behind on there maintenance

    • Nuclear might be solved as a technical problem but the social problems are still there. For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance.

      My solution to the social problem is you can volunteer to have electricity in your home, or you can live nuclear power free.

      • when the disaster hits and those people are forced to evacuate and become homeless they're going to show up in your city looking for help. Are you going to gun them down? If not then you still need to come up with a solution.

        • army tents and free wood for cook fires. not sure what you need electricity for in an emergency. obviously most of us would prefer to go to hospitals that are nuclear-friendly in my world. hard to do surgery by candle light.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            Technology so good you have to threaten people with loss of civilization to get it "accepted".

            FWIW I haven't paid for nuclear energy or fossil fuel electricity for years, and the lights stayed on. Cheaper too.

            • Re:That's not a solution (Score:4, Insightful)

              by OrangeTide ( 124937 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2023 @01:51AM (#63291301) Homepage Journal

              Technology so good you have to threaten people with loss of civilization to get it "accepted".

              No viable options long term. Wind and solar take up a staggering amount of space, too much to realistically supply 8 billion people. Hydro and geothermal have only a limited number of usable sites. Fossil fuels would end human civilization if we continue using it much longer. Short term is fission, perhaps for the next 100 years. Very long term source is fusion power. Supplement with orbital reflectors and we can move to solar, but we don't actually have the technology yet. By the time we have it, we'll have moved to mainly fusion power (or ended ourselves). Expect such cool tech on the next planet we colonized, it's not going to be for this planet.

              As for fossil fuels. It would be best if we leave all the coal and oil in the ground. In case we accidentally collapse civilization it will be pretty important for uplifting a lower tech society back to the level where they can synthesize the materials that we make easily today.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by gweihir ( 88907 )

                Technology so good you have to threaten people with loss of civilization to get it "accepted".

                No viable options long term. Wind and solar take up a staggering amount of space, too much to realistically supply 8 billion people.

                Who told you that lie? And why have you not fact-checked it?

    • How are they not safe to run already? (Score:5, Informative)

      by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @04:17PM (#63290365)

      For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance.

      What on earth makes you say that?

      Nuclear reactors have had WAY less problems than any other form of power.

      They have an incredibly proven track record at this point. Even Fukushima didn't fail until a tsunami destroyed some backup power systems that were incorrectly placed, and even THEN no one died.

      In the Ukraine a nuclear plant in a war zone had zero issues despite being shelled!

      Nuclear plants need to be maintained but do not have extraordinary maintenance needs.

      Japan of all places knows the most about the reliability of nuclear power, and they are tripling down (reopening closed plants, running plants longer, AND building new nuclear power). If Japan thinks it's safe why on earth should anyone think otherwise?

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        1.5% of all civilian nuclear reactors ever built have melted down. Many more have had less serious failures. Overall, it's about twice as bad for deaths as wind, and far far worse for people severely affected by failures (who didn't die), and horrendous for cost.

        We just don't need nuclear. There are better alternatives. Every year, nuclear gets less attractive, as the alternatives take more and more of the market at lower and lower cost.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by G00F ( 241765 )

          Some problems...

          Me doing a bit of googling, I see worldwide: 439 operational, 200 have been shutdown and 11 Nuclear Meltdowns and Disasters, which includes things where no impact to people or environment.

          So we get 1.7%, but that's total of problems. Those accidents are further padding as it includes military cases and most of them are early, pre 1970. Even Russia and china builds them way safer than they did back then. Sadly we stopped building them as we learned how to build them safely. like saying cars

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by TA ( 14109 )

        "Even Fukushima didn't fail until a tsunami destroyed some backup power systems that were incorrectly placed, and even THEN no one died."

        You severely underestimate how close this was to total disaster. "Incorrectly placed" - Yes, the power plant was placed close to the sea, and not in the mountains as engineers 40 years earlier had planned. But still way higher than any presumed tsunami. Then a double (two geological faults) whammy happened at the same time and you got an unprecedented tsunami. So yes, th

    • If I had to live next to a coal plant vs a nuclear plant Id pick the coal plant every single time.

      Nuclear energy requires tax dollars to support. If a society want the benefits of carbon-friendly rock-solid 24-7-365 baseload power, they need to voluntarily cough up some tax dollars. If they want freeeedduummmm and care about nothing but the bottom line, drill baby drill, burn baby burn and let the next generatin deal with the hundreds of extra gigatons of carbon in the atmosphere.

      Personally, Im in fa
      • it's not a risk I want to take. It's not a risk most voters want to take. So unless you can solve for those risks you're not going to get nuclear power plants to speak of, at least not if you're an American.

        It's not about the odds of a disaster in raw numbers, it's about what happens if there is one. Well, I say that, but the odds increase very rapidly when you're skipping maintenance.

        I'm American. We have bridges from over 100 years ago. We just had a major train derailment in Ohio that is very lik

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by atomicalgebra ( 4566883 )
          NuScale reactors cannot meltdown. It is physically impossible. That is the same with every new reactor being built. Coal kills more people every hour than non soviet nuclear has ever. Try to come up with another antinuclear excuse. I mean you used your fear of homelessness as an excuse to oppose nuclear energy. You are fucked in the head.

          • NuScale reactors cannot meltdown. It is physically impossible.

            True, it's physically impossible for a reactor which does not exist to melt down.

            Coal kills more people every hour than non soviet nuclear has ever

            ABAHahAHAH

            First it was "than nuclear has ever"

            Now it's "than non soviet nuclear has ever"

            Give it some time.

            Also, false fucking dichotomy, get a real argument kid. If you have to compare nuclear to coal to make it look good, it's not good.

            • Actually they proved it mathematically. They had to submit 2 million pages to receive NRC approval.

              False dichotomy? No it isn't. Opposition to nuclear energy means fossil fuels. That is the historical reality. Opposition to nuclear energy results in increased air pollution deaths. To the tune of 8.7 million a year worldwide. That's a fucking holocaust a year. And that is why I call everyone who opposes nuclear energy a scumbag

              • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

                by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

                False dichotomy? No it isn't. Opposition to nuclear energy means fossil fuels. That is the historical reality.

                Welcome to the present, let alone the future, in both of which nuclear is daft and renewables keep getting cheaper while nuclear keeps getting more expensive and we still have no rational plan for waste management.

                • You mean the present where runaway climate change is poised to kill 100's of millions! A present that could have been avoided with nuclear energy.

                  Waste is a non problem that has resulted in zero death ever. Stop getting your science form a cartoon.

                  • Your claim is that nobody died from this, or any similar accidents?
                    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

                    That seems unlikely.

                    • Well TIL. I have been saying used fuel(waste) has killed zero people for more than a decade. No one has been able to provide a valid answer in all that time. This is the first time I have seen an answer which could legitimately result in me correcting my statement if it turns out to be true. IF. The wiki needs more references, yet I will continue to research it. I need more details.

                      Not that any soviet union fuckups are valid excuses to oppose nuclear energy.

                    • There are bigger considerations than whether something has killed anyone yet. If there's a tree about to fall on your bedroom, you don't do nothing about it because it hasn't killed you in your sleep yet. Or maybe you do, I wouldn't know, but an intelligent person wouldn't act that way.

                    • Blah, blah, blah. Zero deaths ever is a big consideration. It blows up your antinuclear arguments. Remember I think you are an evil scumbag who enjoys killing children with fossil fuels.

                • Re:Good for you I guess (Score:4, Insightful)

                  by hdyoung ( 5182939 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @11:03PM (#63291139)
                  To be clear, Im in favor of both. yeah, wind in every field and solar on every available spot. All for it. But 24-7-365 baseload power is reeeaaalllyyyy nnniiiccceeeeeee.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by gweihir ( 88907 )

                I see you have no clue what you are talking about. You cannot "prove" the properties of a physical object "mathematically", because there is no GUT. All you can do is simulate an approximation for a limited number of specific expected accident scenarios. Guess what, Windscale, TMI, Tchernobyl, THTR300, Fuckushima were all _unexpected_ scenarios.

                • stfu nazi. go suck coal fumes

                  • Re: (Score:2)

                    by gweihir ( 88907 )

                    Thanks for the confirmation that you are lying scum. Because if that is your comeback to a completely scientifically sound reply, it is clear you have nothing but a made-up fantasy.

                    As to "coal fumes", clean coal including CO2 capture is entirely feasible, has been demonstrated at scale and is just a bit more expensive than dirty coal. It is still massively, massively cheaper than nuclear and has absolutely nothing of the accident potential. Of course, like a true fanatic you claim that "coal" is the alterna

          • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            NuScale reactors can melt down if the cooling system fails. They claim that it's fail safe, but we have heard that before and there are oblivious flaws. The reactor needs a cooling pool, so loss of coolant is a possibility, for example. Earthquakes crack the concrete they plan to build the pool from.

            Their reactors also produce more waste than conventional ones, which also needs to be stored in pools. Many serious nuclear accidents have involved spent fuel.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by gweihir ( 88907 )

            NuScale reactors cannot meltdown. It is physically impossible. That is the same with every new reactor being built.

            A direct lie. Of course newly built reactors can melt down. But the nuclear fanatics have a long, long history of lying about safety. I see the tradition is still intact.

            • Projection from a nazi. Go suck coal fumes.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by gweihir ( 88907 )

                See my other reply. Obviously you do not live in reality.

                Incidentally, there are reactors that cannot melt down. AFAIK, two were in operation, the THTR70 and the THTR300. Both failed catastrophically, although without any radiation leaks. The THTR300 has been dismantled and the concept was given up for a long time. The Chinese are currently building a new prototype based on the old German patents, hoping that new materials will fix the issues. The THTR70 is still a radioactive ruin filled with concrete that

                • Go suck coal fumes you evil fearmonger.

                  • Re: (Score:2)

                    by gweihir ( 88907 )

                    How pathetic. Maybe seek professional help? It seems you need it.

                    • LOL. 8.7 million people die a year from fossil fuel and biofuels. That's a holocaust a year. That must make your Nazi blood smile. And that is the real reason you oppose nuclear energy-because you want people to die from air pollution. Eat shit!

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by hdyoung ( 5182939 )
        Nuclear. Gawdammit. I meant id pick the nuclear one every time.

        Wtb an edit function.

        • Wtb an edit function.

          Slashdot has one and always has. It's called preview. First you preview, then you edit, then you submit. Or you don't edit, throw caution to the winds like you did, and maybe regret it later. But don't complain that you haven't been given the tools you need to succeed, you're just refusing to use them.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Z80a ( 971949 )

        I think i probably would prefer to get stolen by the government rather than getting lung cancer.

    • so you run reactors well past their "best by" date

      Makes sense, just gotta sniff it every once in awhile to make sure it’s not breeding new life forms cause that’s gross and unsanitary.

      Nuclear might be solved as a technical problem but the social problems are still there. For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance.

      Newer designs are safer, for sure, but maintenance free designs at scale for 50+ years on a nuclear reactor, or even just an RTG are beyond the horizon in terms of development. These newer compact fission reactor models actually look to me like they are less maintenance in that they are pre-fabed and meant to be discarded whole or mostly so after a comparably s

    • not enough money for maintenance, so you run reactors well past their "best by" date. I mean, there's plenty of money, but good luck prying it from the hands of multi-nationals...Nuclear might be solved as a technical problem...

      When Greed acts like this, and the end result is Fukushima, Chernobyl or far worse, we have NOT actually solved the technical problem of avoiding the inevitable. You don't push nuclear plants to failure, and yet that is exactly what this kind of Greed is damn near guaranteeing.

      Making the only place humans can live uninhabitable isn't just a minor fucking problem.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      The way this law works is not to extend the maximum service life, it's to make the periods of downtime not count. Between maintenance, accidents, and the shutdown after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, they can get another decade or more on some of them.

    • what part here says not enough money for maintenance?

      It's not as if all of their monitoring, inspections and regulations are somehow being eased. All they did is say a reactor life span is 60 years- now, that 60 years won't include the years it spent in downtime for mntc... not that the reactor was garbage and high risk, let's start it up again for another 20 years. Or ohhh, this reactor is 55 years old, we won't check for rust and do mntc that's needed for safe operations.

      They only excluded downtime for m

      • If Japan is taking this step then they're already screwing up. They should be building offshore wind. If they need to run the reactors for a little while to accomplish that, then it makes sense to do so. But it doesn't make sense for them to make plans to keep producing nuclear power, putting in new reactors, etc etc. when there is a workable alternative. And TFA says that they will permit new reactors on old sites. But there is only one reason why nuclear was a good fit for Japan — maximum production

    • not enough money for maintenance, so you run reactors well past their "best by" date. I mean, there's plenty of money, but good luck prying it from the hands of multi-nationals. It's not like their CEOs live nearby these plants (or can't just move/fly off if the shit hits the fan). Nuclear might be solved as a technical problem but the social problems are still there. For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance.

      There's more than meets the eye with these "expiration dates". In Japan, things are constructed with an EOL way shorter than the actual date in which things can start to degrade.

      Also, as stated in the article, it is a matter of how "operational life" is calculated. Until now, operational life included time under inspections and shutdown periods. That will not be the case anymore.

      Several plants have been shut down for prolonged periods due to stalled/delayed inspections. If a plant is, say, physically 5

    • For nuke to work we need plants that are safe to run without proper maintenance

      Nothing can operate safely without proper maintenance. Hell, a run-of-the-mill car can literally catch fire and explode if you operate it without maintenance. Very unlikely but not impossible.

      You are asking to design against stupid. Actually, no, you are asking to design against criminal negligence.

      What you are thinking perhaps is for plants to be designed as fail-safe. If they fail, they shut down gracefully and safely. But for that, those systems that guarantee monitoring and graceful shutdowns requir

      • What happens if there's a Carrington event? What happens if they are bombed? What happens if there's a huge quake that damages piping? etc etc. Nuclear is more dangerous in scenarios like these than any other option.

        The worst accidents happened because of criminal neglect (Chernobyl) and because of a tsunami (Fukushima.)

        Fukushima did not simply happen because a Tsunami happened. It happened because the complex wasn't designed to survive a Tsunami, and it was also built in an area which was known to have been inundated before. It illustrates the point that capitalism and nuclear power are incompatible. As long a

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by GuB-42 ( 2483988 )

      Actually, running reactors past their "best by" date involves a lot of expensive maintenance. It is not always a cheap solution.

      Decommissioning old reactors and building new ones may turn out cheaper in the long run, but it is a huge upfront investment. And it takes a while before they start producing power. It is a tradeoff.

  • Most likely 60 years was a figure pulled out of a politicians arse. I doubt they have any data that shows this particular design of reactor becoming unacceptably dangerous in their 60th year when they were perfectly safe the year before.
  • https://www.asahi.com/ajw/arti... [asahi.com] If there were the U.S., the accident would have cost every man, woman, and child $247.73 .

  • Why not wind? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @04:24PM (#63290391)
    I am baffled why they aren't scrambling to develop offshore wind? They only just powered up their first production wind farm last year [electrek.co]!?

    At present they are still at 88% fossil fuel [energytracker.asia], and practically all of it is imported. I.e. a total loss.

    Offshore wind does cost money but the cost incurred by Japan for Fukushima is estimated at $82 billion and counting and that is a lot money on top of a power source that wasn't cheap in the first place.

    They are just sitting there while Toyota becomes outmoded and their population collapses and they pay for imported coal to shovel right into a furnace. What are they thinking?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by atomicalgebra ( 4566883 )
      Wind is an intermittent source of electricity that requires either nuclear or fossil fuel backups. Everyone who opposes nuclear supports fossil fuel backups since grid level storage is not viable.

      • Re:Why not wind? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @04:51PM (#63290481)
        The intermittency of renewables isn't much of an issue until they form a larger fraction of total supply. Many, many places have much larger adoption of renewables than Japan currently does. Actually being still 88% dependent on fossil fuels relegates them to outlier status, and not in a good way.

        • Re:Why not wind? (Score:4, Interesting)

          by atomicalgebra ( 4566883 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @05:01PM (#63290511)

          There is also not a single example of a country deep decarbonizing with only wind, solar and storage. Not one example. Germany has spent nearly 500 billion euros and failed to decarbonize. If they spent that on new nuclear energy they would have enough clean energy to deep decarbonize both electricity and transportation.

          And Japan's use of fossil fuels is a good reason why they are moving back towards nuclear.

          • If by "deep decarbonization" you mean approaching 100%, sure, at some point that becomes difficult.

            Japan is nowhere even close to facing those challenges.

            As for Germany, to look at their progress [cleanenergywire.org] and simply dismiss it as "failed to decarbonize" is a disingenuous at best.

            • Re:Why not wind? (Score:5, Insightful)

              by atomicalgebra ( 4566883 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @05:27PM (#63290553)
              How about g CO2 per kWh? Germany is currently at 728 g CO2 per kWh [electricitymaps.com]. Thats fucking dirty and is a failure. There is nothing disingenuous about that. Get back to me when they average less than 100 g CO2 per kWh.

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

                Germany is still transitioning, and heading in the right direction. It's too early to judge the end result.

                It's also notable that no country has decarbonized with larger quantities of nuclear either. France is reliant on German renewables to keep the lights on. Nuclear has been tried and it failed, renewables are not anywhere near saturation yet.

                • Germany failed to transition. Failed hard. They have no solution to the intermittency problem. And 74% of French electricity is clean nuclear energy. That means they succeeded.

                • Re:Why not wind? (Score:4, Informative)

                  by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Monday February 13, 2023 @09:02PM (#63290959)

                  It's also notable that no country has decarbonized with larger quantities of nuclear either. France is reliant on German renewables to keep the lights on. Nuclear has been tried and it failed, renewables are not anywhere near saturation yet.

                  France is Europe's leading exporter of electrical energy and has among the lowest carbon emissions from electricity in all of Europe.

                  To cherry pick an outlier ongoing fleet maintenance issue as evidence of the failure of nuclear is only evidence of your personal bias against nuclear.

              • What's disingenuous about that is it's the current value rather than something more representative like the average for the last 12 months. Click that button and you're at 461. Not good, but not 728. Looking at how much they've reduced coal one wonders what it must have been 20 years ago. Certainly Germany's reduction would be much larger if they hadn't reduced nuclear at the same time as they reduced coal. But what if they had reduced nuclear without bringing renewables online? Then, they'd be like J

                • I told you to get back to me when Germany averages less than 100 g CO2 per kWh. 461 is a failure. A hard failure.

                  What if Germany built new nuclear? Well they would be under 50 g CO2 per kWh.

            • As for Germany, to look at their progress [cleanenergywire.org]

              The main thing I take from that graph is replacement of nuclear with renewables (which is not decarbonisation)

              The fact that lignite (dirty dirty dirty) is #2 source of power tells us where the priorities really lie.

          • I beg to differ. The Australian state of South Australia is a good example that it can be done.

            In the 21/22 financial year, they achieved nearly 70% for the year [sa.gov.au] on purely wind and solar and battery. You might recall they were the first to install a large grid-scale battery back in 2017 [wikipedia.org] after a bet between Musk and Cannon-Brookes (co-founder of Atlassian) [abc.net.au].

            South Australia is consistently setting records. Dec 2022 was at 85% for the entire month [reneweconomy.com.au]. They set a world record of operating the entire grid for 10

            • South Australia averages 136 g CO2 per kWh. Much better than Germany and the rest of Australia, but it is not there yet. Since they import a fuckton of coal from the rest of Australia.

        • The intermittency of renewables isn't much of an issue until they form a larger fraction of total supply.

          True, but getting there is kind of the plan, isn't it? Or are you one of those "let's worry when we get there" kind of people?

          Many, many places have much larger adoption of renewables than Japan currently does. Actually being still 88% dependent on fossil fuels relegates them to outlier status, and not in a good way.

          OK, noone questions we should be investing in renewables. The question is whether they should continue running their nuke plants or not. And the only sensible answer is to that is YES, DON'T YOU *DARE* touch the nuclear plants until the last fossil plant gets shut down. Once they're off, we can have the discussion about grid stability, economy, risks and so on again, and maybe rethin

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      It's because Japanese industrial giants missed the boat and are still developing offshore wind, while trying to work around patents.

      They don't want to import the technology, and are heavily invested in nuclear and fossil fuel.

      Same reason they are pushing hydrogen for cars. Toyota went all in on hybrids and failed to develop EV technology.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by jwhyche ( 6192 )

        It's because Japanese industrial giants missed the boat and are still developing offshore wind, while trying to work around patents.

        They don't want to import the technology, and are heavily invested in nuclear and fossil fuel.

        That is a pretty big load of bullshit even for you.

        The reason that Japan doesn't develop on shore wind and solar is the price of land in Japan is limited.. Wind and solar farms have to be huge to be effective. Compared to that nuclear plants have a much smaller foot print.

        Off shore wind farms might be more practical but the sea around Japan really isn't suitable for large scale deployments. There are huge political issues involved and most of that area is in dispute just who owns it. Plus the weath

        • The reason that Japan doesn't develop on shore wind and solar is the price of land in Japan is limited.. Wind and solar farms have to be huge to be effective.

          Nobody is talking about onshore anything right now but you, but let's anyway. Onshore wind is a non-starter, but they could go hard on rooftop solar. In Japan it might not even raise the death rate, because they would actually use the safety equipment. (Most solar deaths involve falling off roofs, and most falling off roof deaths involve not using a roof anchor.)

          Plus the weather in that part of the world would make maintenance on such structures a nightmare.

          Found the guy who thinks the Atlantic (roughest weather) and Pacific (roughest surf) are calm, mellow places to put infrastructure.

          The political co

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by TA ( 14109 )

            You say ".. but they could go hard on rooftop solar". Why do you believe they don't?

            Japan has in fact been doing that for many years now. Where I used to live there wasn't a single new house or apartment block which was built without covering the whole roof with solar, and every refurbished home got solar panels added as well. Every single one. In addition to that, they utilize undeveloped land in between shops etc. for arrays of solar. This was well ahead more than a decade ago, at least (before that wa

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          Bollocks. Japan has massive offshore wind resources. The water is deep but that's not a problem now, we have deep water turbines.

          Come on, we recover oil from deep water, we have all the infrastructure to operate nuclear plants. We can harvest offshore wind.

          One area where Japan actually is doing quite well is batteries. Panasonic is a leader, but also Yeasu and others. They had grid scale sodium batteries years ago. Ideal for wind smoothing.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by jwhyche ( 6192 )

            drinkypoo muttered something:

            Found the guy who thinks the Atlantic (roughest weather) and Pacific (roughest surf) are calm, mellow places to put infrastructure.

            Then AmiMoJo rambled:

            Bollocks. Japan has massive offshore wind resources. The water is deep but that's not a problem now, we have deep water turbines.

            Yeah, yeah. Given you two's posting history on the subject at hand; the lies you have told about it to spread fud, I don't see how anyone can take ether of you seriously on this subject. I'm just simply not going to bother. If you want to think this, more power to you.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by skam240 ( 789197 )

              Cant form a rational rebuttal so you're resorting to personal attacks, huh? Offshore wind would work quite well for Japan and your "reasons" why it wouldnt are the real fud here.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by jwhyche ( 6192 )

                Cant form a rational rebuttal so you're resorting to personal attacks, huh?

                No dumbass. You can't rebutt or debate a fanatic. These two lies and misinformation are well documented. No point it wasting time.

                Just to give you a hint about the two your are defending, one of them, not drinkypoo, has indicated that it is perfectly fine if half the people on the plant die as long as we have a green future.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by skam240 ( 789197 )

                  Nothing that you've said means they're wrong here and / or that you're correct. For instance, there is nothing even remotely true in the following statement made by you earlier.

                  "There are huge political issues involved and most of that area is in dispute just who owns it. Plus the weather in that part of the world would make maintenance on such structures a nightmare."

                  While there are small areas of Japanese waters that are in some level of territorial dispute this is not true for the vast majority of their

            • Given you two's posting history on the subject at hand; the lies you have told about it to spread fud, I don't see how anyone can take ether of you seriously on this subject.

              Given that you eat children, I don't see how anyone can take you seriously on any subject. Oh, you say you don't eat children? Amazing, because I presented exactly as much evidence that you do as you did that I have told lies about nuclear power.

              When did you stop eating children, anyway?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by MacMann ( 7518492 )

      I am baffled why they aren't scrambling to develop offshore wind?

      I'm not baffled. They are not scrambling for offshore wind because it costs more. Take a look at Wikipedia for price comparisons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] If you believe Wikipedia is not a reliable source then go look for another.

      Not only is offshore wind expensive it is unreliable. Windmills only produce power when the wind blows and the wind doesn't always blow. There are places in the world blessed with the geography and climate that is favorable to pumped hydro storage which can manage an

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        Your own link contradicts you.

        Nuclear: $6,695-7,547 (IEA), $7,442-7,989 (NREL)
        Wind, offshore: $4,833-6,041 (IEA), $3,285-5,908 (NREL)

        The upper estimate for offshore wind is below the lowest estimate for nuclear.

        By the way, offshore wind farms build a few years ago off Scotland are rivalling nuclear for capacitor factor.

        • Your own link contradicts you.

          It doesn't because those are US/EU estimates. Japan is a different animal because it has a very different legal system which is what accounts for a large amount of the cost of nuclear.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            What about the legal system makes it so expensive?

            Clearly before Fukushima there was inadequate regulation. How do you reform the legal system without weakening necessary regulation?

            In any case, Japan's legal system is quite weak when it comes to nuclear. Look at the victims of Fukushima, still in court 12 years later trying to get fairly small amounts of compensation. The Japanese legal system is not generous.

            • What about the legal system makes it so expensive?

              Legal fees to attorneys because of NIMBYs and anti-nuclear fanatics bringing pointless suits to delay construction as long as possible.

              The rest of your post is not relevant because designing to meet safety regulations is not the legal cost.

  • these things are going to show all kinds of corrosion, leakage and breakage.

  • Free nuclear fuel for everyone.

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