Japan Nuclear Energy Policy: Update
Shunsuke KONDO, Dr.
ChairmanJapan Atomic Energy Commission Is responsible to plan, deliberate and decide a framework forgovernmental actions to promote research, development andutilization of nuclear energy for the production of energy andthe promotion of science and industry, limiting them only topeaceful purposes and assuring nuclear safety and security.
 Decide the Framework of Nuclear Energy Policy that specifies
government activities to pursue these purposes, including
those for fostering the foundation of nuclear energy
utilization such as human resource development, public
involvement and international cooperation, across threedifferent time frames; short term, mid-term and long-term.
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Short-term Activities
 The Objective• Improve existing activities to utilize nuclear energy
technologies so as to utilize them as safely and efficiently
as practicable.

 Major activities to be promoted• Ensure the existence of responsible safety and quality
management systems in nuclear operators so as tomaintain low incident rates and high plant availabilities attheir plants.
• Foster the foundation of nuclear energy policy.

2Mid-term Activities
 The objective:Add new technologies and systems that will improve thesustainability of nuclear energy supply, responding to one of themost important energy policy goals of pursuing a society withsignificantly reduced greenhouse gas emissions.

 Activities to be promoted:
Prepare advanced light water reactors.
Prepare systems to recycle nuclear fuel and systems for longterm management of nuclear waste.

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Long-term Activities
 The objective
 Explore the possibility of radically new energy technologies

that will address effectively the challenges of air pollution,
climate change and energy supply insecurity.

 Activities to be promoted
 Promote the research and development of the fourth

generation fission reactors with increased sustainability andwith applicability beyond electricity generation,
 Promote the research and development of nuclear fusionenergy technologies,
 Promote basic and generic research that will enable us todefine innovative concepts and measures on which futurenuclear energy technologies could rely.
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Tsunami waves are hitting TEPCO Fukushima
Daiichi NPP.

On March 11, 2011 the Great East-Japan earthquake and theresulting tsunami hit people and facilities including nuclear
power plants located on the Pacific coast of Japan.The attack
triggered a major accident at TEPCO Fukushima Daiichi NPP.
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Land contamination extends overareas within 250km or so from
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear powerstation.

6 The fact that this accident has raised concerns about
the safety of nuclear power generation around theworld is a matter that Japan takes with the utmost
seriousness and remorse.
 Japan has received tremendous outpouring of supports
and expressions of solidarity from around the world
since the event. Taking this occasion, I would like toconvey the Japanese people's sincere gratitude to theglobal community for its support.

7Satellite View of the Site
Silt fence
Seawatersluice zone
HarborN

Water storage tanks

Pump-up well

Pacific ocean

Mountain side
Pump-up well

Soil

Reactor
BuildingTurbine
Building

Sea
Aquiclude

The water table(-------) and groundwater flows
in the aquifer at the Fukushima Daiichi site
 About 1000 tons of the groundwater flow in the direction of sea daily.
 About 400 tons of them daily intrude into RBs and TBs.
 About 300 tons of them daily flow into the seawater intake zone of the port.

Current Status of the Site (1) Short-term challenges:
 Assure the reliable operation of the reactor cooling system.
 Manage the groundwater flowing in the aquifer beneath thesite: Reduce the leakage of contaminated water in the trenches into

the groundwater,
 Collect and decontaminate it if it was contaminated, and store
the decontaminated, Start the deliberate release of the decontaminated water to thesea in consultation with interested parties.

 Improve working conditions and assure human resources

for cleanup activities.

Leakage of Contaminated Groundwater to the Sea
 The effect of the leakage of groundwater contaminated dueto the defect in the trenches is limited in the port ofFukushima Daiichi NPS, whose area is smaller than 0.3 km2.
 The level of radioactivity in the open sea is below 1Bq/L, anorder of magnitude less than the limit of the concentration ofradioactive Cs (Cs-134 and Cs-137) specified in theGuidelines for Radioactive Substances in Bathing Areas
released by the Ministry of Environment.

11Decontamination of the Damaged Units Mid-and long-term challenges:
Three phase decommissioning activities that include
necessary R&D projects;
 Phase 1: to commence fuel removal from spent fuelpools within 2 years: it will be started in this November.
 Phase 2: to commence fuel debris removal from RPVs
within 10 years:
 Phase 3: to complete the decommissioning within 30 to40 years.

12Major R&D Projects
 Various robots and remote manipulation devices for cleanup

activities:
 Equipment/device to observe the fuel/debris in RPVs andPCVs, and characterize them with a view to preparing fortheir removal.
 Robust models and simulation tools for the analysis ofsevere accidents, focusing on post accidental heat removal,coolability of relocated reactor core, in-vessel core meltprogression, in-vessel molten corium retention, moltencore-concrete-interaction, and corium stabilization incontainment: Technologies for conditioning and storing radioactive waste
generated in these activities.

13Off–Site Consequences Some 80,000 people are still requested to be out of home and about thesame number of peoples have made choice to leave home. They aresuffering from a psychological agony due to the fear of radiation
exposure, separation of family, disruption of communities，loss of work,
uncertainty in the future etc.
 Though anyone has not been hurt by the radiation so far, the accident
has caused one thousand or so deaths due to the worsening of diseases
owing to dislocation, including emergency evacuation from hospitals,
and/or stress in the life in a shelter after dislocation.
 It is sad and painful but true that the sales of the products fromFukushima Prefecture are still damaged due to consumer fears andproducers are forced to choose to be out of work, even though they
are not contaminated as the production of agricultural and marine
produce is strictly restricted at the place where competent authorities
see the danger of contamination, adopting the most stringent standard
for food and water in the world.
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Decontamination Activities
 In the areas where additional exposure is less than 20mSv/y, theGovernment has been supporting the decontamination of people’s living
environment with a view to reducing the estimated annual exposure ofpeople by 50 % and that of children by 60 % in 2 years.
 In the areas where additional exposure was higher than 20mSv/y, inwhich 11 municipalities are located, the Government has started thedecontamination work to reduce annual exposure there below 20mSv in
two years, excluding areas where doses are higher than 50mSv/y.
 The decontamination has been promoted significantly only in threemunicipalities. There are many issues to be resolved for the promotion,
including the agreement with the resident on the decontamination
methods and the place for temporary storage of the decontamination
wastes. It is also a difficult issue to reach agreement on the appropriate
measures for decontaminating the forests that cover more than 80% ofthe areas.
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Publication of Accident Investigation Reports
 The IAEA International Fact-Finding Expert Mission
 There were insufficient defense-in-depth provisions for tsunami
hazards.
 The Government’s Investigation Committee
 The government and TEPCO failed to prevent the disaster because
they were reluctant to invest time, effort and money in protecting
against a natural disaster considered unlikely: they were overly
confident that events beyond the scope of their assumptions would
not occur.
 A culture of complacency about nuclear safety and poor crisis
management led to the nuclear disaster.
 National Diet’s Independent Investigation Commission (NAIIC) What must be admitted - very painfully - is that this was a disaster‘Made in Japan’. Its fundamental causes are to be found in theingrained conventions of Japanese culture: our reflexive obedience,
our reluctance to question authority, our devotion to ‘sticking withthe program’, our groupism and our insularity.
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Where We Are Today
The release of such judgment made it difficult for theGovernment to allow NPP operators to restart their plants afterrefueling, even after introducing emergency measures to copewith tsunami attack.
 The Government decided to wait the action taken by theNuclear Regulation Authority (NRA), a newly establishedindependent commission body that solely exercises nuclear
regulatory authority. This is the reason why all of 50 units or sohave been in shutdown state from September15th this year.
 To compensate the loss of nuclear power generation, electricpower companies have increased thermal power generation
based on natural gas and oil, importing a significant amount ofthem from abroad. The additional payment for them amounted
to 3 trillion yen or so in 2012, which aggravated the tradebalance significantly. Furthermore this necessarily caused 26%
increase of CO2 emission in electricity generation sector (about178% increase in total) over 2010.
Where We Are Today (2) As a set of the new safety regulation rules was established by

the NRA in July, NPP operators submitted 12 applications tothe NRA for review. They are young PWRs. BWR operators
are promoting the installation of the CFVS to make their units
eligible to apply.
 Government is in a position to support the restart of theoperation of idling nuclear power plants as an important
power source, when they comply with the NRA rules, as wellas to support the infrastructure development in the emerging
countries and supply the safe nuclear technology to them,recognizing the responsibility to share with the world thelessons of the Fukushima accident.

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Where We Are Today (3) As the majority of the public now regards the nuclear power

generation as dangerous to our society, however, it isessential for the operators to sincerely communicate with thepublic about their preparation for the restart and theirresolve to do what they should do at the right time in a rightmanner and never betray the nation’s right to be safe from
nuclear accidents, recognizing their special responsibility toassure nuclear safety.
 The future of nuclear energy policy will be decided, paying
due attention to the public perception about nuclear energythat will evolve from the efforts of nuclear energy community
in this respect, and the prospects of the increased use ofalternatives to nuclear power under the feed-in tariff, a policy
mechanism introduced to accelerate the investments inrenewable energy technologies.
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Thank you for your kind attention!

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