World's largest nuclear power plant restarts - Japan takes final step 15 years after Fukushima
Japan took the final step to allow the world's largest nuclear power plant to resume operations with a regional vote on Monday, a crucial moment in the country's return to nuclear power nearly 15 years after the Fukushima disaster.
The plant, located about 220 km northwest of Tokyo, was among 54 reactors shut down after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that damaged the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.
Since then, Japan has restarted 14 of its 33 plants as it moves to wean itself off imported fossil fuels. On Monday, the Niigata prefectural assembly passed a vote of confidence in the governor of Niigata, who backed the restart last month, effectively allowing the plant to resume operations.
The assembly session, the last of the year, highlighted community divisions over the restart, despite new jobs and potentially lower electricity bills. Outside, about 300 protesters stood in the cold, holding signs that read “No to nuclear weapons,” “We oppose the restart of Kashiwazaki-Kariwa,” and “We support Fukushima.”
The total capacity of this plant is 8.2 GW, enough to power several million homes. The expected restart would bring a 1.36 GW unit into operation next year and bring another with the same capacity into operation around 2030.
But a survey released by the prefecture in October found that 60% of residents did not think the conditions for restarting work had been met. Nearly 70% were concerned about the operation of the power plant. Japan spent $68 billion last year on imported liquefied natural gas and coal, a tenth of its total import costs.
Despite its shrinking population, Japan expects energy demand to surge over the next decade due to a boom in energy-hungry artificial intelligence data centers. To meet these needs and its decarbonization commitments, the government has set a target of doubling the share of nuclear power in its electricity mix to 20% by 2040.
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