Safety of nuclear power station

My opinion of this week(518)

A number of critical accidents at nuclear power stations which should have been reported properly to Government authorities have not been reported at all in many cases. This has become a big issue in recent news of mass media.

Although there were some small accidents at nuclear power stations from time to time in the past, no critical ones as such which have been reported recently did not occur in recent years. The topic concerned with nuclear power generation itself does not seem to draw so much so social interest in recent years.

In addition, when it comes to issues on ecology, warming of earth by carbon dioxide is a major problem to be solved. Nuclear power generation is now considered to have good advantages in this respect. Owing to this social atmosphere , management of electric power stations seems to have lost some sensitivity concerning public relations on the safety of nuclear power generation. This is why so many hidden cases of accidents at power stations have been disclosed one after another these days. Some mass media explained the case that way and I agreed with their analysis
to some degree.

Japan is prone to earthquakes. Observing so many critical accidents at nuclear power stations these days, people may start having some basic concerns about the safety of nuclear power stations. Are all those sites safe enough if they are hit by such epicentral earthquakes like Hanshin Awaji Earth quakes in 1995 ? But people in general seem not to have not so much interest in this issue.

Local election is now starting. The election of House of Representative starts in July. Some main political issues are on constitution, income disparity, pension system and so on.

But according to my belief , this issue of nuclear power generation should be another central issues in the election to decide the basic energy policy of this country in the future.

2007/3/24
Tadashi HAYASE