Poll finds record support for Japanese reactor restarts | Hacker News Reader

Poll finds record support for Japanese reactor restarts

world-nuclear-news.org

48 pointsPaulHoule9 comments

I don't really see a problem with it provided that they've genuinely taken the lessons learned from the Fukushima incident to heart and can assure people that nothing like that will happen again. They should probably plan and be prepared for the reactors to handle for earthquakes and tsunamis much worse than what hit them in 2011 as well as any projected complications arising from climate change.

Nuclear energy isn't ideal, but it beats fossil fuels and can bridge the gap until it can be replaced by cleaner renewable energy.

Nuclear vs fossil fuels pretty much boils down to this:

Nuclear - you might have a big pollution incident at some point

Fossil - you have a continuous pollution incident every minute of every day

Which is worse?

Also big incidents would they happen would still have a regionally limited impact while climate change affects the entire planet.

That's a false dilemma.

You can control both. You can take measures to reduce the probability of a nuclear accident, and the impact of a nuclear accident if it were to happen. You can also take measures to reduce the continuous pollution coming from fossil fuels.

Depending on which measures you implement, how stringent they are, and how strictly they are enforced, either nuclear or fossil-based power plants may come ahead.

If something isn't done fast to curb energy bills people will take to the streets. Maybe it will be more polite compared to what's seen elsewhere, but people aren't going to accept it regardless. Getting those reactors up and running again is an absolute necessity.

Well yeah, I live in Japan and our energy bill doubled last month so I can see why people would want some nice stable supply of power.

Is it just a political stunt then?

Like a knee jerk reactive move because energy prices have gone up, the government will turn on potentially old and dangerous reactors to make the populace happy?

What other steps have been taken since Fukushima (a long time ago) to ensure energy security a side from hoping old reactors are still safe?

Under the new policy, Japan will also develop and construct "next-generation innovative reactors" to replace about 20 reactors that are set to be decommissioned.

It sounds like too little too late, what's a next generation reactor? When will it be online? Sounds like things that should've been happening ten years ago?

Smells desperate considering Japan is still trying to workout how to dispose of waste water from the last mess.

I’m not Japanese nor have I lived here long enough to give good answers to your questions. But virtually all reactions in East Asia to Fukushima incident were short sighted knee jerk reactions. I was immensely frustrated that both Korea and Japan had shut down reactors and stopped new developments. Both countries are realising now that wasn’t such a good idea and yes it is too late.

I have followed it a bit, I agree, but it looks like protecting those responsible was more important than transparency and overhauling regulatory bodies to continue the safe use of the reactors.

Let's not forget the relatively simple mitigation steps that were recommended to have taken place to avoid the meltdown at Fukushima but weren't.

It's pretty unusual to go from having a lot of nuclear energy to none almost overnight.

If it was that dangerous and that foolish to have nuclear energy, why was it every commissioned in the first place? Did someone not think of this before Fukushima?

On the other hand, what has changed to make it all so safe ~ 10 years of having them offline now makes it ok to have them back online in a relatively short amount of time?

Quite scary.

Seems like the path of least effort was chosen and a lack of planning is responsible in all cases.

Edit: Down votes, why? Actually interested to hear others views because I personally think Nuclear energy done right is really important.

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