Nuclear - A pact with the devil

December 17, 2013

Making a nuclear pact with the devil

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/perspectives/news/20131217p2a00m0na009000c.html

Is the government hurtling toward post-war national policy on nuclear power? I actually think it's having second thoughts, like Faust in the face of the Mephistopheles's temptations: "Come on, nuclear power is easy. Just take it."

A report compiled earlier this month by a subcommittee of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's Advisory Committee for Natural Resources and Energy on the government's three-year energy plan stated that nuclear power was an important base-load electricity source. Meanwhile, the report also said that Japan would reduce its reliance on nuclear power as much as possible.

The report has been criticized as a regressive step from the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) administration's plan for zero nuclear power. However, the recent report is much more cautious than the 2010 basic energy plan compiled prior to the March 2011 disasters, when Japan was still drunk on the nuclear renaissance.

Take, for example, the painstaking choice of the phrase "base-load electricity source." This means that the committee sees nuclear power as a power source necessary for the stable supply of electricity, and carries the nuance that we are resigned to using it in order to avoid blackouts.

Compare this to the basic plan laid out three years ago, which called nuclear power a core energy source, and said the government would promote it with enthusiasm.

The theme of the German legend "Faust" is the making of a deal with the devil. Faust trades in happiness in the next life for pleasure in the present. If we substitute the next life in "Faust" with the happiness of our children and grandchildren, the nuclear dilemma is the same as the dilemma faced by Faust.

Nuclear power may guarantee ample electricity and economic activity, but a disaster could rob people of their land and cause genetic damage. Even without a disaster, nuclear reactors continue to produce extremely toxic radioactive waste for which we have yet to develop the technology to control, and that future generations must contend with.

I was reminded of Faust upon reading the contents of a lecture given by the economist Sadakazu Chikaraishi immediately after the March 11, 2011 triple disasters.

"We should no longer increase our energy consumption, utilize oil and natural gas on a small and long-term scale, and commit 100 percent to the development of green energy," he said. "It's ridiculous to make a Faustian pact and rely on nuclear energy."

Chikaraishi, 87, had provided theoretical support to the All-Japan Federation of Students' Self-Governing Associations (Zengakuren) in its early stages, soon after World War II. He studied in what is today Kyoto University's humanities department, where he was exposed to German literature, and the faculty of economics at the University of Tokyo. I still remember his smile as a popular host of an NHK television program on economics in the 1970s.

The professor emeritus of Hosei University, who is spending his retirement in Zushi, Kanagawa Prefecture, sent me a copy of the speech he made at his alma mater. Surprisingly, his argument in the speech is almost exactly the same as the one he made in an article in the May 1977 issue of the monthly journal "Sekai" (The World).

How did Chikaraishi have such insight back in 1977, when neither the Chernobyl disaster nor the Three Mile Island accident had yet to take place? When I met him to ask this question, I noticed that his smile had not changed over the years.

"Contemporary technology merely combines the laws of physics and chemistry in an excessive pursuit of convenience, speed, and economizing. Environmental biology is ignored. Nuclear power is a classic example. Even though the technology is incomplete, it has been promoted with the idea that 'we'll figure it out sooner or later,' which goes against the principles of technology assessment. We have to shift our selection of technology toward that which is ecologically sound."

The social structural reforms associated with such a shift in technological selection are difficult. There are bound to be countless views on such potential change.

However, we've had enough of the "we'll figure it out soon" line of thinking of his country's pro-nuclear advocates. In October, operations of the Rokkasho Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing Facility in Aomori Prefecture were postponed for the 20th time. Even the U.S. and France have abandoned their fast-breeder nuclear reactor programs. When is Japan going to wake up? (By Takao Yamada, Expert Senior Writer)