New safety standards - Not up to the utilities any more

February 1, 2013

EDITORIAL: Utilities must not dally on new nuclear safety standards

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/views/editorial/AJ201302010043

The Nuclear Regulation Authority released a draft outline of new safety standards to deal with serious accidents at nuclear power plants.

Under the “safety myth” promoted by Japanese nuclear power advocates for decades, measures to safeguard nuclear plants have been left to the voluntary efforts of the power companies that operate them.

However, these utilities will be legally required to prepare for a serious accident on the assumption that it “does occur.” The details will be worked out by July, together with the recently released draft of safety standards for earthquake and tsunami preparedness.

The administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stands by the policy “to restart nuclear reactors whose safety has been confirmed.” But we believe the standards should be used to distinguish the dangerous reactors and ensure that they are not put back online.

Many regulations adopted by Western countries were incorporated into the NRA’s safeguard measures. If they are fully implemented, the safety of nuclear power plants would significantly improve.

However, some measures are expected to take a long time to implement. For this reason, the government plans to set up a grace period for such steps.

Since fuel costs to run thermal power plants weigh heavily on their bottom lines, utilities want to restart nuclear power plants at the earliest possible time. The truth is they want the grace period and other requirements to be as lax as possible.

But they should not be allowed to interminably delay the start of the safety measures.

At the very least, the installation of a quake-resistant “emergency control room” with in-house power generation capability and other key functions should be made mandatory before reactors are restarted.

The revised nuclear reactor regulation law requires utilities to introduce “backfitting,” a system equipped with the latest safety measures, to existing nuclear reactors.

From now, each time new findings concerning nuclear power generation emerge, all nuclear power plants will be required to adopt new safety standards in response. Regardless of the grace periods, they must always keep up with the latest updates.

Naturally, doing so will be costly. In the past, power industry officials tended to believe that they could cover expenses by raising utility rates or extending the lifespan of reactors until their losses could be written off.

But such a mind-set is no longer acceptable.

The NRA must also strictly enforce the 40-year maximum lifespan rule for reactors and not allow reactors with outdated designs to continue to operate.

The government needs to steadily advance reform of the nuclear power industry, including a re-examination of the existing setup that allows utilities to tally all costs needed to generate power and pass them on to electricity rates.

Such reform would also make it easier for utilities to decide whether to invest in additional safety precautions for their reactors or decommission them.

No matter how much safety measures are advanced, however, there will always be risks in operating nuclear reactors.

Also worrisome is that no plans have been decided on temporary storage and final disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high-level nuclear waste.

If these points are weighed in, the number of reactors that can be restarted would be limited.

-- The Asahi Shimbun, Feb. 1