{"id":4439,"date":"2019-06-03T17:54:27","date_gmt":"2019-06-03T08:54:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cnic.jp\/english\/?p=4439"},"modified":"2019-06-04T09:59:48","modified_gmt":"2019-06-04T00:59:48","slug":"nuclear-power-and-coal-fired-power-will-hamper-japans-shift-to-a-carbon-free-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/?p=4439","title":{"rendered":"Nuclear Power and Coal-fired Power will Hamper Japan\u2019s Shift to a Carbon-free Society"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

~Our response to the governmental panel\u2019s proposal on Long-Term Growth Strategy under the Paris Agreement<\/strong>~<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

CNIC Statement, 16 April 2019<\/em>
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nParis Agreement calls on all parties to combat climate change, and requires\nthem to submit Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to the United Nations\nby the year 2020. These must specify their long-term strategy to reduce\ngreenhouse gases and to achieve economic growth at the same time. The Japanese\ngovernment aims to announce its long-term strategy before the G-20 Summit is\nheld in Osaka in June 2019. The governmental panel on the Long-term Strategy\nunder the Paris Agreement as Growth Strategy held a meeting in the Prime Minister\u2019s\nOffice on April 2, and released its proposal on Japan\u2019s long-term strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nrecommendation said the long-term strategy should contribute to joint efforts\nto limit the global temperature increase to 1.5 \u2103 as stipulated in the\nParis Agreement, and should contain ‘disruptive innovations’ for creating a\nvirtuous cycle of the environment and growth. In addition, the proposal said\nthe strategy should include ‘ambitious visions, speedy measures and promotion\nof a shift to a desirable society.’  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u2018ambitious visions\u2019 mentioned in the government\u2019s proposal, however, are nothing but (1) a plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by the year 2050 from the FY2013 level, (2) the ‘disruptive innovation’ to remove CO2<\/sub> from coal-fired power generation by using Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) technology, and (3) to create a hydrogen-energy based society by 2050. If these measures alone are taken, it would be impossible to achieve the goal of 80% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from the FY2013 level by the year 2050, and to limit global temperature increase to 1.5 \u2103 by that time. It seems that the ‘disruptive innovation’ is the government\u2019s excuse for its wish to maintain the status quo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This deceptive, illusionary proposal has stemmed from the government\u2019s traditional policies on nuclear power and coal-fired power generation. Since the 1990s, when reduction of CO2<\/sub> emissions was taken up on the global political agenda, the government has tried to address this issue by simply promoting nuclear power generation. As a result, the amount of Japan\u2019s CO2 <\/sub>emissions continued to rise.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ngovernment plans to reduce the share of nuclear power generation in the energy\nmix to 20%-22% by the year 2030, and increase that of coal-fired power\ngeneration, to 26%. (As of 2010, the share of nuclear power generation\naccounted for 29% and that of coal-fired power generation, 25%) To achieve this\ngoal, the government is poised to maintain both nuclear-power and coal-fired\npower generation, and has worked out plans to\nestablish exchange markets for generation capacity, base load power, and\nnon-fossil fuel value for nuclear power generation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the government\u2019s plan, only nine nuclear reactors are currently operating as of April 2019, although 54 were operational before the devastating nuclear accident occurred at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in 2011. Of the off-line reactors, the operators of 21 units have decided on or are considering decommissioning the reactors. As for eight units of the remaining reactors, operators have yet to file applications for the official review and inspection for checking conformity to the new regulatory requirements. What does the government think about this situation? It is obvious that the government will not be able to achieve the target of expanding the share of nuclear power generation in the energy mix to 20%-22% by the year 2030.\u00a0 Meanwhile, antiquated coal-fired power plants may be decommissioned after operating for 45 years, but even so, coal-fired power generation\u2019s share would exceed the target level substantially. Even if the share of renewable energy increases and makes up for the reduced share of nuclear power generation, the CO2<\/sub> emissions from power generation would surpass the current level considerably.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reduction of CO2<\/sub> emissions should be achieved by developing a number of technically feasible technologies that can actually be introduced. The development of technology that may or may not become possible in the future should be considered as an additional, extra step. It is certain that a long-term plan based on the policy of techno-mania and wishful thinking will collapse. What is needed right now is a long-term plan that reflects the public opinion against nuclear power generation and is compatible with the current situation where it is impossible to restart many nuclear power plants. In other words, the plan should feature the disruptive innovation of the full-scale introduction of renewable energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

~Our response to the governmental panel\u2019s proposal on Long-Term Growth Strategy under the Paris Agreement~ CNIC Statement, 16 April 2019 The Paris Agreement calls on all parties to combat climate change, and requires them...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cnic-statements"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4439"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4454,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4439\/revisions\/4454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cnic.jp\/english\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}