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Dirty Tricks In Japan, But Also World-Wide
In The Nuclear Industry

http://www.emfnews.org
NukeNe.ws on Tue, 08/16/2011
the
same factors are at work in every country that has a nuclear
industry. The impulse to minimise the inherent risks of the
most dangerous technology man has ever tried to master, the
tendency to conceal or downplay accidents, the assertion
that each succeeding generation of plants is foolproof and
super safe, and the presumption, so often proved wrong by
events, that every contingency has been provided for, all
these have been evident again and again. Angela Merkel, one
of the few leading politicians who is also a scientist, saw
the writing on the wall. Her decision to phase out nuclear
power has revived a global debate which has been dormant for
far too long
After Fukushima: nuclear dirty
tricks, After nearly half a century of producing nuclear
power, Japan has finally separated regulation from
promotion. Editorial The
Guardian, 16 August 2011.
The Japanese cabinet decided this week to transfer the
country’s nuclear safety agency from the trade ministry,
where it nestled in a department also dedicated to the
expansion of nuclear power, to the environment ministry,
where, at least in theory, there is some chance that its
operations will not be subverted or manipulated by Japanese
energy firms. After nearly half a century of producing
nuclear power, Japan has finally separated regulation from
promotion, but the move may well have come too late to
restore public trust.In a country where people have to use
their own detectors to check on local radiation levels
which the government failed to release, where information
about threats to life and health after Fukushima dribbled
out so haphazardly, and where a nuclear industry apparently
unabashed by that disaster has been resorting to dirty
tricks to influence public debate, mere bureaucratic
rearrangement will hardly suffice.
The latest blow to confidence came when it was reported
last month that workers at the Kyushu Electric Power Company
had been asked to pose as ordinary citizens with no
connection to the industry and send emails calling for the
resumption of operations at two nuclear reactors in southern
Japan to a televised public hearing . Investigations showed
this was standard behaviour long before Fukushima, with
other power companies admitting that they had sent employees
to make up as many as half of the participants in similar
forums as far back as 2005.
As if this were not bad enough, two of the utilities said
they were urged to do so by the nuclear agency itself. It
was this revelation which appears to have led to the
decision to fire three top officials, including the head of
the agency, and then to reorganise and move it.
Japan’s polarised industrial culture, which veers between
the heedless pursuit of short- term interest, on the one
hand, and confessions, tears, and apparently heartfelt
apologies when things go wrong, on the other, makes it an
extreme case. But the same factors are at work in every
country that has a nuclear industry. The impulse to minimise
the inherent risks of the most dangerous technology man has
ever tried to master, the tendency to conceal or downplay
accidents, the assertion that each succeeding generation of
plants is foolproof and super safe, and the presumption, so
often proved wrong by events, that every contingency has
been provided for, all these have been evident again and
again. Angela Merkel, one of the few leading politicians who
is also a scientist, saw the writing on the wall. Her
decision to phase out nuclear power has revived a global
debate which has been dormant for far too long.
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