Comision de Poblacion, Ambiente y Desarrollo
Asamblea Legislativa
Republica de Panama
Dear Members of the Commission:
Green Action is an environmental NGO based in Kyoto, Japan which works on Japan’s plutonium program issues.
We are submitting this letter in conjunction to your deliberation of proposed legislation that would prohibit shipments of ultrahazardous nuclear cargoes through the Panama Canal. This letter addresses the fact that maritime shipments of ultrahazardous nuclear cargoes from Europe to Japan are not necessary for meeting Japan’s energy needs.
Japan at present has 53 nuclear reactors producing approximately 37% of Japan’s electric power needs, but not a single one of these reactors is dependent on maritime nuclear shipments between Europe and Japan.
The maritime shipments of HLW (high level radioactive waste) and MOX (mixed plutonium-uranium oxide) fuel are taking place only because of Japan’s plutonium program.
Japan’s plutonium program is not only not necessary for meeting Japan’s electricity demand, it is also an economic drain. In fact the chairman of Japan’s most powerful business lobby, the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren), has called on the national government to review its current nuclear energy policy that pushes use of plutonium for fuel. (Please see attached Japan Economic Newswire article dated January 27, 2003).
There is only one reactor in Japan that uses plutonium fuel to produce electric energy. (The plutonium is procured domestically and not by shipments from Europe.) This reactor is the ATR reactor Fugen. Fugen is scheduled to be shutdown permanently at the end of this month (March 2003). It will subsequently be dismantled. Apart from Fugen, there is not one single light bulb being lit in Japan by the plutonium program.
The French companies Cogema and the British company PNTL continue to attempt to mislead countries on the route of Japanese maritime nuclear shipments, making it appear as though these shipments are necessary for Japan’s energy future. Nothing can be further from the truth.
Now that the ATR program has been scrapped by the Japanese electric utilities, there are two parts of Japan’s plutonium program which remain: Japan’s FBR (fast breeder reactor) program and the use of MOX (mixed plutonium-uranium oxide) fuel in the commercial nuclear reactors currently using uranium fuel (the Pluthermal Program). Both programs are going nowhere.
Japan’s FBR program has been under development for four decades. However, to date, the program has produced only one hour of electricity. This occurred in August 1995. The electricity was produced by the prototype FBR Monju located in Fukui Prefecture. There has been no electricity produced by the FBR program since then. Monju has been shutdown since December 1995 due to a sodium leak and fire accident. There is no restart date set. There is only one other FBR in Japan called Joyo, but this reactor is experimental and cannot produce electricity.
Under Japan’s current Long Term Program for Research, Development and Utilization of Nuclear Energy, there are no plans for any further FBRs to be built.
On January 27, 2003, the Nagoya High Court ruled that the license granted for Monju by the national government was illegal. The case is now in the Supreme Court. As can be seen above, Japan’s FBR program is in total disarray.
The Pluthermal Program (use of MOX fuel), the remaining part of Japan’s plutonium program, is also currently at a complete standstill. The program was to begin in the first half of the 1990’s. Kansai Electric and Tokyo Electric were to be the first to implement the program. However, in 1999 BNFL (British Nuclear Fuels plc) was found to have falsified the quality control data for the MOX fuel to be used in the first Kansai Electric reactor in Fukui Prefecture (Takahama Unit 4). The fuel was subsequently returned to Britain in July 2002.
In September of 2002, the governors of the remaining two prefectures, Niigata and Fukushima, which were slated to be the first to use this plutonium (MOX) fuel rescinded their prior approval for the program (to be implemented at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Unit 3 and Fukushima Unit I-3 respectively, both Tokyo Electric reactors).
As can be seen above, Pluthermal Program plans have been set back further each and every year since 1999. There are now no dates for starting the Pluthermal Program and no need for shipping MOX fuel to Japan.
Masatoshi Toyoda, former president of Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited (JNFL), the company central to Japan’s plutonium program, states in the October 2002 edition of the Japanese publication ENERGY, "Currently, the supply of uranium exceeds demand, and the price is around $50/kgU. On the other hand, reprocessing and MOX fuel fabrication fees have increased several times from prices estimated 20 years ago, and the prospect of fast breeder reactors coming into practical use has become opaque. Considering this change in the state of affairs, I believe that it goes without saying that a review of the nuclear fuel cycle should be carried out." ("Circumstances Concerning Reprocessing and Pluthermal", Energy, October 2002. Translation from the Japanese by Green Action.)
We thank you for considering our submission and we hope the above will be helpful for your deliberations.
Sincerely,
Aileen Mioko Smith
Director,Green ActionAttachment:
Japan Economic Newswire article dated January 27, 2003
About Green Action:
Green Action based in Kyoto is a Japanese NGO founded in 1991 which works to stop Japan’s plutonium program. It is co-founder of Stop the Monju (1991), the Japanese NGO working exclusively to stop Japan’s fast breeder reactor program. Green Action is also the international office for and co-founder of Stop Nuclear Waste Campaign.
Green Action has been invited by the Japanese government- the Atomic Energy Commission and the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy-to give testimony at government roundtables and symposiums.Green Action is not affiliated or associated with any political party.
Japan Economic Newswire
January 27, 2003 Monday
SECTION: INTERNATIONAL NEWS
HEADLINE: Nippon Keidanren’s Okuda urges energy policy review
DATELINE: TOKYO, Jan. 27
Hiroshi Okuda, chairman of the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren), called on the government Monday to pursue energy policy changes from a long-term perspective, taking the opportunity afforded earlier in the day by a high court ruling against construction of the Monju experimental fast-breeder nuclear reactor. ‘It (the ruling) will serve as a starter (for the government) to review its energy policy centering on atomic power,’ Okuda, the head of Japan’s most powerful business lobby, told reporters. While noting that the ruling by the Nagoya High Court nullifying a 1983 government approval of the trouble-plagued reactor could be a big obstacle to energy policy in the short run, Okuda said, ‘It is necessary to look around, to see whether we will need atomic power or not in the long and medium terms.’
The government ’should think about a combination of energy sources as there have been advances in technology, like fuel cells,’ Okuda said, calling for a policy shift taking future technical innovation into consideration. The landmark decision in favor of residents seeking a halt to the operation of the nuclear reactor in Fukui Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast has clouded plans to reactivate it, following its suspension after a massive sodium coolant leakage in 1995.
Green ActionSuite 103, 22-75 Tanaka Sekiden-cho, Sakyo-ku Kyoto 606-8203 Japan
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E-mail amsmith@gol.com
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