2 June 2011
To: Foreign Media in Japan
Japanese Utility Still Committed to New Nuclear Reactors
Amid calls to halt all nuclear development in Japan, following the unprecedented disaster in Fukushima, Hiroshima-based utility Chugoku Electric is pushing ahead with a total of three new nuclear reactors in Matsue and Kaminoseki, the latter despite three decades of opposition by local island residents, and recent warnings on the need to safeguard biodiversity in Kaminoseki’s “Kiseki-no-Umi” – “Sea of Miracles.”
Chugoku Electric Power Co. Inc. (head office, Hiroshima city) has a new reactor (No. 3) nearing completion at the Shimane Power Plant, close by Matsue city. Two more reactors are planned for the new Kaminoseki Nuclear Power Plant, located on the Seto Inland Sea coast 70 km south-west of Hiroshima, a project which has been actively opposed by nearby islanders for the last 30 years.
Iwaishima is a small island 3.5 km offshore from the site of the plant. Its residents, mostly grandmothers and grandfathers now, have refused to accept 1 billion yen as compensation. In weekly protest demonstrations, they have used their boats and their own bodies to try to block construction. Many young people from around Japan have come to support them, including a kayak team working with the local people trying to prevent planned landfill from proceeding. The company has retaliated by obtaining a Supreme Court ruling setting a penalty of 5 million yen per day if work is obstructed.
International academics and scientists have expressed deep concern over the plant’s threat to the biodiversity of the nearby sea, and recent documentaries have depicted the islanders’ hard-fought campaign against the plant, and highlighted the island’s beautiful environment.
On March 17th, the governor of Yamaguchi Prefecture requested Chugoku Electric to temporarily suspend the project. However, parties opposed to the construction of Kaminoseki Nuclear Power Plant demand its complete termination. The triple meltdown and resulting emissions of high levels of radioactivity into the air, land and ocean in Fukushima has proved beyond doubt that the safety of nuclear power cannot be guaranteed, and its threat to the environment cannot be ignored.
The grandfathers and grandmothers of Iwaishima are not interested in the company’s promises of safety and financial prosperity. They understand real wealth. All that they want is to pass on to their successors the traditional cultural heritage and unspoilt natural environment that they have known all their lives. They want the Kaminoseki Nuclear Plant project terminated, permanently.
■Information available in English
●Chugoku Electric Power
http://www.energia.co.jp/e/energia/profile/profile.html
(Head Office)
4-33 Komachi,Naka-ku,Hiroshima-shi,Hiroshima
730-8701,Japan
Tel: +81-82-241-0211 Fax: +81-82-523-6185
★General meeting of stockholders is scheduled for June 29, 2011. Local citizen’s organizations (“Iwaijima-citizens against building the Kaminoseki Nuclear Power Plant
●English leaflet from Iwaishima islanders
“No Nuclear Power Plant in Our Community! Iwaishima says no to nuclear power”
http://shimabito.net/200907english.pdf
●Kaminoseki: Nuclear Power Plant, Human Rights and Biodiversity
http://hotspotkaminoseki.soreccha.jp/
English Blog by ANKEI Yuji, Professor of area studies in Yamaguchi Prefectural University. Head of the Comittee for Conservation of Kaminoseki Biodiversity, Ecological Society of Japan. A member of the Amnesty International. Sc. D., Ecological Anthropologist.
●Recent blog post at Ten Thousand Things
“Amidst hopeful signs, activists continue impassioned efforts to stop nuclear power plant in gorgeous Seto Inland Sea”
http://tenthousandthingsfromkyoto.blogspot.com/2011/05/amidst-hopeful-signs-activists-continue.html
●Recent news article in Japan Times
May 15, 2011 “Utility and opponents lock horns over planned N-plant”
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20110515x3.html
●Recent news article in LA Times
May 5, 2011 “Japan islanders oppose proposed nuclear plant, year after year“
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/may/05/world/la-fg-japan-nuclear-protest-20110504
●Recent article in Yale Environment 360
17 Mar, 2011 “Japan’s Once-Powerful Nuclear Industry is Under Siege”
http://e360.yale.edu/mobile/feature.msp?id=2383
●CNIC Newsletter
http://cnic.jp/english/newsletter/nit133/nit133articles/kaminoseki.html
■Recent Movies on Iwaishima
●”Houri no Shima (HOLY ISLAND)”
Director: HANABUSA Aya
2010/JAPAN/105 minutes
English page: http://www.hourinoshima.com/english/
Trailer: http://www.hourinoshima.com/予告編/
★HANABUSA Aya and KOIDE Hiroaki, Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute, will hold a seminar on June 11 in Kobe.
http://civil-society-forum.com/?p=546
●”Ashes to Honey: Toward a Sustainable Future” (2010)
Director KAMANAKA Hitomi
Trailer: http://888earth.net/888tv.html
from same director
“Rokkasho Rhapsody” (2006)
Trailer: http://www.rokkasho-rhapsody.com/en/_preview/trailers
■Main Information in Japanese
●祝島島民の会blog (Blog of Iwaishima Islanders)
http://blog.shimabito.net/
★The list of movie clips of protest movements
http://shimabito.net/siryou%20200909100922.htm
●Nuclear reactors under construction / plan on Chugoku Electric Power website (Japanese only)
島根原子力発電所3号機（建設中 営業運転開始 平成24年3月予定）
http://www.energia.co.jp/atom/atom13-1.html
上関原子力発電所（準備工事中）
http://www.energia.co.jp/atom/kami_menu.html
●長島の自然を守る会 (Association to Protect the Nature of Nagashima)
http://www2.ocn.ne.jp/~haguman/nagasima.htm
●カンムリウミスズメ国際シンポジウム (International Conference on Japanese Murrelets, April 10, 2011 at Hiroshima)
https://sites.google.com/site/nagashimanoshizen/
Japanese Utility Still Committed to New Nuclear Reactors