TEPCO Must Restore Nuclear Power to the State (Taisei Hokan,) and the Government Must Have Courage in Presenting Its Vision of Nuclear Power

To that end, in the short-term, there is a need to substitute oil and coal for natural gas, which is relatively cleaner and is supplied by various countries; in the medium- to long-term, it is necessary to carry out major reforms on the energy supply structure by reducing the supply of import-dependent fossil fuels and increasing the supply of nuclear power and renewable energy, which are produced. [...] In view of this, how about stripping TEPCO of its qualifications as a nuclear power operator and returning the operation of nuclear power facilities to the state? The government can establish a nuclear power company that consolidates all nuclear power operations based on Kansai Electric Power Company and Japan Atomic Power Company, while TEPCO can take over the power grid of Kansai Electric Power. [...] The President of TEPCO, like Tokugawa Yoshinobu who attempted to reform the shogunate, will take the lead in this “restoration of nuclear power to the state (Taisei Hokan,)” and hopefully take the 3 IEEJ：November 2019© IEEJ2019 IEEJ Energy Journal Special Issue November 2019 first step forward in the energy renaissance of Japan in the Reiwa era. [...] On the other hand, the Republic of Korea (ROK) can take over the highly enriched uranium held by the North and incinerate it in a light water reactor, thereby participating in the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. [...] The system will be able to reduce the transuranic element in the debris by a third over 25 years, and the cost of constructing the facility ranges from 200 to 300 billion yen (US$2 to 3 billion.) If we were to consider the fact that close to 1 trillion yen is being spent on decontamination every year, it cannot be difficult to cover this construction costs.