Fukui governor agrees to Oi n-reactor restarts

November 27, 2017

Fukui- Fukui Governor Issei Nishikawa agreed Monday to allow Kansai Electric Power Co. to restart the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at its Oi nuclear plant in his central Japan prefecture.

The consent of the governor means that all the local procedures needed for bringing the reactors back online are complete, as the Oi town government and the Fukui prefectural assembly have already agreed to the restarts.

"I decided to agree to the restarts after comprehensively examining the plan," Nishikawa told a press conference at the prefectural government office in the city of Fukui, the capital of the prefecture.

After the news conference, Nishikawa phoned industry minister Hiroshige Seko to inform him of the decision.

"It's extremely significant that the restart plan has gained the governor's understanding," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a press conference in Tokyo. "We hope Kansai Electric will continue to work on ensuring safety above anything else."

This is the second time for Nishikawa to agree to restarts of nuclear reactors in his prefecture that passed screenings based on the country's new nuclear safety standards introduced in July 2013 after the 2011 triple meltdown at Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc.'s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.

In December 2015, he agreed to operations resuming at the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at Kansai Electric's Takahama nuclear power plant.

After Kansai Electric completed safety measures at the Oi reactors to meet the standards, the Nuclear Regulation Authority finished the screening of the reactors in September this year.

The reactors are currently undergoing the NRA pre-use inspections, the final procedure required before their restarts. If the NRA finds no problems, the No. 3 reactor is expected to resume its operations in mid-January and the No. 4 reactor in mid-March. The two reactors have an output capacity of 1.18 million kilowatts each.

Announcing his consent to the restart plan, Nishikawa said his decision was based on the views of the town of Oi, the prefectural assembly and a panel of experts set up by the prefecture to assess nuclear safety.

The governor welcomed a pledge by Kansai Electric President Shigeki Iwane to come up with candidate sites outside the prefecture next year to build a facility for the interim storage of spent nuclear fuel generated in the prefecture.

The Kansai Electric chief "showed his strong determination by presenting a specific plan," Nishikawa said. The company should implement the plan responsibly, he said.

In July 2013, Kansai Electric applied for NRA screenings of the two Oi reactors to bring them back online. They passed the screenings in May this year.

In July 2012, before the new nuclear safety standards went into force, the Japanese government allowed Kansai Electric to resume operations at the two reactors temporarily, a discretionary decision made due to concerns over possible summertime electricity shortages. Jiji Press