Nuclear energy: a shift in Japan's balance of power

The country's agreement to scrap atomic energy, made under popular pressure after last year's Fukushima disaster, will lead to some interesting shifts within the global energy sector … if the government sticks to it, of course.

Protesters rally against nuclear power outside Japan's parliament in Tokyo in July this year. Thousands gathered to object to atomic energy after the Fukushima crisis. Kazuhiro Nogi / AF

News that the Japanese government has finally bowed to public pressure after last year's Fukushima nuclear disaster and agreed in principle to scrap all atomic power could hardly have been delivered with more historically interesting timing.

Work began on Japan's first nuclear reactor, at Tokai, in the early 1960s, but the country's decision to go nuclear in a big way was accelerated by the Middle East oil shocks of the 1970s.

In 1973, Japan found itself caught up in the Opec price rises and embargoes imposed by the Arab world in response to the US support of Israel in the October War, also known as the Yom Kippur War.

Six years later, the volatility of the region was emphasised when oil supplies were again hit, this time as a result of the Iranian revolution and the subsequent Iraq-Iran war.

Japan, still rebuilding an economy shattered by the Second World War, was determined it would not be held hostage to fortune again and redoubled its efforts to become more self-sufficient.

Now, in the same week Japan has, essentially, thrown itself and its entire economic future back on to the mercy of fossil fuels, the geopolitical heat is rising again in the region from which Japan - already the world's third-largest consumer of crude - obtains the vast majority of its oil.

Warships from 25 nations, including the US and the UAE, are gathering in the Arabian Gulf as Israel appears to be edging closer to a unilateral attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.

Although this is an annual exercise, military experts say this unprecedented gathering of naval firepower is aimed at reminding Iran of the consequences of its frequent threats to close the Strait of Hormuz, the bottleneck through which a third of the world's oil passes.

That firepower includes three US Nimitz-class carrier groups that combined have more aircraft than Iran's entire air force.

It is, says David Rea, a Japan economist with Capital Economics, "not the most opportune time" for Japan's nuclear volte-face.

Full details of Japan's new energy plan were released yesterday, with the cabinet agreeing to end nuclear power in principle but backing away, under intense pressure from the pro-nuclear lobby, on an earlier promise to close the final power stations by the 2030s.

Even with nuclear energy, Japan was already the world's largest net importer of coal and natural gas, and second only to the US in the market for crude oil.

Despite its network of 54 nuclear power stations, Japan was still dependent on imports for 82 per cent of its primary-energy needs, with oil accounting for half those needs - and with 90 per cent of that oil sourced from the Middle East, according to an intelligence briefing issued by Capital Economics on Monday.

Japan had "turned to nuclear to diversify its energy sources and increase both energy security and energy conservation", noted the briefing, with nuclear power "intended to take a growing role over the coming decades".

When it came to electricity, until last year's near-disaster nuclear was responsible for about a quarter of production, with fossil fuels accounting for 60 per cent and hydroelectric and other renewables making up the 15 per cent shortfall.

And by the government's own estimate, Japan will have to spend more than US$40 billion (Dh146.92bn) on fuel imports a year to compensate for the loss of nuclear power.

For many commentators, that is an extraordinarily high price for prime minister Yoshihiko Noda's government to pay for assuaging emotive public opinion, even with elections looming next year.

After all, even though the earthquake and tsunami on March 11 last year claimed the lives of more than 15,000 people, while tens of thousands had to be evacuated for fear of radiation contamination, no lives were lost as a result of the flooding of the nuclear facility at Fukushima.

So is the nuclear shutdown an overreaction? "From a completely external perspective it does seem a bit like that," says Mr Rea. "But for people on the ground in Japan it has been a very big deal."

The tsunami and the nuclear near-disaster "marked a big schism in the national consciousness … they have probably found it hard to separate the two issues".

Greens and other opponents of nuclear power took heart this summer from the fact that Japan's power supplies seemed to cope well through the peak air-conditioning months.

But, says Mr Rea, "to extrapolate … to say the country is ready to go nuclear-free is wrong".

The reality is that demand for electricity was down this summer due to economic weakness, and a determined and successful voluntary drive by Japanese citizens to minimise electricity use - down 15 per cent for households this year.

There will, of course, be winners and losers around the world if Japan's plan comes to fruition.

Its climate-change targets are almost certain to go out the window. With its nuclear power plants up and running, the country would have been on course to reduce carbon emissions by 39 per cent by 2020.

But without them, as a government report this year made clear, it would be lucky to hit 25 per cent - and the government is committing itself only to 20.

Forbes says the Japanese decision will also have "severe repercussions" for India, which is heavily reliant on liquefied natural gas for electricity.

Japan, with scant natural resources of its own, has been making up the shortfall caused by the closure of the Fukushima plant by "soaking up liquefied natural gas from the global markets, driving up prices in Asia".

And there is a second problem for India, where Japan's decision may have ramifications for its neighbour's own, badly needed nuclear plans: the Japanese phase-out "strengthens the anti-nuclear lobby within India, and is bound to slow down new capacity addition".

Mr Rea says there could be challenges down the road for other countries developing nuclear power - an initiative being led in the Arab world by Abu Dhabi, which plans to supply a quarter of the UAE's electricity needs with nuclear power by 2020.

"The issue is whether [the decision] affects the industry as a whole," he says. If Japan sticks to its non-nuclear plan, "it is going to have a massively detrimental effect on its nuclear sector, which is a world leader, and that could have knock-on effects elsewhere.

"It could mean a lowering of standards unless the Japanese nuclear industry decides it is going to start producing elsewhere.

"But they won't have that home advantage of government support and funding and, if they can't do the research and development, it might have negative effect on the whole global nuclear industry."

All of which makes Abu Dhabi's decision to go with a South Korean consortium for the first four of its planned nuclear-power reactors, work on the first of which began in July, appear a wise choice.

Indeed, nothing is likely to stand in the way of Abu Dhabi's nuclear plans, which have the full support of the West. This month, the US Export-Import Bank authorised a $2bn loan to the state-owned nuclear company Barakah One, which aims to have four nuclear power stations online between 2017 and 2020.

America also has an interest in seeing Abu Dhabi's plans realised. Westinghouse Electric is among the suppliers, providing a range of parts and training for the project and creating jobs in US states including California, Pennsylvania and Texas.

At the same time, the Japanese decision could add momentum to the world's efforts to develop renewable sources of energy.

Those efforts are led by Abu Dhabi through many initiatives, including Masdar, its hosting of the annual World Future Energy Summit and the international investments made in solar and wind technology made by Mubadala, the government investment arm charged with diversifying the emirate's economy away from reliance on fossil fuels.

It is, says Mr Rea, hard to see how the Japanese government's fresh commitment to renewables, with favourable tariffs on offer to suppliers of solar power to the national grid, could not be good news for sector leaders such as Abu Dhabi. "It will be a massive growth area."

Before last March, nuclear supplied 26 per cent of Japan's power, and was expected to account for 53 per cent by 2030.

In 2010, government plans called for fewer than a million homes to be fitted with solar panels. Now, it says, the target needs to be 12 million, while the country must develop 610 wind farms, rather than the 30 envisaged in 2010.

But all of this is dependent on Japan sticking to its non-nuclear pledge, and there are those who doubt that, once the last echoes of the magnitude-nine earthquake have died away, the country will be quite so inclined to kick the nuclear habit.

"The business establishment will seize on worries about the economy," predicted the Financial Times this week.

"Japan's 'nuclear village' of pro-atomic energy utilities, contractors, politicians, bureaucrats and academics still has huge potential influence [and] … the vast sums that resource-poor Japan spends on imported fossil fuel is an argument on its own."

In short, "Mr Noda's government may have made its decision. But it will certainly not be the last word".