Japan Press Weekly

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2011 June 29 - July 5 [NUCLEAR CRISIS]

Tax used to buy public approval for nuclear power generation

The Japan Atomic Energy Relations Organization (JAERO), a nonprofit corporation which promotes nuclear power generation, in 1991 proposed to electric power companies and the government the use of measures to get the general public to accept nuclear power generation.

All the proposed measures were intended to divide public opinion and to manipulate the mass media to support a pro-atomic energy policy.

In the 1991 report entitled “How to get public acceptance (PA) of atomic energy,” JAERO called for “the need for repetitive public relations (PR) efforts” It states, “Readers will forget newspaper articles after three days. Imprinting effects can be realized through repetition.” The report is an insult to the intelligence of the general public, stating, “The masses are selfish, they say they don’t want blackouts but they say they hate atomic energy.”

The report proposes that power companies should recommend to the media the use of pro-atomic energy commentators, and contact TV directors and popular news anchors to use such advocates on their programs.

The report even encourages the utilities to use nuclear power plant accidents as a “chance for promoting atomic energy,” stressing the need to contact anti-nuclear energy groups with a view to creating internal discord in the Japanese people’s opinion which is marked by antipathy toward atomic energy.

About 30-40% of JAERO activities are government-funded. In the FY 2009 financial statement, the organization received 322 million yen from the Education and Science Ministry and the Economic and Industry Ministry to carry out ten projects.

To facilitate the choice of sites for constructing nuclear power plants, JAERO sent 136 lecturers a year, paying them 6.06 million yen for traveling expenses and 5.91 million yen for giving talks.

JAERO has Tokyo Electric Power Co. President and representatives of major corporations like Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, and Hitachi Ltd. on its board of directors.

As JAERO was established in 1969 with the purpose of “developing and disseminating knowledge about the peaceful use of atomic energy,” it carried out many tours to nuclear power plants for children in primary and junior high schools, as well as for high school students, and lectures and seminars for media representatives.

A high school student who took part in a JAERO seminar on radiation wrote afterwards that he was able to get rid of his idea that radioactivity is dangerous, and of course this was what JAERO had expected to accomplish.

Imprinting the nuclear safety myth using tax revenues began under the Liberal Democratic Party government and is maintained under the Democratic Party of Japan government.