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2011 October 5 - 11 TOP3 [NUCLEAR CRISIS]

Founders of Japan’s nuclear energy program educated in US

US strategy influence on Japan’s nuclear energy policy (Part 1)

“You represent a positive accomplishment in the Free World’s efforts to mobilize its atomic resources for peaceful uses and the benefit of mankind.” On March 10, 1955, President Dwight Eisenhower gave a short speech at the White House and shook hands with each of 31 young researchers and engineers from 19 countries.

Among them were 30-year-old Ihara Yoshinori (who later became vice-minister of Science and Technology) and 31-year-old Oyama Akira (who later became professor at the University of Tokyo and vice chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission).

At the U.N. General Assembly in December 1953, the United States announced the “Atoms for Peace” policy, which included a plan to offer 100kg of enriched uranium for experimental reactors as well as its nuclear energy technologies to its allies and friendly countries. At a concrete measure, the U.S. government in 1955 established the International School of Nuclear Science and Engineering at the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois, to which Ihara and Oyama were sent as students by the Japanese government.

At the school, they studied the design, construction, and operation of experimental reactors as well as the basic structure of nuclear power reactors.

At that time, the U.S. fell behind the U.K. and the Soviet Union in putting nuclear power reactors to practical use. Trying to highlight the U.S. superiority in nuclear power generation, the school taught the students the structure of prototype reactors and showed them boiling water reactors developed by General Electric.

The Argonne Laboratory invited international students to study there for nearly 10 years, including about 50 students from Japan. They ended up as staff of the Science and Technology Agency (now the Japan Atomic Energy Agency), professors at the University of Tokyo, and staff at Mitsubishi and other nuclear reactor manufacturers.

Ihara later promoted the construction of nuclear power plants at the Science and Technology Agency. Oyama became full professor at the age of 38 when the University of Tokyo established Japan’s first nuclear engineering department in 1961.

The nuclear power engineers educated in the U.S. created the framework for the world’s third-largest nuclear power generating nation.

(To be continued)