Japan Press Weekly

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2015 January 28 - February 3 [POLITICS]

Abe falsely claims 10 billion yen in national wealth lost every day due to nuclear reactors remaining offline

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo on January 27 at a Lower House plenary session said that 10 billion yen in national wealth is lost every day with all nuclear reactors in Japan remaining offline, trying to justify his move to restart nuclear power plants. His claim, however, is unfounded and deceptive.

In response to the interpellation by Japanese Communist Party parliamentarian Kokuta Keiji, Abe made this remark based on a government estimate. The estimate states that during the period between 2010 and 2013, the amount of electricity generated by thermal power plants substantially increased and the value of LNG (used at thermal power stations as fuel) imports also rose by 3.6 trillion yen a year or by 10 billion yen a day.

The estimate assumed that thermal power output would go up by the same amount of a decrease in the total electricity output due to unavailability of electricity from nuclear power plants. In reality, the growth in thermally generated electricity is lower than expected thanks to energy saving efforts. The estimate neglected to take into consideration this difference.

In addition, the estimate included the impacts from the higher LNG price and the depreciation of the yen, both of which are unrelated to the suspension of nuclear power plants.

Proclaiming a loss of national wealth by using questionable figures, the prime minister is trying to get the general public to approve the restart of nuclear power plants.