Ten years ago, three nuclear reactors melted down at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan, producing the worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.The disaster, caused by an earthquake-triggered tsunami, pushed Japan and a few other countries to rethink their use of nuclear energy. But elsewhere, it didn’t spur major changes. Instead, experts say, climate change could force a major reckoning with how the world uses nuclear power.
Ten years ago, three nuclear reactors melted down at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan, producing the worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. Hundreds of thousands of residents within eighteen miles of the power plant were forced to evacuate. Most haven’t returned, even though the government has said most areas are safe.
Before the Fukushima meltdown, officials saw nuclear energy as a way for Japan, a country with limited fossil fuels, to achieve some degree of energy independence. Thirty percent of Japan’s energy came from nuclear power plants, which were supposed to provide half of the country’s energy supply by 2030.
That changed after the March 2011 disaster. Public support for nuclear energy plummeted, and, a year later, all of Japan’s fifty-four reactors had been taken offline. The government also created a new regulatory agency to improve oversight of the nuclear industry.
Still, lawmakers see a scaled-back role for nuclear energy, which produces relatively few greenhouse gases, in meeting Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s October 2020 pledge to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. Japan’s most recent energy plan, adopted in 2018, calls for nuclear energy to make up 20–22 percent of the electricity supply by 2030, but officials still debate how much to rely on the power sourc