Japan's recent earthquake casts doubt over restarting its nuclear plants

Japan was on the first day of 2024, claiming the lives of more than 80 people and leaving thousands without electricity in the western Hokuriku region. The magnitude 7.6 quake also triggered a tsunami warning, reminding many of the devastating disaster that struck the country in 2011 and caused a nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima plant.

The earthquake has reignited the debate over Japan’s reliance on nuclear power, which accounts for about 30% of its energy supply. Japan is located on the “Ring of Fire,” a zone of intense seismic activity around the Pacific Ocean, making it vulnerable to earthquakes and tsunamis. The recent earthquake caused the land to shift , as per satellite images captured by the ALOS 2 spacecraft.

The uplift was particularly noticeable on the western side of the Noto peninsula, and it may have lessened the impact of the resulting tsunami waves, which were around 80cm high when they hit the shoreline, according to a report by BBC. Unfortunately, some areas still lacked basic amenities such as water, electricity, and mobile connectivity, which has left residents uncertain about their future.

The quick dissemination of public warnings through broadcasts and phones, combined with a prompt collective response from the public and officials, appeared to have mitigated some of the destruction. The quake struck just days after regulators lifted a ban on the operation of the nuclear power plant, the world’s largest, owned by Tokyo Electric (Tepco).

The plant, about 120 kilometers from the quake’s epicenter, has been offline since 2012 due to safety violations, including a failure to protect nuclear materials. Tepco hopes to restart the plant by the end of 2024 but faces strong opposition from residents and activists, who fear another Fukushima like catastrophe.

The quake caused water to spill from the nuclear fuel pools at the plant, but Tepco said the radiation levels were normal. “The Japanese public is still generally less positive toward now than they were before the Fukushima disaster,” analysts at Rystad Energy wrote in a client note. “As a result, public sentiment – and potentially government policy – is likely to be sensitive to any new power plant disruptions caused by the most recent quake or any future ones,” reports.

Japan had planned to phase out nuclear power after the 2011 disaster. Still, rising energy prices and repeated power shortages have prompted a shift towards restarting idled reactors and developing new ones. As per , the earthquake also rattled the stock market, as shares of Tepco and other utilities fell sharply on Thursday, the first trading day since the quake.

Tepco shares dropped as much as 8% before recovering to close up 2.2%. Hokuriku Electric, whose Shika plant is about 65 kilometers from the quake’s epicenter, slid as much as 8% before ending down 2.2%. The company, which reported water spill over from spent nuclear fuel pools and oil leaks at the plant after the quake, hopes to restart the No.2 reactor there sometime after April 2026, it said in October.

Rystad said it does not immediately see Japan, the world’s second largest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG), tapping spot markets as it did after an earthquake in March 2022. While prolonged power plant outages, like in 2022, could trigger purchases of the super chilled fuel, spot power prices indicated business as usual, Rystad said..