Japan is reconsidering to restart Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant No. 2, just over two years after its reactor meltdown.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco)'s nuclear reactor, which got crippled after a tsunami hit, might get another chance by Japan to fulfill its atomic energy requirements.
The 2011 natural disaster rocked Japan's confidence in the safety of its nuclear facilities. It forced them to abandon plans to raise its dependence on nuclear energy needs to more than 50 percent by 2030.
The Christian Science Monitor reports that that besides two, all of the country's 50 working reactors are non-functional and none will be able to resume operations unless they meet strict safety standards introduced by the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA).
Paul J. Scalise, a research fellow at the University of Tokyo, said that Japan has little choice other than to consider restarting the reactors to fulfill the huge energy gap left by nuclear with more oil and gas imports.
Scalise further said that fuel costs for Japan's utilities rose 36 percent last year. At the end of fiscal year 2012, four of Japan's nine nuclear power operators posted their largest losses ever. Hence, restarting the nuclear plants is a financial and economic necessity.
