Japan

Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s twin Sendai nuclear units in Japan’s Kagoshima Prefecture on Nov. 7 got the government’s green light to restart. Once back online, likely in 2015, the units will be the first to restart of Japan’s 48 reactors that were shuttered for safety checks following the March 2011 Fukushima accident. Kagoshima Prefecture Governor Yuichiro […]

Bad weather, unforeseen setbacks, and even natural disasters are far from unheard of during power plant construction. But there may be no plant that experienced the sort of construction hardships that Tokyo

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) in August revealed that it had developed a 2-MW 16-cylinder high-speed gas engine that potentially offers a power generation efficiency (lower heating value) of more than

Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) has approved Kyushu Electric Power’s application to make changes to its Sendai reactors, putting them a step closer to resuming operations.  The regulatory agency this July said in a 400-page draft report that Kyushu’s No. 1 and No. 2 reactors at its Sendai plant in southern Japan’s Kagoshima prefecture passed […]

Fourteen members of the World Trade Organization (WTO)—including the U.S., China, the European Union (EU), and Japan—on Tuesday launched negotiations to eliminate tariffs or custom duties on wind turbines, solar products, and other environmental goods.  The first phase of negotiations between the 14 WTO members, which make up 86% of the global environmental goods trade, […]

In a stark departure from the zero-nuclear future proposed by a previous administration, the cabinet of Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Friday endorsed restarting the country’s idled nuclear reactors as it develops more renewables.  The cabinet on Friday officially adopted the first Basic Energy Plan since the Fukushima disaster, a 78-page document (in Japanese) that […]

Japan and South Korea, countries that depended heavily on nuclear power before the Fukushima catastrophe in 2011 (Figure 3), separately released draft long-term energy plans in December, both placing renewed

In 2010, intent on continuing its commitment to energy efficiency and preventing climate change, Japan enacted its second Basic Energy Plan. The new policy document, revising the first, from 2003, called for

A prototype 100-kW floating wind turbine that has been tested off Nagasaki near Japan’s Kabashima Island since May 2012 is slated to be replaced by a full-scale, grid-connected 2-MW wind turbine this fall