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Japan's government is considering whether or not new nuclear power plants will be built:
Japan's trade ministry will launch a panel to revise the government's basic energy plan and consider a need to build new nuclear plants or replace existing plants in the future, the Nikkei business daily reported on Friday.
[...] The government will keep its current plan to reduce its reliance on nuclear energy but it would propose to keep a minimal amount of nuclear power for long-term stable power supplies and maintain technology and personnel, according to the report.
A target by the industry ministry for nuclear to provide about a fifth of the country's electricity in 2030 provoked widespread criticism when it was finalised in 2015.
[In light of the fallout from the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, what would be a reasonable and prudent level of nuclear power for Japan? --martyb
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday June 09 2017, @06:53PM (1 child)
So what makes someone a child in this regard? It's the inability to plan and the inability to accept current pain for future gain. Japanese leadership has shown a lot of this behavior over the past two decades.
This doesn't sound any different from American leadership these days. In fact, it seems perfectly normal for human societies that are past their sell-by date. Basically, if you look at the history of human societies, they all have limited lifespans, where they start out, prove to be very successful for a while and rise in power, but then become complacent and corrupt and then the society declines. Japan and the US were both ascendant in the early 20th century; now they both seem to be in decline, while China and India are on the rise. It's too bad about Japan though; they were really kicking ass in the 70s and 80s, but then took a wrong turn and things have been downhill from there. Maybe they just over-extended themselves during that time, achieving a lot through a ton of hard work but sacrificing too much in the process, and it's now biting them in the ass.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @07:34PM
Sacrificing too much? Like what? My view is that the problem is rather that they kept the top-down systems that worked for them in the earlier decades, but not the people who made those systems work relatively well in the past. What helped them then is now hindering them due to the quality of the people running things.
I agree that sounds like American leadership today. But that's why I'm an advocate for government reduction. One doesn't have to hope for the very unlikely event that will somehow catalyze competent government leadership when you can create it instead on the private sector side.