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ABOLITION of NUCLEAR POWER an Appeal from the Catholic Church in Japan ABOLITION OF NUCLEAR POWER An Appeal from the Catholic Church in Japan Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan Compilation Committee for Abolition of Nuclear Power Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan Copyright © 2020 - Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan 2-10-10 Shiomi Koto-ku, Tokyo 135-8585 JAPAN Tel. +81-3-5632-4411 / Fax +81-3-5632-4453 Published and Printed in Japan, July 2020 3 Abolish Nuclear Plants Immediately ～Facing the Tragedy of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant Disaster～ To all living in Japan, The accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant triggered by the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake contaminated the ocean and land by radiation, and tragically disrupted the daily life of an enormous number of people. Even now, almost one hundred thousand people are evacuated from the neighboring area of the nuclear plant, and numerous people are forced to live in fear and anxiety. With regard to the pros and cons of nuclear plants, we, Japanese bishops, expressed in our message “Reverence for Life – A Message for the Twenty-First Century from the Catholic Bishops of Japan” as follows: It has provided a totally new source of energy for humanity, but as we can see in the destruction of human life in a moment in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the disaster at Chernobyl and the life-threatening criti- cality accident at Tokaimura, it also has the potential to pass huge problems on to future generations. To use it effectively, we need the wisdom to know our limits and exercise the greatest care. In order to avoid tragedy, we must develop safe alternative means of producing en- ergy.1 The “tragedy” in this message was brought about by nothing less than the accident in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant. This nuclear disaster wiped out 1 Reverence for Life –A Message for the Twenty-First Century from the Catholic Bishops of Japan (Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan, 2001, pp.104-105). Another message on nuclear plants announced by the Catholic Church in Japan is “Petition on the Criticality Accident at the Uranium Conversion Facility, JCO Co. Ltd” (1999). 4 the “safety myth”, which was created because people put too much trust in science and technology without having “the wisdom to know our limits”. In the message “Reverence for Life”, we, Japanese bishops could not go so far as to urge the immediate abolishment of nuclear plants. However, after facing the tragic nuclear disaster in Fukushima, we regretted and reconsidered such attitude. And now, we would like to call for the immediate abolishment of all the power plants in Japan. With regard to the immediate abolishment of nuclear plants, some people voice concerns about energy shortage. There are also various challenges such as the reduction of carbon dioxide. However, most important of all, we as members of the human race, have responsibilities to protect all life and nature as God’s cre- ation, and to pass on a safer and more secure environment to future generations. In order to protect life, which is so precious, and beautiful nature, we must not focus merely on economic growth by placing priority on profitability and efficien- cy, but decide at once to abolish nuclear plants. Because of the prediction that a new disaster will occur due to another earth- quake or tsunami, all the 54 nuclear plants in Japan are at risk of horrific accidents like the latest one. Therefore, in order to prevent human-generated calamities as- sociated with natural disasters as much as possible, it is essential to eliminate nu- clear plants. Although nuclear plants have been supplying energy in the context of “peace- ful use” to society until now, they have also released an enormous amount of radio- active waste such as plutonium. We are going to place the custodial responsibility of these dangerous wastes on future generations for centuries to come. We must consider this matter to be an ethical issue. Nuclear power has been encouraged by national policies up to now. As a re- sult, natural energy has fallen behind in development and popularity. We urge that the national policies be changed to place top priority on development and imple- mentation of natural energy, which will also contribute to reducing carbon diox- ide. On the other hand, it takes a long time and enormous labor to decommission 5 a nuclear plant. Therefore, the decommissioning of reactors and the disposal of radioactive waste must be conducted with extreme caution. Indeed, electricity is essential for our lives today. However, what is important is to amend our ways of general life by changing the lifestyles that excessively de- pend on electricity. Japan has its culture, wisdom and tradition that have long co-existed with nature. Religions such as Shinto and Buddhism are also based on the same spirit. Christianity has the spirit of poverty as well. Therefore, Christians have an obliga- tion to bear genuine witness to the Gospel especially through the ways of life ex- pected by God; “simplicity of life, the spirit of prayer, charity towards all, especial- ly towards the lowly and the poor, obedience and humility, detachment and self-sacrifice”.2 We should choose anew a simple and plain lifestyle based on the spirit of the Gospel,3 in cases like saving electricity. We live in the hope that sci- ence and technology will develop and advance based on the same spirit. These at- titudes will surely lead to a safer and more secure life without nuclear plants. From Sendai November 8, 2011 Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan 2 Pope Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Nuntiandi, 76(1975). 3 Cf. Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, 486 (2004). 7 Foreword When the Editorial Committee on Nuclear Power of the Catholic Bishops’ Confer- ence of Japan was established in September 2014, it intended to publish an English trans- lation of the Japanese text it would eventually produce. We wanted to inform the world of the situation, viewpoint and responsibility of Japan, the scope of the Fukushima nucle- ar power plant disaster, and the response of the Japanese Catholic Church. The actual preparation was expected to take one year from the start of the work in the fall of 2016. Since the project had a limited time frame and budget, it was decided that Chapter One of the second part, “Radiation, Nuclear Energy, and Nuclear Power,” which contained information readily available from other sources would be omitted from this translation. Even so, for various reasons the work took longer than the committee anticipated. I apologize for the delay to all those involved in the work and those who awaited its conclusion. Please note that the situation described in Chapter 1, Part 2 of damage caused by the nuclear power plant accident has changed somewhat between the time it was first written and this translated version in 2020. During his visit to Japan in November 2019, Pope Francis met with victims of the Fukushima nuclear accident, and later referred to the dangers of nuclear power genera- tion during an in-flight press conference on his way back to Rome. We are thrilled that the pope’s experience in Japan deepened his awareness of the dangers of nuclear power. I am pleased that today we are finally able to inform the rest of the Church and the world of the opposition by the Catholic Church of Japan to nuclear power generation. I want to express my deep gratitude to Rev. William Grimm MM and Rev. Patricia Ormsby who translated the text. Rev. Masayuki Semoto SJ and Prof. Mami Yoshikawa of Sophia University provided a detailed review of the translation. This book is dedicated to the late Rev. Michael Siegel SVD. Mick was the central figure in the preparation of this English text but succumbed to cancer in the early morn- ing of July 3, 2019. Editorial Committee on Nuclear Power, Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan Ichiro Mitsunobu SJ Tokyo, Easter 2020 9 Introduction At 2:46 on the afternoon of March 11, 2011, an earthquake of magnitude 9.0 oc- curred on the sea floor 130 kilometers off the Oshika peninsula in Miyagi prefecture. The quake registered seven on the Japanese scale and produced a tsunami that caused massive damage along the Pacific coast of the Tohoku and Kanto regions. About one hour after the quake, a tsunami 14 to 15 meters high slammed into the Tokyo Electric Power Company’s Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima, knocking out power to all but one unit. With the loss of power, it became impossible to cool the nuclear reactors. As a result, the cores of Units 1, 2 and 3 had meltdowns, a catastrophic accident that caused the leakage of large amounts of radioactive material. This disaster that contaminated both land and sea with radiation and destroyed the livelihood of many people has not yet been remedied. More than 90,000 people who had to be evacuated have still not been able to return to their homes. In November 2011, eight months after the accident, the Catholic Bishops Confer- ence of Japan issued Abolish Nuclear Plants Immediately: Facing the Tragedy of the Fukushi- ma Daiichi Nuclear Plant Disaster. The statement pointed out the dangers of nuclear power generation and called for the abolition of nuclear power. The attitude of Japan’s Catholic bishops toward nuclear power generation was ear- lier put forth in their 2001 message Reverence for Life: A Message for the 21st Century from The Catholic Bishops of Japan. In Section 75 of that message, the bishops said, [The development of nuclear energy] has provided a totally new source of energy for humanity, but as we can see in the destruction of human life in a mo- ment in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the disaster at Chernobyl and the life-threaten- ing criticality accident at Tokaimura, it also has the potential to pass huge problems on to future generations.
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