May is Nuclear Free Japan – Prophetic Month Names

i name my months.  i get that this is a bit odd.  And it gives me the chance to celebrate extraordinary events, like children of my friends being born or honor heroes passing (had he died earlier April might have been called “Bye Ernest” after recently passed Ernest Callenbach who wrote the visionary novel Ecotopia).

May 2012 will be “Nuclear Free Japan”.  This is a “slam dunk” as predictions go, since we have known for a while that 53 of the 54 reactors were closed down and the last would close on May 6th.  It has become clear in the last few weeks that the efforts of the central government to rush the restart the Ohi reactors (the only ones to make it thru the new Stress Tests) were meeting to significant resistance to make the May 6th deadline.

There are a myriad of questions surrounding this situation.  Will there be black outs in a Japan short 30% of its generating capacity (that is what the 54 operating reactors produced on average before Fukushima)?  Will the government break with the long standing “consensus” decision making process where local communities can block restarts over the will of the utility or the central government?  Will Japan institute mandatory conservation measures like the did last year? [This seems likely] Will Japan use mostly fossil fuels to meet the demand left by the shuttered reactors

Let’s work together to make more countries nuclear free.  And i am happy to be working in the US first.