The district court of the Japanese city of Sapporo has ordered the Tomari nuclear power plant in Hokkaido to remain offline, in response to a request of over 1,200 plaintiffs. The operator, Hokkaido Electric Power Company, was seeking permission by the authorities to restart the plant’s three reactors. With an overall capacity of 2 GW, the Tomari power plant accounted for about 40% of the power needs in the Hokkaido region prior to the 2011 crisis.
The reactors had been taken offline between April 2011 and May 2012 for inspection and were supposed to restart in 2013, but they remained halted following the Nuclear Regulation Authority’s tighter rules, introduced after the Fukushima disaster in 2011.
Japan’s reliance on nuclear power collapsed since 2011, dropping from 25% of the power mix in 2010 to 1% in 2015, and back to 4% in 2020 (estimated share of 10% in 2021). Before the accident, there were 54 reactors spread over 17 power plants; since then, only 12 reactors have been restarted.
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