Japan's nuclear regulator announced Wednesday that it has lifted its safety ban on Tokyo Electric Power's (TEPCO) Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, the largest in the world in terms of capacity. 

TEPCO has been looking to restart the plant due to high operating costs. It must now seek permission from local bodies in the Niigata prefecture, Kashiwazaki city, and Kariwa village.

Why was the ban imposed?

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant has a capacity of 8,212 megawatts (MW) and was TEPCO's only operable atomic power station. It has been offline since 2012, after the Fukushima disaster in March 2011 led to the shutdown of all nuclear power plants in Japan.

The Japanese Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) said TEPCO's preparedness had improved and decided to lift the de facto ban. The body has carried out more than 4,000 hours of inspection of its facilities.

Previously in 2021, the NRA had barred the plant from operating due to safety breaches and insufficient antiterrorism measures. This included a failure to protect nuclear materials and an incident that involved an unauthorized staff member accessing sensitive areas of the plant.

It had then issued an order that prevented TEPCO from transporting new uranium fuel to the plant or loading fuel rods into its reactors.

"The government will seek the understanding and cooperation of Niigata prefecture and local communities, emphasizing 'safety-first'," Yoshimasa Hayashi, the government's top spokesperson, said.

After the decision, TEPCO said it would continue to work towards gaining the trust of the local community and society at large. On Tuesday,  a Tokyo court ruled that TEPCO, the only operator of the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant, had to pay damages to dozens of evacuees. 

Japan has been trying to reactivate all domestic nuclear power plants that comply with the safety network, to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels which need to be imported. But in some cases, there is opposition from locals or other regulatory bodies.

tg/rc (EFE, Reuters)