Osaka to create panel for nuclear safety

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto will consider setting up a panel of nuclear experts to verify the safety of nuclear power plants.

This is a very rare move by a local government that does not host nuclear power facilities, reports Mainichi.

Similar expert committees have been set up at such local bodies as the Fukui and Niigata prefectural governments that host nuclear power plants.

The Osaka Municipal Government is the biggest shareholder of Kansai Electric Power Co., as it holds about 9 percent of outstanding KEPCO shares. As a precondition for the reactivation of the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at the Oi Nuclear Power Plant run by KEPCO, the "energy strategy council," formed under the Osaka municipal and prefectural governments, has decided to urge the central government and KEPCO to secure the consent of local people and governments within a radius of 100 kilometers from the atomic power station.

Mayor Hashimoto said, that a nuclear safety commission should consist of people who do not receive money from government and private industry officials who have interests in the nuclear sector.

In Fukui Prefecture, the prefectural nuclear safety commission, made up of 10 nuclear engineers, assesses the operations and management of nuclear power plants. "I have never heard of a local government that does not host a nuclear power plant setting up such a committee," said a Fukui Prefectural Government official in charge of nuclear policy.