{"id":3679,"date":"2019-01-24T09:22:57","date_gmt":"2019-01-24T09:22:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en-renew\/?p=3679"},"modified":"2019-02-15T05:59:52","modified_gmt":"2019-02-15T05:59:52","slug":"hitachi-president-alarmed-about-future-human-resources-as-company-freezes-project-in-britain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/news\/3679","title":{"rendered":"Hitachi President Alarmed about Future Human Resources as Company Freezes Project in Britain"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In 2017, the British Nuclear Authority issued approval for the project after completing its generic design assessment (GDA). One year later, Hitachi began serious negotiations on a financing model with the British government. Ultimately, however, the company determined that the parties were unlikely to come to an agreement on various conditions, so decided to freeze the project.<\/p>\n<p>At a press conference held at Hitachi\u2019s headquarters on January 17, the company\u2019s president, Toshiaki Higashihara (photo), said that his firm had \u201cmade the utmost effort to provide clean energy without CO2 emissions.\u201d He added that the GDA approval meant that Hitachi\u2019s had been given high marks, so that the decision to freeze the project was solely based on economic logic.<\/p>\n<p>Asked whether the project might be resumed, he said that one premise for its \u201cunfreezing\u201d would be the British government\u2019s demonstration of a new financing scheme, adding that a \u201czero-based review of processes and costs\u201d would be required for resumption, among other things.<\/p>\n<p>In light of the virtual cancellation of an overseas construction project, he then expressed concern for the maintenance of the company\u2019s technological capabilities in design and construction given the current domestic environment in Japan, where the focus is on restarting and decommissioning.<\/p>\n<p>He also revealed a sense of crisis, saying that Hitachi would address the issue of ensuring future nuclear human resources with other plant manufacturers, while indicating the need to reach a conclusion as soon as possible.<\/p>\n<p>On the future of Hitachi\u2019s nuclear business, Higashihara said that the company intended to continue negotiations with the British government on nuclear power systems, while it would continue to carry out its business in Japan \u201cbased on the strength of Hitachi\u2019s proven reliability and technology.\u201d He emphasized the need for broad engineering discussions on various issues, including the stable supply of electricity and environmental protection.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, at a press briefing after a cabinet meeting held on January 18, Hiroshige Seko, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, noted several issues pertaining to international nuclear development in response to a question about the freezing of the Wylfa Newydd project, as follows:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A decline in the number of experienced personnel to build nuclear reactors.<\/li>\n<li>Risks resulting from a delay in the schedule.<\/li>\n<li>Additional costs for obtaining licenses from regulatory authorities, preparing land, etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The minister then stressed, \u201cWhile nothing can be said generally, as the business environment of each country is different, Japan\u2014which experienced the [March 2011 nuclear] accident\u2014can still contribute to the world through its efforts to improve nuclear safety.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 2017, the British Nuclear Authority issued approval for the project after completing its generic design assessment (GDA). One year later, Hitachi began serious negotiations on a financing model with the British government. Ultimately, however, the company determined that the parties were unlikely to come to an agreement on various conditions, so decided to freeze [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":3685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry","category-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3679"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3679\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3686,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3679\/revisions\/3686"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}