Photo/Illutration Lawyers and plaintiffs hold up papers with words such as “unjust ruling” in front of Oita District Court on March 7. (Minako Yoshimoto)

The Oita District Court on March 7 rejected residents’ plea seeking to halt the No. 3 reactor at Ikata nuclear power plant in Ehime Prefecture over the threat of natural disasters to the plant. 

Presiding Judge Maiko Takechi almost fully accepted the plant operator Shikoku Electric Power Co.’s argument that its safeguards against earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, the main points of contention, are sufficient.

She determined that underground surveys and volcanic eruption assumptions conducted by the utility are “not unreasonable.”

The lawsuit was filed by 569 residents in Oita Prefecture.

The No. 3 reactor is located in Ehime Prefecture on the opposite shore of Oita Prefecture across the Bungo Channel.

The plaintiffs argued that an active fault may lie closer to the plant than the fault zone the utility has anticipated for earthquakes.

They maintain that the utility should conduct a 3-D survey to thoroughly examine the underground structure.

The court ruled that the utility effectively combined surveys such as drilling and acoustic exploration to understand the underground structure, so it’s not considered unreasonable for it not to conduct a 3-D assessment.

It also acknowledged that the utility’s assumptions about the scale of eruptions and the amount of volcanic ash are reasonable.

The court concluded that the No. 3 reactor is not lacking in safety.

The defense team criticized the ruling, saying, “The court blindly accepted Shikoku Electric’s arguments.”

The utility said in a statement that it was a “reasonable ruling.”

After the trial was concluded in June last year, the Noto Peninsula earthquake occurred on Jan. 1.

Lawyer Yasuyuki Tokuda, who co-chairs the defense team, said at a news conference, “No one could have predicted that the earthquake would cause that kind of damage.”

“Thinking about if ground uplift happens at the location of a nuclear plant sends a shiver down my spine,” he said.

The plaintiffs plan to file an appeal.

Tokuda expressed an intention to strengthen arguments on the difficulty of earthquake prediction and to add how to evacuate as a point of contention in an appeal of the ruling.

(This article was written by Ryuta Kuratomi and Tomoki Yasuda.)

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