Public preferences for alternative electricity mixes in post-Fukushima Japan

Abstract

Using representative household survey data from Japan after the Fukushima accident, we estimate peoples' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for renewable, nuclear, and fossil fuels in electricity generation. We rely on random parameter econometric techniques to capture various degrees of heterogeneity between the respondents, and use detailed regional information to assess how WTP varies with the distance to both the nearest nuclear power plant and to Fukushima. Compared to fossil fuels, we find a positive WTP for renewable and a negative WTP for nuclear fuels. These effects, in absolute terms, increase with the proximity to Fukushima.

We choose what we like – Affect as a driver of electricity portfolio choice

“…Although the magnitude of this group remains somewhat unclear, we believe that the preference for new nuclear power plants will not be widespread. Furthermore, the acceptance levels for nuclear power were found to be either lower (Rehdanz et al, 2017;Woo et al, 2017) or relatively stable (Siegrist and Visschers, 2013) in the post-Fukushima area after 2011. Our findings show the majority of respondents to favour renewable energy sources in their portfolios, which is in in accordance with the acceptance levels associated with renewables (Bronfman et al, 2012;Ertör-Akyazı et al, 2012;Greenberg and Truelove, 2011;Tampakis et al, 2013).…”

Preferences for Nuclear Power in Post-Fukushima Japan: Evidence from a Large Nationwide Household Survey

“…In Japan, public support for and trust in nuclear power have visibly collapsed after the Fukushima accident [28,29]. Thus, renewable energy is considered the most favorable while nuclear energy is the least in Japan [30][31][32][33]. These previous studies mainly focus on the public's overall energy preferences, and some of them conducted cross-country comparisons.…”

“…Most importantly for our purposes, the KHPS 2014 encompasses a module of energy-related questions (see [33] for more details). In particular, this module posed the following question to each household in terms of methods of electricity generation:…”

Analyzing the condition of Japanese electricity cost linkages by fossil fuel sources after the Fukushima disaster

“…These changes in the energy mix for electricity generation after the Fukushima disaster likely have disturbed the linkages among the costs of electricity from various fuel sources. Many studies have investigated how the Japanese energy mix should change [4][5][6] or have analyzed Japanese people's preferences regarding energy mixes after the disaster [7,8]. However, until now, few studies have used quantitative methods to analyze how electricity prices or costs of electricity generation from various fuel sources have changed since the Fukushima disaster.…”