FUKUI - A survey of over 1,800 high school students carried out by their peers in this central Japan city brought to the surface mixed feelings that young people have about the high number of nuclear power facilities that occupy the prefecture, including the Tsuruga, Mihama, Oi and Takahama plants.
Fukuiminami High School students Yume Amemiya, 18, Yuri Imaizumi, 17, and Yuno Mori, 15, who conducted the survey in October 2021, are all members of the Genshiryoku Tankyu nuclear power investigation group at their school. They collected responses from 1,807 students from various schools, including 34 prefectural, public and private schools, schools for the hearing impaired, and free schools. Of the respondents, 79.9% lived in the prefecture's northern region, while 17.4% lived in the southern region, where most of the nuclear power plants are concentrated, and 2.7% were from outside the prefecture.
The results showed that 60.6% of respondents were aware of the problems surrounding nuclear power plants on a regular basis. Asked what prompted them to become aware of the related issues, 28.3% said school classes, while 25.4% said the Great East Japan Earthquake, which was followed by the tsunami and nuclear disaster, and 16% said the news. According to a question asking how much they knew about nuclear power plants, 5.1% or 22.3% if limited to southern Fukui Prefecture said someone close to them worked at a job related to nuclear power, 4.7% or 16.2% in southern Fukui Prefecture said there was a nuclear power plant in their everyday living zone. This comes out to about 10% of all respondents. The three students who conducted the survey concluded that this was a very unique feature of Fukui Prefecture.
Asked what kind of image or impression they have of nuclear power with multiple answers permitted, 80.2% of respondents said dangerous northern Fukui 82.3%, southern Fukui 38.5%, and outside Fukui 22.4% were not necessary, exceeding the 8.3% northern Fukui 9.1%, southern Fukui 3.5%, outside Fukui 14.3%. In response to the survey results, Mori said, I was surprised that a majority of people said they had an image of nuclear power as dangerous and yet many still answered that it was 'necessary'. Even among high school students, there are some who feel that '' It's dangerous, but it's something that can't be cut out of our lives right away. The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station accident was a question on what nuclear related topics the respondents had learned about in school with multiple answers permitted by 64.9%. A total of 61.4% said they learned about the mechanism of nuclear reactors, 58% said they learned about the merits of nuclear power, and 54.1% said they learned about the merits of nuclear power. There were few people who said they had learned about high-level radioactive waste, which is produced in the process of generating electricity and reprocessing.
The survey made room for respondents to give comments freely. I think nuclear power plants are scary but I am also scared that there are comments that are unique to a prefecture hosting nuclear power plants, such as, There is a tendency for people to avoid debate on it even though it is so close to home. Amemiya said, I do wish that we were taught more about radioactive waste in schools, but maybe it's a subject that is hard to handle from a neutral position, and that's probably the reason why it's not taught in schools. The results were printed into a booklet, of which 100 copies were printed. They will be distributed as resources to high schools that cooperated with the survey. The results of the survey were released on the Fukuiminami High School website.
Imaizumi, who was responsible for getting the booklets printed, said: We may all be high school students, but we have different views and sensibilities.