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Last summer was quite bad, with many nuclear power plants shut down, and the mothballed oil-fired and natural gas-fired plants not yet brought back online, and the constant damn quakes. The air conditioning and lighting were reduced in public places, but otherwise, you couldnt tell anything had happened in Tokyo.
This summer, almost all of the nuclear plants are still offline, but the mothballed generators have been brought back online, and even though it has been 35C (95F) on some days, Tokyo Electric Power Company has so far not had to deal with electricity use more than 90% of capacity. TEPCO usually liked to maintain 20% excess capacity, so 10% excess capacity under the circumstances is not bad. Nuclear used to provide 30% of generating capacity.
You can see daily the peak capacity and a graph of usage for TEPCO here
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/forecast/html/index-e.html
The real test will be around mid-August, which is usually the hottest time of year.
A lot of things have happened in the last year to help reduce energy consumption. LEDs have replaced incandescents in restaurants and may public places. There is finally an LED mania going on, with hundreds of types to chose from and the prices have dropped to $10 for basic types.
Convenience stores like Lawson's
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawson_(store)
with about 10,000 stores, have nearly completed conversion to LED lighting in ceilings and display cases, cutting lighting electricity use by half. Many stores, having reached the end of their 30 year service life, have been completely rebuilt with energy use being cut by 25%.
Offices I know of have replaced all their old computers with ones that use 70% less electricity. Windows 8 is coming out in October, and no one here wants a repeat of what happened before, so offices are replacing their computers with energy efficient ones with Windows 7, which by now, since it is going to be discontinued, is as debugged as it is ever going to get. Typically, a desktop and display that was using 150 watts is now using 40 or 50 watts. Laptops are using 20 watts. An office with 100 workers has cut its direct electricity use by 100 kwh per day. Even more savings come from the air conditioning not having to remove that heat. Offices are getting ready to convert to LEDs or task lighting, which will trim another 100 kwh per day in direct electricity. So, at a cost of essentially nothing since the computers needed to be replaced anyway, and at a cost of nothing for the LEDs since they last 5 times longer but cost 5 times as much as a fluorescent, but use half the energy, an office with 100 people can cut its electricity use by more than half, by more than 200 kwh per day. That's enough to run a household for a month. Every day.
New refrigerators are so energy efficient that they run at 30 cents per day at our horrendous electric rate of 30 cents per kwh, and would run at 10 cents per day at the US average rate of 10 cents a kwh. New air conditioners can air condition 600 square feet for $1 a day here, 35 cents a day in the US, when its 90F plus outside but 72 degrees inside.
So, there has been a lot of replacement of old energy-inefficient stuff, and it was easy and cheap.
There have been huge protests against nuclear energy, and they have been saying to TEPCO and the other electric companies: You said we would not have enough electricity without nuclear, but there hasnt been a problem, so were you just saying that because nuclear is cheaper?
Personally, I think nuclear is just too much trouble. It causes too much stress and too much fear.
We are expecting a huge quake along the south side of Honshu, which would do huge damage to Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, depending on which part slips.
It would be better to just plow money into replacing all the old inefficient things, which I think would cut electricity use by about 30%, which would offset the lost 30% electricity from nuclear.
This summer, almost all of the nuclear plants are still offline, but the mothballed generators have been brought back online, and even though it has been 35C (95F) on some days, Tokyo Electric Power Company has so far not had to deal with electricity use more than 90% of capacity. TEPCO usually liked to maintain 20% excess capacity, so 10% excess capacity under the circumstances is not bad. Nuclear used to provide 30% of generating capacity.
You can see daily the peak capacity and a graph of usage for TEPCO here
http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/forecast/html/index-e.html
The real test will be around mid-August, which is usually the hottest time of year.
A lot of things have happened in the last year to help reduce energy consumption. LEDs have replaced incandescents in restaurants and may public places. There is finally an LED mania going on, with hundreds of types to chose from and the prices have dropped to $10 for basic types.
Convenience stores like Lawson's
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawson_(store)
with about 10,000 stores, have nearly completed conversion to LED lighting in ceilings and display cases, cutting lighting electricity use by half. Many stores, having reached the end of their 30 year service life, have been completely rebuilt with energy use being cut by 25%.
Offices I know of have replaced all their old computers with ones that use 70% less electricity. Windows 8 is coming out in October, and no one here wants a repeat of what happened before, so offices are replacing their computers with energy efficient ones with Windows 7, which by now, since it is going to be discontinued, is as debugged as it is ever going to get. Typically, a desktop and display that was using 150 watts is now using 40 or 50 watts. Laptops are using 20 watts. An office with 100 workers has cut its direct electricity use by 100 kwh per day. Even more savings come from the air conditioning not having to remove that heat. Offices are getting ready to convert to LEDs or task lighting, which will trim another 100 kwh per day in direct electricity. So, at a cost of essentially nothing since the computers needed to be replaced anyway, and at a cost of nothing for the LEDs since they last 5 times longer but cost 5 times as much as a fluorescent, but use half the energy, an office with 100 people can cut its electricity use by more than half, by more than 200 kwh per day. That's enough to run a household for a month. Every day.
New refrigerators are so energy efficient that they run at 30 cents per day at our horrendous electric rate of 30 cents per kwh, and would run at 10 cents per day at the US average rate of 10 cents a kwh. New air conditioners can air condition 600 square feet for $1 a day here, 35 cents a day in the US, when its 90F plus outside but 72 degrees inside.
So, there has been a lot of replacement of old energy-inefficient stuff, and it was easy and cheap.
There have been huge protests against nuclear energy, and they have been saying to TEPCO and the other electric companies: You said we would not have enough electricity without nuclear, but there hasnt been a problem, so were you just saying that because nuclear is cheaper?
Personally, I think nuclear is just too much trouble. It causes too much stress and too much fear.
We are expecting a huge quake along the south side of Honshu, which would do huge damage to Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, depending on which part slips.
It would be better to just plow money into replacing all the old inefficient things, which I think would cut electricity use by about 30%, which would offset the lost 30% electricity from nuclear.
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